Never Talk to Strangers Read online

  Never

  Talk to

  Strangers

  By T. L. Hanigan

  Never Talk To Strangers

  By T. L. Hanigan

  Copyright © 2019 by T. L. Hanigan

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the author.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  To my mom who became my first editor and to both of my parents for always keeping me safe – especially from the Internet. (Even if it really was because I couldn’t sneak anything past you, Dad, because you’re I.T.)

  To my friends and family who are supportive of my writing.

  To my first grade teacher, Mary Inkpen, who made me want to become an author when I grew up.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  One

  The Internet

  “Hey, ready?” Emily walked in my bedroom, with her backpack over her shoulder. She had spent the night since it was a two-hour late start today.

  Throwing my backpack on, I nodded, “Yeah, let’s go.”

  My brother, Tyler, and his boyfriend, Sam, had already left for school so Em and I were walking.

  The cold December air blew in our faces as we opened the front door.

  “You can’t call Tyler and ask him to come back to get us?” Em chuckled.

  “Please,” I chuckled, shivering, “Like he even has service.”

  We set out to school on foot, thankful the sidewalks weren’t icy yet. December in Washington almost never got above forty degrees; except on the very rare occasions where it was in the fifties – but unfortunately, this wasn’t one of those times. Cars drove past us, with the cold wind burning our noses, silently wishing we just stayed home today.

  Emily had her head down scrolling on her phone, laughing and reading off random things, then she gasped, “Amber Murphy said she’d come pick us up!”

  Amber Murphy was the most popular girl in school – and the most gorgeous. The two of them were good friends, so it didn’t really surprise me when she said Amber would pick her up, at least.

  At the end of my street, past the elementary school, a silver car stopped next to us. The window rolled down to reveal Amber in the driver’s seat; her long black hair tucked perfectly behind her ear to show off her highlighter against her flawless mocha skin. A guy, I’m assuming her boyfriend, was in the passenger seat.

  “Hey, guys,” she smiled, “Hop in.”

  Em opened the back door and we slid inside the warm car; it even had seat warmers in the back!

  “Thank you so much, Amber,” I told her.

  “It’s no problem, Summer” she smiled, reassuringly.

  For a moment I was shocked she knew my name, but then I thought that Emily must have told her. Amber turned up some music for the five-minute drive to school. By the time my body temperature returned to normal, it was time to go back outside, again.

  “Thank you again,” Em told her, shutting the door.

  “Yeah, there was no way my brother would’ve been able to come get us.”

  Amber shrugged her shoulders as if it were nothing. “You’re welcome, no need to thank me.”

  Amber and her boyfriend linked arms, walking towards the building.

  “Sometimes, I wish I were popular,” Em admired.

  “Are you kidding me?” I laughed, “You’re friends with Amber Murphy! You’re basically popular, too!”

  Emily laughed, “Okay, you’re right, sorry.”

  On the outside doors, there were colored flyers announcing this year’s Winter Formal – and I slightly groaned to myself because I knew that –

  “So, do you have a date yet?” That was going to happen.

  “No,” I told her, wanting to change the subject.

  “I can find you date, if you want!” She told me, a little too happily. “Please?”

  But I shook my head. “No, I’m good.”

  Danny, Emily’s boyfriend and my other best friend, walked over, putting an arm over her shoulders. “Good morning, babe,” he told her, giving her a kiss.

  Emily and Danny have been dating off and on for about a year, now. When he moved here a few years ago, Emily had a huge crush on him – though she refused to actually talk to him. She just needed a little push, so I invited him to sit with us at lunch one day and slipped him Em’s number before he went off to class.

  “Good morning, babe,” she kissed him back. “So, we need to find Summer a date for –”

  “No,” I dragged the word. “No, I don’t need a date.”

  “Are you sure?” Danny asked.

  I nodded, smiling. “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “Then you’ll find one?” Em asked, hopeful.

  Passing Tyler talking to his boyfriend and their friends, I noticed Nick Wilson do a double take when he saw me. He flashed me a beautiful smile and I felt my face grow warm as I smiled back. Tyler and Nick have been best friends since kindergarten. I was the first-person Tyler told when he came out, then we told our parents by introducing Sam as Tyler’s boyfriend. They were not only happy for him, but happy that he came home to introduce Sam the same way he’d come home to introduce a girlfriend.

  “Summer!” Emily gasped, “What about Cory?”

  “Em, I can find my own date,” I reassured her – if I even wanted to go.

  The first few classes seemed to go by really slow; maybe because I was tired, or maybe because I was dreading lunch when Em would ask me, once again, if I had a date yet.

  Though surprisingly, she hadn’t asked when we dropped off our stuff into our fourth period class.

  “Do you want to come over on Friday?” Emily asked as we made our way down the hall. “My mom won’t be home, she has work.”

  “Yeah, I’ll bring more popcorn.”

  “What should we watch?” She asked as we met up with Danny.

  “When?” Danny asked.

  “Sorry, babe. Summer and I are having a girl’s night Friday.” Em told him.

