Jasey Rae

The next morning was rough. It seemed as if people all around me were staring at me, then quickly whispering to their friends, giggling about some private joke of theirs. Like they were making fun of me, or if they knew my secret. Or as if they knew I was kicked out of my own home by my insane mother. Sam wasn't at school because he had a doctor's appointment, and Jack stayed by my side pretty much the whole day though.

Alex barely looked at me that morning. And when he did, his eyes were full of pity, some anger, and a whole lot of hurt. It pained me to see him kiss the blonde what seemed like every two seconds when Mr. Black wasn't looking.

But everywhere around me it seemed like everyone was talking about me. Pointing, laughing, whispering. It was driving me insane. I wanted to scream, just to find out what is so interesting about me that they had to talk to each other in private.

When I was in my class with only Rian and Jack, something very interesting happened.

Jack and I walked in early as per usual, and went to sit down by Rian in our usual seats.

Rian gave me a sad look. "Hey, Chicago, I'm sorry about your mom. I can't believe she did that to you."

"Excuse me?" My insides jumped a little and my outsides seemed to freeze. How could he possibly know that? My eyes jumped over to meet Jack's. "You told Rian?"

"What? No! I only told Alex!" Jack defended. He was as equally confused as I was. "Rian, you know what happened?"

"Yeah, it's around the whole school by now. You know how word travels fast through this school. Rumor has it that Chicago was kicked out of her house by her Mom after her and her mom fought about something. And that Hayley's mom hit her."

"She didn't hit me!"

"That's not what the whole school is saying. Hey, I believe you, Hays, but you're gonna have a hard time convincing the rest of the school." Rian shrugged, holding up his hands in surrender.

I buried my face in my hands, the salty layer of water forming on my eyes quickly. I noticed that that seemed to be a common thing lately. Great, now everyone knows what happened. The whole school is talking about me right now and thinks my mother hit me! Which isn’t true at all. My mother may have said some really mean things in the past, some completely unnecessary, and she may have kicked me out a few times, but she would never stoop so low as to hit her own child, no matter how mad she is at that time. She wasn’t raised like that, and we all knew it. She was raised better than that.

"Who told you, Rian?" Jack asked, slight anger in his voice. I looked up to hear Rian better.

"Several people-" Rian started.

The teacher called the class for attention, yelling at the people who were talking. Rian sighed and turned back around I'm his seat, facing forward and I did too. Tears were falling down, but I didn't care. Right now, the only thing running through my mind was the fact that practically the whole school knew about my personal life. And yes, saying the whole school practically knew seems overdramatic, but it’s completely true. Everyone knows how word travels fast throughout the school, no matter how small of a matter it is. That sucker travels to everyone who can hear.

I sighed sadly, knowing who had spread the rumor. The only people who know what happened are Jake, Mom, me, Jack, and Alex. And I know for sure it wasn't Jack who had told. Which left one person: Alex. Jack and I both knew he had told. We just didn't know why.

[jaseyrae]

By the time lunch had come around, Jack was livid at Alex. Mainly for asking out Whitney and everything, but telling everyone what had happened added on to the list, right at the top.

Jack wanted to just about punch Alex in the face, and he was about to if I didn't pull him to another table in time. Sure, I was mad, but I wasn't as mad as Jack was. The damage is done; I can't do anything about it except to keep my head held high and try and get through it, no matter how uncomfortable it was to have people whispering to their friends about me and point whenever I pass. But Jack wouldn't just sit there while Alex acted as if nothing happened, so he did something that pretty much made my year.

He stormed off toward our old table where Rian, Whitney, and Alex were seated, laughing at something Alex had said.

Alex saw Jack and went wide-eyed, seeing how mad his best friend was. "Jack-"

"No, it's my time to talk. How fucking dare you fucking tell the whole school what had happened to Chicago!" When Jack yelled, it was really loud, especially when he was seething like this. The whole lunch room became silent because it was so loud. All eyes were on the two boys, going back and forth as if they were watching a tennis match. Alex tried to cut in, but Jack continued to scream. "Even when you fucking knew it was her own personal business, you still fucking told the whole goddamn school! You knew she didn't want anyone to know!"

"How was I supposed to know she didn't want anyone to know?" Alex retorted, standing up himself. He had a glint in his eyes that flashed for a split second, and I knew that look. If Jack was mad, Alex was going to get mad as well.

Jack clenched his fists so tightly his knuckles were white. "Come on, Alex! You know her better than she knows herself! So don't give me that fucking bullshit that you didn't know! You really hurt her, Alex. I hope you know that. She cried because of you, man."

I had to cut in about now because if I didn't, Jack was going to deck Alex in the nose or something. "Jack-"

"No, Hayley! He has to realize that what he's doing is hurting you." Jack said, still glaring at his best friend. Right now he looked like he was going to strangle Alex. And at the moment, I really wouldn’t have minded. But I knew after it happened and Alex was dead, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself anymore. Alex kept me going, whether I was mad at him, orcompletely in love that I like him, this boy was the reason I woke up. I looked around to see if any teachers were watching, and thankfully there weren't. They all must be in the teacher's lounge or something.

