Chapter One

The rough, solid shove against Tabitha’s right shoulder demolished her precarious balance as she negotiated the last step. Her pile of textbooks, pencils and new tablet flew from her folded arms and splattered in an arc on the narrow landing. She reached out to save herself but her hand slipped from the rail and she crashed onto her knees with a bone-jarring thud.

“Oops, Tubby Tabby’s done a bellyflop, but then, you always were clumsy, weren’t you? Such a shame, on your first day at college and all, to make such a scene.”

Tabitha flinched at the scathing words, the scorching heat of embarrassment burning across her face as she looked up into Amelia Eckerton’s sneering expression. What the hell was she doing here? Why wasn’t she at university?

As usual, Tabitha struggled to respond to Amelia's taunts, to find the words to refute her cruelty and the courage to say them out loud. As she cowered on her knees, the other students pushed past, stepping nonchalantly over her belongings or shoving them aside so they didn’t have to step on them. By the time Tabitha had gathered her composure, Amelia had disappeared down the next flight of stairs. Her knees hurt, her wrist throbbed where she had used it to break her fall and tears of embarrassment burned at the backs of her eyes. As she tried to scramble to her feet with as much dignity as possible, a hand provided support under her elbow.

“You all right?”

Upright once more, Tabitha turned and found a dainty blonde girl by her side.

“I think so. Thank you for helping me,” she said.

“I’m Jaclyn,” the blonde girl announced as she bent down and began to gather Tabitha’s books from the floor. “Here you go,” she said as she handed over Tabitha’s things. “Good luck. I might see you around.”

“Thanks again,” Tabitha said loudly as she watched Jaclyn skip down the stairs and disappear in the milling students.

Tabitha’s positivity and mettle for her venture into campus life vanished with the helpful stranger. One cruel action of a ruthless bully had shattered her new start and brought the past rushing back with stark cruelty. The throb from her knees underpinned the tremble of shock and dismay as she clutched the handrail to steady herself. Was this year about to be a repeat of Year Twelve, where she had crumbled under the barrage of abuse from Amelia and failed to deliver the work to achieve a satisfactory score for university? Resentment flared and Tabitha stiffened her spine.

No, I will not lose this too. I will not let her get to me.

She consolidated her pile of books, pushed away from the handrail and made her way down the stairs.

Shock rattled through her as she struggled to regain her earlier orientation and negotiate the maze of corridors, but at last, with a sigh of relief, she slipped through the door of room two-one-nine into the half-filled classroom. With surreptitious glances, she studied her companions—a couple of girls huddled in the back corner whispered to each other, and three guys her age sat silently waiting for the lecture to start. One of them looked up as she reached a spare desk.

“Hey, Tabitha Cockell, long time no see,” he said.

She looked directly at him, stunned by a flash of recognition. “My god, Alex, what are you doing here?”

“I bombed out in my second year of my vet course, didn’t work hard enough. I have to get some money together to go back so took a job at the racing stables,” he said. “Boss wants me to have some qualifications so he sent me here.”

“Wow,” Tabitha exclaimed, stunned at Alex’s failure to make the grade at university.

“So where ya been, Tabitha?” Alex asked. “You haven’t come on any of the car club cruises with your dad, and you deactivated your Facebook ages ago.”

“Yeah. Would love to have been with Dad, because he even lets me drive the car sometimes, but study and work called. As for Facebook, I stopped using it because there was too much nastiness and shit going on.”

“Yeah, it can be like that. Anyway, Tabitha, it’s good to see you again. Maybe we should get together to study sometime,” Alex suggested.

She nodded. “That would be good, Alex.”

As Alex turned to answer a question about textbooks from one of the other students, Tabitha found a seat and prepared to begin. While she waited she glanced surreptitiously at Alex several times. She had always had a thing for him since meeting him four years ago at one of the cruises, but both fathers had made it clear Alex was too old for her.

The door opened and shut as another person arrived. Footsteps came closer. Someone leaned over her shoulder and whispered in her ear.

“Oh my goodness, fancy that, Tubby Tabby—we’re in the same class. This is good. We can get reacquainted.”

