The Impossible Vastness Of Us. Samantha Young

Чтение книги онлайн.

       CHAPTER 4

      HE WAS EATING DOUGHNUTS. They were fresh and I could smell them. Carla had brought them.

      My stomach clenched painfully.

      “I can’t keep eating ’em if she’s gonna look at me like a feral cat,” Carla complained. “Just fucking give her some food, Ed.”

      “Little bitch isn’t getting a thing until I say so. She knows what she did.” He glared at me.

      I didn’t know what I did.

      I just knew it didn’t take much.

      “Well, she’s freaking me out.” Carla shoved the box of doughnuts away.

      “Fine.” He stood up abruptly and grabbed up the box of baked goods. Eyes on me the whole time, he strode across the trailer to the trash can, stood on the pedal that opened the lid and one by one he dropped the doughnuts inside.

      I hated him.

      I tightened my arms around my knees and shoved my face against my skin to block him out.

      “I gotta go to work.”

      “She ain’t going to school?”

      “Nah. They’d feed her.”

      “She could just eat while you’re gone.”

      “I emptied every inch of the place.” He laughed, a wheezy sound I hated just as much as I hated him.

      “You’re sick,” she said.

      If she thought so, why didn’t she do something?

      I felt a stinging burn against my head, the crack of his hand echoing in my ears. I winced and looked up at him.

      He sneered down at me. “Don’t move a muscle or I’ll know.”

      I nodded, so relieved when they were gone.

      I waited a while before I dragged my tired body over to the trash can. I pulled the doughnuts out, wiping cigarette ash and some spicy sauce off a few of them before I shoveled them into my mouth. And I cried the whole time.

      * * *

      By the end of second period the next day, I knew bulimic had been added to my roster of fictional problems after a girl I didn’t know leaned across her desk as I finished an energy bar before Calculus 2 started.

      “Bryce Jefferson told me all about you so I need advanced warning if you’re going to puke that up, because I don’t handle vomit very well.” She wrinkled her nose at me.

      I blinked at her, confused for a few seconds, before it dawned on me that Eloise had told Bryce about my kitchen escapade the night before, and Bryce had clearly told everyone else. It was bad enough the whole thing had given me nightmares I didn’t want—I didn’t need this crap.

      “I’m not bulimic. But it’s good to know you are so concerned about a possibly life-threatening disorder affecting a classmate. You should win an award or something for most compassionate student. No, wait. I mean the most self-centered dipshit award.”

      Her mouth fell open in outrage and she shifted her entire desk away from mine with a screech across the hardwood floors.

      That probably wasn’t the best way for me to go about making new friends.

      As it turned out I shouldn’t have worried too much about alienating one of my classmates. By Day Four at Tobias Rochester, Eloise’s friends had done that for me. I had not made one friend and the only classmate that spoke to me at all was Gabe, and that was to flirt with me briefly in the cafeteria. It didn’t make me feel too special, however, because it became clear as he mingled with other students that Gabe flirted with a lot of girls.

      I’d also exhausted all avenues regarding extracurricular activities. It turned out every team was full—the debate team, yearbook, events committee... I’d even asked about the math and science teams but apparently only geniuses were allowed and I was rejected because of my mere above-average brain. As for athletics, they had no soccer team so I was already at a disadvantage. I couldn’t play basketball or lacrosse, I couldn’t fence or dance (at least not at the level Tobias Rochester dance team could), I couldn’t sail, row or play rugby or squash. The only thing I was good at was running but the cross-country team was full, which left me with just plain old running. Not exactly a team sport but I signed up, anyway.

      Tobias Rochester was a small and competitive school. If you didn’t get your foot in the door of a team the first day of the school year it was doubtful you ever would.

      The only other extracurricular options left to СКАЧАТЬ