He's My Protector.

Come on, please let it be 3:45 already.

The clock read 3:41

I tap my pen onto my chemistry book as I stare at the clock, my mind replayed everything that happened in lunch today, and right now I just want to go home, wrap myself up into a ton of blankets and don't come out until I graduate high school.

Or it would be nice to go home, wrap myself into Kegan and never let go, not even when I graduate.

That would be nice.

"Ms.Keith please read, starting from where I left off." Mr.Hugo demands, noticing I wasn't paying attention. I stare at him in shock, he never called on me, not even when I raised my hand to ask or answer a question in his class.

"I hope you know where that is, Ms.Keith." I blink a couple of time hoping there was another Ms.Keith in here but, it was just me. All eyes glared at me as I stuttered my words for an explanation to why I don't know where we are.

"I-I-I-"

"Right side, third paragraph, second line, starting with between." Kegan mumbled from behind me.

Sure enough I checked, shaking my index finger to where Kegan had told me, with a sigh of relief I smiled at Mr.Hugo and sat up, stalling by putting the cap back onto my pen and tying up my hair.

"Between the two tu-"

*RING*

As all of the students stood up in and instant, I turned to Kegan with a smile, this was the only time people didn't care about gossip, all they cared about was leaving school as fast as they could.

I stared at him for a moment before letting out a slight laugh.

"Thank you, Kegan." I reached out to touch his hand but jumped when Mr.Hugo coughed loudly behind me.

Turning to face this rather large teacher with dark brown curly hair and a large beard, I spotted a couple of chicks staring behind me, where Kegan was.

"I hope I didn't interrupt the two of you love birds, but Ms.Keith I expect you to know where I left off next time I call you." I smile at him and stand up closing my book and held it in my right arm before nodding. The class was empty now

"I will be sure to pay attention next time, Mr.Hugo." I smile once again before grabbing Kegan's wrist and trailing him out the class.

Now the halls were cleared, and now I feel I can talk more comfortably with Kegan.

"So my dad said I have to be at my mom's bakery at five, if you need to go home, we can drive there. Where do you live?" I say simply, letting my grip on Kegan go, wishing Kegan would wrap his arm around my shoulders.

I watch as Kegan slows down his steady pace when I mentioned his house.

Where does he live, exactly?

"Or we can go to my place and eat something?" I ask avoiding my first offer to him and locked my arm with his as I watch a little freshman girl stuff as many books in her backpack as she can. Psh, nerd.

Kegan stayed quiet and just continued forward to my locker.

"Or we can just eat somewhere?" I offer, looking straight ahead cautious about other people finding us together like this.

"Or we can just stand here," I stop pulling my arm out of his and stare at him clearly pissed.

"Are you not going to talk to me now?" I ask staring into his eyes, hoping for any clear facial expression, but not even a twitch. Rolling my eyes I poke Kegan on the shoulder hoping for a blink, nothing again.

"Lets just go out and eat." Kegan says blankly, I stare at him hoping he would show at least happiness, but there was nothing.

Sighing, I decided it was useless to even try looking for any emotion in him.

"Can't even fake emotion." I mumble to myself, leading the way to my locker. Giggles echoed through out the hallways, my eyes trailed onto a couple. They were kissing in a corner, but mostly laughing. They were really happy and I can tell by their facial expressions that they really liked each other.

It's sad that I couldn't have that with Kegan, or anybody else for that matter. It always seemed to be too much complications having a boyfriend.

I tried hiding my broken smile towards them, but with my high heeled height and Kegan's eyes one me, Kegan saw the smile, and looked away with no expression.

"Where do you want to eat?" I ask, occupied by putting in my combination more than listening to Kegan. 17-36-07

"It doesn't matter, we can just eat at your place if you want." Kegan says casually.

Once I open the locker. a piece of folded line paper falls out of it landing by Kegan's feet. I froze in place, hoping Kegan doesn't realize what it is, or that it fell out.

Holy shit, it's happening again.

Kegan reaches down to pick it up and eyes me suspiciously, which I understand why, my eyes are probably sticking out of my head with my mouth hanging low. As soon as I saw Kegan trying to open it, I step toward him and snatch it out of my hands.

"There goes my history notes." I fake my relief when I open it up.

There were no notes, just hurtful words, not in a specific handwriting, it was more than one person writing all of these words. I try to hide my face from Kegan, but it was useless. He saw through my lie, and reached for the paper. I stepped away from him just in time and glared at him.

The rumors were worse than I thought, even the ones that Travis started were coming back. Words resembling my money, my sexual activity, and my bodyguard were spread all on the paper, all lies but all of them hurt.