Tabitha cringed as the words cut into her soul. She struggled to hold back the burn of acid bile in her throat as her stomach contracted into a tight ball of grabbing pain. With a sense of foreboding, she glanced up at Amelia—her nemesis—then dropped her gaze back to her books. She had nothing to say.

“Did you have a good trip on the stairs, Tubby?” Amelia chuckled. “And I thought college was going to be so boring, with no one to stir.”

“You could’ve really hurt me, Amelia. Just go away, this isn’t high school and we aren’t kids anymore,” Tabitha muttered, keeping her eyes on her desk.

“Well, well, well, think you’re too good for me now, do you? Perhaps I’ll have to rectify that before you leave today, Tubby,” Amelia sneered.

“My name is Tabitha. Don’t call me that childish name,” Tabitha snapped, all her frustration and consternation at Amelia’s continuing ridicule adding sharpness to her tone.

“Awww, Tubby, don’t be like that,” Amelia admonished as she drifted to the back of the room and found a seat.

Tabitha sat stock-still, her hands clenched on the table in front of her, fighting to control the tremble. Her stomach threatened to rebel and she swallowed hard to keep it under control. Of all the people to be in her class. She wanted to run from the room and never come back, but something held her in place—a desire to complete the vet nursing certificate and get a full-time job at the local vet clinic where she now worked part-time.

As she had walked away from her high school graduation, she’d dared to believe the misery of Amelia was behind her. Thirteen years of bullying and angst that had almost destroyed her life. Well, there’s no way she’s going to take this from me. I will not buckle. She would suffer, and struggle with the abuse as she had before, but somehow she would survive this.

Amelia quickly sat down when the lecturer entered the room. He introduced himself as Kayne Smith and invited them to use his given name because they were all adults and he preferred to keep it informal. Apart from the inevitable class member introductions, Tabitha didn’t have to say anything and she breathed a sigh of relief when her turn had passed. She found the lecture informative, and thought the first assignment looked challenging but interesting and decided on the spot she would base the report on the vet clinic where she worked, if the manager would give permission.

With a two-hour break between classes, Tabitha walked across to the nearest shopping center, planning to hide in the crowds of shoppers and office workers eating lunch—somewhere Amelia couldn’t find her. As she munched on her sandwiches in a corner of the food court, she examined her options. There weren’t many—she either put up with Amelia, or she pulled out. She was determined to complete her course. The other thing she decided was not to tell her parents this time. They had been upset and frustrated with the ongoing bullying in school, always jollying her along or offering solutions that failed to work. She was an adult now, so she had to cope with this on her own.

At two when she returned to the college, Amelia, flanked by the other two girls from class, was waiting for her at the end of the corridor.

“So where’d you get to, Tubby Tabby? I missed the fishy smell that emanates from you, fishbait. I thought we could have lunch together. Mighty antisocial, aren’t we?”

“I had a job to do,” Tabitha muttered defensively, not willing to admit she had run away to avoid Amelia.

“Never mind, there’s always Thursday,” Amelia replied.

“Whatever,” Tabitha muttered as she pushed past them into the room.

As she took her seat, Amelia leaned over her shoulder. “There’s no escape, fishbait.”

Tabitha stared straight ahead at the whiteboard as she tried to ignore the threat that seared her soul. There were always online courses, she thought, but that would mean trips interstate for the contact sections—more fees and more costs. It wasn’t an option.

She settled down in her seat, determined not to let Amelia’s taunts get to her like they had in Year Twelve, but all through the lecture, she was on edge, all too aware of Amelia behind her, just waiting for a chance to pounce at the end of class.

Tabitha dawdled with her packing up, hoping Amelia would have gone, but she and the girl called Petra who sat next to her in class were waiting in the corridor when she emerged from the classroom.

“So, Tubby, have a good day?” Amelia asked.

“Fine, thank you.”

Amelia smirked. “Didn’t find it all too hard, did we? I know you’re not the brightest light globe in the box. How you even got in, I don’t know. Maybe your mom put in a good word for you. She’s pretty good at that, isn’t she?”

Tabitha looked directly at Amelia, struggling to make sense of her comments. “What has my mom got to do with it? I got in the same way you did, Amelia—by getting the right score.”

