Pushing the Limits

I headed for the door. “Go ahead. What is she going to do? Rip my family apart? Put me in the foster care system? Continue to dig and you’ll see you’re too late.”

“When was the last time you saw your brothers, Noah?”

My hand froze on the doorknob.

“What if I could offer you increased supervised visitation?”

I let go of the doorknob and sat back down.

Echo (#ulink_e5ae0da4-9628-541f-8afb-5fca2e7b2d82)

If only I could wear gloves every moment of the day, I’d feel more secure, but the stupid dress code wouldn’t let me. Because of this, my wardrobe consisted of anything with long sleeves— the longer the better.

I clutched the ends of my sleeves and pulled them over my fingers, causing my blue cotton shirt to hang off my right shoulder. My freshman year, I would have freaked if people stared at my white skin and the occasional orange freckle. Now, I preferred for people to look at my bare shoulder instead of trying to catch a glimpse of the scars on my arms.

“Did she say who it was? I bet you it’s Jackson Coleman. I heard he’s failing math and if he doesn’t get his grades up he’ll lose his scholarship to college. God, I hope it is. He is so hot.” My best friend, Lila McCormick, took her first breath since I’d given her the rundown on my counseling session and the tutoring job Mrs. Collins spontaneously created. With her nonstop mouth and tight clothes, Lila was Eastwick High’s own version of Glinda the Good Witch. She floated in her own beautiful bubble spreading happiness and cheer.

As Lila moved her tray down the lunch line, the smell of pizza and French fries made my mouth water, but the nausea roiling in my stomach kept me from buying food. My heart thundered and I hugged my sketch pad closer to my chest. I couldn’t believe I was actually in the lunchroom. Lila and I had been best friends since preschool and the one thing she’d asked of me for Christmas was that I ditch the library and reclaim my old spot at our lunch table.

It may have sounded like an easy request, but it wasn’t. The last time I’d eaten lunch in the cafeteria was at the beginning of May during my sophomore year: the day before my entire world fell apart. Back then, no one stared at me or whispered.

“Who’s hot?” Natalie cut the line by sliding her tray between me and Lila. A group of guys behind us groaned at her boldness. As usual, she ignored them. Natalie was the second of two people who refused to treat me like a social pariah because of the gossip flying about me at school.

Lila pulled her sleek golden hair into a ponytail before paying the cashier. “Jackson Coleman. Echo is going to tutor some lucky guy and I’m guessing it might be him. Who would you like to add to our list of hot yet stupid boys?”

I followed them to the lunch table as Natalie’s eyes roamed the cafeteria, searching for the right combination. “Nicholas Green. He’s dumber than dirt, but I could eat him for dessert. If you’re tutoring him, Echo, think you could introduce me?”

“Introduce who to who?” asked Grace. Natalie and Lila took their seats and I hesitated.

Grace’s smile fell when she spotted me. She was the main reason why I didn’t want to return to the lunchroom. We were total best friends before the incident and, I guess, even after. She visited me every day in the hospital and at home during the summer, but when our junior year began and my social status took a nosedive, so did our friendship … in public that is. In private she claimed to love me like a sister. Everyone else at school treated me like I didn’t exist.

“Natalie to Nicholas Green.” Lila patted the seat between her and Natalie. Attempting to hide, I dropped into the chair, slouched and propped my sketch pad against the edge of the table.

The other girls whispered to each other as they glimpsed me. One giggled. From the time I’d come back to school, I never had a social shot. The rumors about why I was absent for the last month of my sophomore year ranged from pregnancy to rehab to attempted suicide. My gloves became the kindling and my memory loss the match. When I returned that fall, the rumors exploded into a firestorm.

Lila continued her explanation. “Echo’s going to be tutoring some dumb hottie. We’re trying to guess who it will be.”

“Well, don’t hold out on us, Lila. Who is Echo tutoring?” Grace’s eyes flickered from Lila to the girls on her squad sitting at the table. When we’d returned for junior year, Grace had found out she had a shot at making head cheerleader—a difficult feat since she’d always hovered in the periphery of popular in that crowd. I’d assumed things between us would go back to normal once she was voted in. I’d been mistaken.

“Ask Echo.” Lila’s teeth crunched into the apple, her hardened gaze locked on Grace. Our table became eerily silent as the most beautiful girl at school openly defied the most popular girl at school. A lull fell over the cafeteria as the student body prepared to watch the showdown in progress. I would have sworn a tumbleweed blew past the table and that weird Western whistle song played on the loudspeaker.

I gave Lila’s foot a nudge, begging her in my mind to answer for me, instead of forcing Grace to acknowledge me in front of other people. Seconds ticked by as neither flinched in the stare-down.

I couldn’t take it. “I don’t know. I meet him this afternoon.” Mrs. Collins didn’t want to say who I’d be tutoring. She’d mumbled something about smoothing over a few details with him before we met.

