Senseless Attraction by Lila Rose

race you upstairs,’ and forget that I was even in the house?
          “Rosita, what is it?” Kane asked.
          “Nothing, Mr Kane. Excuse me for a second.” The door to the library opened and Rosita came in.
          “Donna, I…”
          I didn’t hear the rest, what caught my undivided attention was the look on Rosita’s face; she looked upset and concerned. She closed the door with one hand and had a phone in the other.
          “Rosita, what is it?” I asked panicked, my hand going to my throat.
          “It is for you, Senorita.” She held out the phone. I took it with a shaking hand and held it up to my ear. Rosita stepped closer, her arm going around my waist.
          “Hello?”
          “Oh, Sky, honey.” I recognized the voice straight away. It was Barbra Keating, my Momma’s best friend from her work.
          Oh no, this couldn’t be good if she was ringing me here.
          “It’s your Momma, honey. There was a robbery at the store. Oh, honey, he—the man had a gun…”
          Thankfully, Rosita was there, or else I would have fallen to the floor. “No, no, no. Not Momma, please…”
          “Sky, hon, listen. She’s been shot; she’s at the hospital. I’m here now, but—hon, I don’t know… she’s being operated on now. Come here, honey; she’ll want to see you when she gets out.”
          If she gets out. No! I will not think like that.
          “I’ll be there soon.”
          “Good girl; the Base Hospital. I’ll see you soon.” 
          I passed the phone to Rosita’s waiting hand. Had I even hung it up? I didn’t know.
          Damn it to hell. Oh shit, my Momma had been shot.
          How could this happen?
          Not to her. She didn’t need this. Damn it, she had better pull through.
          I wanted to cry. I wanted to sink to the ground and sob. But that would get me nowhere, and when I couldn’t cry, I got angry. That was better than breaking down.
          “I have to go,” I uttered, my fist clenched at my sides.
          “Yes, go, child. I am sorry.”
          I nodded. Without thinking, I opened the door, picked up the bottom of my dress so I wouldn’t trip over, and ran. I kept running, ignoring Donna yelling, “What is she doing here?” Ignoring Kane asking me, “Skylar, what’s wrong?”
          What was wrong?
          A million things.
          I didn’t stop, even when I heard the words that nearly broke me again from Rosita, “Her Momma has been shot while working.” And Kane’s audible answer of, “Shit.”
          No, I kept moving out the front door, out into the cold night air.
     

 

     

 

     
     
    O n a sigh, I wondered what was going to be in store for me today at Rushton High School. Probably something disastrous, like the last couple of days, since I was klutzy enough to trip over my own two feet and land on the floor at the feet of Miss Cummins and Mr Haydn. I’d had everyone’s attention and my usual invisible geekiness was no longer working. All I heard every day since then was that I was falling for Mr Haydn, or that I was trying to look up Miss Cummins’s skirt.
    Of course, I was doing neither. What I had actually been doing was trying to make enough room in the hallway for Tristan Davis and his crew to walk past. It was their teasing of others in the first place I wanted to stay away from. They were the worst, especially Tom Sinker, Hunter Gresham, and Aaron Kellie; the three of them together were trouble. Now that I no longer blended into the background after that one hiccup, they tried to flirt with me—only not in a good way. They probably thought I loved the attention they gave me. But I didn’t; I loathed it. Who wouldn’t?
          Who would want to walk into a room or pass by them while getting their bottoms pinched or slapped, or something thrown at them, like food or sports equipment? Or