“Yeah, like you still got to be a fairy in the ballet concert. Your mom always goes in to bat for you, doesn’t she? Either that or you’ve cheated—too fat to be a fairy, and too stupid to make the grade. Cockles belong in the sea, fishbait, not stinking up our college,” Amelia sneered loudly and gave Tabitha a little shove toward the stairs.

“For goodness’ sake, Amelia, we were five, and it wasn’t my fault the teacher made you be a tree just because you were too tall to be a fairy.”

Amelia pushed her again, harder this time. “But you got to be a fairy, even though Mrs. Edwards said you were too fat. And she was right. You were too fat. You are too fat.”

“Hey, you. Let up on her, okay? This is college, not the schoolyard you just came from,” Alex yelled from the doorway of the classroom.

“What’s it to you?” Amelia taunted.

“She’s my friend,” Alex replied.

“Really?” Amelia exclaimed. “Well, Tabby doesn’t need your protection. We go way back, to preschool, in fact. She knows I’m only stirring her.” Amelia glared at Alex.

“Well, it looks to me like it’s stirring she could do without,” Alex replied.

Amelia turned her focus back to Tabitha. “Oh, fishbait, it looks like you have a friend. Maybe more than a friend, which would be a first, wouldn’t it?”

“Shut up, Amelia,” Tabitha retorted, totally mortified for Alex. She glanced over to see how he had taken Amelia’s suggestive insults and tried to give a small smile in his direction that said sorry. Then she turned to walk down the stairs.

“Oops, looks like I hit a nerve,” Amelia mocked.

Tabitha kept walking down the stairs, cloaked in embarrassment, for Alex and for herself. She found it difficult to acknowledge him when he caught up to her. Finally, she summoned up the courage and the voice to speak. “Thank you for helping. I’m sorry about what she said.”

“Try not to let it get to you, kid. She’s just an immature bitch, that one. The novelty will wear off in a couple of weeks.”

“I wish, Alex. She’s been bullying me since we were five.”

“What a bummer,” Alex muttered, a grim expression transforming his face.

“Yeah, I thought I’d seen the last of her at the end of Year Twelve, but here she is, turning up like a bad penny to make my life unbearable again.”

“Just ignore her, Tabitha. Anyway, see you Thursday.”

“Okay,” Tabitha replied and headed to the bus stop. The last thing she wanted to think about was her next day at college, but that was all she did on the long ride home—the next dreaded meeting with Amelia and what she should tell her mother about her first day at college.

As she walked in the door, her mother pounced on her.

“Tell me, young lady,” she demanded.

“It’s great, Mom. Alex from the car club is in my class. We’ve already got an assignment too,” she informed her mom, trying to sound enthusiastic, but her words came out flat and dull.

“You don’t sound all that sure, dear.”

Tabitha tried to smile but instead started to cry. “It was good, Mom, but Amelia turned up in my class. I wish she hadn’t.”

She wiped the tears away and blew her nose with the tissue her mother handed her.

“I hope she’s not going to start up all that rubbish from school again. I mean, you’re adults now. I thought you said she would be going to university, becoming a doctor or something,” her mother said.

A dying sob squeezed her chest with a painful jerk as Tabitha shook her head. She didn’t have an answer to her mother’s question, but she muttered, “I don’t know, Mom. Maybe she didn’t get high enough grades.”

“Never mind, love. You go and get freshened up. I’m sure it will be fine,” her mother reassured her.

Tabitha trailed to her room, the weight of her dilemma heavy on her shoulders and burrowing into her heart. She already knew it was not going to be fine. And she had no other options. Her parents weren’t well-off, and they’d already paid her fees. They couldn’t afford to lose that money, or pay fees to go out of state to do her course at another college.

By the time she got out of the shower, a bitter anger had invaded her—anger that one person was so determined to destroy her opportunities. Strip her of choices in life. Damn Amelia Eckerton. How dare she be so cruel?

She’d heard her father arrive home some time ago, but she was reluctant to go downstairs and participate in the expected rehash of the day she wanted to forget—she didn’t want to see the worry on her parents’ faces, as she had last year when she’d struggled to cope with Amelia’s bullying. It made her feel sick that she’d caused most of their worry. They were good parents. They had always wanted the best for her, and they didn’t deserve this hassle with their only child.

