“Oh, are you accepting openings inside your gaping and often-visited vagina?” I shot back quickly.
Colin pulled her back to his side with a roll of his eyes and they walked on.
“Nice.” Billy gave me a high-five. “Is today the day you’re going to tell me why you hate Colin?”
“Nope.” Curiosity finally got the best of me and I reached across and snagged a piece of the yellow concoction on Billy’s plate, discovering it was actually some kind of cheesy potatoes.
“Come on,” Billy whined. “I know about your,” he stuck his hands in the air and made large, dramatic air quotes, “‘tutoring.’ It can’t be worse than that, right?”
I leered at him. “Let it go.”
He held up his hands. “Fine.”
The rest of the day passed at a snail’s pace until I was finally sitting in physics with the clock counting down to the end of the day.
“I know we only have a few minutes left, so please turn to page 196 in your books so we can go over your assignment for the night.”
Mr. Val Kepler, the 11th grade physics teacher, gave me a quick glance and I winked back at him, opening my book and turning it to a totally random page. He and I both knew I wouldn’t be expected to do the homework on page 196. He was six solid feet of a man who could have been undercover as a high school teacher to study for a role in his next movie, or porno. He had short dark hair in an undercut and a balbo goatee. His eyes were a mysterious gray, and his skin had a natural tan to it. He was stunning. He explained the assignment masterfully, which I challenged him to do while sitting under my lustful gaze, but he didn’t flinch. The bell rang, and all of the students packed up their books and followed out of the classroom one by one until only the two of us remained.
“Miss Marquette, was there something I can do for you?” He sat at his desk and started flipping through a binder, pretending to be uninterested with my presence.
I stood up from my desk, walked over to the door to shut it, even closing the small black shudder that covered the slim, peer-through window. I pressed the button to lock the door and then sauntered my way over to Val’s desk. I seated myself on the top, and crossed my legs over one another right next to his head.
“Well, I don’t think I’m going to finish tonight’s assignment,” I hummed. “I was wondering if there was something we could do.”
“Unless you’re willing to do extra credit, I’m afraid there’s nothing we can do.” He kept his eyes trained on his binder with impressive focus.
“You’re sure?” I lifted my sweater over my head and dropped it to the side of my desk, leaving me in just my black camisole. “Nothing?”
Val looked up at me then, his eyes instantly landing on my large bust forcing my cami to the max. He stood up and placed his arms on either side of me. “Where did you learn to behave this naughty young lady?”
I grabbed Val’s tie. “I had a good tutor.”
Val pressed himself against me, touching his lips to my cheek before working his way down my neck. A wandering hand glided up my thigh until it could hop up to push at the edge of my cami. I wrapped my arms around Val’s neck, feeling the burning inside me churn hotter and hotter. He started to push me back to lay on his desk when my phone cried out from my backpack.
I looked over at it and pushed on Val’s shoulder. “My phone.”
Val lifted from the place he’d latched onto on my shoulder. “Just ignore it.”
“It could be my parents. You know they freak out when I don’t answer.” Val tried to keep going, but I smacked the back of his head and he stood up with an irritated growl. “Just grab it.”
He walked over to my backpack and fished my phone out and handed it to me. It was in fact my parents, and I was only just noticing that they’d actually texted several times before the phone call. “I have to call back.”
Val rolled his eyes and slumped back down in his desk chair. “If someone walks in and sees me with a boner, that’s on you.”
“The door’s locked.” I dialed my mom’s number and waited for her to answer. “Hey mom. Sorry, my phone was still in Do Not Disturb from school.”
“Come home immediately.” Her voice was shaking and filled with urgency.
“Mom? Are you okay?” I looked at Val and his irritated expression had shifted towards a concerned one.
“I’m okay, but you need to come home immediately. It’s an emergency.”
3
Tatiana
I hurried down the couple of blocks to my house as fast as I could. My parents never demanded anything of me, so I took their order for me to get home immediately as a bad omen. I unlocked the front door and walked inside, immediately getting rushed by my mom and pulled into a strangling hug.
“Mom.” I pushed against her. “Mom, what’s wrong? You’re scaring me.” She stepped back from me and her eyes were red and swollen. I touched her cheek. “Hey. What’s going on?”
She took a deep sniffle in with tears quickly rushing in to replace the ones she’d attempted to wipe away. “Ryan Undinger was murdered.”
My whole body turned to stone in place. “W-what?”
My mom nodded. “And Helena is in the hospital in critical condition. They were attacked in their restaurant.”
My jaw dropped. I looked over her shoulder at my dad who’d snuck his way into the entryway and was standing behind her quietly. His face was equally anguished. “I, um…” I let out a breath. “This is a joke, right?” Tears of my own were gathering in the corners of my eyes.
My mom tugged me back against her, followed by my dad, who wrapped his arms around us both. “It’s not,” he said sadly.
Ryan and Helena were Colin’s parents and two of my parents’ closest friends. They’d all gone to high school together and Ryan and my dad played on the Orchard Mesa varsity team together. It had just been common knowledge amongst them that when they eventually had children, those children would become best friends; that was Colin and I. In fact, my dad maintained to this day that my mom didn’t want kids until right after she found out Helena was pregnant, after which point she chased the dream until she eventually conceived her own a few months later. I’d spent whole weeks with the Undingers before. They used to always take me on vacation with them, saying that I was family. They’d been like a second set of parents to me growing up. I suddenly hated myself for not seeing them again even after Colin and I grew apart, and even worse for how Colin and I’s separation kept my parents from seeing them as often.
We released from our family hug and walked into the living room where the dreadful story of the burglar who’d broken into the restaurant they owned while it was full of patrons and tried to hold the place up. Ryan, ever fearless, jumped into action to protect his business, customers, and wife, and got shot, while Helena, who tried to finish what her husband had started, was able to disarm the thief, but hit her own head in the process. Ryan was pronounced dead on arrival and Helena was rushed to the hospital where she was still in critical condition, and it wasn’t looking good.