Chapter 30

                                    

                                          
Chapter 30
                          
 
                          
 
                          
Chloe snapped her diary closed and leaned her head back against the wall with one of those silly grins plastered on her face. It had been a long time since she felt this good about herself and oddly enough she owed this euphoric feeling of hers to one person. Justin Pinnix.
                          
It had been three days since Justin had first so boldly kissed her.
                          
Three very weird, very telling and very wonderful days with a whole bunch of those bold Justin kisses scattered in between.
                          
The edges of her lips curled up even higher as she thought back to that life altering afternoon. She had been so surprised to see Justin pull up in the front of her school and step up to her defense that it took her several long minutes to put herself into action. It wasn’t until Craig and Justin were actually physically going at it that she was able pull herself from her initial shock and do something. And even then her brilliant idea was to steal some poor unsuspecting kids slushy and drench them with it.
                          
The slushy move did all that she hoped it would. It got both of their attentions in a really big way. They both stopped their snarling and turned to stare at her like she had grown a third head or something.
                          
Once she had their full attention, she didn’t stop there. She stood up and proceeded to tell Craig off in front of the entire school. She told him exactly how she felt, what she thought of him and what she thought about what they had done to her. She didn’t honestly expect anything to come of her Hail Mary speech other than her just getting some words off her chest but to her amazement- a lot did in fact happen.
                          
As it turned out, she wasn't the only girl that Craig and his buddies had victimized.
                          
Hannah and several other girls that Chloe had gone to school with over the years stood up that day too and told their similar stories. They went to the Coach the next morning and told him how Craig, Tyler and several others on the football team took advantage of them too. She talked with several girls that day, including Hannah and they made it clear to her that she wasn’t alone- not anymore anyways.
                          
Chloe opened up her eyes. I’m not alone.
                          
Justin had told her those same three words several times over the last few days and now she believed him.
                          
When he first kissed her, still covered in blue slushy, Chloe’s first reaction had been to slap him. Her emotions were already on the borderline of meltdown and that one kiss had tipped her over the edge.
                          
After she had slapped him, Justin grabbed her hand and turned it over so that her palm was facing up. Her handprint was bright read on the side of his face and instead of retaliating he pulled her palm to his mouth and very gently, kissed it. That was confusing enough for her but it was what he said to her afterwards that finally broke through the last of her defenses. “You don’t have to be alone.”
                          
And now she knew for a fact that she wasn’t. She had her friends, she had her family and more importantly, she also had Justin.
                          
Chloe shook her head. After their explosive meeting of the minds that first day she arrived at his school and the week that followed, who would've ever guessed that the two of them would have ended up together?
                          
She surely didn’t but fate was funny like that. Sometimes, things happen when you least expect them and Justin was one of those things. She wouldn’t change it for the world.
                          
Since that day though several things had happened. Craig and Tyler had been put on probation with the football team and from what she had heard; they were both now doing community service at the Rape Crisis Center downtown. They were the ones that were now the social pariahs of the school, not her. And absolutely no one wanted to willingly associate with them any longer.