O4 Baby Keep My Heart Beating

"BABY KEEP MY HEART BEATING"

My nails dug deep into the forearm of whoever grabbed me from behind. The person yelped and dropped me on the dirt trail.

"Chill, Faye! It's just me."

I looked up at Daniel McGiffens. His brown hair swooped low on his forehead, nearly obscuring his dark eyes. It'd been days since I'd been this close to him. That cologne that used to drive me crazy now made me dizzy in a bad way.

He examined the scratches on his on his arm, blood beading up along them. "Dammit, Faye." He hissed.

Getting up from the dirt, I dusted myself off. "You're lucky It's just a scratch! Next time, don't try to scare people."

"Don't be so sensitive. It was a joke."

"Screw you." I pushed him out the way and continued to my house.

He jogged to catch up to me. "I saw that video you posted."

I slowed my pace, looking over at him. I'd hoped he'd see it and know what a jerk he'd been. I wanted to know if hearing my lyrics made him realize his mistake. That he'd want me back. Not that I'd ever take him back, because he was the worst person on the planet.

"Good." I spat.

"Not good." His hand gripped my arm, yanking me into him. "Have you seen the comments? People know it's about me!"

Since losing my song book, I hadn't thought to check the comments on that video. Whatever he was talking about must've been new comments I hadn't read yet.

"You make me sound like dick."

"All I did was tell the truth. If you sound like a dick, that's on you. Now let me go!" He did the opposite. His grip tightened and he pulled me so close I felt the heat of his breath on my face.

"The truth? The truth is you're a crazy bitch and you're pissed I called you out on it."

"Don't be so sensitive." I threw his words back him.

"I want the video taken down. Tonight."

"Get a court order and maybe I'll consider it," I shot back.

Anger flashed across his face. I braced myself for a fight. I could finally put those self defense classes my dad forced me and my sister to take to good use use.

"Hey!"

Daniel and I looked in the direction of the voice. Peter Conway ran across the field in a second, his eyes zoned in on Daniel like he was ready to take his head off. What was he even doing her?

"This doesn't concern you, Conway." Daniel seethed.

"It does, actually. Take your hands off her." This Peter sounded nothing like the charming guy everyone loved. This Peter sounded like he was out for blood.

"I can handle myself, Peter. Go save the dolphins or something." I said, trying to decided between Daniel's grion or his nose. Both would most likely take him down.

"I know you can," Peter agreed, not missing a beat. "I just don't want to see Daniel get too hurt. He just got a scholarship for baseball. It'd be shame for him to put it in jeopardy by getting beat up by a girl."

Daniel seemed to consider this. His hold on me loosened. "Whatever." He dropped my arm completely and stalked away in the opposite direction.

My arm was bright red where he had me in a death grip. His angry hand print marked my skin.

Peter took a look at it, gently running his fingertips over it. The chill I felt had nothing to do with his touch. It was cold for an early June afternoon. "It's gonna bruise." He looked in the direction Daniel ran off in like he wanted throttle him. "That guy's a jerk."

"I wish I knew that two months ago."

He gazed at me with sympathy. I wasn't used to that from people other than Cherry. "Sorry, you had to deal with him."

"My choice." I said, stepping out of his intoxicating orbit. "Some of the best songs come from dating crappy people."

His brows bunched together. "You wrote a song about Daniel?"

"Multiple. That's why he was so angry just now."

"You wrote them in your notebook?"

"Obviously."

He raised a brow, like he knew something super obvious and was waiting for me to get it.

"Oh my god!" I gasped. "Daniel stole my notebook. He had to. No one else had any reason to take it."

I should've listened to my mom the first time I introduced her to Daniel. She said he gave her bad vibes. I thought it was just because of his leg tattoo and septum piercing.

"We'll figure out what to do with him later," Peter said, glancing at his watch. "I promised your mom I'd have you home by now."

"Right, don't want to ruin your perfect record of parental butt kissing."

"This year, I'm going for the gold."

I laughed out loud. I swear his eyes lit up like he'd won a prize. He blinked and it was gone. "Let's get you home."

We went through the field to his car that was parked haphazardly at the curb. Did he see Daniel put his hands on me from way over here and jump out to help?

