Hidden Within

I stare out of my window, watching Brian again as he walks over to where he must keep his guitar and anxiously await for him to play. I know it’s weird, I know it’s creepy, but I can’t help stopping and staring at him whenever I notice he’s going to play. I just wish I knew what he was playing, just how it sounds when he strums those chords. Does it sound half as beautiful as it is to watch him as his fingers slide across the neck of the acoustic in his hands? I can only wonder.

It’s a wonder he hasn’t caught me watching him though. I wonder if he even realizes that we’re neighbors. He must know. But then again, I didn’t have the slightest clue he lived in the vicinity until I saw him walking into the house across the street. Maybe he’s just as clueless as I was.

“There you are,” a deep familiar voice growls into my ear and it’s as if my heart stops beating. A pair of strong arms wrap around my waist and my entire body goes stiff, as if I’ve become paralyzed. “I’ve missed you, Lana.”

I close my eyes tightly, shaking my head slightly as his hold on my body gets stronger. I open my eyes, looking out the window and wishing that Brian would look up and realize that I’m here. But it’s hopeless; he’s absorbed in his music, oblivious to what’s going on here in my room. I’m going to have to get out of this on my own.

I muster up enough courage to will myself to move and I start to struggle against him, attempting to squirm out of his grasp. But he’s too strong for me. He chuckles into my ear, amused by my feeble attempts to escape the inevitable.

“Silly, silly girl.” His hot breath hits my neck and makes my skin crawl. “You know you can’t get away from me.”

I open my mouth to cry out for help, praying that someone in the house will surely hear me. However, it’s useless. Only a small, tiny squeak passes from my lips, not even close to enough for a passerby to wonder what’s going on.

Hot tears well up in my eyes and my body begins to grow tired of fighting. I’ve let myself get too weak, sapped myself of all energy that I once possessed. My body goes limp and he lightly laughs. I swear I’ve never heard anything so sinister.

“That’s a good girl,” he whispers, bringing up one of his hands and he starts to stroke my hair. “Don’t fight it anymore.” He presses his lips to my ear and a silent sob passes from my lips. “You know you want it.”

I shake my head.

This is not what I want at all.

It’s very far from what I want.

“Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you. I’ll be nice and gentle.”

I shake my head again, knowing very well that it’s not going to do a damn bit of good. Maybe I’m still stupid enough to think that the cousin I knew growing up is still somewhere inside. That he hasn’t really turned into the grotesque monster that he is now.

“Now, Lana, I’m just finishing what I started,” he says softly. “You’ll like it if you just relax. I promise.”

No!

Dear God, this can’t be happening!

Please, don’t let it happen!

How did I get myself into this? How did I end up here with him? I thought I had done everything I could to make sure this could never happen? I thought I knew better than to leave myself alone and vulnerable. Why does he have to do this? Wasn’t last time enough for him? Didn’t he do enough to scar me for life? Didn’t he do enough to damage me to the point where no one would ever want me?

“Get down there,” he snarls, pulling me away from the window and pushing me down onto my bed.

I guess not…

I stare up at him, my eyes wide with fear as he smirks down at me. He grips my hips roughly, pulling me towards him. He leans down, resting his hands on either side of my body, as he slowly closes the gap between our lips. I quickly turn my head to the side, but he forcefully grabs my face, pulling it back to where I’m facing him head-on, and smashes his lips violently against mine.

I refuse to kiss him back, keeping my lips stationary as he continues to kiss me roughly. He pushes his thumb on one of my cheeks and his fingers press on the other, forcing my mouth open as he shoves his tongue into my mouth. He tastes disgusting, just like last time, and bile burns at my throat as it pushes its way up from my stomach.

“You taste so sweet,” he smiles as he breaks the kiss. “Just like last time.”

I feel like ripping off my skin, tears cascading down my face, as his fingers run up my arm. He reaches my shoulder and lets them move south, towards my chest. They trail in between my breasts and down my stomach, heading straight towards the waist of my jeans.

“Are you ready, Lana?”

No!

No, no, no, no, no!

