"Julie, wait" I heard my name being called as I turned on my heel and ran out of the room as fast as I could.
I knew that before Ryan could catch me he'd have to (a) get off of my mother and (b) get dressed. I decided to use it to my advantage as I sprinted straight past my evil brother and out the door.
"JULIE!" I heard Ryan scream my name.
He can get stuffed. There's no way I'm stopping for that asshole. Not now and not ever.
I continued running down our driveway and out of the Gaffney property. I knew where I was going and I wasn't going to stop running until I got there.
I approached the lake where many of my early hockey practices were held. It was where I learned to become one of the best goalies in the country and it was one of my favourite places in the world.
"DAMN!" I cursed out loud realising that I was missing two very important things.
The first being my skates and the second being money to hire skates because I forgot them in the first place.
"Well if it isn't Julie "the Cat" Gaffney!"
I spun around to come face to face with Reg, the owner of the rental stall beside the lake that consisted of a long table with a handmade sign that read "Skate Hire" on it. At the end of each day Reg packs up his stall and takes the skates back to his skate shop. He reminded me somewhat of Jan, without the Scandinavian accent of course.
"Hi Reg" I couldn't help but grin back. Even on your worst day old Reg could make you feel like the world's most special person.
"Have you come to skate?" he asked.
"Yeah" I affirmed.
"No skates I see" he commented in a non-confrontational way. Somehow he always knew when something was up.
"Yeah" I replied not wanting to get further into it.
"Come on" he gestured for me to follow him to the rental stall.
"I don't have any money" I protested.
"Your moneys no good around here Julie, because of you I've been running out of skates to hire because everybody wants to skate on the lake where Julie "the Cat" Gaffney skated, at this rate I can retire next week" he smiled at his own joke.
Wow! Did I really have that effect on people?
"Oh my god!" I heard the excited squeal of a young girl who looked no older than ten.
I turned around quickly half expecting there to be something wrong.
"Are you okay?" I asked.
"Am I okay? I'm better than okay, you're Julie "the Cat" Gaffney!" she squealed again.
Well duh, I did know my own name.
"Yeah I am" I confirmed for her turning around to accept the skates Reg had pulled out of the stall for me.
"Oh my god are you going to skate? Can I skate with you?" she asked hopefully.
I really didn't want to but what could I say? She looked so impressed that I was standing in front of her.
"Okay" I replied pulling my best fake smile.
Maybe having her around would take my mind off of my mother and her 'boy toy' for a while.
"So what's your name?" I asked the girl as I tugged on my skates.
"Kelly" she replied.
"Great name, so you're a fan of Team USA then?" I ask.
"Yeah you guys were awesome!" she gushed watching me lace my skates up.
"So who's your favourite?" I asked.
"You!" she giggled.
"Besides me" I pressed on.
"Ummmm, the Bash Brothers were cool, Robertson was funny but I like Adam Banks" she gave me the answer I thought she'd give me.
"Adam's cool" I agreed.
"Is he your boyfriend?" she asked me in a hushed tone.
"Nope, Fulton Reed is" I gave her a huge secret.
Kelly's eyes grew wide "REALLY!" she asked.
"Yep" I nodded feeling much better. Fulton was one of my favourite subjects to talk about.
"Wow! Is he a good kisser?" she blurted out turning red.
"Yeah he is" I replied feeling myself blush a little.
"I can't wait til I get a boyfriend' she told me as we rose to our feet ready to hit the ice.
"You'll get one, one day" I told her as I pushed out onto the ice.
God it felt good to be back.
After an hour or so of skating around and being silly with Kelly and even signing half a dozen autographs for a few star struck fans I wandered off the ice.
Sitting down to remove my skates I felt someone sitting down beside me.
Someone I didn't want to talk to.
"I have nothing to say to you" I didn't waste no time in ripping his head off.
"I know Julie but I'm sorry, I want you to know that" Ryan pleaded.
"You're only sorry you got caught, who knows how long it would have gone on for if I hadn't have walked in, or how long it was going on prior to today" I spat at him.
"But Julie…" he began.
"Don't 'but Julie' me. I trusted you" I blurted out angrily.
"I know Julie but you can use this to your advantage" Ryan said.
