Starcrossed Page 9

  this Greek tragedy nonsense, she would deal with whatever came

  her way.

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  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Publishers

  .....................................................................

  Chapter Five

  The next week at school was nothing short of torture. On

  Monday, Helen tried to stay away from the Delos family,

  but every effort she made to avoid contact seemed to lead

  her right to them. She went to school early to try to beat

  them there, only to see them pull up behind her in the

  black Hum-Scalade she had seen at the market. She rushed to lock

  up her bike and get her bags together, but her rush only put her in

  stride with Jason and Hector. Slowing down to let them get ahead

  of her, put her next to Lucas who was helping his little sister get

  her cello out of the back. Helen took a flustered step forward, then

  went back toward her bike to stand and wait there as long as it took

  for them to go inside and get out of her way.

  Later that day, she got permission to eat lunch outside, only to

  find Cassandra was already out on the patio practicing the fingering

  without using her bow on her cello. When she saw Cassandra,

  Helen pulled up short. As she turned to go back inside, she

  smacked into Ariadne. The contact made Helen’s skin prickle so

  tight that her pores hurt, and although she tried to be gracious and

  smile apologetically, Ariadne’s hands balled into fists around her

  violin case. Helen stumbled to get away from her, both of them

  mumbling apologies.

  “Cass and I got an outdoor pass to practice. We’ll be out here

  during lunch for the next few days,” Ariadne explained quickly,

  avoiding eye contact as she moved away from Helen.

  “Thank you,” Helen managed to push out between her clenched

  teeth. She went back to the cafeteria to intercept Claire.

  “Aren’t we going to eat outside?” Claire asked, still moving toward

  the exit. She spotted Ariadne and Cassandra out there and

  then turned back toHelen with an incredulous look on her face.

  “Seriously? It’s not like we have to sit at the same table as them.”

  “I know. I just don’t want to be anywhere near them,” Helen said

  defensively as she fiddled with the clasp on her lunch box. Claire

  rolled her eyes.

  “Hey,” Matt said, catching up to them. “I thought we were going

  out on the patio. There’re still plenty of tables . . .” His voice trailed

  off when he saw the Delos girls. Matt had just enough willpower to

  stifle a whistle at Ariadne’s glorious cleavage—pretty impressive

  since Ariadne was wearing a tank top and bending over at that particular

  moment. Helen knew she was ruining Matt’s eye candy and

  Claire’s sunshine, but she just couldn’t eat outside.

  “You guys go out. It’s fine,” Helen said as she abruptly left them

  and headed toward the cafeteria.

  “Lennie! What the hell?” Claire called after her in frustration.

  “Could you please get your head out of your ass?”

  Claire’s voice carried right around the corner with Helen. The

  word ass seemed to echo in the air as she found herself facing

  Hector and Jason at their lockers. They were talking with Gretchen

  and Amy Heart, a senior girl on the cheerleading squad, both of

  whom were flirting their brains out. Gretchen and Amy looked at

  each other and then turned in unison to stare at Helen as though

  she was something they had just found in a hankie. The Furies

  started to whisper. Helen took a deep breath and tried to block

  them out.

  “Hi, Helen,” Hector said with a bright voice and eerily blank eyes.

  His body leaned ever so slightly forward in her direction, as if he

  couldn’t stop himself from trying to reach out and grab her. Jason

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  playfully smacked his brother on the chest with far more force than

  normal people like Amy and Gretchen could guess at.

  “Rude?” Jason reminded Hector.

  “Just saying hi to Helen. Hi, Helen. Helen Hamilton, hi. Get out

  to ’Sconset lately?” he jeered.

  “No, she hasn’t,” Lucas said from behind her. Helen spun around

  and glared at him. “And I would know,” he said so quietly there

  was no way normals could hear it. But Helen could.

  All of a sudden she felt like she’d had enough intimidation for

  one day. Goaded on by the Furies, she took a tiny step toward Lucas.

  She saw him inhale sharply, and understood in a flash that Lucas

  had probably spent just as much time trying to scrub away her

  scent after their little tumble in his front yard as she had spent trying

  to scrub away his. The thought made her so happy she almost

  laughed.

  “Tell Noel the olive oil she sent was the best I’ve ever tasted,”

  Helen said with a wicked little smile. She saw Lucas’s eyes snap

  open a little wider with fear, and she knew she had guessed right.

  There was something different about his mother. “Anytime she

  wants to try my bruschetta she’s more than welcome to stop by.”

  Lucas made a move toward Helen, but Jason was suddenly at

  Helen’s elbow, pushing her gently to the side as he forcibly pulled

  Lucas tothe lockers. Helen took the opportunity to be on her way,

  but she couldn’t resist one final jab before she left.

  “Tell your aunt I said hi,” Helen breathed through bared teeth as

  she passed Hector, mimicking his menacing tone perfectly.