Movement and chatter resumed in the cafeteria. The muscles in Grace’s face relaxed and she took a relieved breath before taking stock of the reaction of her public friends. “I’ll play guess the stupid hunk.” She sent me a private wink. For the billionth time, I wished my life could go back to normal.

When Grace threw out a name the rest of the group also decided to play. I sketched Grace as they talked. Her new short blond haircut framed her face perfectly. I listened to their name-dropping and the new school gossip that accompanied their guesses.

“Maybe Echo’s tutoring Luke Manning,” Lila said with a not-so-gentle nudge of my arm. “He fits hunk and less-than-bright.”

I rolled my eyes and did my best to fix the dark line her nudge had created on my drawing. Lila held on to the false hope that Luke, my boyfriend from my life before, still harbored feelings for me. She substantiated her claim with made-up stories of how he watched me when I wasn’t paying attention.

“Luke and Deanna broke up over the winter break,” said Grace. “Deanna says she broke up with him. Luke says he broke up with her. Who knows if we’ll ever find out the truth?”

“Who would you believe, Echo?” Natalie asked. Gotta give her credit. She wanted me to participate in the conversation, regardless of whether I wanted to be included.

I focused on shading the shadow Grace’s hair created against her ear. After meeting Luke in freshman English, I’d dated him for a year and a half. This made me the table’s Luke expert. Since our breakup, every table with a female contained a Luke expert. “Hard to say. I broke up with Luke and he didn’t claim any differently, but he’s changed a lot since then.”

“Noah Hutchins,” Natalie said.

I stopped sketching, confused about what Noah had to do with Luke. “What?”

“Guess the hunk, remember? Noah Hutchins is definitely hot. I’d tutor him.” Lila stared over at the stoner table, practically drooling. How could she swoon over the guy who’d made fun of me?

Grace’s mouth gaped. “And take the social hit? No way.”

“I said I’d tutor him, not take him to prom. Besides, from what I’ve heard, quite a few girls have ridden that train and loved every second of it.”

Grace glanced at Noah, eyes wandering up, then down. “You’re right. He’s hot, and rumor has it he’s only into one-nighters. Though Bella Monahan tried to force a relationship. She followed him around like a pathetic puppy dog. He wanted nothing to do with her if it didn’t involve the backseat of his car.”

Lila loved dirt. “She lost her boyfriend, her virginity, her reputation and her self-respect in less than a month. That’s why she transferred to another school.”

Guys like Noah Hutchins ticked me off. He used girls, used drugs and had made me feel like crap this morning. Not that I should be surprised. I’d had a couple of classes with him last semester. He’d stride into the room like he owned the earth and smirk when girls fell all over themselves in his presence. “What a jerk.”

As if he heard me from across the room, his dark eyes met mine. His shaggy brown hair fell over them, but I could tell he was looking at me. The stubble on his face moved as he smiled. Noah had muscles, looks and trouble stalking him. Somehow, he made jeans and a T-shirt look dangerous. Not that I was into girl-using stoners. Yet, I took another peek at him while sipping my drink.

“Harsh words, Echo. You’re not talking about me, are you?” A chair scraped the floor. Luke flipped it around so he could straddle it between Natalie and Grace. Come freaking on. Luke and I had barely spoken a word to each other since we broke up sophomore year. Why was everyone pushing me into social mode today?

“No,” said Lila. “We talked about you earlier. Echo was calling Noah Hutchins a jerk.” I kicked her under the table. She sent me a glare in return.

“Hutchins?” Luke Manning: six foot two, built like a freight train with black hair, blue eyes, captain of the basketball team, hot and full of himself. To my horror, he sized Noah up. “What’s stoner boy done to deserve your wrath?”

“Nothing.” I returned to my sketch pad. My cheeks burned when one of Grace’s public friends mumbled something about my weirdness. Why couldn’t Lila, Natalie and Luke just leave me alone? The gossip only became worse when I crept out of my shell.

Unfortunately, Lila chose to ignore my red cheeks and my warning kick. “He made fun of Echo this morning, but don’t worry, she told him off.”

The pencil in my hand bowed from my tighter grip as I fought the urge to yank Lila’s gorgeous hair out of her head. My teachers and Mrs. Collins were so wrong. Interacting with my peers stunk.

Luke’s eyes narrowed. “What did he say to you?”

I stomped on Lila’s toes and stared straight at her. “Nothing.”

“He told her that she had an effed-up name and then did the stupid ‘echo’ thing people did in elementary school,” said Lila. Oh, God, I wanted to murder my best friend.

“You want me to talk to him?” Luke stared at me with a familiar hint of possessiveness. Both Grace and Natalie smiled like Cheshire cats. I refused to look at Lila, who bounced in her seat. Now I would never hear the end of her fantasies about Luke and me getting back together.

“No. He’s a stupid guy who said a stupid thing. He probably doesn’t even remember saying it.”