Free Dark Secrets by A. M. Hudson Page A

chair, resting his hands behind his head. “Can
you blame me? I kinda like fresh meat.”
    I inched away from him
jokingly, and a sudden whoosh of air brushed past my hair,
impacting something that screeched loudly. Silence washed over the
room. We all turned to the kid behind us, who sat straight again,
rubbing his head.
    “ What gives?” His
friend stood up, aiming his voice at the jocks.
    “ What up, losers?
Mommy forget to pack your helmet?”
    Apple pulp covered the
chess club boy’s hair and shoulders, while the remainder of the
offending fruit rolled around on the ground just near his feet.
“That’s it,” he said, and with teeth tight in his mouth, jumped up
and grabbed the apple.
    “ Just leave it,
Dominic. It’s not worth it,” one of his friends said.
    “ No. I’m sick of
this.” His knuckles turned white around the apple.
    No one in the room
seemed to have moved; I think they were bracing for an all-out war.
But someone should have done something . If even one person stood
up for that boy, just once, maybe those jerks would leave him
alone.
    I pushed my chair out,
and as I took a step toward him, Emily squeaked, “David?
Don’t!”
    My eyes flicked from
the apple that was in Dominic’s hand, to the other side of the
cafeteria where juice rained in a shower over the jocks, a million
tiny pieces of apple sticking to the wall behind them.
    A cool silence
lingered.
    David’s arm came back
down to his side, his shoulder still leaned into the throw, when
the whole room erupted—every person, sitting or standing, started
clapping and cheering. Even the helmet-comment jock raised his
thumb.
    David took a few pats
on the back and shook a few hands, and when he looked at me again,
his eyes betraying fake amusement by displaying anger, I closed my
gaping mouth and walked up to the chess-kid. “Hey? Are you okay?” I
asked.
    “ Yeah, I’m fine,” he
moaned and sat back down, rubbing his head. “Those guys are just
assholes.”
    “ Yeah. They had no
right to do that. I’m so sorry. If I hadn’t moved, it would’ve hit
me.”
    “ Guess it’s good you
moved then.” He gave me a smirk, his whole face still
red.
    I shrugged. “Nah, I
can handle embarrassment pretty well.”
    “ Lucky
you.”
    I smiled softly at
him. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
    He nodded and shifted
his black knight to another square on the chessboard. “I’m used to
it.”
    “ Yeah, but it was
cool what David just did,” one of the other guys piped up, still
laughing.
    “ Right. Today. But
tomorrow he’ll just be a big jackass again like the rest of
them.”
    A bucket of
realisation flooded over me like heat. “Really? He’s a
bully?”
    The boy glanced at
David, then shook his head; not a no, but maybe more like he was
shaking it at himself, then went back to his game, ignoring
me.
    David turned quickly
away then, dropping his head, tension making a stiff line across
his shoulders.
    “ Is that true?” I sat
back down in my spot.
    “ Really, Ara,” Emily
said. “He sits with the jocks, but he’s not like them at all.
Anymore.”
    Anymore? I searched
his face for a second, but he kept his gaze on the table between
his wrists. Ryan and Alana looked back at their food, making
sideways glances at each other. “So what’s the big deal, then?” I
shrugged and looked at Emily. “Why are you all acting
strange?”
    Emily took a breath
to speak, but David cut in. “Because I was a jackass, Ara.” He turned to
me, and a flicker, resembling disgrace, fluttered under his
eyelids. “When I first came to the school, I used to do stuff like
that all the time.”
    “ Oh, okay. Well…” I
blinked, studying the side of his face. “I still don’t get it.
You’re not like that now, so—”
    “ I had hoped it might
be some time before you learned of this. You know what they
say—about first impressions.” David looked at me with those big,
green eyes, and all I could think was how unfair it is that guys
have