Chapter 82
Mrs Albert reached for the teapot, "Some tea?"
There was a pause.
"I KISSED ZENON!" I blurted, unable to keep the secret any more. I had to get it off my chest, "WE KISSED LAST NIGHT AND IT WAS COMPLETELY UNPLANNED!"
Mrs Albert froze, her hand still on the teapot. It continued to pour hot tea out of the snout, spilling over the table.
Too much tea.
Zenon, who was never really shocked by anything, had his lips parted in shock. Jake hardly moved a muscle.
At least my conscience had calmed.
Everyone else was about to go crazy.
Spilt tea dripped off the coffee table and stained the plush carpet. For the first time, Mrs Albert did not care.
She stared at me, sitting in the center of the couch. "You kissed Zenon. But aren't you about to go on a date with Jake?"
"It's a love triangle, mum," Charlotte said from her armchair.
"I don't approve of the shape," she responded.
"Jake asked her out first," Zenon explained.
"Are you recording this, Charlotte?"
"I'm just sending this to Nicole. She loves this stuff."
"I asked her out on a date because I'm a gentleman, unlike Zenon," Jake snapped.
"I've known her longer than you. If you count all the times we've hung out-"
"Doesn't count."
"Everyone needs to calm down," Mr Albert said, rubbing his temple.
"She's sabotaging her own date," Zenon smirked, satisfied.
I didn't know if there was any way I could exit the conversation... the situation... my entire life right now.
"So, um..." Jake cleared his throat and turned to me, "Did you like it?"
It was my turn to be shocked. Was that really the question to ask right now?!
"Go on," Zenon urged, "Did you?"
"Don't you dare talk!" Jake yelled over me at Zenon.
"You want to fight instead?" Zenon threatened back.
I squirmed in between the two of them.
"YOU WENT BEHIND MY BACK-"
"I KNEW HER FIRST!"
"I LIKED HER!"
"ONLY BECAUSE I DO!"
They stood up to face each other, neck to neck. I saw the veins on Jake's neck and Zenon's fists clench. Suddenly, a punch was thrown that hit Zenon in the jaw. He threw a right hook into Jake's rib. Jake doubled over and they wrestled to the floor.
Mrs Albert started screaming and Charlotte stood on her chair, to avoid getting pulled into it.
The table shook and a framed photo of the family crashed to the ground. The boys rolled over it a second later and we heard the glass crack.
"GET OFF HIM!" Mr Albert's boot came in between them both, "You two compete over everything!"
I'm not a thing.
He bent over in his fancy shirt and pulled the boys up with brute strength.
"If your throwing arm is hurt Zenon, I'm going to hurt you myself," he threatened and grabbed Zenon's right arm to inspect it.
I was surprised that Mr Albert's first thought was basketball... not their safety. Jake was breathing heavily, rubbing his rib cage. Mrs Albert was almost in tears. She ran to get a first aid kit.
But she never went far. Instead, we heard her call out to all of us in the living room.
"Look at the house across the street!"
My house?
Outside the window, we could see my front door. Spray paint was all over the door and the brick wall. The following words were sprayed in large letters:
$1 H-OO-KER INSIDE
My date with Jake never happened. I excused myself from the Albert house and, in great shame, I went back to mine. Mrs Albert didn't even look at me.
Zenon had a bruised jaw and Jake was injured in his rib cage. It was my fault. The boys offered to help clean the spray paint on my wall, but their father silenced them in a heartbeat. So, I left them to their own situation.
And walked towards mine.
$1 H-OO-KER INSIDE
There was no question that the same person who had written the threatening letter was responsible for this. The blackmailer. Now, also a vandalizer.
I hoped my mother wouldn't come home before I cleaned this off. I hoped not many people had passed by and seen it. I didn't want to cause my family more humiliation than I already did.
I filled a bucket with soap water and took an old cloth. I set the bucket outside, next to one of the garden gnomes, and started to scrub my wall. It took almost an hour to get the paint off. My arm was weak from the effort. I had cried at one point as well.
But after I was done, I was sure of one thing.
I was going to end this blackmail one way or another.
I vowed to that.
The next day began like any other. Preston Oakes High School filled with students: some half asleep, some energetic for the day.
No one expected to see the posters hanging across the walls. They were printed and pasted across lockers and slapped on the back of doors. Hundreds of copies of the same photo.
Candace half-naked with a $1 bill in her b-ra.
Passed out for the whole school to see.
And under the picture were the words: $1 Entry
"Who did this?!" Zenon yelled, a poster scrunched up in his fist.
Zenon confronted Bianca and the girls. His guy friends backed him up. They were terrified. Around them, a crowd had gathered.
No one expected the reaction it would stir in Zenon. He was not about to let anyone get away with this.
"Me. I did it."