“How’s this for scum?” he asks harshly.
She manages to stop gagging long enough to spit out, “Still better to look at thanhim.”
Shut up, Lia. Shut up!
Too late.
He pushes her down and shoves her face into the pile of trash that he’s just dumped out on the floor around her. It’s hard to recognize anything in the brown mush, but I make out a half-eaten moldy apple, something that looks like it was once a sandwich, a banana peel, and some more gum. At least I can be thankful that the condom is in her hair, rather than pressed toher face. I realize I’m grasping at straws though.
She shakes her head furiously as he keeps her down so that her face makes full contact with the wet, moldy mush.
“Glad you like the look of that scum,” growls Damien. “Noweatit.”
She shakes her head even more furiously as he rubs her face in it. “Eatit,” he barks, “or things are going to get a whole lot worse for you.”
Any trace of the old bravado has melted. Great big sobs rise in her throat as her hands go up to claw pitifully at Damien’s jeans. But he merely keeps her there, on hands and knees, her face in the pile of trash.
“I’m going to count to ten,” he threatens, “and you’re going to fucking eat it. If you don’t, I’ll string you up by your ankles and leave you dangling from the ceiling for the rest of the school day.”
“Damien!”
I’m a mess of emotions right now. Anger at him, anger at myself for my own helplessness, sickening pain for the girl I can’t do a thing to save.
I feel a whole lot weaker now than I did back in the cafeteria, when Lia was calling me a loser.
“Damien,” I say again, my voice thick with everything that’s coursing through me.
He glances back at me, and whatever he sees in my eyes must convince him to at last let her go.
She’s still crying as she slowly sits up, her face entirely coated in the wet garbage, her hair still tangled with trash.
A shout of laughter erupts in the classroom, andfuck, if I had a gun, they’d all be dead. I’m incapable of raising a finger against Damien, even to protect Lia, but I’d happily kill each and every one of the assholes who are laughing at what he did to her.
But before I can react, Damien faces the classroom. “If anyof you idiots make another sound, Logan and I will slit your throat. Got it, fuckers?”
His threat has an immediate effect. The laughter dies down abruptly. It’s like they barely dare to breathe as Damien heads over to the teacher’s desk, grabs a stack of napkins, and tosses them back to Lia.
“Clean yourself up,” he grunts. “You’re filthy.” Then he turns to the teacher and adds, “You should be ashamed of yourself for letting something like that happen in your classroom.”
The latter’s eyes bulge out of his head while Damien saunters right back out of the class, as if nothing happened, not even looking back to check that I’m following.
I am. As always.
5
Logan
“You’ve got it bad, man.”
“Andyou’rea fucking asshole.”
My head is hanging down, pressed so hard against the table in front of me that I know it’ll leave a deep ridge on my forehead.
I don’t care though.
I hate myself. I fuckinghatemyself.
How could I let this happen to her? What the fuck is wrong with me? She was right to call me a loser. That’s what I am.