behind me as I rush out of the classroom, and I want to grab him, punch him, kick him, SCREAM into his stupid face, but I barely have the strength to push open the double doors.
“May!” He has the audacity to say my name, like he thinks he has the right. “Hey! May! Wait up.”
I am just going to ignore him. I’m not sure where I’m going—definitely not to the nurse’s office, which is always the most useless place in every school—but wherever it is, I need to figure it out, fast, and get the hell away from this shit. I’m trapped in a hallway of lockers that’s just like every other hallway of lockers in every other goddamn hellhole high school on the planet. You’d think before they sent us here, they could have at least attempted to make this place look different from Carter. You’d think that, but you’d be wrong, because the public-school system doesn’t give a shit what happens to you when you’re a leftover.
“Hey! I have your bag.” Zach’s behind me, panting.
I whirl around, hair whipping out, and grab my bag from his outstretched hands. “Great. Thanks. Bye.” I turn and keep moving down the empty hallway.
“Wait.” He’s still here, breathing down my neck. He’s really testing the limits of my self-control right now. “I want you to know. When we met the other night, I didn’t know…who you are. Not that I wouldn’t have talked to you, but, like, I wasn’t trying to trick you into liking me. Or being nice to me. I didn’t know…”
“So instead you tried to sneak into class late? So, what, I wouldn’t figure out who your mom is? Who you are?” I stop myself from continuing. This guy isn’t worth my words.
He groans. “No. I mean, sort of, I guess, but I wanted…I thought maybe if you got to know me instead of my last name…I had a good time with you the other night. I haven’t had fun talking to another person in so long….”
“I don’t care.” Why won’t he leave me the fuck alone?
“And you obviously figured it out now. That I’m…that my mom is…the lawyer. For the guy.”
I stop in my tracks. Rhetoric matters to me, even if it doesn’t to him. “?‘The guy’? You mean the shooter? You mean David fucking Ecchles, the psychopath who killed my brother and five of my friends and my favorite teacher? Who murdered them all for no reason?”
Zach’s face falls. Good.
I’m up in his face now, breathing hard. My hands are balled into fists. “He’s not the guy, you asshole. He doesn’t even deserve to be called a guy—it makes him sound too human.”
“Yeah…I know. I’m sorry. I wasn’t…I wasn’t trying to play it down. Who he is. What he did. I know…” He runs a hand through his hair. “No. I don’t know. I can’t imagine. And my mom…” His face shuts down. “My mom is not someone I like to think about.”
“Good for you, that you have that privilege. I think about her. I think about her every. single. fucking. day. Every single day, and every single night as I try to sleep. I dream her face. Hers, and Jordan’s, and the face of that fucking psychopath. Sometimes they all get mixed together. Sometimes Jordan’s face isn’t his…it’s one of theirs. Those are the worst.” I swallow hard. I’m trembling. I’m saying way too much, more than I’ve said to my therapist, more than I’ve said to Lucy. Why do I suddenly have diarrhea of the mouth?
He shakes his head. “No—no—that’s not what I meant. I don’t like to think about her, but I still have to. Of course I do. She’s my mom. And she ruined my life.” He pauses, like he’s trying to decide whether to continue talking. I start backing away from him. “No, please wait. You have to know—I’m not my mom. We might share the same DNA—the same last name—but I’m not her. I don’t agree with her choices. I’m not responsible for her actions. I never asked for this.”
My heart clenches. I shake my head. “Fine. You didn’t. But neither