The Girl Read online

  The Girl

  K. Larsen

  By K. Larsen

  Copyright © 2019 by K. Larsen

  Edited by Derek Bishop

  Cover Design Cover Me Darling

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Contents

  Newsletter

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  1. Charlotte

  2. Charlotte

  3. Charlotte

  4. Charlotte

  5. Charlotte

  6. Dallas

  7. Charlotte

  8. Charlotte

  9. Charlotte

  10. Dallas

  11. Charlotte

  12. Charlotte

  13. Charlotte

  14. Charlotte

  15. Charlotte

  16. Charlotte

  17. Dallas

  18. Charlotte

  19. Charlotte

  20. Charlotte

  21. Dallas

  22. Charlotte

  23. Charlotte

  24. Charlotte

  25. Charlotte

  26. Dallas

  27. Charlotte

  28. Dallas

  29. Charlotte

  30. Dallas

  31. Charlotte

  32. Charlotte

  33. Charlotte

  34. Dallas

  35. Charlotte

  36. Charlotte

  37. Charlotte

  38. Dallas

  39. Charlotte

  40. Dallas

  41. Charlotte

  42. Charlotte

  43. Charlotte

  44. Charlotte

  45. Charlotte

  46. Charlotte

  47. Charlotte

  48. Charlotte

  49. Charlotte

  50. Charlotte

  51. Charlotte

  52. Dallas

  53. Charlotte

  Epilogue

  THE END

  The Tutor

  Him

  Her

  The Girl

  Newsletter

  Click the lady for your

  Newsletter

  Facebook

  Website

  Twitter (@Klarsen_author)

  For Isabella and Madison

  Acknowledgments

  A quick note to give thanks. Lotte’s story was a joy to write, but I couldn’t have done it without the help of numerous people. Thank you to my beta team—you know who you are. Without you, this book wouldn’t be the polished piece that it is. Thank you to my author friends who let me bounce ideas off them, helped push me through the writing slumps, and who read early copies for me.

  I might not say it enough but, I appreciate you all so much!

  Thank you to every blog and reader who shouts out a book, leaves a review, shares a post, and tells a friend. Your support is invaluable—there is no book community without you!

  To M and B...I hope Charlotte teaches you to believe in and know your worth. I love you!

  Prologue

  The room is so quiet you can hear a pencil drop. Not a single person coughs, sniffles or shuffles in their seat. We're all perched in our spots, waiting with bated breath for what's to come. Everyone but me, anyway. The piano starts, the kid playing it an amateur. The first three notes wobble and it irks me, but there's nothing to be done about it. The kid’s probably more nervous than a virgin on prom night, but me? I'm bored to death. Until I notice her— head dipped, staring at her pastel, chevron-patterned Converse.

  I’ve seen her before. We have two classes together despite that I’m a year ahead of her. Her head lifts slightly, and her eyes, blue and bright like a summer sky, glance at me through her lashes. I pinch my thigh so I don’t grin at her. My grimace sends her eyes flying back to her sneakers.

  She moves through the school like a beam of light. I’m a ghost in an ocean of living, breathing, banal, teenagers; but not her, she emits something like a gravitational force drawing everyone and everything in.

  Her head is nearly always bowed, usually over a book. Clothes fitted but bland, and hair golden, long and almost always plaited. If you’re lucky enough to catch her gaze, you’ll see her blue eyes blazing.

  The amazing part is, you can't not notice her. No matter how hard she tries to slink around without discovery; she sticks out—to me. Every detail about her is otherworldly. She’s one of those people who carries a paperback in hand like a talisman, wears simple understated jewelry or scarves. Quirky. Effortless. Classic in a way people strive their whole lives to be. People are drawn to her for a host of reasons: jealousy, attraction, resentment, curiosity. They all want a sliver of her light.

  But that aura that hovers in the air around her is nothing obvious really, more like the compounding of many things. Her smile's too genuine. Her kindness too evident. Her heart too big on her sleeve. She shines like a beacon without meaning to. Maybe that's why I’m drawn to her; because she is light and I am dark. Or maybe it's just the whole opposites-attract mentality. Mostly I think it’s because she doesn’t want to be seen, and I want her to know that I see her. That I understand the fringes. We aren't opposites in social standing, just interpersonal perception standing.

  I've heard the rumors, about who she is. About what she'd been through, but honestly, being the new kid, yet again, I didn't buy into it all when I heard it. The rumors about me were ninety percent false. I know better than to believe everything said by the masses. Not that the truth matters to me. I feel compelled to watch her. To take her in. Soak her up. God, I want to soak her up. Her light is far more than the deceptive emotions evoked by the psychopathic teenage mind. The first time I looked at her I felt something, before ever speaking to her, that I’d never felt before.

