By the Likes of You

A novel by ThunderLocke

CHAPTER 1

“I wouldn’t be caught dead with you,” that’s what I told Jason Peters, the most obnoxious person of all time. Do you know what he asked me? He asked what any two-faced, sleazy sophomore jerk would ask. “Hey, Bonnie, I’m having a movie night at my place tonight. Wanna come over?” For all those less experienced with boys, that means, “I really like you, but only for your body, and want to make out.” Yeah, that’s why I said what I did. Oh, and that’s in front of twenty watching classmates. 

Score one for The Bombster!

“Nice one, Bonnie,” Sam Johnson said, slapping me on the back as he past. 

I grinned. Sam Johnson was the most popular, cutest guy in my grade. The fact that he thought my comeback was enough to get noticed, I should do it more often. 

Class had just let out when Jason Peters asked that question. He grumbled at me incoherent words but I simply smiled at him in a sarcastic way and gathered my books. Heading towards the door, someone collided into me and I only managed to hold on to my books by jamming my hand against the doorframe.

“Yow!” I yelled.

“I’m sorry, Bonnie, I’m so sorry!” Katherine Peters said to me hysterically. Yeah, Katherine was Jason’s sister. They were twins but I had been best friends with Katherine since I was eight-years-old. She was constantly running into things and was classified as klutzy, but she was the only person I knew that actually understood me for me and not because I had a decent body.

“It’s all right, Kate,” I lied, examining my hand as I went down the hallway towards our lockers. My hands were white with cold and the place where I had hit my hand was red and stinging.

“God,” Kate said. “I need a therapist or something,”

“I second that!” Derek Kidman called as we past him.

“At least she won’t need the children’s therapist!” I shot back, wiping the smirk off of his and his pal’s faces. 

“Ha!” I said to myself as I opened up my locker and put in my books. I hauled out some workbooks for my next classes and also grabbed my lunch. I grinned at Kate, who smiled back. “I can’t wait to see Jason’s face when Eric beats him in the baseball game.”

Baseball was a huge deal around my town. You’d expect football or basketball to be big everywhere, but not here. Baseball ran in almost everyone’s blood. All the boys in high school tried out and most got in. Occasionally, someone’s dad got in the minor leagues, but that hasn’t happened since the 80’s, or so my dad told me.

“Jason’s been practicing for three hours every night,” Kate informed me as she caused half the contents of her locker to cascade onto the floor at her feet. She sighed and started to pick the stuff up. I bent down to help, ignoring the stares we were attracting. “God, what I really need is some decent body coordination.” She mumbled under her breath so that only I could hear.

“All part of being a teenager,” I told her, helping her put her necessary books in her bag. 

“Oh, don’t give me that!” Kate said sharply. “You’re Miss Perfect and I’m Miss hey-there-you-dropped-this.”

“Kate,” I started. Kate did this at least twice a week. This whole thing about me being perfect was more a lie than my dad claiming he won a bakery prize in high school.

“No, I’m serious, Bonnie, you’re as perfect as your name suggests!” Kate insisted.

“Kate,” I said again. “My name means happy, not perfect.”

“Who cares what it means?” Kate said, slamming her locker shut and taking her lunch out of my hands. “You are and that’s it!”

As she stalked off towards the cafeteria, I rolled my eyes, sighing. I don’t know why she loves to torture herself. She must be obsessed with my name and how it applies so well with my life style and character. She’s been complaining that her name is too common since we met. After seven years, I am still blank with a plan to get her to see that everyone is special in his or her own way.

I slammed my locker shut and walked after her. Twice someone came up to me to chat, but I gracefully brushed them off. That was until I saw my other best friend. 

“Grace!” I called to the girl at the end of the hall. She groaned when she heard the name. 

Grace was, by far, the most unique person I had ever met. She was also the most open rebellious too. She wore black leggings and a white mini skirt. Her shirt was ripped and frayed at the ends and her forearms were covered with black fishnet. A nose ring glittered in the hallway lights and her hair was pulled into two spiky ponytails.

“Tell me again why you hate your name.” I said, stopping beside her and leaning casually against the locker.

“Bonnie,” she said calmly, slamming her locker and making a freshman beside her jump. Ignoring the stares she was getting, she said to me, “How many punk rock artists can pull off a name like ‘Grace’?”

“I like that name,” I said. “You can actually form a nickname from it, Grace. God!”