"What are you doing out here, anyway?" I asked, settling into the passenger seat of his car. "I thought you had daycamp duties."

"I did. I do. I just wanted to make sure you were home," he told me as he started the drive to my house.

"So, you drove around looking for me?" Something about that warmed my chest.

"I was on my way to your house when I saw you and Daniel." His knuckles went white around the steering wheel when he mentioned my ex. "Nothing pisses me off more than a guy putting his hands on a girl."

I was touched by how angry he was on my behalf. I'd never seen Peter in a fight, but I'd bet money on him based on his anger alone. "Well, this girl could've laid that guy out."

He suddenly turned to me. "Has he done that before? Hurt you?"

"No. Never," I answered truthfully. I'd seen Daniel rough up guys before, but he'd never been that angry at me. It was usually the other way around. He constantly did things to upset me to the point where I'd throw something heavy in his general direction.

Peter focused back on the street. "If he tries something like that with you again. I want you to tell me. He won't get away with it next time."

Note to self: Pissed off Peter was kind of hot. His jaw, sharp and tense. His eyes flickered like a storm. Daniel should start sleeping with one eye open.

I nodded, speechless as he pulled up to the curb outside my house. Slipping out of the car, I reminded myself that it was Peter Conway I was thinking about. The same Peter who spent most his weekends picking up trash off the side of the road. The only way you'd catch me out there was if a judge ordered it.

"Faye?" He called out before I shut the car door. I ducked to get a better look at him. "You forget something? Manners."

Just like last time, I flipped him off. Then slammed his door for good measure. I had to keep that boy out of my head.

***

Freckles and I were in the backyard when my dad got home. He always beat my mom back. He joined me on the back steps, handing me a lemonade while he had a beer himself.

"What'd you get up to today?" He asked, taking over throwing the stick for Freckles.

I changed into a light sweater, covering the hand-shaped bruise on my arm. "Well, I'm grounded. So... this."

Freckles laid the stick at my feet, choosing me as the stick thrower. I flung it across the yard.

"I'll talk to your mom about reducing your sentence. You shouldn't be cooped up in the house all day."

I might look like my mom, but I got my personality from my dad. We had the same dry humor and eye rolling technique. He also understood that sometimes my mom overreacted and took controlling me too far. So he was on my side whenever she pulled out an unreasonable grounding sentence.

When they were separated, though, and my dad stayed in an apartment for six months, my mom wasn't as harsh. She didn't have a permanent frown or constantly found reasons to be upset with me.

My dad remained the same laid-back guy during those months. It made me think my mom took her frustration with my dad out on me. She couldn't get him to do what she wanted, but since I lived under her roof, she could control me. It was kinda twisted to think about.

A song idea popped into my head. My hand reached for my notebook. When my fingers brushed the empty stairs, my stomach sank. Did Daniel really have my songs? Was he shredding them? Was he taking pictures to post online?

"Hey, kiddo, what's going on in that head of yours?" He asked as Freckles came back with the stick, dropping it at his feet. I guessed we were taking turns.

"I lost my lyric book," I admitted.

"That thing with all the scribbles on the cover?"

I nodded.

"How? Didn't you have it super glued to your hand?"

"Dad, it's not funny! What's written in there is top secret," I said, hugging my knees to my chest. "I think I know who has it."

"Go get it back then." He said it like it was so simple.

"It's pointless. Even if I wanted to, I'm grounded."

"It's the weekend," he declared. "Be grounded during the week."

"That's not how things works."

Freckles began barking, rushing around to the front yard.

"Mom's home," my dad announced, standing with a grunt. "Let's go clear things up."

Despite having little fate this would go over well, I followed him into the house.

My mom stood in the kitchen, confused.

"What's wrong, Abby?"

She turned in a semi a circle before facing us again. "The kitchen. It's cleaner than when we left this morning."

My dad looked around, as if seeing it for the first time. "Faye, you do this?"

My mom looked at me expectantly. The honest thing would be to tell them Peter did it. But if I wanted freedom this summer, maybe taking credit for cleaning wasn't a bad idea.

My mouth betrayed me. "Peter insisted."

"Aw." My mom placed her hand over her heart like I'd just told her Peter saved kittens from a burning tree. "He is honestly the nicest--"

"I'll be in my room," I groaned. Regardless of how true it was, I was sick of hearing how nice Peter was.