  Home.

  She feels like comfort and safety and home. A real, loving home. Free from the betrayal and hurt I am accustomed to.

  She would say “There’s a word for that; querencia.” And I’d laugh because that’s so her—to have a word for something. A single word for a big feeling.

  When the rally ends, I sling my messenger bag over my shoulder and pick up my pace. I lose sight of her in the crowd and by the time I make it outside, she's curled up under a tree, reading, (surprise, surprise). She doesn't look up as I pass by. She doesn't move at all. I don't look back, I just keep walking forward. Something I've been doing my whole life. Pushing my way forward.

  I might be headed to a new home, in a new town, but I'm used to that as much as I am to the voices in my head always whispering. I do my best to fight them, but the whispers turn into screams sometimes, and I have to get it out somehow. I like the little rush I get when I do something reckless. Sometimes a bit of pain helps quell the screams. Other times, I'm just a ghost, staring at a ceiling watching the world pass me by like a zombie.

  "Yo, Texas! Where's the rave?" I ignore the jab because these hicks don't seem to understand that Doc Martens and leather jackets don't make a Goth. I don't care to be a walking advertisement for American Eagle, or a mainstream Hollister kid, like all these twats are. How much more dreadfully boring can their suburban lives really get? Giggles ring out, but I ignore those too. My footfalls against the pavement drown out the lingering ridicule as I clomp my way home.

 
It's not a long walk, but there isn't really anything interesting about it either. No neat paths or tree lines or waterways to explore, just...sidewalk. Endless freaking pavement, right up until the moment it touches short trimmed grass at the house I’m currently calling mine. I stare up the path to the well-maintained white house I’ll pretend is home for the next six months.

  I'm in the entryway, shucking off my messenger bag when Ray pokes his head into the hallway and says, "Hey, don't forget we have your appointment this afternoon." My bag hits the hardwood floor with a dense thunk.

  "I didn't," I say.

  I take a knee so I can unlace my boots enough to get them off and leave them near the door. He doesn’t like shoes in the house. She’s still on my mind, even now, as I grab a spoon for a scoop of peanut butter. I don’t know why I still eat it like this. I hate peanut butter. I hate the memory behind it.

  When you refuse to give up on something it can make you chase it obsessively. It can make you risk everything. Look for answers where there aren’t any. Hope.

  I refused to give up on me.

  And our story—it was just a moment—a blip in our lives so far, but it might have been the most important part of my existence.

  Ever since I was little, maybe eight, I’ve had this daydream about going out in flames someday. A grandiose show of mortality or some shit. Probably because all I’ve ever wanted is to be seen.

  Maybe it was fate. Maybe it was destiny. Maybe it was neither. What you’re about to learn is our story, but it’s awkward when you aren’t sure if the narrator is reliable, so I’m not going to tell it—much.

  1

  Charlotte

  I am an outcast. Not in a cool this-is-my-choice kinda way either.

  I shift in my chair and try not to yelp. My pad is stuck to a clump of pubic hair. I raise my hand and Mr. Cobleigh nods his permission for me to scoot to the bathroom. I’m never denied. His eyes are full of genuine compassion—and I know why. We’re doing a dissection unit right now, and in his brain, using scalpels equates to me being traumatized. I sigh and attempt to halt the rolling of my eyes. God how they want to roll, though.

  It’s as if there is a sign on my forehead that reads: Victim. Or maybe it’s just etched into the skin there. Lately, I've been angry. I can't pinpoint why or when it started, although Eve says when I started my period I morphed into a raging beast with too many opinions and hormones. Maybe she’s right.

  I know when I came home—was rescued—that I was so in awe of all that normal life had to offer that I was too immersed in it all to notice the looks. To see the judgment and curiosity. Or maybe middle school kids are less prone to pay attention to others. Or their parents don’t want to scare them so they don’t tell them the bad stuff. I don’t really have a baseline for normal parent-child relationship stuff.

  I keep my strides as short as possible down the hallway. My gait akin to a kid trying to stave off an accident—awkward and rushed. I’m embarrassed just thinking about anyone catching sight of me. Every step causes the pad to shift, tearing out another pubic hair. It’s torture. My breaths are short and quick as I walk down the hall—basically clenching my thighs together like a five-year-old who can’t hold it.

  I didn’t have friends when I went back to school, but I was overjoyed and content at all the things I was able to experience, by all that I had missed out on while away. It wasn’t until ninth grade that I began to notice my peers. To hear the whispers. The rumors about my life before. It bothered me, but, still, I let it roll off my shoulders with wide beaming smiles and offers to help with school projects.