With slow steps, she finally joined them in the dining room. Her mom, of course, had cooked her favorite dinner, ravioli with thick bolognese sauce. For her mom, food was the great healer, the timeless expression of love. Tabitha knew this, accepted this, but felt a deep-seated pain because all that ‘love’ had made her chubby.

Her dad smiled at her, but she saw the worry under that smile, and guilt swirled in her gut because she’d caused it. She would have to pretend it was all good.

“Mmm, this looks great, Mom,” she said, picking up her fork.

“You all right, honey?” her dad asked.

She looked up at her father and smiled. “I’m fine, Dad.”

“Do you think that nasty piece of work will give you more trouble?” he asked.

Tabitha shook her head. “Nah, Dad, I’m sure she’s over it by now.”

“One would hope so. You’re not children anymore,” he said and began to eat.

Tabitha’s thoughts whirled in her head. No matter what she’d said, Amelia definitely wasn’t over it, but it was time to change the subject.

“And you’ll never guess, Dad, who turned up in my class. Alex. Apparently he bombed out of vet school.”

“That’s not good, because that boy has brains.”

“He said he might go back, but for now he’s working at the stables.”

“Well, I hope he does. I’m sure his parents have made sacrifices for him to study.”

She knew her father wasn’t having a dig, but guilt niggled at her anyway.

* * * *

Thursday came around all too soon, and from the moment she opened her eyes, Tabitha felt tightness grab at her chest and the uneasy slop of her stomach. It got worse with each bus stop on the way, but she refused to give into her body’s desire for flight. Today she would have to fight her demons. She made a silent pact with herself, that she would look Amelia in the eyes and tell her to bugger off. Tabitha imagined herself saying it, but immediately felt anxious and tense. It was one thing to intend to do it, to plan to do it, and entirely another to actually do it to Amelia’s face.

Tabitha was one of the last to arrive in the classroom. Amelia lounged in the back row with her new friends. Leo, Alex’s new mate from the first day, smiled her way as she entered. She smiled back, feeling strengthened by the thought of having at least one friendly face in the room. She swallowed hard on her dry throat, took her pencils out, set up her tablet and switched off her phone, trying to appear competent and calm to anyone watching. But already on edge, she cringed inwardly when someone walked up behind her. Almost unconsciously she mentally curled in on herself, preparing for the taunts. But before they could be thrust at her, the lecturer walked in.

“Amelia, did you need to see me?” he asked.

“No,” Amelia muttered, immediately retreating toward the back of the room.

“Then I suggest you find a seat. We’ve heaps to get through today.”

Tabitha heaved a sigh of relief. Whew, saved by the bell—or the lecturer, actually.

Then Alex arrived, looking scruffy in what were obviously his work clothes. “Sorry I’m late, got held up at work,” he said to Kayne as he wound his way through the desks to his usual seat. He tapped Tabitha on the shoulder as he slipped behind her chair. She grinned up at him then watched him until he was seated. He was such a hunk.

Silence blanketed the room and Kayne began.

The subject matter was fascinating. Tabitha became so enthralled she almost forgot her nemesis lurking at the rear of the classroom. She loved animals with a passion. She had always dreamed of becoming a vet, but her obvious lack of academic ability had soon squashed that idea. She’d mourned her failure to be brainy enough for quite a while, but then decided a veterinary nurse qualification was well within her reach, and would satisfy her love of animals. She already worked one day a week at the local veterinary surgery—cleaning cages, comforting animals and refilling shelves. The clinic manager had promised her another day when she qualified, and perhaps a full-time position in the near future. In the meantime, she had her job Thursday night and every second Sunday afternoon at Mrs. Waldrop’s, a quaint little gift shop where you would be guaranteed to find that elusive gift for the person who had everything. Ivy Waldrop could be a formidable lady, with high expectations, but she had a heart of gold and had always treated Tabitha with kindness since she started working in the shop just before Christmas. The only problem was that the college campus was completely in the opposite direction and she had two buses to catch tonight to reach Mrs. Waldrop’s, and she wouldn’t dare be late.

