Chapter 17

I try to see the best in people, I really do.

Maybe that was why I didn't really thought of the possibility of this happening.

When I got to school the next day, heads turned as I walked past people.

And no, it wasn't of the good kind.

It wasn't that "Oh, who's that girl, she's hot" kind of looks. It was more of the "Her? Really?" kind.

I didn't know what it was about until I got to my locker to find Kimmy there, already waiting for me. She was wearing ripped jeans and a tucked in shirt, her backpack slung over one shoulder as she leaned against my shoulder.

She would lean back on it and push herself off it and repeat the motion several times, revealing how anxious she really was.

I walked to her and didn't get a chance to greet her properly before she rushed to me and met me mid-way, grabbing my arms. "Are you okay?"

"Am I what?" I ask her, dumbfounded.

"Did anyone say anything to you? Did anyone harass you?" She asked me.

I frowned, shaking my head. "What are you talking about? Why would anyone harass me?"

Kimmy paused, leaning back to look at me. "You don't know?"

"I don't know what?" I asked her again, feeling stupid.

Kimmy shook her head and dragged me to my locker, away from the crowd of people loitering in the halls. I unlocked my locker and placed some of my books inside as Kimmy paced beside me.

"Uh, okay..." Kimmy finally stopped pacing and faced me. She hesitated for a few seconds, her fingers fidgeting, before finally spitting out, "I don't know how to tell you this but yeah, your exchange with Alex yesterday basically sparked some rumors."

I drew my eyebrows together and formed a frown. "Huh?"

"The whole..." Kimmy made some motions with her hands that looked something like giving and taking.

"What?" I asked again.

"The plastic bag and paper bag you guys exchanged yesterday during lunch." Kimmy finally said explicitly, frustrated.

"Ah.." I finally nodded, getting it. "Yeah, what about it?"

"People started talking and they think you guys.. You know.." She trailed off, moving her hands in a circle, expecting me to catch on.

"I don't understand." I looked at her blankly. She groaned as if she was in pain from how dumb I was being.

"People think you and Alex fucked!" She practically yelled out.

My eyes bugged out of its sockets and threatened to fall out. "What?!" I yelled out just as loudly.

I covered my mouth when I realized how loud I was being and looked around to see if people were watching.

Indeed, people were watching.

I shrunk under their stares and fell silent.

"You see what I mean now?" Kimmy whispered in my ear, looking at the people staring at me too.

I nodded furiously. I get it now.

I never thought that people would assume something like this out of a simple exchange between two people and I think the same could be said for Alex. We both didn't anticipate it even though, in hindsight, we probably should have. I guess if you think about it, it's not that surprising that people would get the wrong idea from the exchange.

I mean, okay, fair enough, swapping clothes? I guess it's understandable that it would spark some rumors.

But how the hell did they know that we were exchanging clothes? The plastic bag that had my clothes in it was a black one and the paper bag I had put Alex's clothes in was opaque.

I shook my head vigorously. It wasn't time to think about how this came to be. I need to do something to extinguish the fire before it starts burning everything down to ashes. I chewed on my bottom lip and thought of how to stop the rumors from spreading around the school like wildfire.

A couple of students passed by me and I heard them talking to each other, oblivious that I was standing only a few steps away from them.

"Have you heard?" One of them asked the other. "Apparently, Emily Waterhouse is fucking Alexander West."

Her friend's eyes widened considerably, looking at her. "You mean THE Alexander West? Emily Waterhouse? Isn't she part of the nerdy group of the seniors?"

"She's not really nerdy, just not as social I guess. I don't think I've seen her name in the ranks." The first girl replied.

"She is in the ranks, by the way. 4th rank." I piped up, stepping closer to them to be heard. "And, she did not sleep with Alexander West. That's slander."

Both girls jumped 5 feet in the air at the sound of my voice. "Jesus!" One of them said breathlessly, hand over her chest.

"Nope, just the so-called Emily Waterhouse you conveniently mentioned while passing by." I smiled sweetly.

The looks on their faces after my last remark was a mixture of discomfort, awkwardness and sheepish. But they didn't show any intentions to take it back, they gave me an awkward smile and nodded slightly before scurrying off, whispering to each other in hushed voices.

"Yep, congrats, you'll be labelled as an eavesdropping psycho by the end of the day on top of the whole shit that's going down." Kimmy sighed from behind me, coming up to stand beside me and pat my shoulder.

My shoulders slumped in defeat. "What do I do, though? I can't just sit around and do nothing here, I gotta at least try to stop the rumor from getting out of hand. You know how it is with words getting passed around, by the end of the day I'll probably be labelled something worse than just 'the girl who fucked Alexander West."

Kimmy tsked, shaking her head at me. "No, no. You're the girl that got to fuck Alexander West."

"You say that as if it's a good thing." I scowled at her.

"Is it not?" Kimmy raised an eyebrow questioningly at me.

"It is?" I asked.

"Who the fuck wouldn't want to fuck that hunk of a man?"

Despite the rhetoric question, I still raised my hand and answered with, "Me."