"So that's when World War Two started." I say shocked, reading the paper that held the rumors that were spread since I've been here. One thing that popped out from all of thoes words was a sentence, one stupid sentence that made me go crazy inside.

Stay away from Kegan, bitch, he's mine.

I re read that sentence before folding the paper back and putting it in my back pocket.

Giving Kegan a fake smile, and took out my sweater from my locker, handed Kegan his, then closed the locker instantly.

"So, my place it is." I agree slipping on my sweater before walking outside with Kegan.

[***]

"Hot Pocket? Pop Tart? Anything?" I call out from the fridge to Kegan who was sitting on the Island in the kitchen.

"How about a bathroom?" Kegan asks standing next to me now. My mind was so caught up in that note that I couldn't think well.

"Why would you want to eat a bathroom?" I ask confused that he would even say that, it wasn't even funny. Kegan gives me a concern look.

"I mean, can you show me where the bathroom is, so I can use it?"

Stupid, Annette, you're so stupid!

"Oh, uhm, it's down that hallway, I think the second door on the right." I say slowly, running my hand through my hair, and opened the fridge again, taking in a deep breath.

"I'm going to warm you up a hot pocket, if that's okay." I called out.

"It's alright, and it's the third door on the left." Kegan corrects me, and shuts the door.

I grabbed two hot pockets from the freezer then unwrapped them, putting both Hot Pockets in the microwave.

Checking both directions, I pulled the paper out from my pocket, reading every single one of thoes words.

Why would somebody write these to a person they were once friends with? Why would somebody ever write these words to another person period?

They want to hurt me, they want to take me down, and guess what? They're succeeding, nothing can protect me from this pain, not even Kegan. It hurts even more that Kegan can't always be there to protect me from everything.

Tears fell down my face, and a sob escaped from my lips, so soft that I rarely heard it. My body was shaking, I wanted to cry so much, but Kegan was just down the hall. I don't want to be caught that I was lying to him especially over something he's supposed to protect me from.

So I wiped my tears, I pulled my shoulders back and I forced a blank expression on my face.
The beeping of the microwave made me jump in my place, it took my a while to notice that it was the Hot Pockets ready to be eaten.

Turning to get the Hot Pockets, I froze in place when I noticed Kegan was behind me the whole time. Probably reading over my shoulder, probably just got here, but he noticed me crying. I saw his slight concern on his face before he covered with with blankness.

"The Hot Pockets are ready." I mumble before walking to the microwave, with the paper still in my hand.

"How are those history notes?" Kegan asked as I pulled out one Hot Pocket at a time, placing them both on the same plate. My hands shook as I tried to fold up the piece of paper.

"Their, specific." I say, forcing a smile on my face before folding the paper.

"I want to see them." Kegan demands, holding out his hand for me to put the paper on.

"It's boring, you wouldn't like it." I say clutching my hold onto the paper.

"Try me." Kegan says stepping closer to me, I took the chance to slip it in my pocket, but ended up dropping it onto the ground. Kegan instantly grabs it on the floor, before i could pick it up, and I did, but then fell to the ground in my heels.

"Kegan, don't!" I yell stumbling back up in my heels facing him as he unfolded the paper and started reading.

No shocker that Kegan's face was unreadable, I took that as a chance to sprint towards him and grab the paper, but Kegan moves too fast and has my wrists in his hands, staring at me darkly.

"Why the hell would you hide this from me, Annette?"

"I don't know what you're talking abou-"

"Why?" Kegan cuts me off.

"It's stupid words-"

"Why?!" Kegan yells, making more tears fall down my face as I avoid his stare.

"I didn't want you to know how bad it was!" I yell back, letting out a sob. "I didn't want you to know how hard it is to be at school like this! I didn't want to face this with somebody else! I didn't want you to know how hard it is to go to school! I didn't want you to take your job too seriously because of it!"

I took in a deep breath and slid away from Kegan's hold.

"If you became that serious, I would've lost you, and I don't want that." I whispered slowly walking away, but i stopped and faced Kegan's blank expression.

"If I were to choose to have to deal with this bullshit and still have you around with the same Kegan personality, or not having this bullshit and having you around as a strict bodyguard. I would chose the first one." I whispered.

"Even if I have to deal with your anger towards other guys around me, and even if I have to deal with your stupid blank expressions, I would still chose the real Kegan."

"If it means that I have to deal with the rumors and the bullying, I don't care. I'm just done with losing people who mean the most to me."

Walking away, I take in a deep breath and run to my room.