Rebel Belle

Chapter 4

EVERYTHING after that is kind of a blur, mostly because I was pretty sure I was going insane. I know I walked into the bathroom and didn’t even feel all that surprised to see that it was empty, with no sign of the two dead bodies that had been in there just—I checked my watch—six minutes ago. The walls were fine, no cracks or big craters roughly the size of Dr. DuPont’s head. I even checked the trash can for the bloody paper towel I’d used to clean my shoe.

The trash can was empty.

That’s when I made this weird, high-pitched sound that was kind of a sigh and kind of a gasp. I’m pretty sure I would have had a complete nervous breakdown right then and there if David Stark hadn’t poked his head in and said, “Uh . . . Pres? You gonna hurl again?”

I turned to look at him, and the smirk fell off his face. “Holy crap,” he said, crossing the room and grabbing my arms. “Harper? What’s wrong?”

I saw my reflection in the mirror, and totally understood why he looked genuinely freaked. My eyes were huge and glassy and my skin had gone gray. Not that I really cared. I mean, I’d gone crazy. I was crazy.

For some reason, that thought was way more upsetting than the idea that I’d turned into some sort of superhero who’d killed evil Dr. DuPont with my shoe. That had been traumatizing, I guess, but it had also been . . . well, kind of cool. Like something out of a comic book. But going insane? That was real.

“Harper?” David said again, giving me a little shake.

I think I would’ve caved then and the whole story about Mr. Hall and Dr. DuPont would’ve come tumbling out in a series of sobs and shrieks. But luckily, Bee chose that moment to push the bathroom door open.

“God, there you are!” she exclaimed, and her voice reverberated off the tile walls, hurting my ears. Behind her, Amanda, Abigail, and Mary Beth crowded into the bathroom, too.

Then they saw David, and all of their normally pretty faces twisted into sneers. I wasn’t the only one who didn’t like David’s editorials.

One of Bee’s best qualities was loyalty, but it sometimes had an ugly way of showing itself, especially where David was concerned. “What are you doing in the girls’ room, paper boy?” I wondered if I’d ever looked at David like that.

“Are you stalking Harper?” Amanda asked, folding her arms over her chest.

David wasn’t holding my arms anymore, and he certainly wasn’t looking at me with concern. His usual scowl was back in place. “Yeah, that’s it, Amanda,” he said, trying to shove his hands into the pockets of his skinny jeans. “I’m a stalker. And what a charming and unique insult.”

Amanda rolled her eyes, which was her standard response when she didn’t have a comeback, and Bee looked at me. “Whoa, Harper, what’s wrong?”

“I think she’s sick,” David said, stuffing his hands in his pockets, his eyes focused on a spot somewhere over my head.

“Probably because she’s been talking to you,” Abigail snapped back.

“Abigail,” I said, but David just laughed. “Lovely talking to you ladies,” he said as he walked out the door.

“Did he do something to you?” Bee asked as soon as he was gone.

I laughed, but it sounded, um, crazy, so I stopped. “No. I just . . . I think I’m coming down with something. He was checking on me. It was nice, actually.”

Mary Beth wobbled up to my side and frowned. “Probably only because he wanted something. I don’t trust David Stark as far as I could throw him.”

That’s when I finally noticed the crown dangling from Bee’s fingers, the rhinestones shining dully in the florescent lights. “Is that . . .” My voice came out squeaky, so I started over. “Is that the Homecoming Queen crown?”

She looked down like she had totally forgotten about it. “Oh, yeah! Duh. That’s why I came to look for you. You totally won!”

She squealed and threw her arms around me. I kind of hugged her back, but mostly I was just thinking, I missed it. I’ve wanted this for years, ever since Leigh-Anne won it two years ago, and I missed it because I was having a schizo freak-out in the bathroom.

Bee didn’t seem to notice that I was less than enthusiastic. “We looked for you, like, everywhere when they called your name.”

“Everywhere?” I parroted.

“Well . . . everywhere in the gym. So then Ryan said I should just go up there and, like, accept it on your behalf, so I did, and then I remembered you’d gone to the bathroom, so I came to find you!”

Pursing her lips, Bee tilted her head to one side. “Seriously, Harper, what’s wrong? You look really bad. No offense.”

