Page 18 of That One Time

“I didn’t kill your fucking spider!” I huffed.

I didn’t know why I bothered. There was no changing someone’s mind when it was made up. Not about me and who I liked to fuck, and not about that creepy fucking spider someone had pinned to his locker in tenth grade. Its legs were still twitching after the bell rang out and Alvin had gone to grab the books for his next class and found it. But that didn’t make it any less dead. It also didn’t stop him from having the thing stuffed and turned into a pin.

I think he did it to try to freak everyone out. Or to show them he wasn’t afraid of them. Or me, seeing as I was the one he blamed. And I let him because it kept him away.

“You know what? You’re right. I did it. It was fucking me. I fucking killed it. And I would do it again. Spiders aren’t fucking pets, Alvin. They’re fucking pests. Just like you.”

He turned his back on me. And I slammed the door shut, dropped my bag on the porch, and curled my big ass up on the front bench with a couple of sheets and a scratchy camp blanket. I could already hear the mosquitos buzzing around my head, the crickets singing out in the nearby shrubs while moths circled the porch light.

A shiver ran down my spine. I fucking hated bugs. Which was why it wasn’t all that hard for Alvin to believe I was his spider murderer. I was too stubborn to go back inside, though.

One night out here wouldn’t kill me. But one night with him above me? His body heat so close I could almost feel it, those little sounds he made in his sleep without knowing it, how young he looked when he was all tangled up in the sheets with a leg sticking out and the other protectively tucked under him…

Yeah, that just might.

CHAPTER 7

Iwoke up pissed the fuck off and not just regular pissed the fuck off. Nope, this wasn’t the ol’ ass-fuck didn’t remind me that RuPaul’s Drag Race was on. I was spiritually pissed the fuck off.

I could only describe the feeling as a demon scratching at my brain, whispering devious and uncouth shit to do to get back at Mr. Darius D’Angelo, prick to the extreme.

Maybe I needed to take a run or something logical. But logic never was my forte, which was why, at 8:14 in the morning, I was standing in front of a group of twenty-odd teenagers and announcing our first activity of the day.

Children needed structure. They needed guidance. They needed positive reinforcement and healthy outlets for their developing minds. And, of course, I needed a drain for my seething, boiling anger. These idiots also needed to learn how to properly execute a crime without getting caught—so they didn’t end up in this juvie hell in the first place.

“Okay, listen up, heathens,” I yelled out as I stroked dear Sprigey’s dead, furless body from where she was mounted on her pin. One of her eyes was getting too old.

At least she had seven more, I suppose…

A bunch of heads turned towards me at my barked greeting. Well, most of them. Trevor was sitting on the edge of the picnic table, staring down at his shoes.

I clapped my hands together. “Today’s activity is about teamwork.”

A chorus of groans answered me.

“Oh, now, don’t sound so excited. You’ll hurt my feelings.”

“You don’t have feelings,” Mason, my group’s designated class clown, yelled back.

I pointed at him. “Excellent observation. You’re team captain.”

His face immediately dropped. “What?”

“Leadership comes with consequences.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“Neither does algebra, but apparently society decided you need that shit too.”

I thought about this mission and a twinge of guilt saddled me. These punk asses were here because they were likely misunderstood, stupid, troublemakers or all three and who was I to fool them when I was no different?

“Hmm. Honesty is a lesson you all need to learn…” I sighed. “So let me say this: We’re robbing Mr. D’Angelo. Who’s in?”

A couple of them laughed, and most raised their misdemeanor hands. Children were fucking terrifying.

I smiled and wiped a tear from my eye. “My people.”

Mason bounced out of his seat. “What are we stealing?”