He unbuttons my jeans and smirks at me as he forcibly pulls them down my legs, taking my panties along with them. Why God? Why can’t I fucking move? Why can’t I try to stop him? Why can’t I scream? Why can’t I fight him, push him away? Why am I just letting him do this to me? My mind is racing, and I can see myself hauling ass, running away as fast as I fucking can. But my body is limp, unmoving, paralyzed with fear.

“Have I ever told you,” he starts to unbuckle his belt. “That you’re my favorite cousin?”

I shut my eyes, tears leaking out of the corners, and try to move an arm, a leg, anything at all. I just want to do something to stop him. I don’t want him to finish what he started. I can’t let him finish what he started.

But nothing works.

And there’s nothing else I can do besides squeeze my eyes and wait for exactly what I know is going to happen.

~

I’m violently shaken awake; my breath is heavy and shallow, my eyes frantically scanning the room to find the person who woke me. I stare at my shocked and worried sister’s face, and never before have I been so happy, so elated, to see her. She just saved me from the worst thing I could ever imagine happening. Sure, it was only in a dream, but she saved me none the less. She brought me out of that nightmare and back into reality where Craig is almost two thousand miles away from me and I am safe. Well, for now at least.

“Lana! Lana, are you okay?” Sandi asks in a frantic whisper, her eyes reflecting so much concern for me right now. I can only imagine what a sight I am right now, what a wreck I am.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” I pant, my breathing going back to normal.

“Are you sure? You were screaming in your sleep and tossing and turning like mad.”

“I just had a bad dream, Sands. I’m okay,” I tell her with a reassuring smile. Well, my best attempt at a reassuring smile since I’m not sure how convincing I am.

“Alright…” she sighs, still eying me warily. I guess I wasn’t very convincing to her. Or maybe it’s because she knows me so well; she can tell when I’m lying through my teeth, when something is wrong. “But I’m here, alright? Anything at all, you can come to me to talk about it.”

“I know, Sandi,” I tell her with a small smile. “I know.”

“Okay, well, I guess I’ll let you get back to sleep. We’ve still got a couple of hours before we’ve gotta get up and around for school… And try not to have any more of those bad dreams, alright? You were pretty loud; I thought for sure that Mom and Dad were going to be in here trying to figure out what’s going on.”

“Nah, you know Mom and Dad are heavy sleepers. Nothing wakes them.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right… Well, ‘night, Lana,” she says as she gets up from the edge of my bed. “I’ll see ya in the morning.”

“Alright. Night,” I tell her, giving her another reassuring smile to ease her worries just a little bit.

She walks to my door and smiles back at me, but I can still see the trepidation, the worry, hiding behind her eyes in the dim moonlight. She exits the room, quietly shutting the door behind her, and leaving me alone again. Not that I don’t mind being by myself; I did pretty much drive her out of the room by constantly telling her that I’m alright, but sometimes I just wish… I wish I wasn’t alone. I wish I had someone around, someone that I can really talk to.

I know that Sandi said that I can talk to her about anything, but I can’t talk to her about this. She just wouldn’t understand. It would cause too much tension between everyone if I were to tell her about what happened. And as for Lynn, I love the girl to pieces, really I do, but I’m afraid she wouldn’t be able to keep it a secret; or worse, think that there’s something wrong with me because of it.

I bite my bottom lip and pull my knees towards my chest, hugging them tightly. I wish I could be like everyone else; that I could just go back to the way I used to be. I want to be happy again; I want to feel safe, like I can trust people again. I’m trying, really I am; I’m trying my hardest to see the good in everyone that I meet. But then I get that feeling in my gut that something’s off; that feeling that I need to watch my back or it’s all going to happen again, and I start to withdraw. And the horrible thing is that it’s even happening when I’m around my own damn family. I just don’t know who to trust anymore.

I lean back, resting my head against the wall as I stare out in front of me. I can’t keep doing this, shutting people out like I have. I need to be able to open up and feel at ease with people, like I was able to with Jimmy at the park for a little while. I was actually able to hold a conversation with him for a good while, but then I started to get paranoid again. I kept wondering what his ulterior motives were. I let my fears get the best of me.

