“I will see you tomorrow. In the school,” he offered.

“Yeah, sure,” I muttered.

A sudden desire came over me then. A desire to just out and say everything that was on my heart and in my mind. To confess, to lay myself bare before him and let him destroy me emotionally if he must, but to just end the horrid ‘will he won’t he’ nonsense and get a straight answer—

But just as I was building up the words to lay down, we turned the corner onto my street, and my jaw dropped.

In front of my house was a police cruiser.

“Oh crap,” I whispered. I looked at Riley.

“My parents called the cops.”

Chapter Fourteen: Castigated

I’d never been so grounded in my life.

“Mom, it wasn’t that—”

“Not a phone call all weekend. All weekend. And then we find out Bridget hasn’t seen you since Friday!” Mom had yelled, her face red with anger and splotchy from tears. I’d never seen her so upset before, and it freaked me out. I looked to my dad for support, but he just stared at me, pale as a ghost.

“Mom, stop overreacting—”

“We thought you were dead!” she screamed.

“I’m sixteen, I forgot to call, I don’t know why you’re acting like this!” I yelled back.

She just stared at me, her eyes nearly bugging out of her face.

And that’s when the grounding happened. No internet. No friends. No movies or TV—I was surprised she didn’t take away book privileges while she was at it. Home immediately after school, and I had to call as soon as I got out so she could time me. I was a prisoner in my own house.

I wasn’t stupid though—yes, I had to tell them I’d spent the weekend with Riley, but I wasn’t crazy enough to reveal we spent the whole time in New York City. Not that it helped—no more Riley ever was the law now, and not even me completely dissolving into utterly distraught tears and running up to my room in abject misery would change their minds.

My only consolation was that I would at least still see him ‘in the school.’ I clung desperately to his promise like a lifeline.

When I woke up the next morning after falling asleep from sobbing my heart out, things were still tense in the house. Mom made Dad to drive me to school, but he could barely talk to me. I’d never felt so low before, so rejected by my own parents.

How could I explain to them what had happened? They would never understand.

“Aren’t you going to wish me a good day at school?” I asked Dad, breaking the awful silence as he pulled up in front of Portsmouth High.