Alex's fists were balled into fists as well, ready to throw a punch in a second if Jack did. Alex knew how to fight, and well. He told me he had gotten in a few fights with people, and that’s how he learned. He may have learned the hard way to not tuck your thumb inside your fist when you punch, and not to look away even for a split second, but he learned. He learned so, so well. Jack, well, Jack was a different story. Even though Jack knew how to fight just as well as Alex, he was too much of a goofball and softie to hurt his friend like that, no matter how mad he was at him or her. He could never be able to live with himself anymore if he had hurt his friend, especially his best friend. And we all knew Jack and Alex were just too close to hurt each other like that. Well, we hoped they wouldn't.

"Jack, please...stop. Let's go, okay?" I said, reaching out to grab one of his fists. He quickly relaxed his hand at the touch of our skin, sighing angrily. But he didn't turn away from Alex; he kept on glaring at the boy in front of him.

"Watch your back, Gaskarth, or so help me God you won't be able to have children anymore." Jack seethed; shocking even Alex on how much venom was in his voice. Alex stood there, glaring back at his best friend until Jack finally turned around and pulled me out of the lunch room with him. I turned around to look back at Alex, flinching when he was sitting down as he wrapped his arm around his girlfriend, a scowl on his face.

I turned back around and walked a little faster to keep pace with Jack. "Jack, where're we going?"

"Anywhere. Anywhere that's far away from him as possible." Jack said, taking deep breaths to try and calm his anger down. It was slowly working: a little too slow for my liking.

I nodded and kept up with him as we snuck out of school. I had never cut classes before, especially not with another person. Mother would kill me if she found out I was cutting class, but since I wasn't living with her at the moment, I didn't give a flying fladoodle what she thought. And besides, I only had one class, it's not like I was missing a ton of classes like Jack was. But I knew he didn't care about that one bit.

Jack didn't say anything as we walked as fast as we could from our school. I didn't hold it against him though. He had a lot on his mind right now and I didn't want to disturb it.

I tried to think of something to say, to get his mind off of things, but nothing really came to mind. A car whipped by, causing me to lose my balance for a second. I smiled as an idea came to mind. "Jacky, I know what we can do."

[jaseyrae]

I grinned, seeing Jack smiling in the corner of my eye. His long, lanky arms were stretched above his head to let the air push them backwards. My Viper's top was down, letting the wind whip Jack's and my hair around, causing me to put it up in a messy ponytail.

At the moment, I was driving over a hundred miles an hour down a deserted road in the middle of nowhere. It was out in the country, miles and miles away from our hometown. Jack was having fun, his mind seeming to be off of things that had happened earlier. He kept making airwaves with his hands, screaming out as loud as he could just for fun. It's not like anyone could hear us anyways. We did this for hours, just having the times of our lives, the thoughts of Alex and all that drama completely slipping our minds.

I looked down, sighing once I saw that I needed gas in the car. Going this fast for this long really sucked all the gas out of my car. I slowed down to about fifty, and became aware of that it seemed like we were going ten miles an hour since I was so used to going so fast.

"What's wrong? Why are we slowing down?" Jack asked, his large grin only a small smile now.

"I need gas in the car." I answered, giving him an apologetic smile. "Then we gotta start heading home. If we go after we get gas, we can make it home by midnight."

"Aw...." Jack said sadly, his smile faltering. "This sucks."

"I know. I'm sorry. We can do this another time, I promise." I noticed a local Speedway station and pulled in. After giving Jack a ten-dollar bill, I told him to go get a few snacks and drinks while I filled up the car. He immediately took off at the sound of food.

I sighed, fanning myself with my hand. For a fall day in Maryland, it was getting pretty hot right now. By the time I put my hair up in a high bun and put my baseball cap on, the car was filled up and ready to go. I walked in the store part and quickly paid for the gas before looking around to find Jack. I immediately found him since his head was perfectly showing over the racks of food and such because he was so tall. "Come on, Jack! You ready?"

He turned around, nodding once his eyes landed on me and walked over. He had armfuls of food, causing me to groan. "What?"

"Did you have to go and get so much food? I don't think ten dollars will pay for all this." I explained, pointing at the mountain of food he set on the counter. The cashier quickly started to ring it up, a look on her face that hoped we wouldn’t change our minds and not buy the food.

"I know. That's why I'm paying the other half." Jack shrugged, getting out his wallet. He paid for the rest and we both got back in my car, ready to go to back home.

"I swear, if you so much as get a crumb in my car I will leave you on the side of the road."

"Relax, Chicago, I'll be fine." Jack grinned, opening up his first bag of chips. "Promise."

[jaseyrae]

"Jasey, I'm sorry! Please don't do this!"

I shook my head angrily, chucking the half now empty bottle of water at him, to which he yelped out in pain a little. "No! I warned you! You knew the consequences!"

"Please, Jasey! Please! I'm so, so, so sorry! I'll pay for everything, I promise!" Jack begged, trying to unlock the door so he could get in.

"No! You promised nothing would get in this car, and looked what happened there! You're walking home!" I said angrily. "Do you know how much this car cost? More than you'll make in a hundred years!"