  “But your mom won’t be home,” He joked.

  “Guys,” I held up a hand to stop them. “Right here.”

  Em and I laughed as we went into the cafeteria with Danny for lunch.

  After taking our seats, Emily took out her phone to probably play a game she and Danny had been playing together. I couldn’t remember what it was because I didn’t really have an interest in it. Slowly, the cafeteria became packed with students, making it hard to hear them, so I kind of tuned them out.

  “I hate her!” Emily sneered, looking down at her lap. “I hate her so much. I can't believe she has the nerve to say that!”

  “Who are you talking about?” I asked, curiously.

  She looked up at me with anger in her hazel eyes. She tucked a loose piece of dark brown hair behind her ear. “Amber Gras,” she spit the name.

&nbs
p; “Oh, God.” I sighed heavily. Amber was one of Em’s ex-friends. They were pretty close last year, until she started hanging around Bree – Em’s other ex-friend. Bree had gotten close to Emily just to get to Danny. When Emily confronted Brooke about it, she flipped out, causing a huge scene. She started spreading rumors about Emily that were not only untrue, but absolutely horrible. “What did she do now?”

  “Look!” She handed me her phone so I could read the messages.

  LiaBoo: She's so gross.

  BreeA: She really is though.

  BreeA: OhmyGod, ew! Did you see her today?!

  LiaBoo: Yeah! She's trying to dress like me, what the heck?

  LiaBoo: Ha! Her sweater was so ugly yesterday!

  BreeA: She's such a loser.

  “Who's BreeA?” I asked, giving Emily her phone back.

  “Brooke.” She rolled her eyes.

  “Don't let it get to you, baby.” Danny said, kissing her check. She smiled at him and kissed him on the lips.

  “Get a room,” I joked, looking back down at my lunch.

  Emily laughed, “Sorry, Summer.”

  “You know I’m kidding.” I laughed and asked, “So, what's that thing you were on, anyway?”

  “This,” she answered, showing me her phone. “Download it on your phone.”

  Pulling out my phone and opening my app store, I typed in the first few letters and it popped up. There was a picture of a little thought bubble with the letter ‘C’ in it. “Is it this?” I showed it to her, and she nodded. I started to download it when I heard a voice behind me.

  “I know that's not a phone, Summer.” Quickly shoving the phone in my pocket, I turned to see Mr. M. walking pass us.

  “Sorry, Mr. M,” I mumbled.

  “So, did you find someone yet?” Emily asked eagerly once he was gone.

  “For what?” I asked, taking another bite of my food.

  “Winter Formal! We were just talking about it this morning!”

  “Oh! Yeah, that,” I shook my head, fighting the urge to roll my eyes. “I’m not going.”

  “Um, why?”

  I shrugged.

  “Summer, come on, please!?”

  “Let me think about it, okay?”

  “You had all morning to think about it.” Em looked disappointed.

  Danny spoke up, “But if she doesn’t want to have a fun night, you can’t force her to.”

  I blinked at him. “Wow,” scoffing jokingly, I added, “Thank you, so much, Danny.”

  “Hey, anytime, Summer.”

  The bell rang then and we quickly cleaned up our mess, going off to class.

  “Bye, babe! I love you.” I heard Emily give Danny a kiss.

  “I love you, too, babe.” He told her, moving his black hair out of his brown eyes.

  “Bye, Summer,” he waved.

  “Bye, Danny.” I waved back.

  Emily turned to me, smiling, and linking her arm with mine as we walked back to our class together.

  “You have to go!” She pleaded. “It’ll be fun!”

  I rolled my eyes at her. “I think I’ll be fine staying home. I don’t have a dress, anyway.” This wasn’t exactly true. I had plenty of dresses, just not a going-to-a-school-dance type of dress.

  Emily gasped, excitedly. “We can go shopping!”

  “One step at a time,” I stopped her. I knew she wasn’t going to let this go. If it came down to it, she’d make me go without a date and that would be worse than not going at all. “I’ll,” I paused, letting out a long breath, “I’ll try to find a date, first, okay?”

  “Yes!” Em squealed. “Summer, I promise, it’s going to be so much fun!”

  Emily and I took our seats, waiting for class to being.

  In most of my classes, the teachers don't care whether or not we have our phone out. As long as we do our work. So, after debating on singing up on the site or not, I finally took the leap.

  What should my username be?

  Sunshine?

  I shrugged. Sounds good, I guess. Better not to have my real name out there.

  Scrolling through, I found Emily and Danny almost immediately. CatsCatsCats95 and CatsRule12.

  I laughed to myself. Emily was obviously obsessed with cats, but I wondered if she had Danny make his username cat related or not.

  Pushing the little sleep button, I started working on some class work. There was a test next week in Zoology, and we were going over more material. After a while, my phone lit up I saw out of the corner of my eye. I looked up to see a message from someone named Sk8erBoi.

