“This isn't your house, it never was,” she shouted at him.
Hot angry tears dropped down her cheeks and landed on the soft blue carpet as she spoke.
“This is my father's house. He bought it. He paid off the mortgage not you,” Alyssa yelled.
“You're father's not here, anymore, Alyssa, you know that,” he said angrily.
“And you shouldn't be either,” she spat at him.
“Cody, just leave her alone,” her mother said stepping in between them.
“You're really going to let her get away with it, then?” he asked.
“Get away with what, Cody, telling the truth?” her mother snapped turning towards him, “This isn't your house. It's mine, and it's Alyssa's home. So just leave her be!”
“Fine!” Cody said and stormed from the room.
“Are you okay?
” her mother asked.
Alyssa nodded and sat down on the bed. She could hear Cody storming down the hall and then down the stairs. They listened together as the front door opened and then slammed shut. Alyssa wasn't sure what to think.
“Officer Bryant called me,” her mother sighed, “He was your father's best friend.”
“I remember,” Alyssa nodded.
“Says he's worried about you,” she said.
“Because I'm sneaking out to meet boys?” Alyssa arched a brow.
“No, he says you looked miserable,” her mother answered.
“I am miserable, Mom,” Alyssa told her.
“Tell me what's going on,” she said.
Alyssa looked into her mother's eyes and broke down into sobs. She didn't want to talk about anything, but slowly she told her mother what happened with Ryan Matthers.
“Teenagers can be so cruel,” her mother said when she finished speaking.
Alyssa wasn't sure what was going on, but she knew that things were changing, or at least she hoped they were. She wanted her mother to be happy, but Cody had been her oppressor since he moved in.
Sunday passed in a lazy haze. Alyssa kept her phone in her pocket as she lounged on her window seat. She kept waiting for Jake to call. Her mind would go back and forth between longing for the phone to ring and hoping that he had lost her number. Nothing made sense to her, so she did nothing.
Monday morning she slept through her alarm and drove to school late. Her mother had already left for work and there was no sign of Cody. He hadn't returned home on Sunday either. Alyssa was too afraid to hope that he was gone for good, because she didn't think she could survive her hopes being crashed again.
Alyssa knew something was wrong as soon as she walked into her second period class. Usually she would be greeted by the girls from her squad and guys from the team, but no one acknowledged her. None of them even spared her a glance. She heard one girl laughing and turned to look. It was Katie giggling away as she doodled Alyssa in a lip lock with a rattlesnake. Anger boiled in her veins, but she made herself take her seat.
“Just get through today,” she sighed silently.
The morning passed painfully slow and lunch was an agonizing event. Alyssa had attempted to sit with the girls at lunch, but every time she tried to sit her lunch tray down an object appeared in her way. In the end she threw away the untouched food and spent the rest of her lunch period crying in a bathroom stall.
Alyssa managed to make it through her afternoon classes without breaking down in tears again, but that wasn't saying much. For the first time in her life she was dreading cheer practice. Usually, she took refuge in being with her squad, but everything had suddenly changed. She wasn't their leader anymore, somehow she was their enemy.
Alyssa's hands shook as she walked to her locker. She felt heavy and depressed, but tried to keep her school spirit smile plastered to her face. Her smile turned to a frown and then a grimace when she arrived at her locker. Someone had written the word “TRAITOR” in big black letters across the locker's red surface.
She had to bite her lip hard to keep from crying. A few snickers came from those closest to her and Alyssa clinched her hands into tight fists at her sides. She took a deep breath and put in her locker combination. Alyssa opened the locker carefully, making sure to stand back, because she didn't trust that the vandalism didn't go farther than tagging the locker.