I rubbed my hands over my face. “I told you,” I said from behind my fingers, “I started feeling sick.” I put my hands down and tried to smile brightly, but I had a feeling I looked demented. I felt demented.

Bee was still squinting at me when Abigail took the crown from her hands. With a big smile, she reached up and plonked the crown on my head. “Well, there you go, Your Majesty!”

I turned and looked in the mirror. My face was still gray, my eyes were still huge, and the crown looked fake and stupid. Plus it was crooked.

I burst into tears.

All four girls wrapped me in a group hug, and at first I thought they were comforting me, that somehow they understood that I’d had a terrible night, and that I had thought I’d killed a guy, but actually, I was just going insane, and seeing that effing crown on my head had been the final straw.

But then Abigail squealed, “Oh, sweetie, I know! It’s, like, a dream come true!”

“What do you know about schizophrenia?” I mumbled against Ryan’s mouth.

He raised his head, his eyes hazy, his hand still hovering around the hem of my dress. “Huh?”

We were sitting in his car, parked in my driveway. It was after midnight, but still bright in the car, thanks to the truly obscene amount of security lighting my parents have. Somebody tried to break in a few years back, and ever since then, my dad has been more than a little paranoid. But, I mean, if we didn’t have this big brick, ivy-covered house that pretty much screams, “HI! THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE HERE ARE TOTALLY LOADED! PLEASE TAKE SOME OF THEIR STUFF! THEY’LL JUST BUY MORE!” he wouldn’t have to worry so much.

My crown was on the floorboard. I’d taken it off as soon as we’d left the school, even though Ryan had joked that he expected me to wear it 24/7 from now on. And then Brandon had made a joke about how I should wear it during sex, and said something about properly “saluting” the Queen, which, A) didn’t really make that much sense, and B) was dumb anyway.

“It’s just something I was thinking about,” I said to Ryan now. “Didn’t you write a paper on it for AP Psychology last year?”

Ryan blinked. In the dim light of the car, his hazel eyes were nearly black, and he’d loosened the hunter green tie around his neck and shed his suit coat. Normally, seeing Ryan all rumpled and disheveled sent a little thrill through me, but tonight, I was way too preoccupied to appreciate his hotness.

He slid off me and back into the driver’s seat, running his hand through his hair. “Um . . . yeah. Well, I mean, to be honest, I used one of Luke’s freshman psych papers.” Luke was Ryan’s older brother, currently off at the University of Florida. When I frowned, Ryan gave me one of those lopsided grins that usually made me smile in return. “Is this about the Committee for Academic Honesty?” he asked. “Because I’d hope dating the committee chairwoman, like, exempted me from that.”

“No, it’s nothing to do with CAH,” I said, rubbing my eyes. “I just . . . wait, Ry, you used someone else’s paper? For an AP class?”

He sighed and leaned forward, folding his arms on the steering wheel. “It was right in the middle of basketball season, and I didn’t have time to write a paper on crazy people. And it wasn’t anyone, it was Luke, and since we’re brothers, that makes that paper, like, half mine anyway.”

He was joking, and I wanted to laugh, I really did. I rolled my lips inward, trying to stop the next sentence from coming out, but it was no use. “Ryan, playing basketball on quite possibly the worst team in Alabama is not going to get you into a good college.”

“Oh God,” he muttered, slamming his head back against the headrest.

“However,” I continued, hating myself, but, as usual, totally unable to stop, “cheating in an AP class will most definitely keep you out of Hampden Sydney. Colleges take academic honesty very seriously.”

He snorted, but didn’t look up. “Can we not do this right now, Harper? I know you’re perfect, but—”

“I am not perfect,” I muttered, crossing my arms and settling back into my seat. I had hallucinated killing my teacher with a shoe. That would probably do a lot more to keep me out of a good college than Ryan’s stolen paper.

“Yeah,” Ryan said, raising his head, “you are. Or at least you try to be. I mean, I love you, but why do you have to be queen of everything? Why can’t you just . . . chill?”

