A.N.: I burst into tears writing this one! Might've had something to do with listening to the Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers soundtrack; orchestral music makes me weepy.


Rose Amongst Thorns

Chapter Thirty-Three

It's Different for Girls


Monday was a good day; Rose got an A+ in her French pop-quiz, got an A on her History essay, her last English essay was used as an example for paragraph structure, and it was taco-salad day. People still whispered about her and stared, but she was getting used to it. She and Miller both sat with the girls for lunch in the cafeteria, as it was raining, and Finn joined them halfway through lunch. Evan was civil to Rose, and Hailey ignored her during cross-country training, which made it a very good day.


Tuesday started out…badly. When she stepped out of the bathroom, she realised that Caleb had found her condom stash; there were no Lucky Charms left in the bowl and her favourite snacks had already been divvied out amongst the brothers; one of her tires exploded on the way to school, with Miller and Finn riding shotgun; they were all late to their classes, and she had a hard-ass substitute in History who gave her lunchtime detention for being late.

She was sitting in study hall during her lunchtime detention, starving and irritated by the substitute teacher, trying her best to keep focus on her book, The Age of Innocence, but the whispers of the girls sitting at the table near hers kept annoying her, and she heard her name once or twice.

"Did you hear what she did?" one of them breathed; Rose reread her sentence.

"No, what?" another one whispered.

"She slept with—"

"Finn McGowan," two girls said at the same time. The third gasped.

"And Evan?" she whispered.

"Uh-huh," the first said, and then Rose heard them gasping and whispering even quieter, laughing unkindly.

She stared at her book, rereading the sentence for the third time, her heart in her mouth. How did they find out? she thought. No one knew she and Finn had slept together. Well, obviously, he told.

Indescribable hurt swept over Rose.

Finn had told someone they had slept together; he had gone against what he'd promised her about not telling anyone and he'd told. And now mean girls were whispering about it behind her back, thinking she'd now slept with both Evan and Finn McGowan.

At home, after cross-country practice, where nobody but Aimee spoke to her and yet everybody had something to say about her and kept giving her sidelong glances full of meaning, during which it had rained, Rose drove home and parked up by the barn. Sean was working on Finn's car, his face, arms and t-shirt streaked liberally with grease.

"Hey, Sean, have you seen Finn?" Rose called, climbing out of the truck, glad the rain had relented to a drizzle.

"Studio," Sean replied, leaning over the hood of the Impala. Rose nodded and said, "Thanks," and made her way around the house, down to the brook, where the shed door stood open a crack for some air; she saw Finn already working on a canvas, the back of the painting facing her. She knocked gently on the door, but didn't enter the shed.

When he noticed who it was, Finn's face illuminated with a brilliant smile that made his eyes glitter. "Rose! Hey… Aren't you gonna come in?"

Rose stared at him, her eyes burning; they brimmed with tears. She took a deep breath, suppressing them, and blinked them away.

"Everybody knows," she said hoarsely, her throat burning. Finn's eyebrows flickered.

"Knows what?"

"Finn, they know," Rose said, her lip trembling, as she fought not to cry. After lunch, all she saw anybody doing was whispering behind her back and eyeing her as if she was something unpleasant stuck to the bottom of their shoes. They made up nicknames concerning brothers for her that they'd whisper (or not) to her when they passed her in the hallway, passed notes to her and smirked whenever they laughed at something she couldn't hear. "They know." Finn put his paintbrush down. "Finn, did you tell someone?"

"What?" He looked genuinely taken aback at her question. "No."

"Well I didn't tell anyone," Rose said softly, her voice choked from bottled-up emotion. "So someone had to."

"Rose, I swore to you, I'd never betray your trust with something like this," Finn said earnestly, and it showed in his eyes; he never would betray her. He'd never intentionally hurt her feelings. He'd proved that already.

"Then how do they know?" she choked, clenching her eyes shut. Finn looked around the shed, seemingly lost for words; he raised his arms and lowered them helplessly.

"I don't know, honey," he said softly. "Maybe this is someone's speculating getting out of hand. You know how high-school is. Last week they were already betting who you'd get to next. This is probably just escalating from that."

Feeling like she just wanted to have a hot bath and a big cry, Rose nodded and let tears well up in her eyes. "I think that we…we shouldn't…talk at school…anymore," she whispered.

