Drop Dead Bitches

Chapter 4: The Reputation
“Go Sailors!” the Newport Harbor High School cheer team called with a big smile across each other their faces.
“Okay, that was good girls but this time lets try and get our moves to be a little more sharper,” Caitlyn said.
“Caitlyn, we did the same routine for about six times! Can we please take a break?” Theresa begged.
Caitlyn eyed Theresa, still pissed off that she won Homecoming Princess but not as heated but more because Theresa was gaining significant weight from her five to six meals a day.
“Okay, let’s take five,” Caitlyn said, giving in to all the other girls exhaustion.
Theresa sighed in relief, walking over to the snack table, opening a can of soda and gulping half the can.
Caitlyn stared at Theresa in disgust.
“Who bought all this? I specifically asked for water bottles and a vegetable platter!” Caitlyn yelled.
“Someone bought it for us,” Kristin said, taking a bite of a cookie.
“Someone bought it for Theresa,” Melanie corrected.
“What?” Theresa asked.
“Yeah, I think it was probably your boyfriend. He left a note,” Melanie said, handing it to Theresa.
Theresa read the note under her breath, “I know how much you’ve been craving food lately. This is for you. Love, me.”
“What’s all this about, Theresa?” Caitlyn asked, picking up a bag of Hershey’s kisses.
“Uhm… Colin was just trying to be funny,” Theresa said, putting down the bag of chips.

After cheer practice, Theresa met up with Derek at the back of the school like she asked him to.
“What’s up?” Derek asked as Theresa walked toward him. “Theresa, what’s wrong?”
Theresa looked up at Derek and there was tears streaming down her face.
“What happened?” Derek asked, frightened at the thought of why Theresa was crying. Did Colin find out and break up with her?
“Derek, I have something to tell you,” Theresa mumbled, pushing her hair behind her ears.
“What is it?”
Theresa opened her mouth but closed it again and began crying.
“Come here,” Derek said, stepping forward to hug Theresa.
“No,” she said, using her hand to keep him where he was. “Derek,” she took a deep breath, “I’m pregnant.”
Derek’s eyes widened and followed down to her stomach. There was absolutely no sign of any baby bump what so ever. In health class he remembered that it took around three months for the bump to actually become visible and he had no idea why he was thinking about this so he shook the thought out of his head. “How do you know?” he asked.
“I took the home pregnancy test five times the day after Homecoming and three more yesterday. They all came out as positive,” she whispered, the tears beginning to fall over again.
“Are you,” Derek’s voice cracked so he cleared his throat and started over. “Are you saying that I’m the father?”
“Who else can it be?” Theresa cried desperately.
“I don’t know… Colin?”
“I never did anything with Colin. Nothing at all. We kiss, we hold hands, he cuddle together but other than that, nothing! Derek it’s yours.”
Derek squeezed his eyes shut and ran his hands through his hair. “How could this happen?!” he hissed.
“The night of the bonfire,” Theresa said.
“I know that!” he yelled. “I know and you know why this happened?! Because I was stupid. Because I didn’t know any better.” Derek turned around and kicked a garbage can. “I made a promise that I would change my ways,” Derek said to himself. “I made a promise that I would leave the old Derek behind. What the hell was I thinking? This is me. This has always been me!”
“Derek, stop.”
“Stop what, Theresa? Stop being a screw up? Stop being a failure?”
“Derek, you aren’t a failure!”
“Yes I am, Theresa! I am and I always will be. My parents are embarrassed by me. They hate me for what I made them do!”
“Will you stop?! Just stop it, Derek! You didn’t do anything wrong. This was me. This is my fault not yours! I was stupid and immature!”
“And I have the will-power of a seven year old boy! I gave in even though I knew I shouldn’t have.” Derek swung his foot at the dumpster, creating a dent at the very bottom. Then he broke down. He began crying as he slid to the floor against the dumpster, pulling at his hair.
“Derek, I’m sorry,” Theresa whispered, sitting beside him. “I’m sorry about everything. But things doesn’t have to be this way. No one has to know!”
Derek looked up at her. “What do you mean ‘no one has to know’?”
“I can always get an abortion,” Theresa mumbled.
“Theresa, are you crazy?! How could you say that?”
“We both know we can’t carry on with this and even if we were to we can’t raise a child!”
Derek felt dizzy and put his head between his knees. It was impossible to wrap the thought around his head. He was only sixteen going on seventeen. He couldn’t be a father!
Theresa took Derek’s hand in hers and squeezed it for reassurance.
“I’m… I’m sorry I just can’t do this,” Derek said, standing up and backing away from her. “I’m sorry.” He turned around and walked away without a second glance back.