Last year, my mom took me to see a therapist after she found me making decorations for the Spring Fling at three in the morning. Dr. Greenbaum said that my “obsessive need to overachieve” was due to a “fear of being out of control” and that, like Ryan said, I needed to chill. Only she used some fancy term for “chill” and also suggested I start taking Lexapro to help facilitate said chilling. I managed to get out of the meds by wearing blue jeans and a T-shirt to my next therapy session, where I drew pictures of myself crying in a tornado. That seemed to make Dr. Greenbaum happy and she decided I didn’t need the drugs after all. And the next time I did school stuff in the middle of the night, I just did it in my closet with the door locked. Honestly, what is wrong with this country when striving for excellence means you need antidepressants?

But then I remembered I actually was crazy now.

“Forget it,” I said to Ryan. “I don’t want to fight about this again. I’m just having a really rough night.”

“Are you bummed you missed the crowning ceremony?” he asked, leaning down to pick up my tiara.

Leave it to my Perfect Boyfriend to give me the perfect out. Of course Ryan would assume I was bummed about missing the crowning.

“Yeah,” I said, trying to look more wistful than freaked out. “I know it’s stupid, but . . .”

“Hey,” he said softly, “It’s okay to feel disappointed. Here.” He took the crown and gently placed it back on my head. “Harper Jane Price, I officially crown you Homecoming Queen.” Then he leaned forward and kissed me. It was a sweet, soft kiss, and one for its own sake, and not as a prelude to something else.

That was one of the many great things about Ryan. Just a few minutes ago, we’d been fighting, but once I’d said I was sorry, he was over it. I could be a champion grudge-holder. Briefly, an image of David Stark flickered in my brain, but I pushed it away. David had been nice to me tonight—well, nice for him—so maybe it was time to bury the hatchet. Besides, it was creepy to think about David while I was kissing my boyfriend.

Ryan pulled away, and I smiled at him, laying my hand on his cheek. “You are the greatest boyfriend ever, you know that?”

He shrugged. “Pretty much, yeah.” He scooted closer and kissed me again, but this time, it was definitely a prelude to something else; something I was most definitely not in the mood for.

Gently pushing at his shoulders, I said, “It’s been kind of a crazy night. Can we maybe . . . not?” I hoped I sounded regretful and not irritated.

Ryan sighed, ruffling the hair that flopped over his eyes, but then he turned to me and smiled. “Sure.” Then he glanced down and frowned. “Oh, crap, babe, I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

He reached out and touched my leg. “Your skirt. I must’ve accidently ripped it.”

I felt the hysterical tears/laughter start to rise again as I looked to where his finger was slowly running up and down the tear in my skirt. The tear I’d made when I’d kicked Dr. DuPont.

But it was impossible to have that tear, since the whole thing had been in my head because I was crazy now.

Right?

But . . . a little voice whispered in my head, if it had all been imaginary, then why did I still have that Pop Rocks feeling in my chest? Why did I still feel a tremor running through all my muscles, like I could tear off Ryan’s car door if I really wanted to?

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” I said, trying to sound normal even though all I really wanted to do was run inside the garage and try to lift my dad’s SUV. You know, for scientific purposes.

We made out for another ten minutes or so, but neither my head nor my heart were particularly in it. Ryan could probably sense that, but he didn’t say anything. Finally, he walked me to my door, gave me one last kiss, and then I was breathing a sigh of relief as his taillights disappeared down my drive.

But I didn’t go inside. Instead, I sneaked around the back of the house to the tall wooden fence that surrounded our backyard—if you could call the half acre of landscaped gardens a “yard.” The fence was eight feet high and covered in thick, thorny pyracantha bushes. Leigh-Anne had dared me to climb it once when I was six. I’d gotten maybe a foot off the ground before the thorns tore up my palms. I still have a thin white scar at the base of my right thumb. Needless to say, I’d never made another attempt to scale the fence.

But now I stood in the dark, my heart pounding in my ears, and a shivery feeling coursing through me.

Just try it, I thought.

It wasn’t real, the larger, more sensible part of my brain screamed. There were no bodies! No collateral damage! Not even a freakin’ paper towel!

I looked down at the tear in my skirt. Sure, it was possible I’d been kicking and punching at thin air because I’d finally gone full-on schizoid. But, I thought, what if . . .

I was done thinking. I slipped off my pink, teacher-killing heels, threw them over the fence, and felt my muscles tense.

And then I jumped.