Leaving Finn looking stumped, Rose walked back to the house just as the heavens started to open; almost soaked through, Rose slipped inside and upstairs.

Feeling distinctly miserable, she collected her bath things, her iPod and The Age of Innocence, and sank into a huge, fragrant bath. But she didn't read for much of it, though she had her book open. All she could think about was the look on people's faces, the way they whispered and laughed unkindly behind her back, the way they seemed to know everything and taunted her with that. Compounded by the unkindness of Evan, the indifference of Sean and the obnoxiousness of Doug, it all compounded to make her very unhappy.


It only got worse on Wednesday. Jenna and Pearl, no doubt encouraged by Ria, ignored her. They didn't make any space for her to sit with them at lunch, and Rose ate her lunch alone. Miller "wasn't allowed" to sit with her, he said; he sat outside under an umbrella, listening to the game. She felt like she was going to burst into tears at any moment, as unkindness and hatred poured in from all sides, making her feel like she was two inches tall.

During Art, someone was using one of the computers, and a rather large crowd had formed around them, laughing and whispering about something on the internet they'd found; on her way to the cafeteria, someone bumped into her and tossed a crumpled up piece of paper at her; it caught on her hood, and when she smoothed it out, she saw that an internet address had been scrawled on it.

The only person who caught her eye all day was, strangely enough, Doug. To deserve his attention, Rose knew she was very far up that creek with no paddles. He had caught her eye, where she sat alone at an abandoned table in the corner of the cafeteria because of the rain, and something strange had flickered over his face, before she'd felt another wave of crippling emotion pass over her and tucked her chin down, focusing on her tortilla soup.

She wetted a paper-towel under the faucet in the bathrooms of the locker-room, rinsed it and unfolded it, and walked to her locker. In big letters, written in red lipstick, were the words 'Tramp' and 'Slut,' with 'WHORE' written diagonally down it.

The lipstick didn't come off easily; it smeared, and stained, and it took her almost ten minutes to clean the red residue from the gold-painted metal locker-door. She didn't know who had done it, or why they had felt compelled to, or what she had done to deserve it, but Rose cleaned it up, not wanting anyone else to see it or a janitor to have to clean it up. By the time she had the locker looking like new, she was already very late to cross-country training, and her hands were stained red. She jogged out to the centre of the field, where Miss Smith was taking roll and giving out notices and reminders. Rose knew she would be mad, and rightly so, but already the injustice rankled, knowing it wasn't her fault.

"Rose, you're late," Miss Smith said tersely, when Rose joined the group; Aimee gave her a worried glance.

"I'm sorry," Rose said quietly.

"I don't want apologies," Miss Smith frowned. "I expect you to be here on time."

"Yes ma'am," Rose said softly.

"Is it wrong to enjoy this?" Vithya Jane asked one of her friends, who snickered. Rose flushed but tried to ignore them.

"Alright, let's do our stretches," Miss Smith said. "Jake, you lead."

Rose had a very bad practice. She had spent all day being bullied and called names; people had passed notes to her—boys had passed notes to her—all day, asking for favours, and doodling crass little sexual drawings, asking which was her favourite position. They had asked her which of the McGowan brothers had been better, and which one she'd go on to next. The girls had been even meaner. Boys were just interested in sex; girls picked apart every single tiny detail about Rose's appearance, character, tastes, friends, her diet, her clothes, her car, her intelligence. They whispered amongst themselves and whispered obviously and laughed loudly, smirking at her, whispering, staring across the cafeteria at her.

She did not have a good practice; everything just compounded and caused her so much upset that, for the first time ever, she lagged behind at the back of the group on their run.

"Rose, what's wrong with you today?" Miss Smith shouted up ahead. "You're being lazy." Rose panted and felt exhaustion, both physical and mental, collapse on top of her, and could barely lift her feet to keep running.

"I guess Finn McGowan banged the energy right out of her," she heard Hailey Farmer's friend Jessica remark, up ahead, and closed her eyes, wiping tears and rain from her face.

She didn't stick around for a shower and after-practice chats; she grabbed her stuff and left school, got into her truck, and drove to the McGowans'. Standing under the blistering jet of the shower, she pinched her eyes in her hand and tried to stifle the sounds of her crying, her entire body trembling despite the searing heat of the water.