I release a heavy sigh and slide myself down onto the mattress, staring up at the ceiling. I just don’t understand why it’s so hard for me to get through this. Why is it so difficult when I know that I need to help myself? I should be able to pick myself up; I should be able to get everything back to the way it was. Why can’t I?

I roll onto my side and pat my bed a couple of times, trying to find the headphones that I had set down earlier in the night. I put them into place and feel around on my CD player for the play button. I press it and music fills my ears, Billie Joe’s voice coming clearly though the headphones to lull me to sleep. I take a deep breath and close my eyes, focusing on the music as I wander off to sleep.

And then I see him.

I see Craig’s face; that wicked smirk on his lips, the scary glint in his grey eyes.

I gasp sharply, my eyes pop open, and I sit up in bed, resulting in my headphones to fall off and my body to shake as I try to regain my composure. He’s not here. I know he’s not here, that he’s not even close to Huntington Beach or the state of California for that matter. But I can’t help but be a little fearful; I can’t stop myself from glancing at the shadows in my room, waiting for him jump out of the darkness.

I bite my lip and cautiously slide back down onto the mattress, curling up into the fetal position as I pull the covers over my head. As silly as it sounds and as hard as it is to breathe under here, I feel safe when I’m hidden away underneath my comforter. I pull pillow out from underneath my head and hug it close to my chest, closing my eyes as I try to go back to sleep. I let my mind drift off to anything, anything but that monster hiding away in the back of my thoughts. But I can tell already that not much is going to be able to help me tonight.

~

Sandi and I step out of the car, telling Henry goodbye before we shut the doors and make our way up to the school building. I notice her glance at me from the corner of my eye and I know just what’s going to come out of her mouth.

“Are you okay?” she asks me as we draw closer to the school.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? I mean, you seemed to have a pretty bad dream last night; and you look really tired.”

“Really, I’m alright,” I assure her once more, hoping that she’ll just drop the subject before we walk into the building.

“Okay… Well, I’ve gotta go meet up with Gaby. I’ll see you later, alright?”

“Okay,” I smile, giving her a small wave as we part ways.

I continue up to the doors of the school, quickly making my way to my locker to grab my stuff for geometry. I look around to see if I can find anyone that I know nearby, Lynn, maybe even Laney or Danni, but I don’t see any of them around. I let out a somewhat disappointed sigh and shut my locker, trudging down the hallway towards my first class of the day. I enter the classroom and groan when I see him already sitting in his seat at the back of the room. He flashes me that annoying smile of his and I huff, rolling my eyes as I begrudgingly take my seat next to him.

“Good morning, Sunshine,” he greets me with that cocky smirk on his face.

“I’m surprised you’re even talking to me after yesterday,” I grumble, opening up my notebook to a blank page and grabbing a pencil out of my backpack, placing it on top of the spiral on my desk.

“Oh, because you were an idiot and broke my board?” he queries, raising an eyebrow at me and I feel a slight jab in my stomach. “Now why would I be ever mad about that? It was only the board I saved up six months for, busting my ass doing random shit to make money for it. It didn’t mean anything to me at all.”

I bite my bottom lip, swallowing hard. So it wasn’t just a cheap board from Wal-Mart. It was actually one he put time and effort into, one that he clearly valued a lot. And here I was going to just replace it with any old skateboard, thinking it’d make up for everything. I really am an idiot.

“I’m really sorry, okay? I didn’t mean to,” I whisper, guilt starting to eat away at me. “I didn’t--”

“Know how to stop because you never pay attention to anything that goes on around you,” he finishes for me. Of course it wasn’t exactly what I was going to say…

“What is that supposed to mean?” I ask him, folding my arms over my chest.

“It means that there’re other things in this world besides you, Alana Fray,” he whispers. “You just sit there, spaced out in your own little world half the damn time and you don’t even notice what’s going on right in front of you,” he scoffs, turning his attention to the front of the room and leading me to believe that class has started. Or maybe he just doesn’t want to talk to me anymore.