Kimmy grimaced, looking at me as if I was mentally challenged. "Something might actually be wrong with you."

I shrugged. I just couldn't imagine doing that because all I see when I look at Alexander West is the boy that I was close friends with, someone that I saw as my protector.

"Whatever, there's not much that you can do now. Let's just get to class first and see if there's anything we can do to mitigate the situation later." Kimmy suggested, linking her arms with mine and dragging me to class.

I opened my mouth to argue but closed it afterwards, realizing that she had a point. There wasn't much that I could do.

But it didn't stop me from worrying about what happened and what I was probably going to have to face soon.

And I was right.

The entire day of being in school, surrounded by prying eyes, made me paranoid every time someone would speak in hushed voices or whispered in their friends' ears. It just seems like everyone was talking about me.

Halfway through the day, I just couldn't handle it anymore and ran out of the building in search of a quiet place to be alone with my thoughts.

At least that was what I had convinced myself while running to the one place I can think of that Alex might be at. I haven't heard anything about Alex denying the rumors we were in the entire day and I wanted to ask him why he hasn't done anything about it. I was sure that if he had said something about it, it would've killed the fire instantly but he just hasn't and I wanted to know why.

When I finally got to the spot where I accidentally ran into Alex the other day, I felt my heart fall when I didn't see anyone there and just sunk to a crouch, holding my head as I tried to think of what to do.

God, I want nothing more than to disappear in this moment. I didn't want to be under the spotlight anymore. Every eyes that land on me seems to be scrutinizing me through a microscope, picking out my flaws and weaknesses.

The smell of a smoking cigarette started to infiltrate my senses. I turned my head and caught a stronger whiff. I opened my eyes and frowned at the direction it was coming from before a thought occurred to me.

Could it be?

I straightened up and slowly walked towards the corner. I peeked around the wall and caught a familiar figure standing there, a lit cigarette between their fingers, smoke curling up from the tip and floating over their heads too as they tilted their heads and blew some more out into the air over them.

It was a familiar figure but not the one that I was expecting, dare I say, hoping, to see.

I stood there, stunned at what I was seeing.

"Lily?" I felt my lips move but I wasn't sure that I was speaking. My voice didn't sound like my own.

My sister spun around and saw me, before cursing. Her face was drained of all its colors the second that her eyes landed on me and widened in shock.

"Fuck." She quickly threw her cigarette to the ground a few feet behind her but who was she kidding, of course I've seen it already.

"What..." I couldn't form a sentence as my eyes went between her face and the cigarette that she had flung to the ground.

My mouth stayed hung open as I tried to come up with a coherent sentence to demand an explanation from her.

After a second, Lily finally exploded, "What? Yes, I smoke, okay. You got a problem with that?"

I felt my speech come back to me as her last words hit me. "Got a problem with that? You got a problem with that?"

I can feel myself get heated as I repeated the words that she said. "Are you being serious, Lil?"

Lily stared me dead in the eyes, unflinching, although I could see the panic in her eyes from being caught.

"What's so wrong about smoking anyways? What? Just because Mom and Dad are against it? Like how they're against having guys stay over at our place? Stop being such a fucking hypocrite, Em!"

I gaped at her, feeling so much rage that I didn't know where to begin, I can't choose what bullshit I wanted to address first. "This is why mom and dad treats me like a fucking wild horse when all I've ever done was stick by their rules. And what? I'm a hypocrite? How the fuck am I a hypocrite?"

Lily rolled her eyes, "Oh come on Em, everyone at school has heard by now that you're fucking Alexander West."

My eyes involuntarily widened slightly at that. I felt a pang and I felt as if I was shrinking in size despite the false accusation. The thought that my own sister would believe these rumors that have been flying around the school and actually think that of me. If even my sister thinks this way, then who the hell was going to believe her when she denies these rumors?

"Do u rly think that?" My voice had turned soft and weak, a stark contrast to the previous loud and hard tone that I used.

"I mean u didnt rly leave any room for doubts did you?" Lily scoffed, turning around and picking up the cig that she had thrown on the ground earlier. She flicked the cig uncaringly with the tip of her finger as the burnt flakes floated to the ground and brought the other end to her lips, taking a drag.

I was tongue tied at the sound of her carelessness and the sight of her audacity. The anger that I felt made me want to scream and shout and cry all at the same time. I could feel my eyes watering and Lily watched me with a frown, opening her mouth to probably call me a sensitive bitch who can't own up to her own mistakes.

But before she could even say what she wanted to, a voice came from behind me, making both of us turn to see who it was. "We didn't fuck."

The second I heard his voice, I didn't actually need to turn around to know who he was.

Plus, I didn't fail to notice the choice of words he used, "we", who else could it be?

Lily chuckled sardonically as Alex stood a few feet behind me, keeping his eyes on Lily. "Save it for someone who cares, dickwad." My sister spat before she finally threw her burnt cig to the ground for the second time and snuffed the shortened thing with the bottom of her shoes before walking off.

Both Alex and I simply watched her as she walked off, heading back into the building in silence.

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