Due to the enormous thunder-clouds rumbling over the town, blocking the sun, and the rain that rendered seeing even ten feet in front of you an impossibility, the entire house was dark, and dreary; only the sounds of Caleb's and Ian's giggles down in the den brought life to the house; Rose turned some of the lights on as she walked downstairs, in her comfy pyjamas, her brand-new pale suede knee-high Ugg boots and her dad's oldest, most broken-in and comfiest black sweatshirt with the embroidered blue-and-orange Charlotte Bobcats logo; she had dragged her hair into a rare ponytail and went to warm a glass of milk to drink while she attempted to do her homework at the kitchen-table.

She was listening to the Nessun Dorma, which had always made her cry, when someone sat down at the table. Rose glanced up; it was Sean. And he was without a book for the first time since Rose had seen him; even when working on his bike or Finn's car, he had a paperback tucked into the back pocket of his jeans.

"What're you doing?" Rose mumbled. Sean stared at her.

"What?"

"Don't you know you're sitting with Baker High School's slut?" Rose asked sadly, eyeing him. He blinked again.

"They'll get over it," he said quietly. Rose stared at him, confused.

"Who'll get over what?"

"Whatever is happening at school. They'll get over it," he said. Rose stared at him, not believing him.

"It's different for girls," she said quietly. "You can sleep with whoever you want and people think you're cool… I…"

"You didn't have sex with Evan," Sean pointed out. Rose looked down at her notebook, stifling a sigh.

"No, I didn't sleep with Evan," she agreed. But I slept with Finn, and everyone's making it seem like I'm some kind of jezebel, she thought. They're making me feel like having sex is the worst thing in the world I could ever possibly do. At this point, she felt it, too. She felt like she… She felt like she had committed some huge, unforgivable crime by showing her love for Finn. Because she did love him.

That was why she was in so much pain.

She and Sean stared at each other for a few minutes; then he went back to the barn to work on his bike or hang out with his musician friends; Rose continued with her homework, and refilled her cup of warm milk, trying not to let it show when the little ones came tearing into the kitchen for snacks and things just how upset she was.

Finn didn't approach her; he had taken what she'd whispered yesterday to heart and hadn't said anything to her at school, and hadn't been to her bedroom or even stayed in the same room for more than a few seconds if they were alone in it together.

She was still downstairs when the doorbell rang, and John, who had returned from work rather earlier than usual, answered. From her position at the kitchen table, she could easily hear John's voice, and the voice of their guest.

"Ben Farmer! Long time, no see!" John said, laughing. When he spoke next, his voice was solemn, anxious. "Are you alright…you look like you've just seen a ghost."

The man who spoke had a warm, kindly voice dripping with sadness. He reminded Rose of her dad.

"I want you to know…Hailey put some stuff on the internet about Rosalie," Ben Farmer said; Rose suspected Ben Farmer was Hailey and Aimee's dad. "Other kids added to it, but I'm pretty sure Hailey's the one who started it."

"Stuff on the internet?" John said, obviously stumped. "What're you talking about?"

"It's bad," Mr Farmer said quietly, his voice deadly serious and deeply regretful. "I'm not gonna lie to you. Cheryl's at home now with her, trying to figure out what in the hell possessed her. I felt like I owed Rosalie an apology in person. Aimee's been talking about her new friend a lot at home; Rosalie doesn't deserve this, not after what she's been through the last few months."

Rose picked up her things and tiptoed up the back stairs, avoiding John and Mr Farmer. She tucked herself into her room and took her laptop, and the piece of crumpled-up paper that had been thrown at her earlier today, typed in the address, and felt a wash of hurt crash over her, more painful than anything she'd yet experienced.

She clicked on the Google link for 'The Official Rosalie Meade Slam Page,' and started to cry as she scrolled down and read what total strangers had to say about her; they had cut out her face from a photograph and animated it to rub against Evan's and Finn's grinning faces; they had used SLUT repeated over and over as a backdrop for the photograph taken of her during last year's Homecoming Court crowning ceremony, had drawn beards and moustaches on other pictures of her, written lists speculating who she'd slept with and who she would sleep with, said every mean thing that could be said about a person, and the thing that really broke her heart was that complete strangers could do this to her without any guilt.