My brows knit together and I press my lips together, staring at him for a moment while his words sink in. What the hell is he saying I don’t even notice what’s going on in front of me? I notice plenty, thank you very much. He’s the one with his head shoved up his fucking ass ninety percent of the time. Sure, I’ve let my mind wander a little bit, but it’s not as often as he’s saying. He’s just exaggerating everything because he’s an ass.

I shake my head and pick up my pencil, glancing up at the front of the room to see that Mr. Widmier has already started teaching the lesson. I attempt to take notes of what he’s written on the board, but I grow tired of note taking rather quickly and start to doodle in the margins of my paper instead. My eyes flicker over to Brian for a moment and I see him hunched over his desk, scribbling in his binder. I purse my lips and tear my eyes away from him, trying my best to ignore him and what he’s said until class is over.

~

“I totally think that you can get first chair this year, Lana,” Lynn tells me as we walk out of the band room, heading towards our lockers before we go to lunch.

“Thanks, Lynn, but did you listen to Stacy? She’s gotten so good, even with those damn braces; she’d blow me out of the water. Besides, who knows how long I’ll stay in band anyway.”

“What? What do you mean you don’t know how long you’re gonna stay in band? You love the flute and you totally kick ass at it!”

“Correction, I love music, not the flute. And I don’t need band to keep playing. Who knows, maybe I’ll even pick up a different instrument or something,” I reply with a small shrug as we approach my locker. I quickly do the combination to the lock and open up my locker, stowing away my books and schoolbag.

“Like what?” she asks me as I shut my locker.

“I dunno,” I shrug. “Maybe I’ll take those singing lessons I’ve always wanted to have or find someone to teach me piano. I just don’t know how much I’m going to enjoy band this year now that we’re going to have to march and all that happy stuff.”

“Well, it’s all up to you…” she trails off as we walk over to her locker a little way down the hall. “But if you leave then who’s gonna be my locker partner in band? I don’t trust anyone else around my clarinet but you,” she adds on with a chuckle.

“Quit with me. We can ditch those losers with their ugly-ass uniforms and have our own cool band. Just you and me. We’d be awesome, just a flute and a clarinet,” I say with a light laugh.

“You know I totally would do that,” she tells me when we reach her locker. “Those uniforms make me wanna puke in a tuba.”

“Aw, you’d do that to poor Nick’s tuba? That would take forever for him to clean.”

“You know what I mean. Besides, you know I don’t even like the clarinet. I only play it because my parents thought that making me take music classes would help me with math. Some stupid article they read in some magazine said it.”

“I heard about that,” I comment as she shuts her locker. “I think it’s a bunch of bullshit because I haven’t been improving in math at all. I’m like eighty-nine percent sure that geometry is going to kick my ass.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I just can’t focus on what he says in class.” Of course we’ve only ever really had the one real class and I just couldn’t pay attention because of stupid Haner’s comment this morning. “My mind just wanders off to other things.”

“Maybe you can’t focus because you’re not sleeping enough,” she comments as we walk to the cafeteria.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Come on, Lana; don’t tell me that you think we can’t see it. You look beat, as if you haven’t had a good night’s sleep in a while. Not getting enough sleep can make it hard to focus on things.”

“I’ve just been having a couple rough nights, no biggie. I’m just getting used to going to bed at a decent hour and getting up early is all,” I reply, hoping she’ll brush it all off.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right… So, I was wondering maybe we could hang out after school, just you and me. We haven’t hung out in forever and I miss my best friend,” she says with a smile.

“Really? You wanna hang out without Zacky? I thought you two were joined at the hip,” I comment with a slight chuckle.

“We’re not that bad. Besides, Zacky will understand that I need some time with my best friend,” she replies, slinging her arm over my shoulders. “So what do you say, Lana? Think I can come over?”

“Of course you can,” I smile, taking a couple more steps towards the table everyone’s sitting at. “You know my mom loves having you over and since you haven’t been over in forever I’m sure she’ll be more than happy to have you there.”

“Awesome!” she beams. “Hey, guys!” she greets everyone, taking a seat next to Zacky.

“Hey, Lynn. Hey, Alana,” Laney says with a smile, resting her head on Matt’s shoulder.