“Even though I’d like to pretend otherwise, ‘God’ is not my nickname,” Grace said. She started off with the tide of students heading towards the cafeteria. 

I followed her, still talking. “You can actually have the nickname ‘Gracie’ or ‘Gray’. With my name, all you get is…” I trailed off and raised my arms for emphasis.

“Longer arms?” Grace said.

“No!” I cried. “That’s the whole point: you can’t form a nickname from the name ‘Bonnie’!”

“Who cares?” Grace said.

“Just goes to prove my point that you should be grateful for the name you’ve got!” I said.

Grace groaned again. “Can we please talk about this after I’ve eaten?” She said as we entered the cafeteria, which was packed with talking kids. “I’m ready to eat my binder.”

“Wouldn’t be unusual for you, Gracie,” said Hannah Freedman as she passed. I seized Grace’s shoulder so that she didn’t pounce. Hannah and her friends laughed obnoxiously. 

I had a comeback on my lips when Will Reed suddenly appeared out of nowhere beside me. He cocked an eyebrow at me in question as I released Grace.

“Hannah,” I said shortly.

“Ah, I see, the green monster jealousy has been feeding again,” he said in an understanding way.

Will and I have known each other our entire lives. Our grandparents were best friends when they moved to Roseville Heights from wherever they were previously. Will and I had only ever had one fight and that was over who got to sit in the front seat of my dad’s Cooper. He was the Tall, Dark, and Handsome type that attracted the gaze of every girl as he passed. The difference between Will and Sam was that Sam was well known and lingered in the girl’s minds when he came by. Will was a one second distraction.

“Yep,” I said as we made our way to our usual lunch table near the back wall. I sat down at the end while Grace huffed down nearest the wall. Kate was already there, reading while eating her PB&J sandwich.

I lifted up the book to see the title. I let it drop back onto the table and rolled my eyes at Will as Kate kept reading. 

“Let me guess,” Will said. 

“Pride and Prejudice,” we said together.

“Kate, when are you going to read something other than that book?” I asked exasperatedly, taking out my water and unscrewing it. 

“It’s classic,” Kate said simply, not even looking up.

“Oh,” I said, feigning a serious expression. “Of course,”

“You wouldn’t understand,” Kate said.

“Quite true,” I said. 

Will laughed. “I heard about your great comeback in Geometry today.” He said.

“Really?” I asked, surprised. “You don’t have that class with me so how did you hear about it?”

“Sam told me,” he said, taking out his own lunch and shrugging like it was no big deal.

Did I care to mention that Will and Sam are best friends? Ah! It was a shame that Sam didn’t sit at our—

“Hey, Will!”

Rephrase that: SAM’S COMING OVER HERE!

“Hey!” Will said, getting up and doing that shoulder-bumping thing boys always do. “Are you finally ditching your army for little old us?”

Sam rolled his eyes and took the seat beside me. Beside me! I kept totally cool and merely looked at him out of the corner of my eye as I pulled out my turkey sandwich. Sam had also packed a lunch (more than half of the school’s population does, just goes to show how many people are sensitive about the school lunches) and he had basically the same as me except he had a zipper bag full of Oreos. My favorite.

“I was close to punching that low-life in class today,” Sam said. He suddenly looked up at Kate and said worriedly, “Wait, isn’t he your brother?”

“Don’t apologize,” Kate said with a shrug. “I agree whole heartedly.” She turned a page of Pride and Prejudice idly.

Sam shrugged one shoulder and started talking to Will about the baseball game. I started eating, trying to appear like I couldn’t care less. Grace (thank God), moved down the table and sat on my other side so that I could talk to her, which I did with most enthusiasm. 

It was all going good until Kate interrupted our conversation and Sam’s at the same time. “Bonnie, they sound like they desperately need a good hitter. You’re perfect!”

Oh, she didn’t. SHE DID! Kate knew full well that I didn’t talk about the fact that I was a decent baseball player. So I had hit a few homeruns the only season I played coed baseball. There was no reason bringing it up now and especially in front of Sam, who was the baseball team’s co-captain.

“You play baseball?” Sam asked.

“I used to,” I said, trying to enter back into my conversation with Grace, who knew that I didn’t like to talk about it.

“Are you a good hitter?” Sam asked.

“She’s excellent!” Kate said, her book still covering the lower half of her face. 

“So I got a few homeruns when I played. No big deal,” I said to Kate, giving her a look.