Caleb came to call her downstairs for dinner; it smelt good, but Rosalie didn't even notice what she was eating, and she kept her gaze lowered throughout the meal; John and Regina were unusually quiet, and the whole meal was solemn and tense. Rose knew she wasn't the only one who'd seen The Official Rosalie Meade Slam Page.

Back upstairs in her room, Rose closed the laptop when someone knocked on her door, and wiped her eyes hastily. It was John. He looked like he had just had his heart broken, as if he was having trouble digesting what he had obviously just seen on the internet, how cruel teenagers could be to each other, to her, to a person they didn't even know. She hadn't even done anything wrong. John saw her at her desk and smiled sadly.

"You okay?" he asked, trying to sound casual.

"Yeah. Just…doing some homework," Rose said sadly, stifling a choking cry she really just wanted to belt out and cuddle in his arms. "I have a…History paper due in…" John nodded slowly, and licked his lips.

"Regina and me…we're uh, we're turning in for the night," John said softly.

"Goodnight," Rose half-whispered, managing a sad smile. John gazed at her for a minute, then nodded.

"See you in the morning," he said, and retreated, closing the door silently behind him.


By Thursday afternoon, everyone in the school knew about The Official Rosalie Meade Slam Page. It was all anybody could talk about, and Rose had to sit through everyone watching her and snickering and calling her names, looking at her as if she was something nasty stuck to their shoes. Nobody had written anything on her gym locker today; they'd upped the ante and posted it all over the internet instead. She tucked her daddy's Bobcats on over her running stuff, due to the downpour of rain that had been going on all day, tied her hair into a ponytail and followed behind Aimee and Pearl to the field.

They kept glancing back at her, eyes sparkling with worry, but Rose kept her gaze on the floor; if she raised her gaze, she was in danger of meeting someone's kind eye and bursting into tears.

Miss Smith took roll-call and set out their workout; "Rose, you lead stretches today." Rose nodded, wishing she had chosen someone else, as people already stared enough at her as it was.

"Maybe we could get some tips on your favourite sexual positions?" one of the girls said, as Rose walked past her to the front of the group, to lead in their stretches before they did their warm-up jog.

"Shut up, Jessica, I'm tired of hearing it," Aimee snapped, and everyone glanced at her. Rose just ignored the girls and started leading stretches.

"Wow. My back's a little sore," one of Hailey's other friends, Vithya, said. "Hope I can hold the cradle."

"What the hell is your problem?" Aimee snapped again, and Rose blinked and jumped back when Aimee and Vithya went toe-to-toe, at each other's throats, having a catfight. Miss Smith got in between them and broke it up; everyone was tense and expectant, agitated.

"Enough! Hey! What is going on over here?" Miss Smith demanded; when nobody spoke up, she glanced around, eyeing them each right in the face. "Anybody? Please, enlighten me." Miss Smith glanced between Vithya, Jessica and Aimee. "Whatever is going on between you guys, you need to work it out. We have our first meet this weekend. We've been working all summer for this meet against Spenser." She fixed Rose with a very unforgiving look. "And I don't know what you've been doing all week, Rosalie. Are you with this team?"

No. "Yes ma'am," Rose mumbled, keeping her eyes on the floor. She wanted nothing more than to go home and curl up under her duvet while her daddy stroked her hair and made her laugh even though she didn't want to. She wanted her mommy to go and kick down the Farmers' door and wring Hailey's neck; she wanted her to march up to the school and demand a list of everyone who had spoken a bad word about her daughter so she could put them all against a brick wall. She wanted to go home and have a cuddle from Lucia, who always had time to cuddle her older sister when she saw Rose was upset.

"You're sure?" Miss Smith said harshly, frowning. Rose kept her gaze on the floor, her cheeks flushing, her eyes burning from tears.

"Yes ma'am," she said, glad her voice didn't crack.

"Alright then," Miss Smith said, and practice continued.


