Behind Our Backs

BRINGGGGG!!!

The bell rang and Evaline walked out of the school. She always walked home, living so close and all, but Lila lived farther away and took the bus most of the time.

She walked out onto the street full of teenagers, looking around. She doubted she and Greyson would be able to walk together, but she wanted to ask him if he wanted to come over for a while. She had asked him earlier that afternoon just before they split up to go to class, but she wanted to make sure that their plans were still on. The whole 2 days that Evaline knew him, she had never seen him with any friends or just hanging out with people. She wanted that to change because he was so nice, and the only thing everyone else did was judge him.

She stopped and looked around, trying to spot his long black hair. She looked towards the front doors and found him. He walked out with his head down, looking at the ground and his shoes. He was walking quickly, and jumped down half the steps that led into the parking lot. Why was he so eager to get away from school?

And that's when she saw them. Half the football team: Alex, George, Jeremy and Brandon were following closely behind him.

"Hey, emo freak!" Evaline heard Jeremy hiss at Greyson. "Cut yourself lately?"

Greyson didn't reply, only quickened his pace.

"What's with the hair?" Jeremy continued as Brandon, George and Alex laughed. "Are you a girl or something?"

Greyson started to jog away, not wanting to deal with them any longer. They all laughed, deciding to leave him alone.

Evaline turned back around and continued on her way, walking home.

Greyson was NOT an emo freak! Even if he was, it was better than being a bully to people that were different than you. There were always bullying seminars, teachers and the principle trying to make sure bullying didn't happen. Well, it showed how stupid they were, it still happened anyways. Just talking about it, won't do anything.

Soon enough, the busses were gone and the school yard was deserted. She noticed Greyson walking out in front of her, on the other side of the street, his earphones jammed into his ears again.

She ran to catch up with him and tapped him on the shoulder. It would be safe to talk with him now, there weren't any people around to see them together.

He jumped and turned around.

"Did I scare you?" Evaline smiled.

"Oh! Hi Evaline! What?" He screamed. The music on his MP3 was still blaring.

"I asked you if I scared you." She took the earbuds out of his ears and rolled her eyes.

"Oh, sorry, yeah," He said normally. "Kinda."

"Why're you so jumpy?" She asked. She didn't want to say that she saw the football team picking on him, she knew it would embarrass him. Evaline wanted to let him come out with it on his own.

"Uh... I don't know," He lied, looking down at the ground. "I guess I'm always jumpy."

"Oh, ok," She said brightly, trying to hide the fact that she knew there was something wrong. "Do you still wanna come over?"

He looked up. "Yeah! Yeah, of course I do!"

They neared Evaline's driveway and Evaline saw that her moms car was in the driveway. Uh oh... What was she going to tell her mom about Greyson?

"Oh..." She said, looking up at Greyson. "I didn't know my mom was home... Is that ok?"

"Yeah," He said nervously. "Yeah, I'm fine with it."

"Greyson," She stopped him from walking.

"Yeah?" He asked, biting his snakebites. Evaline noticed that it was something he did when he was nervous.

"Don't worry, my mom won't dis you or anything." She reassured. "She isn't like that. If she has any comments, she keeps them to herself."

When he didn't say anything, she continued.

"Please, don't be scared." She said soothingly. "I don't want to hide you from my mom! She'll be the only person that knows that we're friends."

"I know, I know, it's just... You're one of my first... Friends and I don't want your parents to already hate me." He said.

"Greyson, my parents won't hate you," She scolded. "What makes you think that they will?"

"Everyone else does..." She heard him mutter under his breath.

"Well, I like you." She said, trying to drag him towards the front door.

He dug his heels into the ground.

"Please? Just not yet?" He pleaded. "I want to get to know each other more before you introduce me as your friend. We haven't known each other for very long..."

Evaline thought for a few minutes. That made sense... She didn't really want to meet his parents either yet. She only knew him for 2 days. She guessed he was right, she wanted to get to know him more too, but from what he already told her, she liked him enough to be friends, but getting to know each other more couldn't hurt either... It was only fair, and he had a good point, but how would she sneak him into the house without being detected?

"Fine," She finally sighed. "I think you could probably climb through my window. My bedroom's on the second floor, but there's a trellis with vines going up it, you could try and get up that."

Greyson seemed relieved and Evaline pointed in the direction of her bedroom window. He hurried alongside of the house, secured his bag safely over his shoulder and started to climb.

She walked to the front door and walked in the house. Her mother was in the kitchen washing dishes. When she heard Evaline coming inside, she looked up.

"Hey honey!" She smiled. "How was school today?"

"Oh, good..." Evaline said. "I think I made a new friend."

"Oh really?" Her mother seemed curious. "What's their name?"

"His name's Greyson. He's new and he's really nice. Is it okay if sometime I invite him over?" She asked. Sure, Greyson was probably already hiding in her bedroom, but she thought she might as well tell her mother about him and get permission to allow him over before she tried to sneak him into the house anymore.

"Yes! Of course!" Her mom exclaimed. "I'd LOVE to meet him!"

Evaline nodded and started up the stairs to her bedroom. She opened the door and saw Greyson at the window. She walked over and opened it. He started to crawl through, but his foot got caught on the window sill and he fell into the room.

"Are you ok?" She laughed, helping him to his feet.

"Yeah..." He said rubbing the back of his head and trying to regain some of his composure. He threw his bag on the floor. "Stupid window..."