“You hit homeruns?” Sam said sounding impressed.

“A few,” I said with a shrug.

“She hit seven in the season she played!” Kate said.

“Wow,” Sam said, turning his whole body towards me. “’Cause, you know the teams are still coed and we need a good female player on ours. Rules say that we need at least one to play and they can’t just sit on the bench. We desperately need a good girl player.”

This was becoming more and more uncomfortable. Didn’t Kate wonder why I stopped playing? Didn’t she remember what happened afterwards? Did she want me to be miserable?

“Come on, Bonnie,” Sam said, nudging my elbow. You know those tingly feelings you get when someone you really like, touches you? Major waves here!

“I don’t think so,” I said slowly. God, it would be cool to be on the team with Sam but I didn’t want to for a reason.

“Why not?”

I shrugged. Grace and Will were looking at me strangely. I had never told them exactly why I had stopped playing even though I was really good.

“What position did you play?” Sam asked.

“She was an excellent catcher,” Kate said, still looking over the top of her book at Sam.

“Kate!” I barked at her, wanting her to stop. My neck was getting hot and my throat was becoming constricted.

Kate ignored me and still continued to look at Sam, who asked, “What can I do to get you to play?”

“Nothing,” I said, taking a sip of my water, hoping that this would end the conversation. Ha, I’m not that lucky.

“How about you come to one practice and see how well you fit in.” Sam said. “I promise it’ll be painless.” When I said nothing, he continued, “And if it makes you feel any better, I’ll make sure that all the guys keep their hands off you.”

I grinned. “Okay, one practice,” I said.

The moment the words left my mouth, I regretted it. My chest felt tight and tears stung behind my eyes. NO! I screamed in my head. I am not going to fall apart in front of Sam or anyone else for that matter.

I stood up, getting a claustrophobic feeling. I took a deep breath and said, “I’ll be right back.”

Sam, Will, Grace and Kate all watched me high tail myself out of the cafeteria. I hoped against hope that they wouldn’t follow me. I didn’t want anyone to witness me on a near breakdown. I wished that it wasn’t only twelve thirty. I wanted to go home and if I went to the nurse’s office to get sent home, my dad would want a fully legit reason.

I felt like someone had punched me in the chest, pulled out my heart and then tried to replace it with a needle. Several tears went down my face as I ran through the empty hallways, passed classes that were in session, and finally into the courtyard where I leaned against one of the basketball poles.

I leaned against it, gasping for air and wiping away the now on coming tears for about five minutes before I heard the soft thrum of footsteps behind me. I prayed with all my heart that it wasn’t Sam.

“Bonnie, what is the matter with you?”

I let out a breath of relief. It wasn’t Sam, but Will. He always knew how to make me feel better. His tone was slightly sharp but kindness was lurking behind his words.

He stood in front of me and bent down a little to look into my face. “Why are you so against baseball now?” he asked.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I said with a heated clip to my voice. I felt that bruise in my chest pulse. I didn’t want to get into a fight with Will at the moment.

“You do realize that that may be the problem,” he said. 

“Yes!” I cried miserably, banging my forehead against the pole.

“Okay, I don’t want to worry about you giving yourself amnesia so…” He gently took my face and pulled me away from the pole. His hands were warm on my face, which felt nice against the cold. “Try to keep that pretty face of yours in tact.”

I laughed and punched him on the shoulder. Then, without really meaning to, I gave him a hug. It felt nice to have a best friend who can make me feel better under any circumstances. Besides, I had no coat on and it was forty degrees outside.

“Come on, Bon, you can tell old Will what’s the matter, can’t you?”

I sighed and pulled away. I looked around and motioned Will to follow me to some benches not too far away. I sat down on the cold metal and tried to ignore the cold. “I don’t like to talk about baseball anymore,” I said.

“As I see,” Will said. “You used to be as sensation slugger and now….”

I sighed again, looking around the cold, wind swept looking school. I had an idea and turned to Will. “How about you, Grace and Kate come over after school and I’ll explain then? The story will be chilly enough to tell without the weather butting in.”

Will smiled and nodded. “Okay,” he said, standing up, grabbing my hand and pulling me with him. “Deal.”

“WHERE IS SHE?” Grace shrieked, stalking into the room and looking livid and impatient. She spotted me, ran over, and seized my shoulders, shaking me. “Are you telling me that you’re not going to play when you can hit better than Babe Ruth?”