"How the hell can I use this to my advantage?" I was outraged. Did he even know what he was on about?
"You wanna go to Eden Hall right? And she won't let you go" Ryan began.
"So?" I felt like being an argumentative little shit right now.
"So use it against her. Threaten to tell your father if she doesn't let you go" Ryan looked dead serious.
Of course! Why didn't I think of that?
"What about you? Aren't you worried about your job?" I asked.
"I quit" Ryan replied simply.
"Why?" I asked not entirely sure I wanted to know the answer.
"I only did it for the extra money, I know you think its like pimping myself out or something but you don't understand what its like to have no money for things you need" Ryan said.
I didn't say anything, mostly because I couldn't think of an answer.
"So go home, tell your mother either you get to go to Eden Hall or your father finds out about her infidelity. She'll go for it, your father's money is far too tempting to pass up for someone like her" Ryan tried giving me a pep talk.
Or someone like you I thought bitterly."I'll see you later" I said coldly standing up to return my skates to Reg who told me he was glad to see me and looks forward to the next time I skated on the lake.
That would be the only sad thing about leaving Maine and never returning.
"Julie" my mother glanced up at me from the seat on the porch.
She only ever called me Julie when she's guilty of something and this time I knew exactly what it was.
"We need to talk" I said sharply leaning on the railing across from her.
"Yes" she looked down at her hands that were holding a small glass of something brown in colour, probably whisky.
"Here's the deal, you deliver to me by tomorrow morning the signed and accepted Contract for me to attend Eden Hall and I'll conveniently forget I ever saw or heard anything between you and Ryan" I laid my deal out on the table.
"Julie that's blackmail" my mother pretended to look shocked.
"What can I say I learned from the best" I replied stonily.
She had to agree there. Between my father, my brother and herself we had a team of the best dirty, lying, cheating blackmailers in the country.
"I don't know if I can do that" she tried resisting.
"Can you do without father's money, this nice house, your nice clothes, your social status" I replied.
I knew it was cold and heartless but I honestly stopped caring about her years ago, she was never going to change and I had accepted it.
"Alright you win, I'll get your father to sign the Contract" she said.
I took the opportunity to steal a glance at her, she looked defeated.
"I'll start packing" I said dryly leaving her out on the porch staring off into space.
The day had finally arrived. I had survived another week in the place I like to call hell.
As promised, my mother had gotten my father to sign the Contract and she delivered it to my room the next morning.
I called Connie in excitement telling her that I was coming to Eden Hall with her. She was thrilled and had been keeping me up to date on what had been going on in dreary Minnesota.
Apparently the boys had cried the day Jesse left for Philadelphia, especially Goldberg who, according to Connie, had thrown himself at Jesse shouting "take me with you!" at the top of his lungs.
When we finally stopped laughing about that she told me all about her email relationship she had going with Portman. I teased her mercilessly of course to which she always replied 'we're just good friends'.
She then told me that Fulton hadn't stopped talking about me all summer and that Charlie had actually grown the balls to shove one of his filthy socks in Fulton's mouth as a gag. Charlie was still watching his back to see what the retaliation would be.
"Ew I'm not kissing him again" I remembered telling her and we both knew that wasn't true.
So here I was at Bangor International Airport waiting for my flight to be called. This time both of my parents and my brother had come to see me off.
No doubt John was already calling dibs on my room and thinking about what he was going to do to it in my absence.
"We will be over in a week to attend the official induction ceremony" my father was telling me.
"Okay" I replied trying to work out what the ulterior motive was.
I was even more confused when he hugged me and told me he'd miss me.
I'd never seen that much affection from him in years, if ever.
"Goodbye Juliette" my mother was back to calling me 'Juliette'. I knew the whole 'Julie' thing wouldn't last long. She was still pissed that I'd won in the end.
"Bye mother, John" I nodded in the direction of my brother out of politeness.
My flight was called and I took a deep breath feeling more and more excited by the second.
I was on my way to Eden Hall and to Fulton.
I couldn't wait.
AN – so this is the last chapter of part 2 and nothing gets past you reviewers does it! (thanks for the review btw – they are really appreciated and motivating) Kudos to Gaffney06 who got the twist. Part 3 will be up soon – I think it will be called Camp Eden.