Rose wanted to go home. She wanted to go where the sun shone almost all the time; she wanted to be able to climb through her bedroom window, into the tree outside it, and up to Pogue's bedroom. She wanted to curl up beside him on his big bed; she wanted him to hug her, not demanding any explanations until she had had a good cry and tired herself out. She wanted to go home and have her mom and Lucia waiting for her with snacks and chatting in the backyard, their toes dabbling in the pool as they sat at the edge and sipped sweet-tea, talking about their days, showing each other what they'd done at school; Rose's sketches and Photoshop projects, Lucia's finger-paintings and doodles and her kindergarten craft-projects, the little cardboard star she'd made for Christmas with a toilet-paper roll, yellow paint and gold glitter, and the little beaded bracelet she'd made for Rose with a craft kit she'd been given for her fourth birthday; she wanted to chase Lucia around the garden with a water-gun and teach her how to jump-rope and she wanted to spend hours in their mother's closet trying on clothes and shoes and jewellery and bake cupcakes in those outfits. She wanted to make those disgusting pizzas with any kind of topping they could find in the fridge and kitchen-cupboards, peanut butter and grape-jelly, M&Ms, ranch dressing, strawberries, chocolate, bananas, olives, ham, fried-egg, grapes, pickles, marshmallows, pineapple, on the one pizza; she had eaten the whole thing, down to the last Nutella-spread crust, and had been sick the whole night and next-day. She wanted to sit up late with her mom and dad, watching a movie, or playing cards, or bouncing a basketball out by the garage, or go out to dinner at their favourite restaurant, talk to people they knew, who they always saw when they went out for dinner; she wanted to go to a party with her friends and she wanted to go on Pogue's motorcycle down the freeway, tearing it up and just being happy. She wanted to cook dinner with her dad and not have her mom already passed out after a bottle of wine. She wanted to not see the looks of heartbroken wonder whenever she saw the parents of Lucia's kindergarten friends; she wanted her baby-sister back to hug and play with and love; she wanted her parents to be as they should have been, whole, happy, in love, and loving her and loving Lucia.

Rose went to the school next day, and then Friday; she went to her classes, and she did her homework; she didn't speak to anyone, and nobody came to talk to her; at the McGowans', nobody spoke to her and she didn't seek any of them out; she couldn't talk to John and Regina, and Finn was avoiding her like she was carrying a highly-contagious hemorrhagic disease.

On Friday, she slinked away from her class as Miss Willow led the Art class to the big gymnasium for a pep-rally to inspire school spirit for the football team. She went to the bathroom and cried.

At the beginning of lunch, Rose went to her locker and opened it, focusing on the combination. She found a note folded onto the stack of textbooks, and knew it wasn't anything of hers. She picked it up and opened it, and tried not to start crying again.

"Hi Rosalie," someone said cheerfully; she recognised the voice as Miss Smith's. "I didn't see you at the pep-rally. That blonde hair of yours is one-of-a-kind. You missed Finn McGowan in a skirt. What's that?"

Miss Smith took the note that read 'For a good time call Rose at 1-800-SLUT!' Miss Smith folded the note and tutted. "Well that's just bush-league. We don't listen to those jack-asses." She peered into Rose's face, closed Rose's locker, and led her away with an arm around her shoulders. Miss Smith led her to her office in the locker-rooms, closing the door and shutting the blinds, and turning a chair towards the sofa on which she had deposited Rose.

She had a big box of tissues and limitless patience, and Rose cried for a long time before she could calm down long enough to talk to Miss Smith.

"L-last year, m-my l-little sister, Lucia…died," Rosalie cried, pressing the wad of tissues against her eyes, choking on a sob. "Doctors found out she had a d-degenerative heart d-defect, it was a h-hole in her h-heart, and they c-couldn't do anything about it."

Miss Smith held her hand tenderly, her expression so tender and anxious that Rose could almost see her mother peeking through. That made her cry even more.

"M-men are s'posed to be made of steel, but my daddy couldn't even s-step foot in the h-hospital the last day; my mommy couldn't stay in the room when th-the doctors took Lucy off life-support. But I stayed!" Rose choked, whimpering. "I stayed, with my little sister, I stayed with her. I cuddled her up in m-my arms and I kept telling her I loved her…I was there when she died, she died in my arms, she died knowing she was loved—but she died without her mommy or daddy there. S-she said she'd b-be a star, and she'd look after m-me from Devon. She didn't know she was going to heaven!"

Rose broke down and cried, her entire body rocking, hot tears splashing down her face, her mouth and throat burning, her nose running, her eyes swelling, her hands shaking. Miss Smith hugged her tight, the same way Pogue's mom had hugged her after she'd come home from the hospital, that terrible night when that sweet little light that was Lucia went out.