She shook me so hard that I thought I could feel my teeth rattling in my gums. She basically bellowed in my face and her nose ring glittered in the light coming from the kitchen.

“Grace,” Kate said impatiently, sitting down on the couch. Will came in, dropping his bag onto the floor and forcing me to scoot over in my huge armchair. 

“What?” Grace asked indignantly. She looked back at me. “This girl is the next baseball sensation and she’s sulking around like she’s just lost her dog!”

I looked up at Grace, smirking. “My dog?”

“Oh, whatever!” Grace said, slightly hysteric. She sat down heavily—and grumpily—next to Kate and closed her eyes, breathing deeply.

Will nudged me and I tried to collect myself. Telling the truth was going to take something out of me this time. I had a lot to tell and a lot to ask forgiveness for as well. “Well--,”

The phone rang.

I rolled my eyes and sighed impatiently. This wasn’t really the best time not to have an answering machine. I hauled myself off the overstuffed armchair with Will’s help and ran into the kitchen to answer the phone. It was one of those kinds that you expect out of the royal palace except it was rather beat up.

“Hello?” I said before the phone was even to my ear.

“Good, this is the right number.” Sam’s voice said, sounding extremely irritable. “I told Will I’d bury him alive if he gave me the number to Mrs. Jeffery’s house.”

Mrs. Jeffery was our math teacher and giving Sam her number, thinking it was mine was exactly the kind of thing you’d expect out of Will. I laughed and Sam chuckled.

“Well, you were pretty distant after you rudely left Grace, Kate and I at the table at lunch,” he said lightly. “Are you coming to practice tomorrow or what?”

“I’m working on that right now,” I said, noting that I had promised to go to one practice to see how well I fit in. I also felt a little giddy at being told from Sam himself that he had noticed I wasn’t myself.

“Do you want to come?” Sam asked.

“On what?”

“How about this?” I said, the idea springing off the top of my head. “I’ll call you back with my definite answer.”

On the other line, Sam sighed. “Okay, I suppose I can deal with that. Thing is, if you’re as good as your friends make you out to be, you’re the blessing from heaven we’ve been waiting for. Not that you wouldn’t be if you weren’t good at baseball…”

I blushed. “Thanks,” I said, trying to be cool about it. (Just so you know, I was failing miserably.) “I suppose I’ll give you a call later.”

“Sure,” he said. “Thanks, Bonnie.”

“Sure, Sam, bye.”

I hung up and it took me several seconds to pull myself together enough to walk back into the living room and sit down. It was like my body didn’t like taking orders from me anymore. Will took one look at my face, which was probably beet red, and laughed, probably guessing what I was blushing about.

“Sam has a way with words, I’ll give him that.” He said.

“He’s all right,” I lied.

“Well,” Grace said, stamping her foot impatiently. “Are you going to tell us what’s wrong or what?”

The grin blew right off my face and all the color went right back out of my cheeks almost as quickly it had come. All the euphoria of Sam calling me a blessing from heaven was gone like a light. I was now cold again with the dread of telling my friends this story. How they would react…

I opened my mouth to begin, and one word had escaped when I heard the door blast open and my dad came clambering in, a mass of leather and hair.

“Hi dad!” I said, cheerful at the excuse not to tell the story. “Home from work early?”

“Yeah,” my dad said gruffly, shrugging off his coat and tossing it onto the table. “Hey kids.”

They chorused their hellos while we all heard him stumbling around the kitchen, starting his evening cup of coffee. I knew I wouldn’t be able to tell the story with him around because he’d get on me for it. No one was supposed to know.

I looked apologetically at Grace. “Not with him around,” I whispered.

Grace made an angry growl but I ignored it, instead reaching across Will and grabbing the TV remote. I flipped on Cartoon Network where Bugs Bunny was playing. We watched that until my dad came in, now changed out of his work clothes and had a cigar in his mouth.

“Dad!” I barked, making Kate jump. “No smoking in the house! You know better!”

My dad looked sheepish. He took the cigar out of his mouth and looked down at it with longing. “It’s my last one, Bon,” he drawled.

“Good!” I said. “The last thing I need is for you to die from blackened lungs.”

My dad sighed, his red hair shining from the light behind him, and turned to go put it out. I really hated it when my dad smoked in the house. I wanted to search his room for his stash but I could never find it. He hid them well. I told him I don’t have a huge problem when he does it outside or even better, when I’m not around but I will never let him smoke in the house.