Chapter 1

It was a sticky summer day. I woke up drenched in cold sweat, sitting in class.

The dark green chalkboard blurred before my eyes as our elderly math teacher shot me an annoyed look. The bell rang, and he gathered his books and left.

A hand with long, clean fingers reached over from my side, holding a couple of pieces of tissue. A calm, pleasant male voice sounded above my head.

"Hey, are you okay?"

That voice snapped me fully awake. I looked around and realized that I was in my familiar high school classroom!

I was reborn!

…

I was a random sidekick in a tragic teen novel and the female lead, Tinsley Wood's best friend.

When she learned to smoke, I saved up my allowance just to buy her cigarettes, only to get yelled at by Asher Kane, the male lead, who was all entangled with her. He pointed in my face and screamed that I'd led her astray.

When Tinsley's grades tanked, I stopped studying just to keep her company, so I ended up at a vocational school when my average grades would have earned me a better choice.

When she contracted an STD after sleeping with a local thug, I took the blame for her and endured judgmental whispers and looks from people around us.

When the star-crossed leads finally had their happy ending and moved abroad, I stayed behind to raise the child she'd had with the thug.

I did all of that until the thug was released from prison. When he couldn't find her, he took his rage out on me by driving one stab straight into my stomach and plunging the knife deep.

…

Gasping for air, I took the tissues. Before I could even say thank you, a loud, jeering voice boomed from the back of the class.

A group of teenagers started whistling crudely. "Hey, Tinsley! Why is there blood on your butt?"

I whipped my head around, while Tinsley, with her neat short hair, instinctively looked at me. She clenched her hands around the blood-stained school jacket tied around her waist.

"N-No, it wasn't me! This jacket is Gia's; she's bleeding!"

Tinsley was undeniably beautiful. She had soft, short hair brushing past her ears, a perfectly oval face, and smooth skin. Her figure was so well-developed that she made the teenage boys, who were in the middle of their puberty, swallow hard.

Her eyes were expressive, almost like they could speak. And right now, those big, pretty eyes were locked onto mine pleadingly, as if she was saying, "Help me like you always do, Gia Fletcher. Claim the blood stains and take on these cruel jokes."

Under the collective gaze of the class, I stood up, pulled my jacket out from under my desk, and put it on. Then, I turned to my seatmate, Henry Summers, and said, "Close the window. I'm going to take a nap."

After I lay back down, the room went silent for a beat before a louder explosion of laughter broke out.

"Look! Gia's wearing her own jacket!"

"What are you embarrassed about, Tinsley?"

Asher was the one leading the teasing. "Didn't your hostess mom give you money for tampons? Ask me nicely, and I'll buy some for you."

The teenagers laughed like a flock of geese, and their taunts mixed with Tinsley's soft, embarrassed protests.

I stayed face-down in my arms and felt completely unmoved. There wasn't even a spark of justice or sympathy because now, I knew that Tinsley was enjoying every second of it.

In my past life, I'd hidden my jacket, walked over to her, and put on that damp, blood-stained piece, while the teenagers laughed and the ladies whispered in hushed voices.

I stood there in the blazing summer heat, wrapped in a cheap, suffocating uniform. I'd carried all her shame and secrets of adolescence with my head held high, thinking I was some kind of hero.