I give a small smile and take a seat next to Jimmy seeing as how it is pretty much the only open place to sit down.

“Hi, Alana,” Jimmy smiles at me.

“Hey, Jimmy,” I reply softly, giving him a tiny smile in return. My eyes scan the table and I realize that Brian’s not sitting with us. I wonder where he is; maybe he’s more upset with me than I thought.

“Where’s Brian?” Lynn asks, taking note of Brian’s absence.

“He’ll be here in a little bit. Coach needed to talk to him for a little bit after practice,” Matt replies.

“Oh, alright. I was just wondering. Lana, you ready to go get something to eat?”

I look up at Lynn and nod my head. We get up from the table and I follow her to the salad bar where we go our separate ways. I go up to one of the lines and bite my lip as I look over the selection of food.

“You actually gonna eat today, Sunshine?”

I turn my head and look up to see Brian smirking at me. “Why does it even matter to you?” I mumble, following the person in front of me and grabbing the first thing I see, a piece of pizza.

“Because believe it or not; I don’t want you passing out in Gym again. I told you already, it was scary.”

“Well, thank you for your concern, Haner, but I’ll worry about myself and you just worry about you. Alright?” I query, quickly grabbing a Coke and moving down the line, pulling my money out of my pocket and paying for my food before I hurry over to Lynn. “Ready?”

“Yeah.” She leads the way back to the table and we take our seats again. I lift up my can of Coke and open it up, setting it back down on the table, making my weak attempt to actually start eating lunch today.

“Hey, Alana, do you want some of my fries?” Laney asks. “I got way too much.”

“No thanks, I’m okay,” I reply softly.

“Are you feelin’ alright?” Danni pipes up. “You look tired. Like, you’ve got bags under your eyes.”

“I’m--”

“That’s the way she always looks.” I bite the inside of my lip, trying my best to keep myself from making some snide comment about him. He takes a seat next to me and flashes me a cocky smirk. “Isn’t that right, Sunshine?”

I glare at him, wishing that I could just kill him with the daggers my eyes are throwing at him.

“Why do you call her that?” Danni asks, stealing one of Laney’s fries and popping it into her mouth.

“Call her what?” Brian replies dumbly.

“Sunshine; you call her that a lot. It’s like the only thing I’ve heard you call her.”

“Because she’s just such a ray of sunshine. I mean look at that smile!” he tells her as he turns to look at me. “It’s so beautiful that it almost looks like a scowl!”

“Shut the fuck up, Haner,” I grumble, looking away from him and bringing my attention to my soda can, playing with the tab on it.

No one says anything for a while; they all just look at me and Brian as if seeing us not getting along is something foreign to them. Maybe it is for some of them, but it’s just going to have to be something they get used to.

“So… We were thinking of going to the park tomorrow,” Johnny says, breaking the fairly awkward silence that had fallen over us. “It won’t be lame this time; promise.”

“We’re gonna show you the spot!” Jimmy tacks on with a large smile on his face.

“The spot?” I ask, raising my eyebrow at him. I vaguely remember them mentioning this ‘spot’ yesterday, but I have no idea what this place is.

“It’s this awesome place that we found at the park where we can just sit around and drink and stuff like that.”

“It’s really nice there,” Laney tells me.

“I dunno guys…” I start off, not exactly wild about the idea of drinking or doing anything of the like. It’d only be something that would make me vulnerable. Maybe that’s what Jimmy wants… “I don’t drink.”

“Don’t worry, neither does Laney,” Zacky informs. “You don’t have to drink if you don’t wanna. We just like to go over there and get away from the parents, just hang out and have some fun with friends.”

“Well, I still don’t know…” I trail off, looking at them unsurely.

“You’ll love it there, Lana,” Lynn assures me. “It’s a lot of fun.”

“Maybe… I’ll have to think about it,” I reply, playing with the tab on my Coke can a little bit more.

“Well, we hope you do decide to come along,” Jimmy says. “Kinda wanna get to know you a little more since you’re our new friend and all.”

“Okay,” I say with a nervous smile.