* * * *

With only fifteen minutes left of class, Tabitha’s uneasiness returned. As the lecturer rattled on, right down to the last five minutes, she was almost tempted to ask to leave early, worried she would get caught up by Amelia and miss her bus. She had already packed everything into her backpack as the lecturer outlined the assignment. This needed to be completed in the next fortnight. It sounded interesting, but Tabitha couldn’t concentrate on it with Amelia about to scuttle out of the door in readiness to attack her. As they were dismissed, she snatched up her bag and bolted for the door, but Amelia and her friends had already slipped out into the passage.

“You look harassed, Tabitha. You gotta be somewhere?” Alex asked as he came up behind her at the door.

“Yes, I have two buses to catch to get to my part-time job,” she told him. “Time is cut fairly fine, and I’m afraid Amelia will hold me up.”

“Come on. I’ll play bodyguard,” Alex said and grinned down at her.

“Really?

Alex laughed then. “Don’t be so surprised, Tabitha. I have a younger sister, and she was bullied by a couple of kids in primary school. I really wanted to punch them in their noses, but Dad said no. Caitlin took up karate the next year and gained so much confidence knowing she could take them down if she chose they stopped hassling her.”

Tabitha was grateful for Alex’s company when, as expected, Amelia was waiting for her. But at the same time, embarrassment washed over her for Alex, who obviously felt obliged to help her. That quickly turned to mortification when Amelia started a sleazy verbal tirade directed at her, about him. Alex glared at Amelia but stayed silent, just putting his hand on Tabitha’s back to urge her forward. Tabitha lowered her gaze and hurried down the stairs, and Alex stood with her until the bus arrived, not commenting on the abuse. She made it to work with minutes to spare and knew if there were the slightest delay in the future, she would be late.

* * * *

The following Tuesday she drummed up the courage to ask Kayne if she could leave class ten minutes early on Thursdays, to catch the earlier bus. He understood, but warned if she missed anything or showed signs of failing, he would have to rescind his approval. Tabitha nodded, happy with the outcome as she went off to lunch.

She had just gotten settled back at her desk after the lunch break when Amelia waltzed into the room and, grinning wolfishly, veered so close to Tabitha’s desk that her bulky backpack swiped everything on the desk onto the floor.

Amelia paused for just a moment as the clatter echoed around the room. “Oops, so clumsy of me,” she muttered in a singsong voice before flicking her long hair over her shoulder and walking away.

Tabitha watched her take her place in the last row of desks before she slipped off her chair to gather up her scattered belongings. Her face blazed with humiliation under the curious scrutiny of the others and the quiet snickering coming from the back of the room. Alex wasn’t there yet and no one else offered to help. She was still flustered and unsettled when Alex hurried through the door just in time for the beginning of the lecture, and found it difficult to concentrate. By the end of the class, she felt totally confused about zoonotic diseases and ever so slightly panicky.

Alex came up behind her as she left the classroom. “So did that all make sense to you, Tabitha?”

She shook her head. “No. I’m having trouble concentrating today,” she replied, but refrained from telling him that she had been unsettled by Amelia’s little stunt. It was extremely embarrassing that she still couldn’t cope with Amelia’s teasing even though she was now an adult.

“Tell you what, why don’t I come over on Saturday and we can go over it together. I have track work at the stables in the morning, but I could be at your place by two.”

Overcome by pleasure, excitement and gratefulness, Tabitha grinned. She liked Alex, and his offer to share study was a great idea. “That would be great, Alex. Maybe we could talk about the assignment too. I have some ideas and some notes.”

“Great, Tabitha. See you Thursday.”

All the way home, Tabitha felt warm inside, and for a while it helped to ease the anxiety about Amelia.

No one was home when she got there and she went straight to her room to review the day’s lecture. Instead she found herself doodling Alex’s name across her lecture pad, and when she finally went to bed, she was no closer to understanding the contents of the lecture.

Tabitha lay awake and pondered why Amelia hated her so much. Surely it wasn’t just the debacle at the ballet concert thirteen years before. It had to be something else, but although Tabitha racked her brains, she couldn’t come up with one thing Amelia might hold against her. She planned out imaginary scenarios on how she could act the next time Amelia picked on her, but deep down she knew she would never have the courage to carry any of them through. The only time she had found the courage to fight back and used some of the strategies the counselor had given her, Amelia had called her a cheeky bitch and given her a physical beating, leaving her with a black eye and bruised ribs.