Willow Heights Gossip Grrl
Student Attacked
I usually try to focus on the positives, but this week I come bearing tragic news. If you’re a normal person who leaves “Local News with Jackie” to your parents, you probably still saw this all over social media over the weekend. If not, you missed a tragic story, and though I hate to be the bearer of bad news, this cannot be ignored. I’m sure we’re all equally shocked at the news of a brutal attack on one of our own.
Sometime after school on Friday, Colt Darling was violently assaulted outside Willow Heights in the east/faculty parking lot. A member of the custodial team found him on the ground, unresponsive, when she arrived for work at around 7pm. She called 911, and Officer Gunn arrived on the scene shortly thereafter. Colt was then airlifted to Faulkner Regional where he remains in stable but critical condition as of Monday morning. His family asks for your prayers in this heartbreaking time but also asks that you respect their privacy and do not contact them regarding his condition, details of which they will share as new developments occur. Colt did not attend school on Friday but was seen leaving campus that morning with Harper Apple. His reason for being on campus after school is unknown.
The Scoop: Though the perpetrator(s) remain at large, the police do not think anyone else is in immediate danger. Sources say the attack seems to have begun over a fender bender in the parking lot and escalated to a physical altercation. If you have any information regarding this attack, please contact the police department or call their anonymous tip line.
Must have item of the week: A candle for the candlelight prayer service that will be held Tuesday night at 7pm in the east/faculty parking lot where the attack occurred. First Baptist of Faulkner’s Pastor Burton will preside. The Darlings request that all cards, flowers, etc be left there or donated to First Baptist, where Colt attends.
I sit there reading it over and over, wanting to puke. Fragments of conversations I’ve had about the Dolce boys cycle through my mind interspersed with lines from the news-like blog post.
They’re not like the guys you’re used to… Prayers in this heartbreaking time… In with the mafia… Perpetrators remain at large… They’re criminals… Brutal attack… They ruin lives… Contact the police… They’re dangerous… Unresponsive… Airlifted… Critical condition…
I slam my laptop and bolt out of my seat, sure I’m going to be sick. Everyone turns at my sudden disruption, but I barely hear the teacher telling me to sit down as I pass her, throw open the door, and stumble into the hall. My feet carry me out the door before I can stop them. I know I’m fucking up right and left. I should sit through class and pay attention, not go back to my old habits of skipping school and smoking under the bleachers. But fuck that.
Fuck everything.
I don’t have anything to smoke, so I sit on the bleachers alone, not doing anything. The day is bright and sunny and cheerful, though inside, I’m being torn apart by a fucking hurricane. This is why I don’t have friends.
There will always be psychos in the world. I can’t control that. I can only control how they affect me, whether I give them access to my heart.
Friends are dangerous. Friends are a means for them to get to me.
No more friends. That’s my first sacrifice.
Because this is my fault. I didn’t just let them get to me. I led them straight to Colt. They warned me over and over to stay away from him. They warned me they’d hurt him if I didn’t. And I still had to have it my way. They don’t give a single fuck about who should have been punished for that indiscretion. They could have hurt me. I can take it. I’d rather they’d hurt me than Colt.
But they knew. They knew that it would affect me more deeply if they went after Colt. And yeah, I could blame them for being sociopaths, for the assault itself, but they’ve never hidden who they are. I know. They warned me. Everyone warned me. Can I blame a scorpion for having venom? Or myself for reaching in to pet it?
It doesn’t matter why they are the way they are. I have to stop trying to understand them and making excuses for them. They are scorpions, and they sting, and I’ve always known that. They don’t care who’s the casualty as long as they get the result they desire. No more. I won’t risk anyone else I care about. Not by borrowing Blue’s car, or talking to Maverick when I run into him, or even breathing the Darling name.
A footstep reverberates along the metal bleachers, and I startle, my heart in my throat for one second before my rational brain catches up and reminds me that Colt won’t be joining me today.
Instead, I look up to see Dixie trudging along the row of bench seats toward me.
“Shouldn’t you be heading to dance right now?” I ask, resentful of the intrusion. She wrote that blog. She put my name in it. The only reason the cops haven’t shown up to ask me questions is that the Dolces had already collected my bike and backpack when the cops showed up, so no one could place me at the scene.
Suddenly, my head swims and my stomach heaves. If they really went back and got my things before the cops showed up, that means they saw Colt. They saw that he hadn’t gotten up, that he was lying out in the cold rain, beaten unconscious, and they took my stuff and left him there without even calling for help.
I have to swallow down bile at the thought that I kissed the boy who did that to him, after he did it. Yeah, part of that was to distract him before I pushed him off a bridge, but I kissed him right after he beat the shit out of my friend so bad he might not live through it. I didn’t just kiss him, either. I enjoyed every second of it, way more than I should. I felt the kinship of our souls.
Maybe that’s the most fucked up part of all. I still feel for Royal. I still see the human boy behind the monster. I still feel a connection, no matter what he does, and I don’t know how to break it.
Dixie sits down beside me without speaking, her shoulders slumped, her head down. For a while, neither of us say anything. I imagine what it must have been like for her to write that blog about Colt, to sound all professional, when I know she has feelings for him.
“I do have dance,” she says after a long time. She sniffs and wipes her nose, and I realize she’s been sitting there silently weeping for the boy who only we mourn. “I just couldn’t go in there pretending everything was fine and listen to Lo’s trivial bullshit about Royal Dolce and how he called her over the weekend, or whatever she wants me to spread around school so everyone thinks he dumped his older girlfriend and now he’s into her. Again.”
“Is he?”
“Who fucking knows,” she says, the word sounding jarring in her sweet, southern drawl. “I’ve heard he’s into older women, that people have seen him out at fancy restaurants with his secret lover or whoever she is. But every time he sticks his dick in Gloria, she hears wedding bells.” She laughs, but the sound is hollow and tired. “And here I am judging when I’ve been doing the same thing for two long years.”
“With Colt?”
“Yeah,” she says, wiping tears from her eyes. “I know you care about him, too, Harper. That’s why I came out here. I just wanted to sit with someone else who cared about him. Even if it’s not the way I did.”
“He’s not dead, Dixie.”
“He’s been in the ICU since Friday night,” she says. “His parents said they had to put a metal plate in part of his skull. That’s how bad they messed him up.”
I swallow down the bile again. I don’t want to think about it, about how long Royal was kneeling on him, punching him in the face. I must have gone into some kind of shock. It didn’t seem that long. I have to tell someone, and not just Mr. D. I have to tell the police. “Do you have any idea who did it?” I ask carefully.
She scoffs and swipes her eyes. “Of course I know who did it,” she says. “Everyone who went to school here last year knows who did it. We’ve all been waiting for it, in a way. I mean, they ruined Preston and Mabel. Why would they let Colt stay, relatively unscathed, forever?”
I think about his hand, the way his skin is so tight he can’t extend his fingers—the ones that remain. I think about the sadness in his eyes when he talked about his sister and even the Dolce sister. I wouldn’t call him unscathed.
“Do you know why they did it?” I ask.
“Yeah,” she says, knotting her fingers together between her thick knees. “It all started about two years ago.”