If I Tell

peppermint gum on his breath. Goose bumps covered my arms. “She’s not worth getting into it with.”
    I forced myself to take another step to put space between Jackson and myself so he wouldn’t see my reaction to him. He winked and turned for the door. “I’m going this way. You coming?” He gestured right with his thumb.
    “Just a minute.” I pretended to search for something in the front of my backpack. Being left alone with Tina and her friends was better than walking with Jackson. “Go ahead. I’m going the other way.”
    He ignored Tina and her friends as if they were insignificant dust particles. “Sure you’re okay?”
    “Fine.”
    “Okay. I’ll see you at work tonight.” He hesitated and then shrugged and walked out of the classroom.
    “You gettin’ it on with the bad boy?” Tina demanded as soon as he was gone.
    I ignored her and watched him disappear into the hallway, sort of wishing I was, and then tried to rid my brain of those thoughts.
    “Are you?” she asked.
    I jutted out my jaw and glared at Tina’s smirking face. Her eyes flickered with disappointment when I didn’t show outward signs of being intimidated. Inside, my nerves were jittering like crazy, but Grandpa and experience taught me well over the years.
    “Never let ’em see you sweat, Jazzie. Stand tall. Never let ’em know what you’re thinking.”
    I kept my expression neutral, knowing Tina thrived on weakness. She’d ignored me for years, but I knew she marched around the school treating people like crap and drumming up hours of business for local therapists. The school psychologist should pay her a commission. And she had the nerve to call Jackson the bad boy. Worst thing he’d probably done to her was refuse to kiss her ass.
    “Am I trespassing on your property?” I asked sweetly. In the back of my head an alarm silently rang. Who did I think I was, taking on Tina? “Or maybe he wasn’t interested.”
    Nadine, her follower, made a tiny squealing sound. “Oh, my God, she can talk,” she said and giggled.
    Tina glared at me. “Gross. I’m sure I’d get an STD just kissing him. Guys like him have been around, you know.” Tina snapped her gum and jutted her hip out.
    Please, even I knew Tina had slept with half the football team.
    “Well, I guess you have something in common,” I politely told her.
    “Oh, my God. I can’t believe she said that,” Nadine shrieked.
    Truthfully, I couldn’t believe it either.
    “You’re one to talk. Hanging out with that slut Lacey Stevens.” Tina glared at me. “She’ll screw anything that moves.”
    So much for flying under the radar. I blinked, surprised and slightly alarmed. How did she even know Lacey? They didn’t exactly hang in the same crowds. Did she know about Simon? Had someone else seen them?
    Tina crossed her arms across her overdeveloped chest and sneered at me. “What’s the matter? Cat got your tongue?”
    “Why do you care who my friends are?” I asked.
    Snap. Snap. She clacked her jaw, chomping on her gum. “Oh, please. Friends? And as if anyone cares about you.”
    “You did say she was talented,” a girl said. Carly. I remembered holding hands with her at recess in second grade. Before it became social suicide to touch me. Or talk to me.
    Tina shot her a death glance. “I said I would never act like I was cool and superior, showing off my singing and guitar like a friggin’ busker looking for spare quarters. That’s hardly a compliment.” She glared at me.
    “I guess you have no choice but to hang out with white trash like Lacey. No one around here has wanted anything to do with you since you almost drowned yourself. Oh. Except that lesbian. And now the juvenile delinquent. You’re probably desperate enough to do both of them to keep them around.” The girls around her laughed, but they sounded nervous. “You sure do know how to pick ’em. I guess you don’t have a lot of choice. Half-breed and all. ”
    The hair on my arms rose. I stood straighter. Every inch of my body went into flight mode, even though I had several inches on Tina in her heels versus my flat sneakers. I took a deep breath. I wouldn’t run. “You know nothing about me.”
    Or my color, I silently added.
    She grinned. There was no friendliness in the smirk. “My sister told me you were fooling around with some black guy. Trust me, there’s not a lot I don’t know about people at this school.” She smirked again as my head felt close to exploding