“A little.” I pull the blanket closer, but he pulls it off me when he gets up, and starts taking his hoodie off, and gives it to me.
“Put this on?—”
“No, you’ll be cold.” I hand it back to him.
“And my bedroom is over there.” I look over to where he is pointing, the window which looks straight out to the treehouse. “I'll go get one when I start feeling cold.” He brings the hoodie over my head, and he leans in closer to me, leaning his forehead on mine. “Can’t have my friend dying on me.” He stays there fora little longer, and I take in a deep breath, but he pulls away when Mason calls his name.
What was that?
He’s my best friend. I don't want to lose him as my friend, he’s the only friend I’ve ever had. I’m not going to mess it up.
Present Day
I park my car and look around to see if I can see them. Any of them. One group hates me, while the other group I hate, and that group I would never want to ever see again. I have to keep telling myself, it’s only five months, five months and I'll be able to go to law school. If I finish with the grade I hope to get, I’ll be able to go to any law school I want. For five months, all I have to do is hide my hate and guilt.
If I’m lucky the group I hate might not even recognize me., I pray they don’t.
Getting out of the car, I grab my book bag and make my way into school. If I can get through the first day without being seen I’ll be happy.
I look at the map to see where my first class is. I tried to plan my route last night, mostly because I didn’t want anyone to see me looking at the map. I mean it shouts that I’m the new girl.
When I find which building I need to go to, I look as I walk toward it but stop when some girl stands in front of me with a huge smile on her face.
“Hi, I’m going to guess you’re Olivia. I’m Abigail, the professor asked me to meet you, to help you settle in.” I keep telling myself to smile, because I know I have a resting bitch face. Some will call me a bitch while others might just think I’m being rude. So, I tell every muscle in my face to smile. “I think we both have the same classes. Do you have your schedule?” Shepoints to the folder in my hand, and I hand her the paper with my classes on. “We do; this will be great. I can show you around after our first class, unless you know anyone here.” She looks around at some of the other students walking around, which gives me the time to think of my answer.
Yes, I know about seven people here. Four of them I want to kill, and three of them would probably want to kill me. How do I tell someone that, especially as our lessons are law, not the best way to start my first day.
“No,” I reply.
“Great, well you have a new friend now, come on, let’s get to class, and I'll give you the tour.” She links her arm with mine, and she pulls me to get up the stairs.
Great, just fucking great. My plan was to go to class, then hide in my car, until the next class. I’ve got my lunch in my bag, so I didn’t have to go anywhere, and if the weather was too warm or cold, then the back of the library was where I thought I’d run to and hide.
Abigail has other plans, so I just need to work on a plan to get away from her, but she gives me the preppy girl vibe and is doing this to get in the good books of a teacher, so I don’t think she'll let me go anytime soon.
I’m still constantly looking around hoping I don’t see anyone I do know. My hand goes to my necklace automatically to try to calm myself down.
Six
Hayden
15 yearsold
I laugh at my brothers as they try to fight over which one mom loves the most. I never get involved in this fight for two reasons. Firstly, I’m her first born and moms always have a soft spot for the first born. Well, that’s what I always tell myself anyway, Secondly, she finally got a girl, so we all know who she'll be doing shopping trips and spa days out with. So, I’m not even sure why we are having this conversation again.
“Hayden,” I look over at my dad. “You didn’t turn the light off in your tree house.” I look out the window, thinking of when I came inside.
“I did turn it off.” I’m sure I did, because the one time I didn’t, dad shouted at me for wasting electricity, and how there are families out there who have to be careful about the money they spend. After that I never did it again, because I didn’t want to hear the speech. “I’ll go do it now.” I walk out of the kitchen and then climb up the ladder. I’m not going to admit it to Olivia, but having the ladder is so much easier than the rope.
As I reach the top I see Olivia sitting on the other side looking out the small window, well it’s more just a hole.
“Olivia?” I get fully into the tree house, and crawl over to her. Before I can call her name again she quickly turns around and wraps her arms around my neck and starts crying. “Hey, what’s happened?” I pull her in closer to me, wrapping my arms around her, my hand rubbing her back.
She doesn’t say anything, so I leave her for a moment and let her cry it out. Five years we’ve been friends, and I’ve never seen her cry. She’s always happy, talking too much, but I’ve never seen her upset.
This week she’s been quiet, but she said she had a lot of schoolwork, or the book she was reading has been so interesting and she wants to finish it. But nothing to the point where I had to question her if something was seriously wrong with her.
“Olivia, is everything okay?” I ask her again, and she pulls away from me, and I wipe her tears away. “You’re scaring me, are you okay?”