"But-"

"No!" I said and glared at him. "Bye, Jack Bassam." I hit the gas, praying I wouldn't start laughing where he could see me. I was definitely bullshitting Jack; I thought it would be fun to
mess with him. I needed a laugh.

I went about a mile down, just out of Jack's sight and pulled over to park. I was only gonna go this far in the first place. I'd never leave Jack in the middle of the road like that, no matter how funny it would be. I leaned back and turned my mix CD on to kill time to wait for Jack, and put on my favorite song.

Oh, Florida, please be still tonight,
don't disturb this love of me,
look how she's so serene,
you've gotta help me out'

I smiled, thinking that if any guy ever sang this song to me, I'd fall in love with him forever, no matter whom the guy was.

After the song passed and then a few more, a small figure behind me in the distance was getting closer. It was a tall, lanky boy with skunk colored hair and a slightly large nose, and had only bones and skin, no muscle. Jack Bassam Barakat.

The second his deep brown eyes landed on my midnight blue car, he bolted for it. I laughed, thinking that I had never seen someone run that fast before. He got to my car in about a minute, panting for breath as he did his best to apologize about what he had done in between breaths.

I let him go on and on about how sorry he was that he had gotten crumbs in my car, not really paying attention. I was actually thinking of what I wanted for dinner that night. Finally, after what was about four minutes, I unlocked the car doors, smirking. "Get in, Jacky."

[jaseyrae]

The next day flew by and it was now Thursday, meaning tomorrow was my seventeenth birthday. I dreaded that day, knowing it was going to be the worst day ever. I don't have Alex with me, Jack and Alex are fighting, my mother and I are fighting, and it's yet again another year without my father.

Jack and Alex haven't even spoken to each other since their fight in the lunchroom. They wouldn't even look at each other, and when they did, they were straight up glaring at each other, stabbing one another to death in their minds, or something that involved killing the other.

I knew deep down-way, way deep down-they wanted to talk to each other. To say they’re sorry for such a stupid fight and be best friends again. To jam out with each other in the band since they haven't played together in about a week. To be able to just act like they did before I came along.

And, deep down, I too wanted to make up with Alex. I wanted to say I was sorry for doing such an idiotic thing when I knew it was completely wrong. I wanted to be best friends with him again. I wanted to hug him, and hold his hand whenever I wanted, and goof around with him. I wanted to poke fun at him and complain when he made fun of me jokingly. I wanted to talk to him about anything and not feel awkward about it. I wanted to fall asleep with him after him saying I was beautiful. I wanted him to call me pretty and scoff when I said that it wasn’t true. I wanted him and I to watch movies for hours and hours, talking about how much we loved them and quoted them. I wanted to fall asleep on his chest with his arms wrapped around me. I wanted him to play guitar for me and sing me songs. I wanted to flirt with him whenever I pleased. I wanted to love him.

Sam came over today and I filled him in on everything on why I was living with Jack and his family. He didn't mind at all that I was living with Jack because he knew Jack and I weren't ever going to be more than just best friends. And for that, I gave him a kiss. So, we ended up watching movies and talking for the rest of the night. Jack stayed in his room for the night to give us some space and I was very thankful for that, and I'm sure Sam was too. We needed time to ourselves. But, throughout the night when Jack needed something from my room, such as a CD or movie, he always kept hinting that it was my birthday tomorrow and that he had a surprise for me after saying that if we did ‘the dirty’ to keep it down because he didn’t want his movie ruined. I tried to keep myself from blushing too red, but I wasn’t succeeding at all. So I just scolded my best friend and told him to go back to his room and leave us alone.

Sam knew it was my birthday the next day, too. And he as well kept hinting that he had a big surprise for me at school. I kept telling him that he shouldn't have gotten me anything, but he kept insisting that he had to since I was his girlfriend and he was raised to treat his girl right.

After Sam left, it was around eleven, and since I wasn't tired, I stayed up to read a little. But my mind kept drifting to my mother's and my fight for some reason, though. I kept thinking that it was absolutely ridiculous she made me leave like that, and that we'd probably never get over this fight.

My mother and I haven't spoken since that night. She hasn't called to check up on me, to see where I'm living at the moment and with whom. She didn't care. She honestly didn't care. Or, so I thought.

My phone vibrated in my pocket, tickling my leg lightly before I pulled it out of the tight pocket of my jeans. Not even bothering to see who was calling, I hit the green button and put the phone to my ear. It must be Zack or Rian drunk dialing me. "Hello?"

"Jasey Rae?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Mom...?" What could she want?

I heard her sigh on the other line, cringing a little because I knew what kind of sigh that was. It was one of those 'I've got some bad news' sighs. Trust me, I've heard that sigh before. And the first time I heard it was when she came to my room almost four years ago to tell me my father was leaving because of me. "Honey, I've got some...interesting news for you."

I bit my lip, bracing myself for whatever news she could possibly bring. I thought of the worst-case scenarios, such as Jake being dead or really hurt. But those thoughts went away as quickly as they came because if Jake were dead or severely hurt, she would be crying right now. "What's the news?"

"It's your father, Jasey. He's coming here...for your birthday...tomorrow."