Everyone soon break off into their own little conversations and I begin to zone out again, staring down at my food as I try to push away what Jimmy had said about getting to know me better. It just seemed a little…weird. I shake my head, open up the small box that my food is in, and look down at my pizza, sighing. It looks good, really good, but my stomach churns at the sheer thought of eating it. I just don’t feel like having anything at all.

I pick up my Coke and take a tiny sip, hoping that maybe if I drink something I’ll start to feel more like eating. But I grimace once the carbonated beverage hits my tongue. It just tastes so strong, nothing like the one I had yesterday, and in turn my stomach only feels worse. I set the drink back onto the table, trying my best to conceal the small cough that passes from my lips.

I feel a pair of eyes on me and I glance to my left to see Brian staring at me; no, not staring, glaring. I narrow my eyes at him and look away, grabbing my drink and bringing it back up to my lips. I tilt the can slightly, making it look like I’m taking a sip, in hopes that he’ll stop looking at me. Maybe he’ll stop if I make it look like I’m eating something, taking in something. I don’t want him to think that he needs to take care of me. Of course it’s not as if he actually cares about me; he’s just doing it so that he doesn’t get his ass kicked by Lynn, Danni, and Laney. It’s almost funny that he’s afraid of them.

I spend the rest of the lunch period acting as if I’ve been eating, making it look like I’ve been drinking my Coke, and nodding every now and then to make it look like I’m listening to whatever people have been asking or telling me.

Matt’s the first one to stand up from the table, Laney doing the same a couple moments later, and they tell us that they need to get going to class. We all tell them bye and pretty soon Johnny, Danni, Jimmy, and Zacky also decide that they need to get going. Zacky plants a quick kiss on Lynn’s cheek.

“I’ll see ya later, Lana,” Jimmy tells me with a smile. “I think I might ride the bus with Matt again.”

“Oh, that’s cool,” I reply with a small smile, an unsettling feeling falling down to the pit of my stomach. I guess I just don’t enjoy having so much attention from one person. I’m not used to it. “I’ll see ya there.”

He smiles at me as he gets up from his seat, following Johnny and Danni out to the hallway with Zacky hurrying up behind him. I notice Brian looking at me again from the corner of my eye and I realize that he can probably see that I haven’t touched my food the whole time. I quickly close the small box and grab my Coke, pretending to take another drink. But I can still feel his gaze on me, making me feel a bit…uneasy.

“So, you guys ready to go to English?” Lynn asks.

“Yeah,” I mumble, picking up my food and drink to toss them in the trash.

“Yeah,” Brian says softly, getting up and gathering his trash, too.

He follows me to the trashcan and I carefully drop my stuff in the trash, but it doesn’t help; Coke splashes out of the aluminum can and I bite my lip, silently praying that no one noticed. Lynn didn’t because she had walked to a different trashcan, but Brian seems to have by the disapproving look on his face. I scratch my neck and quickly walk past him, making my way to Lynn.

“Okay, let’s go.”

“But shouldn’t we wait for Brian?”

“Nah, I’m sure he’ll be okay,” I reply, starting my way over to the hall.

“Oh, okay…”

Brian quickly catches up with us and I ignore him as he closely follows me and Lynn down the hall to our lockers. I wait while Lynn grabs her stuff out of her locker and Brian walks past us, stopping at one that isn’t too far away from mine. He pulls out his stuff and makes his way to English. Lynn closes her locker and follows me to mine; I find my English book and my notebook, stuffing them into my bag.

“You ready?” Lynn asks me as she hugs her books to her chest.

“Yeah, just a sec,” I reply, closing up my book bag before we begin the short trip to Richmond’s classroom. “Hey, do you think that we could try to not sit by Haner today?”

“Why? He’s our friend.”

“He may be your friend now, but he’s not mine,” I reply, squeezing past a couple of people in the hallway.

“You’ll get used to him after a while, Lana. He’s actually a really cool guy once you get to know him, sweet even.”

I scoff. “Haner? Sweet? Ha! That’s really funny! You should really go into comedy, Lynn.”

“I’m serious, Lana. He’s a nice guy.”

“Whatever, I’m not buying it.”

