Page 61 of Cruel Prep (Princes of Ravenlake Academy 1)

Horrid. Vile. A demon sent straight from the pits of hell.

“Fine.”

Sharon’s mouth quirks to one side. That’s a dead giveaway that she has talked to my mom. Usually, my mom stays out of my therapy, except when there is a problem. And me getting three demerits in one day and detention could definitely be classified as a problem.

I sigh. “Okay, maybe not fine.”

“What happened?”

Dr. Sharon isn’t a school administrator. She isn’t my mom or someone who is going to punish me. Her only job is to talk to me and help me make sense of what’s going on inside my head and in the world around me, so I don’t need to defend myself.

At school, I tried to explain to everyone that I didn’t do anything I got in trouble for.

Fat lot of good that did. Now, I’m not even going to try.

My mom obviously told Sharon what happened, so she already knows, and whether she thinks I’m guilty or not doesn’t matter to me. I have bigger problems to deal with.

“Cora is a bully. She has been singling me out.”

“I thought you were friends?” she asks, writing something down in her notebook.

“I thought so, too, but that was part of the trick,” I explain. “She pretended to be my friend so she could betray me later.”

A wrinkle appears on Dr. Sharon’s forehead, concern etched into the lines of her face. “That seems especially mean.”

I almost want to laugh. If she thinks that’s bad, I can’t tell her a thing about Finn. She’d never believe me.

“Yeah, well, Cora is especially mean.”

She frowns and folds her hands on her knee. “How do you feel about her targeting you?”

Naming my emotions is something Sharon and I have been working on for years. After Dad died, I couldn’t discern anger from sadness. I’d see other kids with their dads at the mall or the park and get jealous, and then I’d lash out at Mom. It wasn’t fair, but I didn’t know any other way. But Dr. Sharon helped me name my emotions, which made them easier to control.

Still, it isn’t always so simple.

“Angry, sad, alone.” I shrug and shake my head. “It makes me feel out of control.”

“Okay. So, let’s focus on what you can control.”

I run my fingers over the seam of my jeans. “Which is?”

“Yourself.” Dr. Sharon leans forward, her eyes wide and filled with meaning. “You can’t control what someone else is going to do or say, but you can always control your own response. That is how you keep control.”

It sounds so rational when she says it. So possible.

Of course, I’ll just control myself. Why didn’t I think of that?

Maybe because, like everything else, it isn’t always that simple. Sometimes, as much as you want to, you can’t control yourself. Finn has shown me that.

I want to hate him. I want to ignore him and pretend he doesn’t exist.

But I can’t.

My body pulls me towards him again and again. He lashes out at me, cutting deep, and rather than learn from my mistakes and stay away, I seek him out.

I meet him at the football fields.

I reach for his hand and pull him up to his room.

---