Maybe I'd be nice too, if my efforts were even half as appreciated as Peter Conway just existing. When I threw myself into my unmade bed, I landed on my bad arm. Wincing, I rolled onto my back and pulled out my phone. I wanted to see the comments Daniel was talking about.

I watched a few seconds of my music video for "Don't Wanna Dance With You". Cherry's camera work was phenomenal. If I hit it big, she'd be my official director.

Scrolling down, the top comment was from someone claiming to go to school with me. Which, they probably did. I didn't know everyone. Under that was a comment tagging Daniel. The comment thread was about thirty comments deep.

Some people said I was obsessed with Daniel--mostly his baseball buddies and a couple groupies. But most of the comments seemed to come from other girls he had humped and dumped before me. They dragged him for filth.

Daniel's only come back was calling them crazy bitches. I screenshot the comments incase I needed to testify against him in the near future on some poor girl's behalf.

Then I clicked through to his profile. Just to see if the pictures he posted of us were still up. They weren't. He deleted a majority of the pictures he posted in April and May. His latest post was of him, shirtless, sitting on the diving board of his outdoor pool.

You know what this means! Come thru on Friday.

#nobadvibes#nocrazies#notaylorswiftwannabes

I wanted to scream. What did I ever see in him? The only thing that gave me solace were the comments under his photo. In between the fire emojis from his friends, there were girls posting lyrics from my song. I liked every single one of those comments.

There was a knock on my bedroom door, followed by my mom sticking her head in my room. Why didn't parents ever wait to be invited in?

I sat up as she stepped into the room. She glanced around. My messy bed, the pile of clothes in the corner, a trashcan over flowing with discarded songs.

"Maybe have Peter clean your room next time he comes over."

"I like it like this." It was true. When my room was too clean it felt like I was trespassing into someone else's bed room. Though, the pile of clothes seemed too messy. Even for me. I had to do laundry soon.

She crossed over to my desk chair, removing a flipflop from the seat before sitting down. "So, you sent your dad to do your dirty work?"

I flopped back on my bed, once again forget the bruise on my arm and hissing in pain. My mom was too busy organizing the pens on my desk to notice. "I didn't send dad to do anything. He offered."

"Your behavior this past year has been abysmal. Detention, sneaking out of the house, these boys you claimed as boyfriends." She was specifically talking about Daniel. I only introduced Nathan and Ivan as friends.

"Okay. I get it," I groaned into my pillow. " I'm already grounded, do I really need to listen to you criticize me, too?"

"I'm not trying to criticize you. I just want you to start using your brain--"

I turned up the music playing over my tv. Olivia Rodrigo drowned out my mother's voice. She tried to yell over the music, but I turned it up as loud as it could go. She stormed out of my room, slamming the door behind her.

Two minutes later, the power went out and I was drenched in silence. Except when I stepped into the hall to complain, I realized it was only my room that was dark. Every other light was on.

When I got down the stairs, my mom was coming in from the garage. "What did you do?" I demanded.

"Until you fix your attitude, you don't deserve electricity."

"You're sick!" I shouted. "Dad, do something!"

"Abby, I think you're--"

"Don't!" My mom warned, pointing a finger at her husband. "You get to be the good guy all the time and I'm sick of it. Maybe if you stopped trying to be the cool dad and tried parenting for once in your life."

"This isn't parenting. This borderline abuse!" I said in defense of my dad.

"Excuse me if I don't want you to end up like your sister!" she shot back, her face red with anger.

I stood there, jaw on the floor. I couldn't believe she threw Sabrina in my face like that. I couldn't believe she thought I was heading down the same path as her.

"That is enough, Abigail!" My dad hardly ever rose his voice, so to hear it boom throughout the house now had us all at stand still. "Now we are going to sit down and have dinner as family."

"Henry--"

"Then!" he said, silencing my mother. "Tomorrow we will have a civilized conversation about what's going on in this house. Now, the next thing that comes out of either of your mouths better be pizza or Chinese."

There was a beat of silence filled only with Freckles confused whining. I broke it by stomping up the stairs and slamming the door.

My appetite was officially ruined.