  I thought as I got older people would forget what happened to me. But they didn’t. The masses only grow more curious. Maybe it’s my lack of communication or friends. I don’t squash the rumors when they erupt. I let people talk. I am at school to learn, and I have home to be me. To have fun, to relax and laugh. I’ve compartmentalized the two facets of my life. I don’t need my classmates to befriend me to be happy. Sure, it’d be nice, but it’s not a necessity.

  It irritates me that my peers have everything at their fingertips yet are bored. I missed out on so much that I can’t help but appreciate all the world has to offer, but not them. They don’t know how privileged they are. There’s no gratitude. They can’t see it, but it’s all I can see. I lived with a man, stowed away from society for years against my will. I didn’t have friends or school, TV or computers or electricity. I had a few books, eight crayons and some scraps of paper. I had chores. I had...uncertainty and fear.

  I shove my way into the girls’ bathroom and directly into a stall, which I lock immediately. I’ve got a real quandary at this point. Drop trou and gently peel off my undies, prying the wing of my pad away from my pubes little by little, or fast and swift—guaranteeing a loss of pubes and tremendous pain.

  I’m staring at my underwear, waffling. Eve, my older sister, and Nora and Aubry, her best friends, all talk about waxing like it’s no big deal, but just the few little yanks and tugs on the hair down there while getting to the bathroom were enough to cause my eyes to well up and my jaw to clench. It occurs to me that perhaps my three well-meaning role models are in fact—insane.

  I never knew what Holden would do. What mood he would be in day to day. I have classmates who think eggs magically appear in refrigerators. I had to collect the eggs every morning for breakfast. Clean the meat Holden killed for us. They were playing video games and attending pool parties and I was cooking and cleaning for Holden with no electricity, bathing with no running water, and falling to my knees and praying at the end of every day that someone—anyone—would rescue me. Hoping that Eve was still alive. That she wasn’t a dead body in the woods being snacked on and picked apart by wild animals. While they had scraped knees tenderly cleaned and kissed better, I was at the mercy of an unstable mad man with a penchant for slicing skin and calling it art. Sometimes he left me for days. I was ten, eleven, and twelve. Alone in the wilderness for days with no running water, no electricity and no coveted Wi-Fi. That sort of experience changes you.

  The list of why I can’t relate to my schoolmates is endless at this point. The bathroom door swings open just as I decide fast and swift is the best option. The giggles of a few girls echo on the concrete walls as my undies go down, along with what I’m certain is a sizeable clump of pubic hair, and a scream rips from me.

  The kitchen speaker is playing a Queen song. My sister Eve’s hips sway to the beat. The wooden spoon I’m using to stir the sauce seems to move on its own to the same rhythm as her hips.

  “You, Nora and Aubry are certifiable. There is no way waxing your private parts is normal. And you pay someone to do it to you! I thought I was going to die. And the girls in the bathroom didn’t even ask if something was wrong. They didn’t even ask if I was okay. They just laughed.”

  Of course they laughed, Ava, Julie and Brie are assholes. Self-proclaimed It Girls of the most popular sort. Influencers, they say. Exactly what and who they think they’re influencing is still a mystery. They’re also mean. Downright ugly on the inside. Julie is the worst; Ava seems to waffle sometimes between joining in or maybe doing the right thing; and Brie—well, it doesn’t appear that Brie has her own thoughts. I have theories about this: she might be Julie’s artificially intelligent robot or Brie’s brain might be made out of actual brie cheese. Which might be a blessing considering her parents named her and her brother, Niolo, after cheeses. Cheeses!

  Eve snorts, “I told you tampons were better.” She says it like that’s supposed to change my whole day.

  Groaning, I abandon spoon duty and turn to her.

  “Eve,” I whine, “by fourth period, there was an entirely new rumor being tossed around about me and scalpels. Completely unrelated to the pad debacle.”

  My sister’s expression briefly flashes anger—her form of concern. Eve doesn’t like too much emotion. She doesn’t know I’m watching her. But I have to if I want to catch any hints that she does, in fact, have feelin
gs and cares about me outside the tough-love-act she generally throws my way. She stops what she’s doing to make eye contact with me.

  “Learn to use a tampon so your pubes don’t continue to take a beating. What else can I say? It’s a rite of passage—the whole pad ordeal. But the bathroom debacle is exactly why you should go tonight. To prove you’re just like them and not some antisocial weirdo.”

  I sigh. It’s one of those deep-seated sighs that comes up from the depths of my soul’s bowels. Of course she glossed over the whole scalpel rumor part. That would require acknowledging a part of her life and mine that she avoids at all costs. My lips pucker into that unattractive duck face pose.

  “Are you even listening to me? I don’t want to be like them.” She turns back to what she was doing. Evidently defeated at having a meaningful conversation about my school life, about my life at all, I use her passive tactic and say, “And how the heck do you even know there’s a party tonight anyway?”