Chapter Nineteen


    “LILA!”


    Lila had only just left her English classroom the next day, her brain slightly fried after having watched a few presentations, when she saw Elise running full pelt at her.


    “Whoa!” Lila exclaimed, catching Elise in her arms before Elise could bowl her over. “Is there a stampede or something?”


    “Lila, t-the rumours,” Elise gasped, her eyes sparkling with tears that had yet to spill out. “I don’t know what happened, but it’s gone crazy, like overnight.”


    “What happened?” Asher’s voice unexpectedly came from behind the pair in the form of a low growl, causing both Elise and Lila to freeze in place momentarily. Lila had been the last to leave today as everyone else fled into the sunshine to enjoy their lunch, and she had seen Asher leave a minute or so before she did. Why had he doubled back?


    “Asher,” Lila warned, patting Elise’s head gently. “Go to lunch. It’s fine.”


    “Lila,” Asher snarled, his own tone mirroring her warning.


    Lila whipped around in a flash, letting go of Elise who stumbled briefly before regaining her footing, glaring at Asher. She was dangerously close to losing her cool.


    “Asher, Elise hasn’t told me anything yet. If something has kicked up again, is it really wise for you to be standing here talking to me?”


    Asher clenched and unclenched his jaw a couple of times as he exhaled audibly, rage clearly building inside.


    “When?” he spat, seeming unable to form a full sentence. Elise looked nervously between the pair as they glowered at each other as if in a stand-off. Lila realised by the meaningful intensity of his gaze that he intended to ask when she was going to have that ‘girl-to-girl conversation’ with the alleged perpetrator of the rumours. She sighed and dropped her expression.


    “I need one week,” Lila said, regaining some measure of composure as she took a deep breath. “I’ll talk to her next Friday.”


    “That long? Fine.”


    Asher turned on his heel and stormed off away from Lila and Elise, ruffling his hair with slightly more force than necessary. Elise gaped after him for a moment before grabbing Lila’s arm, pulling her in the opposite direction towards the tuckshop.


    “Come on,” Elise muttered. “Grace is already waiting for us at the tuckshop.”


    Elise didn’t let go of Lila’s left arm as they silently walked to the tuckshop, Lila’s mind racing too fast to try and say anything. By the time they reached the tuckshop, Lila had replayed the look on Piper’s face from yesterday afternoon in Study so much that it was burned into her mind’s eye.


    “Finally! There you are!” a familiar voice called as soon as they entered the bounds of the tuckshop. Grace appeared suddenly from Lila’s right side and looped her arm around Lila’s free arm.


    “We met trouble,” Elise sighed, letting go of Lila.


    “What kind of trouble?” Grace asked, leading Lila towards the tuckshop line with Elise following behind.


    “The only trouble that would make everything worse,” Elise replied bitterly. “Asher showed up just as I was trying to hurry Lila along.”


    “Of course he did,” Grace replied, rolling her eyes. “That boy seems so determined to make things worse.”


    “Guys,” Lila said quietly, “what’s going on? Elise seemed like she was about to cry when she found me.”


    Grace’s grip around her arm tightened. “I don’t think we should talk about it here,” Grace said after a quick glance at Elise.


    “Yeah,” agreed Elise. “We need to go somewhere quiet for this.”


    The girls didn’t say any more as they waited for the line to shorten. The chatter from students surrounding them was much noisier than usual. It was impossible for Lila to make anything out, which seemed odd to Lila. Eventually, Grace and Lila were able to enter the tuckshop.


    Unlike all the other times that Lila visited the tuckshop, as soon as she passed through the automatic doors, all conversation stopped. It felt like everyone in the tuckshop, including the lunch ladies and cashier, had turned to stare at her with wide eyes as though she was an alien visitor. No one dared to speak.


    ‘Weird…’ Lila thought, though she tried to shrug it off. As she moved around the tuckshop, selecting her items, she noticed that she had an abnormally wide berth around her. It was… unsettling, to say the least.


    Lila wordlessly paid for her items as quickly as she could and exited, still feeling the eyes of each student boring into her. If she stayed any longer, she would surely become reminiscent of Swiss cheese with all the holes she’d have from their laser-like stares. Luckily, Grace wasn’t far behind Lila and they both collected Elise on the way towards their usual lunch spot. Still, neither Grace nor Elise said a word on their journey.


    Once they sat down, Elise and Grace looked at each other before sighing heavily in unison.


    “Lila, please promise us that you’ll just listen,” Grace said quietly, unwrapping her chicken burger.


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    “Yeah,” Lila replied without much enthusiasm.


    “… I guess I’ll go for it,” Elise said, sounding unusually unsure of herself. “The rumours have taken a… dramatic? That’s not the word… serious? Ridiculous? Outlandi-”


    “Elise, you’re stalling,” Grace said through a mouthful of burger.


    “S-Sorry… point is, Lila, these rumours are absolutely fucked and way worse than what they were before.”


    Lila stopped breathing as she waited for Elise to continue. Elise looked away from Lila, tugging at some grass next to her.


    “So, um, people are saying you’re a slut, and trying to ruin Holly’s relationship with Asher,” Elise finally said, still averting her gaze from Lila.


    “That doesn’t sound so new,” Lila said despondently, unable to bring herself to eat.


    “Y-Yeah,” Elise crushed the blades of grass between her fingers until they were almost mush. “And they’re saying now that… um… you’re prostituting yourself to Asher.”


    Lila blinked at Elise. Surely, she misheard Elise. “What does that mean?”


    “Well,” Grace jumped in, “they think Asher is paying you to have sex with him.”


    Lila’s jaw almost hit the floor. “Huh?”