  She didn’t stop to wait for a response. As she sauntered down the

  hall she could feel all three Delos boys staring holes in her back,

  but it didn’t make her the least bit nervous. She was so pleased

  with herself that she even forgot to slouch.

  Tuesday wasn’t much better, but at least Helen had stopped trying

  to alter her schedule to avoid the Delos kids. Instead, they were

  altering their schedules in order to avoid her . . . so, of course, she

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  was running into them all day long. It seemed like every time she

  turned down a hallway she bumped into one of them.

  To make matters worse, her friends were starting to get annoyed

  with her. Claire thought Helen was being a spineless wuss. Matt

  got all sullen and huffy every time Helen flinched because she and

  Lucas had made eye contact.

  On Wednesday, the Delos clan changed tactics. First thing in the

  morning, Helen went to her locker and found Jason waiting for her

  there, leaning up against the wall like he’d been put there to decorate

  the place. Jason had the kind of body that was built to lounge,

  very catlike, as if he was capable of stretching out and taking a nap

  at any given moment. He was more gracefully built than his cousin

  or his brother and when he stood next to them he seemed small,

  but in the same way a panther is small when compared to a lion or

  a bull. To Helen, seeing him by himself in the relatively empty hallway,

  he was big. She forced herself to keep walking forward, and

  when he glanced over at her she noticed that he had the most outrageously

  long eyelashes she’d ever seen on a boy.

  “Do you have a
sec?” he asked in a stiff but polite manner. Helen

  could see him concentrating, probably trying as hard as she was to

  block out the Furies.

  “All right,” Helen answered, keeping her eyes on the floor. She

  could see that the kids with lockers near hers were taking their

  sweet time getting their stuff together. She really wished they

  would leave, but no one at Nantucket High would pass up an opportunity

  for a front row seat at another possible brawl.

  “Some of us think it would be a good idea if we tried to smooth

  things over,” he said quickly, as if he wanted to get it done with as

  fast as possible. Helen thought for a moment.

  “Some of you? You mean there hasn’t been any unanimous decision

  made yet? About me, I mean,” Helen said pointedly.

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  “No, sorry,” he said, understanding her meaning immediately.

  “But we think—well, at least a few of us think that we should at

  least try to be nicer to each other.”

  “I don’t see how we’re going to be able to do that, do you?” Helen

  replied, not meaning to sound unfriendly but unable to stop herself.

  She heard one of the girls loitering nearby tisk at her.

  “We just want to be friends with you. Or if not friends, then at

  least not enemies. Think it over,” he said, and then left.

  It took Helen three tries to get her lock undone with everyone

  standing around staring at her. Using all her energy to not attack

  Jason as he walked away, she had none left over for patience. She

  wanted to scream at everyone for judging her, but that would never

  be possible. What would she say? I’m not usually a bitch—I’m just

  super-grouchy because I’m being stalked by three blood-crying

  ghosts who won’t let me sleep at night?

  At lunch, she was surprised to see Ariadne and Cassandra sitting

  at her customary table with her friends. Even from a distance

  Helen could see that Matt was flushed with repressed hormones.

  Gretchen and Zach, who never sat at their lunch table, were there,

  too, kissing popular ass. Helen wavered in the doorway for a moment,

  thinking she might still have a chance to sneak away, when

  Ariadne spotted her and waved her over.

  During that uncomfortable lunch, Ariadne was as nice as could

  be to Helen, and even though there was a brittle quality to Cassandra’s

  smiles, there were plenty of them. Despite this genuine attempt

  at friendship, Helen was so agitated by the insufferable presence

  of the Furies hovering just outside the corner of her eye that

  her testy behavior earned her several scandalized looks from

  Gretchen and a few worried ones from Claire. As they left the cafeteria,

  Claire pulled Helen aside.

  “Would it kill you to be nice?” she asked.

  “You have no idea how hard I’m trying,” Helen replied though

  tight lips.

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  “Try harder. You’re coming off like a total snob, and I know

  you’re not one so don’t even start.” Claire continued over Helen’s

  protestation: “I can tell there’s something weird going on. Something

  that you’re not telling me about. I’m fine with that. But

  you have to start pretending you like them or people like Gretchen

  and Zach are going to make sure that your life here is miserable

  until graduation.”

  Helen nodded submissively. She knew she was getting good advice,

  but her life was already miserable enough without cozying up

  to the Delos family. Still, the next day she did her best to make an

  effort and smiled at Ariadne and Jason as she passed them in the

  hall. The attempt wasn’t pretty—it came off more like a toothy

  grimace than a grin—but it was well received by the twins.