Caitlyn was always the last to leave for cheer practice. She walked toward her car, her cheer bag over her shoulder and a water bottle in her other hand. She got into her car, starting it. She began backing out of the parking lot when all of a sudden a car from behind her drives by, hitting the back left door. Caitlyn’s body was thrown to the side by the impact.
“Ugh,” Caitlyn moaned.
“Oh shit. Oh shit. Oh shit!” the other driver chanted as he jumped out of his car and ran toward the Aston Martin. But of course he didn’t know what kind of car it was. He drove a two-thousand and three Kia Spectra that had tape across the tail lights, dents on almost every door, and only three windows and a windshield. “Are you okay?” he asked, opening Caitlyn’s door.
“Does it look like I’m okay, jackass?!” Caitlyn grumbled, rubbing the side of her head that his the window.
The guy pulled out his cell phone, dialing for an ambulance.
When they got there, the paramedics got Caitlyn out of the car who was still a bit dazed by the accident. The other driver on the other hand had no injuries.
It wasn’t long until the rest of the DuPaul family came rushing to the scene.
“Caitlyn, are you okay?” Mrs. DuPaul asked. She turned to the paramedic. “Will she be okay?”
“It’s just a minor concussion. She’ll be just fine. She has a headache and feels a bit dizzy. She should be fine by tomorrow morning at the latest.”
“I’m so sorry,” the guy said from behind them. “I didn’t mean to do it.”
“Dude, are you kidding me?” Colin laughed. “Look at the way you hit the car. You hit the door! It would have been an accident if you hit the bumper. There’s definitely something wrong with you.”

“What happened to your car?” Alexis asked when Colin and Caitlyn got out of their moms car. When Caitlyn saw Alexis, she made a face of disgust and walked with Theresa the opposite direction.
“Caitlyn got into an accident after cheer practice last night.”
Alexis laughed and Colin gave her a look of disapproval which made Alexis stop.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Some loser hit her on the side of our car and gave her a little concussion so now we have to get dropped off and everything until they get the car fixed.”
“Why didn’t you just use one of the other cars?”
“I can’t do that to my baby!”
Alexis rolled her eyes. “Boys and their cars.”

“Where’s Derek?” Caitlyn asked at lunch.
“I don’t know,” Theresa quickly responded then quickly stuffed a spoonful of pudding into her mouth.
“Ew,” Caitlyn mumbled.
“He said he’s not feeling well,” Alexis answered.
“How do you know?” Caitlyn asked.
“He called me this morning and told me. Why do you care anyways?” she asked suspiciously.
“And since when were you close to Derek?”
“Touché.”
“Aren’t you hungry?” Ryan asked Caitlyn.
“No, I ate a blueberry scone this morning,” she responded.
“The scones were tiny,” Colin said and laughed.
“Nonetheless, I ate.”
“Hey, Caitlin!” Caitlyn looked up and across from her and behind Theresa was the guy that crashed into her. “I was just wondering how you’re feeling.”
Caitlyn flipped her long blonde hair. “I’m fine. You can leave now,” she said with a fake smile.
“I’m still so sorry about it and I promise I’ll pay for the damages and-”
“It’s fine!” Caitlyn said again. “Goodbye, whatever your name is.”
“It’s Nick K-”
“Bye, Rick,” Caitlyn said.
“No, it’s with a-”
“Dude, shut the hell up and go away,” Ryan said, annoyed.
When Nick left, Alexis made a sound of disgust. “Who does he think he is to just come up to us and start talking like we know him?”