  Sk8erBoi: Hello(:

  I bit my lip. Not sure if I should reply or not, my thumbs moving in a funny way. I took a deep breath and started typing.

  Sunshine: Hey

  Sk8erBoi: How are you?

  That was a fast reply.

  Sunshine: Pretty good. What about you?

  Sk8erBoi: Good, thanks for asking. What are you up to?(:

  Sunshine: Sitting in class. You?

  Sk8erBoi: Oh, college? I'm sitting on my computer.

  Sunshine: No, actually. High school. Are you in college?

  Sk8erBoi: Oh, cool. What do you want to do afterwards? I'm in running start.

  Sunshine: Not too sure yet, I think I want to be a nurse. What do you want to do? Or what are you doing, exactly?

  I had a couple of messages from other guys, a few stopped talking to me once I mentioned that I was trying to find a date for the school dance. Probably because they didn’t want to go either – or I looked desperate. Which I didn’t blame them, as it did seem like a last resort thing to do; but I told Em I’d try to get a date.

  “So, any luck?” Danny asked as we walked down the hallway at the end of the day.

  I shook my head. “You know, this was a really stupid idea. I think I’m just going to tell Emily that I’m sick.”

  Danny chuckled. “Yeah, good luck with that.”

  “You’re right, there’s no way she’d actually fall for that.” Then I had a thought, “What if I told her that I was grounded?”

  Danny thought for a moment. “It could work – unless I tell her ahead of time,” he laughed and I rolled my eyes, shoving his arm, playfully.

  ***

  Glancing out the window, from my window seat, I began wondering when it was going to snow. Smirking at the thought of telling Emily I couldn’t go to the dance because of the icy roads. I was wearing my favorite blue sweater, and dark blue jeans, with my warm fuzzy socks.

  Unable to focus on my homework, I grabbed my laptop and decided to go on the social media app, again.

  When I did, I found like a billion messages.

  CatsCatsCats95: Oh my God! Summer?!

  I smiled and started to reply to her when my brother came into my bedroom. “Hey, Summer. Time for dinner.”

  “’Kay, be down soon.” I said, not looking at him. While chatting with Emily, Sk8erBoi started messaging me again.

  Sk8erBoi: May I just say that you're a beautiful young lady.

  I blushed.

  I guess my brother wasn't gone yet, because he asked, “What are you blushing for?”

  “Nothing,” I muttered, not looking at him.

  I heard my door shut and he walked up to me. I shut my laptop so he wouldn't look at it, plus he doesn't know the password.

  “Does my little sis have a boyfriend?” He asked, jokingly.

  It wasn't a joke, though – not to me. I was a junior in high school and never had a boyfriend. He was mister popular, while his little sister wasn't. I glared at him. “No. I don't.”

  “Hey, calm down.” He said, lifting my chin up to look at him in his blue eyes. His hair was black, like mine. “It's not a bad thing. You're just being smart and waiting for the right guy.”

  “I know.” I told him.

  “Well, it's time for dinner.”

  I nodded, and followed him down the white carpeted stairs, which lead to the front entry. The hardwood floor was a bit too light, in my opinion
. Turning left, we cut through the living room to get to the kitchen. I grabbed my plate that was on the island and sat at the little table between the kitchen and living room to eat.

  I felt my phone buzz and I pulled it out to see messages from Emily.

  CatsCatsCats95: Do you see this!?

  She sent me screenshots of Amber and Bree talking crap.

  Sunshine: Just act like you don't care. They'll stop eventually.

  “Summer, no cell phones.” Mom said.

  “Sorry, it was Emily,” I told her shoving my phone back in my pocket.

  Then Mom asked, “Isn’t Winter Formal soon?”

  “Two weeks,” Tyler said happily and I mentally rolled my eyes.

  “Are you going, Summer?” Dad asked.

  I shook my head, feeling slightly annoyed I couldn’t catch a break from this thing. “It’s not like this is prom.” Though I probably won’t be going to that, either.

  Tyler nearly dropped his fork. “Summer Anabel Key,” he gasped, dramatically. “It’s still an important moment in your high school career. Don’t you want to look back and be thankful you went to Winter Formal?”

  “Well, I don’t even have a date, yet, so…” I paused, “There’s that.”

  “I’m sure you’ll find one,” Dad said.

  “What about Nick?” Mom asked and I felt my face grow warm.

  Keeping my head down, I said, “Probably not.” I then quickly finished my dinner and helped Tyler with the dishes.

  “I'm sorry about earlier.” He said.

  “It's fine,” I shrugged.

  He paused. “So, if you had a date for Winter Formal, you’d want to go?”

  I shrugged. “I guess.”

  “You’ll have one soon,” he sang.

  I rose an eyebrow at him.

  “Please?” He begged. “You'll have fun!”

  I sighed. “Alright.”

  “Yes!” He squealed like a little girl.

  After cleaning the kitchen, I went back on my laptop. I was surprised to see a message from him.

  Sk8erBoi: So what school do you go to?

  Suddenly, I had a weird feeling about telling him, so I didn’t.