Rose cried into Miss Smith's shoulder, cried in a way she hadn't done since Lucia's funeral, when Pogue had had to half-carry her back to the limousine. Miss Smith rubbed her back and waited, and Rose eventually calmed down a little more to continue.

"Th-then when, when, after the—the funeral," Rose choked it out, "my m-mom started drinking, a lot. She was always drinking. She was always drinking, and then sh-she was always in bed, and she always had a hangover, and she was always angry, or depressed, and…and my daddy went to work, and he came home, and he couldn't get her to stop drinking, and I had to cook dinner and clean the house and I had to hide the alcohol from the house, and at Christmas, Daddy gave my mom money to buy Christmas presents—she spent all of it on d-drink. She was passed out before eleven a.m. on Christmas Day." Rose dissolved into tears again. Miss Smith rubbed her back and stroked a lock of hair behind her ear.

"Do you want to tell me about the accident?" she said softly, passing Rose another handful of tissues. Rose cried into them, shuddering. She felt like her head was going to explode and she couldn't stop shaking. She choked out a sob and wiped her face, tears falling steadily, but she calmed herself enough to talk.

"I don't know why my mom was driving," she said hollowly, then her mouth twisted and she had to sweep up another torrent of silent tears with her tissues. "The…the paramedics who responded to the em-emergency call from s-someone on the f-freeway said that my mom d-died on impact in the crash, that she didn't have a second to feel any pain. S-she had a blood-alcohol level three times the legal driving limit. I don't know why she was driving." Her mother had killed her father; he had been in the passenger seat, and nobody had any idea why he would have gotten into the passenger seat of a car when his wife was so obviously incapable of driving. "And my daddy…My daddy…died at the hospital…twenty-three hours, seventeen minutes and thirty-seven seconds after the crash…of heavy internal bleeding and severe head trauma… H-he was f-fully conscious…" She went off into a torrent of tears again, dissolving into her tissues. "He was f-fully conscious wh-when the emer-emergency r-response t-team tried to cut him out of th-the car."

Miss Smith hugged her for a long time. When she released Rose, her expression was so heartbroken, and so upset, that Rose truly believed she was desolated for her. She tucked a lock of Rose's hair behind her ear.

"So…they left you to John and Regina McGowans' care," Miss Smith said gently. Rose nodded and hid her face in her tissues. "Wanna tell me about the boys, what's going on around school?"

So Rose told her. She told Miss Smith about Hailey bullying her, and giving Evan advice, and the party, and the fight between Doug and Evan, and Rose shouting at Evan, everyone blaming her for Evan and Hailey breaking up, the rumours that she and Evan had had sex; Evan slapping her; kissing Finn; having sex with Finn, someone finding out and spreading it around school.

"And…was this the…first time?" Miss Smith said quietly. Rose nodded and dabbed her eyes with her tissues. Miss Smith let out a sigh.

"Sweetie… Listen to me. You have been hurt, more than any kid has ever been hurt in their life before," Miss Smith said softly. "You've been playing the adult, it seems to me, taking care of your mom, and your dad, when they should have been the ones looking after you. You have acted more maturely than any teenager I have ever met. And you have been treated so horrendously by the students here. You don't deserve any of what's happened to you."

Rose let out a shuddering breath.

"I just thought…if I didn't say anything, if I didn't show how much it hurt to have them talk about me that…that they'd get bored, and that they'd move on. But they haven't—they just keep making up new stuff about me that I've never done," she said. "I can't talk to anyone about it because…because Finn and I aren't supposed to be…we weren't supposed to have feelings for each other. Mr and Mrs McGowan would be so mad if they knew what we'd done." Rose cried, a great sense of self-directed disappointment making her shudder with tears again.

"Seems to me like you bottled it all up, huh, so nobody'd be put out, so you wouldn't be a nuisance, or get in anyone's way," Miss Smith guessed, very astutely. "But, sweetie…your parents chose to leave you to John and Regina McGowan's care because they knew they would take care of you if anything happened to them. No matter what happened, you understand me? I know Regina; there's nothing she loves more than her kids. She'll understand, I promise, if you just be a little selfish and ask people to take care of you."

It wasn't in Rose's nature to make a mess and demand attention; it was her nature to take things in quietly, set them aside, and get on with what needed to be done, no matter what she felt, no matter what happened. She was the crutch; she helped other people; she dealt with everything by herself and didn't like making a fuss or having other people put out of their way to help her. But she understood what Miss Smith said, and nodded.

