I opened my locker, tossed my backpack onto a lopsided stack of crumpled papers and textbooks perched precariously upon my gym shoes and slammed the door shut before the chaos came tumbling down. It shut, but not enough for me to thread my combination lock through the latch. Damn. I pressed my shoulder against the metal door, shoving all my weight against it to gain that fraction of an inch needed.
I dug my heels in, rubber soles squeaking on the tile floor.
I really had to clean this baby out sometime.
A snort of laughter had me flushing and I risked shifting against the door to see who dared to mock my girl-vs.-locker situation. But the laughter wasn’t meant for me.
Across the hall, Owen was also trapped against his locker. Ty and two of his goons had the kid cornered.
Perfect.
Any other poor schmuck and I had to admit, I’d probably leave them to their fate. But this was Roach’s little brother. I had no choice.
I stalked toward them, ignoring the clamor behind me as my locker vomited its guts out onto the floor. Goon One spotted my less than subtle approach and elbowed Ty in the ribs.
“Drop the kid, Ty,” I said. “Now.”
“Stay out of this.” Ty shot me a glare over his shoulder. Good, if I could keep his focus on me, then maybe...oh, shit. With Ty distracted, Owen saw his moment and began to smack Ty’s chest with a weak fist, not even using his knuckles, but making impact with the back of his hand. I choked back a hysterical and highly inappropriate giggle. Owen didn’t punch like a girl. He punched like an ape.
“Did you just hit me?” Ty’s head whipped back to the much smaller boy, who gulped and nodded.
“You leave Charlie alone,” Owen squeaked, sending frantic glances in my direction. “I mean it.” He wanted to impress me. How sweet – and so very stupid. Fortunately, classes had started and the school hallway remained empty of fringe spectators. Although from Owen’s perspective, a crowd of strangers might have been his preference.
Ty laughed and hauled Owen’s scrawny frame an inch off the ground, flinging him into the lockers. He slid down the metal surface to crouch on the floor. Ty slapped the glasses right off Owen’s nose.
“Get off him,” I hollered, leaping forward, pounding my fists on Ty’s muscular back.
Ty grabbed my arms, holding my wrists together. “I’d say this was foreplay if I didn’t know you better,” Ty said on a sneer. “Oh, you’re going to love what I have planned for you.”
“Let me go.” I tugged, but he held fast. “You are such an asshole. No, that’s insulting to the good sphincters out there. You’re the hemorrhoid on an asshole.” There were more than a few flaws in my logic, but Ty seemed to get where I was going.
He shrugged. “I can handle that.” He released me abruptly, sending me rocking on my heels. “Glad you held up your end of the bargain, loser,” Ty told Owen as the nerd staggered to his feet. “I just know it will come in handy.” Ty shot me a smirk, and then fired out one final shot at Owen. “Take some advice kid, get homeschooled.”
Owen held onto his dented locker door for life support. His knees buckled, sending his foot sliding into his fallen glasses. Drawing Ty’s attention to a missed opportunity.
The three of us stared at them. Time slowed. I met Ty’s glinting eyes and deliberately shook my head.
He wouldn’t.
Yeah, sure he would.
A sharp pop sounded as Ty crushed Owen’s glasses under his foot, shattering one lens and warping the hell out of the wire frame. He wore a feral, triumphant grin as he performed the desecration. Satisfied with the damage, he jerked his head and his goons fell in line behind him. They stalked down the hall.
It could have been much worse. Whatever Ty had wanted, he’d accomplished his goal of scaring Owen shitless way before I stepped in. I gave Owen a chance to pull himself together. His Star Wars t-shirt had ridden high on his chest, revealing an abnormal amount of underwear around his waist. Clearly, the kid had endured one hell of a wedgie.
I grimaced. “You okay?”
Owen nodded and tugged his shirt down over the waist of his brown chords. He kept his gaze on the floor, fixed on the remains of his glasses.
“Sorry about these.” I bent down and saved what I could. One lens had popped free of the mangled frame and the other had cracked into five jagged pieces.
“It’s okay,” Owen said. “I have other pairs strategically placed around my house, just in case. Sometimes I forget I’m wearing them.”
Of course he did. I handed him the bits of frame and glass I’d recovered. “Whatever Ty has on you, we can do something about it.” The irony that Adams had said almost the same thing, moments before, didn’t escape me. Still, I had to try.
My cell phone rang. I dug into my pocket, but Owen clutched my arm. It definitely wasn’t a strong grip, but I could see he was working a muscle. Like, one. “Charlie, I did something, something really bad, and I need to do penance.”
I answered the call.
“Whatever it is, Owen. We can fix it,” I said, distracted as I brought the phone to my ear, but admitting I’d grown fond of Roach’s little redemption philosophy.
Speak of the devil. “Where are you? I thought we were meeting in the cafeteria.” Her voice blasted through the phone. “Did you forget it’s perogie day?
“No, I didn’t. But Owen…”
“Owen hates perogies,” she said. “Let’s move beyond food. You’ve got to come with me. Divine Wrath has a huge show tomorrow night and Preston’s invited us backstage. Not only that, there’s going to be this massive after party at the band house.”
“I dunno...” I studied Owen’s face. Teary eyes. Deep frown. He continued to talk, while I wasn’t listening, looking like someone just shot his puppy, point blank, with a cannon.
Damn, Ty, for so many things.
“Don’t dither. I need you. The band needs you,” Roach was saying in my ear. “They need us to work the merchandise table.”
Oh, now that sounded like fun – Roach’s kind of fun, which, if you remember, includes alphabetizing her DVD collection.
And then I heard what Owen was going on about, “I gave him the list, Charlie,” Owen repeated. “He told me if I gave him some intel on you, just one thing, he’d leave me alone. And I did it, I gave it to him, and now you’re going to hate me forever.”
The list.
Owen, the little rotter, had given Ty the list. A red haze settled over my vision. Suddenly I wanted to direct a slasher film, with Owen as the one and only victim. Getting repeatedly sliced and diced, time and again, blood spatters on the camera lens, spurting from arteries like one of those jet propeller lawn sprinklers…
“Charlie, did you hear me?” Roach and Owen asked, almost in the same breath.
I ended the call, turned from Owen and walked away while I could.
But the hits kept coming.