That made Evaline laugh harder. Greyson sat on her bed, taking in her room. It was blue and roomy, but still girlish... Only because it had to be.... If any of Evaline's friends had been in her room, they would've seen the real side of her... And she did NOT want that. What if everyone thought that the music she listen to was horrible and that they stopped liking her? If she wasn't scared of those things, her room would've been decked out with posters of her favourite bands, albums laying freely around, maybe she would've had her room painted a darker color.

Greyson seemed to like it nevertheless. He got up off the bed and started looking through her things.

"Hey, nosy." Evaline smiled.

"What? I'm curious, is that a crime?" He asked, inspecting the contents of her desk.

"No, no, it's fine." She said.

"Evaline!?" Her mother called from down the stairs. "Can you come set the table?"

"I'll be right back," Evaline rolled her eyes. "you can keep snooping around if you want."

She went down the stairs and set the table, when she came back up to her room, she saw Greyson bent over in her closet, his eyes wide and his mouth open. When he noticed that she had re-entered the room, he looked up and rushed to her side holding something.

"You like Avenged Sevenfold?" He asked, holding out an album that she had stashed in her closet.

"Yeah, is that bad?" She bit her lip.

"What? No!! I LOVE Avenged Sevenfold!" He exclaimed. "I didn't know you liked that kind of music though."

He went back over to her closet and got on his hands and knees, looking through her clothes

"My Chemical Romance, All Time Low, Falling in Reverse, Pierce the Veil, Green Day?" He asked, stacking her albums neatly in a pile on the floor.

Evaline sat beside him. "Yeah," She said. "I love that kind of music."

"Then why do you keep all of this hidden?" He asked, looking her in the eyes. Then a dawning expression came onto his face. "Oh... You never wanted anyone to know... It isn't pop or rap, nothing that all the regular populars like."

She nodded. "My friends would never let me live it down if they saw that I liked those bands. Don't tell anyone though!"

"I know what you mean." He admitted. "I got made fun of all the time because I wore Black Veil Brides band tees. And I won't tell, I don't have anyone to tell it to anyways."

"You got made fun of?" She asked, trying to get him to admit it.

"Did I say made fun of? I meant that I used to get people looking at me weird." He covered lamely.

"Oh..." She said disappointed that he didn't trust her with telling her that he got bullied. "Well, Black Veil Brides? Who are Black Veil - " She heard footsteps coming up the stairs and stopped, listening to see if they were getting closer to her door or not.

"What?" Greyson asked. "Why'd you stop talk - "

Evaline shoved him into the open closet, threw the CD's into it after him and slammed the door shut.

"Ouch." She heard him mutter lamely, his voice muffled against her clothes. She giggled.

Then the door opened and Lila walked in.

"Lila!?" Evaline exclaimed, getting up off the floor. "What are you doing here?"

"I told you that we were gonna hang out later. Your mom let me in," She said, walking into the room. "You didn't answer your phone, I called you, like, three times and I texted you a million messages!"

"Oh... Well..." She tried to think of an excuse, "I was doing my Homework," She lied. "Mr. Huggins gave us A LOT of homework."

"Oh," Lila frowned. "Well, do you wanna give me call after you're finished?"

"Sure!" Evaline smiled.

"Ok, well, I talk to you later." she said, waving and walking back out of the room.

Evaline ran and closed the door. She timidly approached the closet and opened it. Greyson was spread out, clothes all over him.

"Greyson?" she laughed, grabbing his hand and helping him out. "Are you ok?"

"Yeah, yeah!" He said, standing up. "I'm great, thanks for shoving me in a closet without warning!"

"I'm sorry," She laughed. "Lila just... Walked in!"

"It's fine." He said, laughing too.

"Well... I better get going." He started towards the window, grabbing his bag off of the floor in the process.

"Wait, why do you have to go so soon?" Evaline questioned.

"My dad doesn't like it when I go somewhere without telling him." He sighed, straddling the window frame. "He gets really worried sometimes when I'm home late because he thinks something happened to me. He knew about my "social status" I guess you could say, at all the other schools. I was never popular and didn't have too many friends, so he automatically thought that I got beat-up everyday." Then he added quickly. "But I don't! I never have!"

"Oh..." Evaline said sadly. He got beat-up TOO? She knew he was lying... He just didn't want her to know. He had people calling him names and taunting him, but he also had people physically hurting him?

"Yeah, well, I'll see you at school tomorrow." He smiled, bringing his other leg out the window. He started to climb down the trellis and vines, Evaline stuck her head out of the window, watching as he descended. As he was slowly making his way down, she got a glimpse of his wrist. There were fresh cuts along his vein. Not only were other people hurting him, but he was also hurting himself. Even though he stopped her, he was still doing it to himself...

"Greyson, no..." She whispered to herself.

"What?" He asked.

"Oh, uh, nothing..." She smiled, trying to act normal. Then she remembered. "Wait! Who are Black Veil Brides? You didn't get to tell me!"

"I'll show you tomorrow! Bye!" He called when he reached the bottom. He ran back through the little ally between Evaline's house and her neighbours. He looked back when he got to the road and waved.

Evaline waved back, laughing slightly at how childish and happy he was. Then, he turned around and ran across the street, to his house. She stared after him dreamily. Wait, what? Since when did she stare at him dreamily? She snapped herself out of it. No. Greyson was just a friend, nothing more, nothing less.

She sighed and flopped onto her bed. She had to face Dylan AGAIN at school.... She still loved him... She was just trying to be tough and make him prove himself to her. She hoped he would. Maybe he would, maybe he wouldn't, she just had to let the next day come and take the problems as they appeared.