After her discussion with Miss Smith, Rose didn't want to go to cross-country practice, but she did; her last ever. She wasn't going to go to another cross-country practice ever again. Not at that school, not with those people. She wouldn't use running as escapism from dealing with Lucia and her parents. She was going to…to face things, head on.

But first, she wanted to go home and curl up with Pogue and a bucket of Ben & Jerry's…except…she knew she couldn't do that…

She drove back to the McGowans' after practice, and heard an echoing groan from the basement as she stepped over the threshold. The rain had stopped when their run had ended during training; she was soaked to the skin, emotionally lifeless, and looking for something, anything, from any one of the brothers. A hug. Maybe a kindly smile.

"Hi guys," she said tiredly, dropping down the last step into the basement, which was a guy's ultimate haven.

No one said a word. Nobody even looked at her.

"Hello?" she said, raising her voice a little bit.

Miller's head bent closer to the page of his baseball magazine. Evan clenched his jaw and stared t the television screen. Caleb started to squirm, looking sad and upset, glancing at each of his brothers in turn.

They were actively ignoring her. And they had brought Miller into it; that was why he "wasn't allowed" to sit with her at lunchtimes anymore. That was why he wasn't sitting with anyone at lunchtimes anymore. Apparently another guys-only meeting had been called, and another freeze-out had been sanctioned.

Rose looked at the floor, eyes burning with tears. She had thought she'd cried enough tears today to completely dry her out for the next year.

"What did I do this time?" she mumbled. Nobody said anything, not for a long time. Then Ian glanced from each of his brothers and at Rose; he flicked his eyes over her face and his eyes widened, then he frowned.

"You got Finn grounded," he said softly. Rose blinked.

"What?"

"Finn's grounded," Caleb said, sounding like he'd been desperate to talk to her.

"Why?" Rose asked, disbelieving. She hadn't heard any arguments between John and Regina and Finn; she would have heard an argument between them, since it most likely would have involved her.

"I'm sure you know," Evan said, in a way that made her certain everybody in the room knew everything.

"You're blaming me for him being grounded?" Rose said, in barely more than a whisper. She couldn't have made herself scream if her life depended on it. "Are you going to blame me for everything that happens in this house from now on?"

"Finn couldn't covet your cookies if you weren't shovin' 'em in his face, could he?" Doug said. Rose stared at him, then she found herself replying;

"Don't talk to me about shoving things where they shouldn't be, Douglas Arnold," she said quietly. "Why is Finn the only one in this family who can take responsibility for his own actions?"

"Uh-oh, watch out. The little girl's gonna throw a tantrum," Doug said, holding up his hands. Ian laughed, but Caleb looked like he wanted to cry, pouting at Rose, as if the only thing holding him back from flying at her was Evan's arm clamped around him as he sat in his brother's lap.

"Don't you laugh at me, Ian," Rose said, her eyes burning. "I am very upset. Don't you dare laugh at me. Miller…why're you letting them boss you around? You were doing so well; why haven't you been sitting with Aimee at lunchtime anymore?"

"You talkin' to girls now, dill hole?" Doug said.

"Don't call him that!" Rose said thickly, her eyes swimming with tears. "One day you're going to call the wrong person the wrong thing, and you're going to pay for it. I hope I'm there to say 'I told you so' when it happens, because you really have it coming to you with that attitude problem of yours. You never even said thank you for getting you out of a suspension—or expulsion. You and I know if you'd been kicked out of school, you'd have really hated yourself for that silly little stunt you pulled; but you still won't take responsibility for yourself."

"What is that supposed to mean?" Evan snapped. Rose blinked at him, sending tears cascading down her cheeks.

"I am not the one who slept with your girlfriend," she said softly. "If you should've slapped anyone, it would have been her. Stop taking everything out on me. None of you is responsible for your own choices or actions; you're a big bunch of whining little babies too lazy to do anything about it but squall and expect everyone else to run around after you."


A.N.: Please review. I was crying while I wrote this! Been a long time since I've written anything this emotive! The poll is still open for Megan's sister's name; Tamsin, Cecily, Poppy, Evelyn "Evie," Samantha "Sammy," or Ella.