“You’re so damn stubborn sometimes,” she chuckles, stepping into our English room.

I quickly scan the room in hopes of finding a seat far, far away from Brian, but Lynn goes straight to where we sat yesterday. I huff and trudge over to the vacant desk by Brian, dropping my schoolbag onto the floor and taking my seat next to him. I pull out my notebook from my bag along with a pencil and start to doodle in the margins of my paper while I wait for the teacher to show up.

“Hey, Lana, you got a pencil I can use?” Lynn asks me.

“Yeah, here,” I reply, digging in my backpack and handing her a pencil.

“Thanks,” she smiles. “So, what do you think he’ll have for our journal today?”

“I dunno. I just hope it’s not like the one from yesterday,” I mumble, thinking about the image from yesterday.

“Yeah, that one was kinda hard to write about, wasn’t it?”

“It wasn’t that hard,” Brian mumbles.

“Well, that’s because you were able to be all deep and shit about it,” Lynn chuckles. “How were you able to be so deep anyway, Brian? You got a secret you’ve been keeping from us?”

“Nah,” he replies with a half laugh. “I, uh, I kinda know someone and the picture reminded me of her.”

“Oh… Someone in your family?”

“Someone I care about, yeah,” he nods, glancing over at me for a second. I scrunch my eyebrows at him, wondering why he looked at me, and he clears his throat. “So, what’d you write on it, Sunshine?”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Fine; what did you write about it, Fray?”

“I just said she looked sad. I dunno; I’m not a writer,” I reply with a dismissive shrug.

“She really isn’t,” Lynn says, chortling lightly. “She tried to write a poem once and it was just terrible. And her attempt at a short story was almost laughable.”

“Gee, thanks, Lynn,” I tell her with a playful glare. It’s alright that she says all of that; I know that I’m not good at things like writing. If I ever need to write a song or something I’ll just have someone else come up with lyrics since I have no flair for writing at all.

“You know you love me,” she smiles, turning in her seat to face the front of the room.

“Right, I’m sure that’s all you wrote,” Brian whispers to me.

“Of course it was. I’m just lost in my own little world, remember? I don’t pay attention to anything that goes on in front of me, remember? I hiss back.

He bites his lip and stares at me for a moment. He opens his mouth to speak. “I--”

“Alright, how is everyone today?” Mr. Richmond announces as he enters the room, cutting Brian off before he even has a chance to start his sentence. The room mumbles in response as he walks to the back of the room where the stereo is. “Our journal entry for today is going to be a song. I’ve printed out the lyrics for you guys so you can read them over while you listen,” he tells us, starting up the music and walking back up to the front of the room with a stack of papers. He starts to pass them out to everyone as the music plays.

The person in front of me hands me my copy of the lyrics and I look them over, thankful to see that it’s not some depressing song that will make me drift off into Wonderland or feel too uncomfortable writing about it. I pick up my pencil and start to scribble down random musings about the song.

I get halfway down the page and a wave of dizziness hits me. I stop writing for a moment and close my eyes in hopes to stop the dizzy feeling. I take a deep breath in through my nose and exhale softly, letting the air pass from my lips. I open my eyes and the paper in front of me has stopped moving around like it had been a couple moments ago. I gently shake my head and resume writing my entry when it hits me again. I set my pencil down again and close my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose for a little while. I take a couple of deep breaths and try to shake off the dizzy spell.

I open my eyes again and I feel like someone’s watching me. I glance over at Brian and he quickly looks away, writing in his notebook again. I look at him for a moment and bite my lip. I shake my head and go back to the journal entry, praying that I don’t get another dizzy wave and ignoring the fact that Brian has been looking at me. Guess this is what I get for spying on him last night…

~

I hum to myself as I look in my Geometry book, trying to figure out exactly how I’m supposed to be doing this problem. It’s kinda confusing to me; maybe because I didn’t pay any attention in class today when I was supposed to be taking notes. I flip back a few pages and look over at some of the example problems, but it all just doesn’t make any sense to me at all.

A knock comes at the door and I hop up off of the living room floor and run to the door. I smile at Lynn as I open the door and let her in. “Hey!”