    “They’re saying that it’s so sad that Asher’s paying you, ‘cause you’re some poor Asian girl and just doing what girls from South-East Asia do. That Holly is too pure to have sex with Asher, so he’s instead paying you to sleep with him. And that you’re letting it happen because you’re using him for his money. And if it’s not through money, it’s through him tutoring you privately. Apparently, your presentation was way too good for you to have done anything on it, so they think you’ve used your body to get him to do all the work…” Grace trailed off, averting her gaze as well and looking at the sky instead.


    Lila gave a nervous laugh. “You’re pulling my leg,” she said. Elise and Grace shook their heads at the same time, both looking gloomy.


    “Someone’s been telling everyone that they know it’s true ‘cause they saw you get off the bus and go to his house the other day. And, apparently, someone saw a box of condoms in your gym bag,” Grace continued in an almost-whisper.


    Lila spluttered for a moment. “I didn’t even know condoms were in boxes,” she finally managed to say, her mind spinning through so many different emotions and thoughts. “I thought they were just sold in, like, a packet or something.”


    Grace shrugged. “I’ve never thought about it,” she said simply.


    “Anyway,” Elise cut in, “so many people have been talking about your presentation. Like, your chemistry was off the charts or something, and apparently that proves that you guys have been banging. I still don’t know what they’re trying to say with that, but that’s just what I’ve heard.”


    Lila was speechless. How could anyone come to that conclusion? Piper wasn’t in her English class… so was someone else spreading these vicious rumours?


    “I feel sick,” Lila whispered, clutching her stomach. Wave after wave of nausea crashed in her stomach, and her face was as white as paper.


    “Should you go to sickbay?” Grace asked, clearly alarmed.


    “N-No,” Lila replied, a hand to her mouth. “I just… need some time.”


    She could see Grace and Elise cast each other a look in her peripheral vision.


    “Are you sure?” Elise asked gently.


    “Yeah, I’ll be fine…”


    The rest of lunch passed by in silence. Lila didn’t end up eating any of her food for fear of throwing it up, so kept it on her person in case she’d feel better between classes. Her next class was Maths and everyone was working quietly on their Maths assignments, given it was due next week, which suited Lila just fine. The students sitting on either side of Lila otherwise ignored her, which also suited Lila just fine. She was almost done with her assignment and spent the rest of her time trying to focus on ensuring all her calculations were correct.


    Throwing herself into her work did help her feel better, so she ended up eating a little on her way to her Design class. It was another lonely lesson, with everyone absorbed in their Design assignments, but Lila felt relieved. No one spoke during this lesson either – Lila was sure she’d be able to hear a pin drop.


    Once Lila’s Design teacher, Mr Dillon, released them, Lila took her time packing up and heading to her locker. She wanted to avoid as many students as possible, which worked in her favour as everyone was eager to go home for the weekend. Upon reaching the lockers, Lila couldn’t see anyone except Piper, who was fussing about in her own locker. Like Elise and Grace had said, Piper didn’t open her locker wide at all. Lila wasn’t sure that Piper could even see what she was doing in there.


    Seeing Piper, however, made Lila’s insides boil with rage.


    ‘Calm down,’ she told herself firmly, opening her own locker and pulling together what she needed to take home for the weekend. ‘Stick to the plan. I don’t have any proof that Piper is spreading rumours, and if I confronted her now, she could easily say it wasn’t her.’


    It was easier said than done to try and let go of the anger taking root within Lila, as she only just managed to not explode as she slammed her locker shut and put the lock back on. She’d stayed at her locker trying to calm herself through deep, shuddering breaths far longer than she normally would, and now the locker room was devoid of any students. Lila jammed her hat onto her head and stomped towards the bus stop. She couldn’t see Piper around but figured she’d either be at the bus stop by now, or already on their regularly scheduled bus.


    The humid air wrapped around Lila’s body as brittle, dead leaves crunched despairingly under her school shoes. There weren’t many students lingering around campus at this time, though Lila could hear distant cheers from the nearby oval. As it usually happened towards the end of the school term, Lila knew that some students (like her brother) would be playing soccer or touch footy after school. Teachers would usually be holed up and busy in the Office Hub (where all the Senior School teachers’ desks were located) marking if they were on campus at all, so a few groups of students would take advantage of the lack of supervision.


    Lila briefly wondered if Daniel was there now, or if he had already gone home, before arriving at the bus stop. Four buses taking a specialised route towards Lila’s home would depart every day in fifteen-minute intervals. Judging by the electronic sign she was standing under, her next bus would arrive in about five minutes. There were only a couple of students milling about alongside the pavement by the bus station, chatting incessantly about assignments, boys or –


    “… Asher!”


    “… totally… seems legit.”


    “Just look…”


    “… defs looks like… money…”


    Lila turned to face the direction the comments were coming from, but the offending students immediately stopped talking and were scrolling on their phones, sneaking glances at each other and trying to contain their giggles. ‘Just… let it go for now,’ Lila tried to urge herself as she slowly turned back to the direction she was facing, trying to see if her bus was coming. It did arrive shortly afterwards, and after Lila placed her school bag next to her seat, she saw Piper saunter her. Piper looked as though she had no recognition as to who Lila was, as her glassy eyes passed over Lila’s body as if she were part of the seating.


    ‘Where was she hiding?’ Lila thought as the bus’s engine roared to a start and trundled through the suburbs. The bus station itself was fairly open – the footpath leading away from the school had a few hedges, but nothing substantially large enough to hide a person without it appearing obvious. Had Piper just been behind Lila the whole time? Did she not want to be spotted? Or was she still watching Lila?


    ‘I don’t need to worry about that now,’ Lila told herself firmly, though it was rather tempting to obsess over this during the weekend. ‘If I finish my assessments that are due next week, I can invest more time into finding out for myself what Piper’s up to…’