After school Theresa skipped cheer practice. All day the only thing that was on her mind was the almost two week old embryo inside of her. Never in her life did she imagine having a child. She didn’t think about it, she didn’t talk about it, she didn’t even want any and here she was, stuck in a situation she didn’t know what to do with. Thinking about this made her nauseous but she knew that was just a part of the symptoms.
She walked up to the De Luca home and knocked on the door. She rocked back and forth in her heels as she waited for someone to open the door.
“Hello, how can I help you?” Mrs. De Luca asked, looking Theresa up and down.
“Uhm… is Derek home?”
“Oh, you’re one of his friends?”
“It’s me, Mrs. De Luca. Theresa. Theresa Santos.”
“Theresa?! Wow, you’ve changed a lot. Derek is upstairs in his room. He said he isn’t feeling good so don’t stay too long.”
“Okay, thanks,” Theresa said, stepping into the house.
When Theresa got to Derek’s room she knocked on the door. “Derek, it’s Theresa. Can I come in?”
“Uh… sure,” he said.
She opened the door and smiled at Derek who unplugged his earphones from his ears.
“So I wanted to talk to you about something….”
“Not here, Theresa,” Derek said.
“I’m sorry but you weren’t at school today so this was the only way I could get to you.”
Derek deliberated then sighed. “Where’s my parents?”
“Your mom is downstairs. Your did isn’t home yet.”
“Okay, come here.”
Theresa walked over to Derek and sat on his bed across from him. Theresa’s eyes flashed to his window, the window where someone took a picture of her and Derek having sex but at the moment, the fact that someone knew that she cheated on Colin was the least of her worries because she could risk a break-up but not nine months of pain and suffering.
“What do you want to talk about?”
“Options.”

After cheer practice, Caitlyn gathered her things and waited in front of the school for her father to come pick her up. Then from the corner of her eye she saw someone approaching. She sighed in annoyance and faced the guy who crashed her car.
“What do you want?” she moaned.
Nick paused where he was. “I was just… walking to my car.” He pointed to the school parking lot that was a couple ways down.
“You’re still driving?” she asked.
“Yeah, unlike some people I don’t mind driving around with a teensy dent in my car.”
“A ‘teensy’ dent? A ‘teensy’ dent would be a rock thrown at the car. A ‘teensy’ dent wouldn’t have broken my back door. A ‘teensy’ dent wouldn’t have gave me a concussion. A ‘teensy’-”
“Okay, okay. I get it, sheesh. I’m sorry. You don’t have to overreact.”
Caitlyn took a deep breath. “I don’t even know why I’m talking to you.”
“Okay, so how about I make it up to you over lunch?”
Caitlyn scoffed, not bothering to look at him. “You got to be kidding me.”
“I’m not! We can go anywhere you want. On me.”
“I’m sorry but I don’t eat at… McDonalds.”
“Great! Neither do I because I was thinking about something along the lines of Harborside.”
Caitlyn’s eyes widened and she turned to him. “Isn’t that place a little too-”
“Classy? For a person like me?”
“No, that’s not what I meant.”
“It’s fine,” Nick laughed. “So what do you say about tomorrow, lunch at Harborside? I’ll pick you up.”
Caitlyn thought about it and sighed in defeat. “Okay, fine but this is not a date. I repeat, not a date. I’m only doing this to get you off my back.”
“Whatever you say, darling.”
“Don’t ever call me that again. So do you need my number or something?”
“No, I already have it.”
“You… do?”
Nick’s face turned red and he smiled, nodding his head.
“I’m not even going to ask.” Caitlyn walked away and got into her father’s car and as she drove away, she looked into the side mirror. Nick stood there smiling after the car. She rolled her eyes.

Reputation was always a big factor in the lives of these bitches. There were strict rules of who and what type of person they could be seen with or couldn’t be seen with. They didn’t care if the person had a great personality. As long as they looked good, then everything would be fine. Nick was on the list of people not to be seen with, let alone go to lunch with at a restaurant where his type of people never dwelled.
And then there was the pregnant one and her baby daddy. Things were never good for them to start off with so when people find out about their little love affair then they would plummet down faster Theresa doing a cannon ball into the ocean.
These bitches were about to get a taste of their own medicine.