“Hey!” she grins. “Wow, your mom rearranged things again, didn’t she?”

“Yeah, she likes to do that sometimes,” I chuckle. “Mom, Lynn’s here!” I call out.

“Lynn! It’s so good to see you again!” my mom beams as she walks in from the kitchen. “How have you been doing?” she asks as she gives Lynn a hug.

“I’ve been doing really good. It’s just been a busy summer,” she replies, hugging my mom back.

“Well, I’ll leave you two alone. Are you going to be staying for dinner?”

“If you don’t mind; I’d love to.”

“Of course I don’t mind. Dinner will be ready in about an hour.”

“Alright. Thanks, Mrs. Fray.”

“Thanks, Mom.”

“Not a problem. I’ll see you two in a little while. Do you two want anything to drink?”

“Nah, I’m good; Thanks though,” Lynn politely declines.

“No thanks, Mom; I’m good.”

“Alright. You two have fun,” she says, turning on her heels to go back to the kitchen.

“So, what do you wanna do?” I ask Lynn.

“We can just hang out in your room like we usually do,” she replies. “I’ve missed hangin’ out with you like we used to.”

“Aww, I’ve missed it, too,” I admit softly. “Come on then,” I wave my hand, signaling her to follow me as I lead the way up the stairs to my room. I hop onto my bed and Lynn takes a quick look around the room.

“You haven’t practiced yet?” she asks, taking note of the fact that my flute is still shoved in my backpack.

“Nah, I haven’t really felt like it.”

“Lana,” she starts, taking a seat on my bed.

“Yeah?”

“Were you serious when you were talking about quitting band?”

“Yeah, I was,” I confess. “I mean, I just don’t think I could do all the marching, and going to all the games. And as much as I hate to admit it, my heart’s not really in the flute anymore. I feel like I wanna branch out to something else.”

“Well, if you do quit then I’m going with you. We both know I hate playing that damn clarinet and you’re like the main reason I even stay in band. If it weren’t for you I would have probably quit in the first two weeks of seventh grade.”

“You’d really do that?”

“Of course I would! Besides, it could give us like a free hour. We could roam the school or watch Zacky during baseball practice,” she says with a dreamy looking grin on her face.

“Or not,” I chuckle. “God, you are so hung up on him! I never thought I’d see the day.”

“He’s so amazing, Lana! I’m just…” she sighs. “Frustrated.”

“What’s wrong?” I ask her, leaning forward and looking at her worriedly.

“Well, you know that my mom is like super strict, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, she was totally fine with me hanging out with him and stuff before she found out we’re dating. But now that she’s found out he’s my boyfriend she’s going on this whole thing saying that I don’t really know him and that she doesn’t want me to go on dates with him by myself.”

“Alright, so just go on a double date.”

“Yeah, but I need someone to go on this date with me.”

“Get Johnny and Danni, or Matt and Laney,” I reply, not seeing why she’s been having such difficulty.

“That’s the thing; she doesn’t really know them that well. So I kinda told her something…” she bites her lip, glancing at me nervously.

“You didn’t, Lynn!” I exclaim when it hits me what she must have said.

“I’m sorry, Lana. I wasn’t thinking and I told her that you’ve got a boyfriend and asked if it’d be okay if I went on dates with you two.”

“And what did she say?” I ask, afraid to hear the answer because I’m pretty sure I know what it is.

“She said that it’s fine and she can’t wait to meet you boyfriend.”

“Lynn… I don’t have a boyfriend!”

“I know…”

“So how long do I have to find a boyfriend?” I’m not even sure what else to say. I mean, what else can I do? Sure I could tell her to forget it and that I’m not going to do it; but Lynn’s my best friend. I’d do anything for her and she’d do the same for me. She’s already done so much for me. I owe her this much.

“That’s the other thing… I kinda already told her who you’re dating…”

“Okay… So, who did you tell her I’m dating?”

“Promise not to get too mad at me?” she asks hopefully, biting her bottom lip.

“Just tell me, Lynn.”

“I told her you’re dating Brian…”

Nevermind, maybe I don’t owe her this after all.