  Hector was a different story. Apparently, he didn’t share in the

  opinion that they should all try to get along, and after another harrowing

  day of forcing herself not to flinch when she saw Lucas,

  Helen had to pass by Hector on her way to track. As if pulled by invisible

  wires, Hector changed direction and started following her

  across the field. He was calling her name under his breath, like he

  was singing a song to himself. Helen glanced around desperately

  for another person, a witness in case something happened, and

  sighed out loud when she saw a few girls headed in her direction.

  They looked at how Helen was practically running away from Hector

  and stared at her like she had grown horns. Most girls at school

  would have run toward Hector if he was smiling at them like that.

  All Thursday night, Helen was kept awake by the moaning of the

  Furies, as though one of the Delos kids were near. On Friday,

  Helen had to get up at dawn to drive Kate and Jerry to the airport.

  They were flying to Boston to attend a small-business owners’ conference

  for the weekend, and Helen was looking forward to a few

  days on her own. Between the lack of sleep and the daily harassment,

  Helen felt ground down to bare bone. All she had to do was

  make it through one more day at school and then she could crawl

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  into bed and hide until Monday. Maybe, eventually, she would

  even be able to fall asleep.

  Unfortunately, what she thought was the Friday Finish Line was

  actually a trip wire, as she found out when she got to school. At

  first she didn’t understand why she was getting bumped into so

  much, and assumed it had to be some new trend that she had

  missed, until Claire began yelling at everyone to back off. Then

  Helen started to listen to what everyone was saying when they

  bumped into her.

  People she had never even spoken to were whispering “bitch” and

  “slut” as they passed her in the hallway. The whole day brought

  one insult after another. Three separate times Helen had to run into

  the girls’ room to hide. She managed to make it through the day

  without seeing any of the Delos kids, but in exchange she had become

  the bull’s-eye on everyone else’s target. By the time she was

  changing for track, she was such a nervous wreck she didn’t know

  if she was going to cry or throw up. Once outside, she caught up to

  Claire on wobbly legs. Thankfully, the other girls gave them a wide

  berth as they ran the trail.

  “Why do they even care?” Helen burst out in frustration. “What

  does it matter if I like the Delos kids or not?”

  “Because that’s not the whole story,” Claire said gently.

  “What did you hear?” Helen asked, desperate for any

  explanation.

  “There’s this rumor that Lucas and Hector are fighting over you,

  so of course all the girls hate you now,” Claire said like she hoped

  the rumor was ridiculous, but wasn’t entirely sure if it was.

  “You’re joking, right?”

  Claire shook her head. “I guess Lucas and Hector got into an actual

  fistfight after school yesterday at football practice. That’s why

  they weren’t in school today. They got suspended.”

  “What happened?” Helen asked, stunned quiet.

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  “Lucas saw Hector following you out of the girl’s locker room and

  he lost it. He started yelling at Hector to stay awa
y from you. I

  guess Lucas sort of said . . . that you were his,” Claire said timidly.

  Helen shook her head. Lucas had meant that Helen was his to kill,

  but she couldn’t exactly explain that to Claire.

  “All the girls hate me because Lucas is a delusional stalker? How

  is that fair? I loathe him,” Helen said passionately. She paused.

  Another thought occurred to her. “But that only explains the girls

  hating me. There’s more, right?”

  “Oh, yeah. It gets way worse, because they didn’t just get suspended,”

  Claire continued, her brow scrunched with worry. “Zach said

  that Hector and Lucas went at it in this really scary way, right there

  in front of the whole football team, the coaches, everyone. It was

  bad. Like death-match bad. Jason got in between them and managed

  to break it up, but it was still too late. And . . . well . . . they all

  got kicked off the football team. That’s why the whole school hates

  you, including the boys,” she said, bringing the story to its conclusion.

  “All three of the Delos boys are supposed to be these amazing,

  legendary athletes, and everyone is saying you destroyed Nantucket

  High’s one shot at a winning season.”

  “You have got to be kidding me,” Helen said slowly. “They’re ruining

  my life.” Even in the depths of her self-pity, it didn’t escape

  her notice that she was also ruining their lives.

  They had been in town for two weeks and all three boys were

  already singled out as disciplinary problems. If these incidents

  kept happening, they could get kicked out of school, and then

  where would they go? They would have to commute to the mainland

  every morning because there was only one high school on the

  island. And all this—the fight, the suspension, the entire school trying

  to trip Helen—had happened after they all agreed to try to get

  along.

  A terrible truth was starting to sink in. Even if she got control

  over her anger and the Delos family got control over theirs, the

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  Furies would not allow them to coexist. The fight between Lucas

  and Hector proved that the Delos kids would have to come after

  her or they would start going after each other. There was no liveand-

  let-live solution to this. For some reason that Helen still could

  not fathom, the Furies demanded blood, and they would get it no

  matter how it was shed.

  “You’re really not seeing Lucas?” Claire asked with care. Helen