Page 5 of Beneath the Surface

“Should we tell someone?” I whispered.

“Nothing happened tonight,” Grayson pointed a finger at Micah and me. “It’s late and we’re all tipsy. We open our mouths, and there goes our upcoming junior year. My career, and your skating.”

I looked at Micah because all Grayson cared about was himself.

“He’s right, Ava. It was probably nothing.”

“Right.”

Micah walked next to me as we rejoined the bonfire. Neither of us spoke. Everyone was still singing and dancing, but I couldn’t muster the energy to celebrate with them.

“I’m going home,” I said, since Micah had not left me alone.

He nodded and silently walked me to my car.

“Goodbye, Ava.”

That was the last time I had spoken to him. That summer had been one of the worst ones ever, and I had never felt more isolated. When we came back to school, Grayson seemed fine, Micah was still helping the hockey team, and as for me, I was telling myself that everything was okay and nothing had happened. I was on my way to believing it as well, but the message on my phone said otherwise.

I had been lying to myself so much I had almost believed what we had told ourselvesthatnight. Now, every time my cell phone pinged, I jumped up as if it were a bomb waiting to go off.

I was in my last class of the day, and I couldn’t wait to get home. I had convinced myself that if I was away from campus and I didn’t look at my phone that somehow the events that haunted me were not real.

In my delirium, I began to think that I felt eyes on me. My skin burned as if someone was watching me. I kept my eyes locked on my philosophy professor until the bell rang, and I was the first to jump up. Just as I was putting my stuff in my backpack, my phone pinged, and I felt my breath get caught in my throat.

My hand shook as I reached for it. The relief I felt once my hand touched the screen to read the message was palpable. It was just from my dad letting me know he wouldn’t be making it home for dinner. Not that it was all that surprising, but today it would have been nice to have him there.

Shaking my head, I put my phone away. When I looked up, I found myself locked in a dark gaze. Brown eyes so dark that they looked black belonged to Cruz Martinez. In the last year, I’d notseen much of him. Sure, I’d heard of him. Grayson was king of campus, but Cruz ruled the streets.

Thanks to his drag racing, his car always needed some type of work, and because of this, he saw my father probably more than I did at this point.

We weren’t friends, and after what happened the other summer, he continued to ignore me like he always had. But now he was looking at me differently. His eyes were on my face, and his brow was furrowed.

I could see he was debating whether or not to talk to me. Before he could make up his mind, I grabbed my stuff and all but ran back to my car. I ignored the way my heart was beating, or how shallow my breathing got. It wasn’t because I was out of shape—I was an athlete, damn it. I’d been denying it for months, but I knew I was having panic attacks. None of them had ever felt like this.

This was my junior year. There was just one year left after this one, and then I could leave all the bullshit behind.

I was passing the bushes by the athletic center where I had parked my car when a hand pulled me by the elbow. My first instinct was to scream. My mouth opened, but before a word could get out, someone was behind me, putting their hand over the lower part of my face.

My heartbeat stopped in that second. A thousand different thoughts ran rampant through my mind.

“Calm down, Ava.”

I heard the words, but my eyes were too blurry to make out the face in front of me. This was not the person holding on to me.

That’s when I realized there were two people who had me. My mind decided it had short-circuited for long enough, because something in me told me to run. I began to struggle, trying to get away from my assailant.

“Ava, calm down.”

The command was whispered in my ear. While one of their hands was covering my mouth, the other was rubbing my arm soothingly.

I blinked away the moisture from my eyes and that’s when I noticed that in front of me was Micah. Relief and confusion washed over me. I felt my body sag into the body behind me.

“I’ve got you,” the person behind me said.

I turned my head, only to come face to face with Grayson. We were so close that I could taste the mintiness of his breath.

My eyes widened, and he seemed to know that I wasn’t going to keep on screaming because he removed his hand from my mouth.

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