[A/N]  Sorry for the delay everyone ! I wanted to reply when I knew I could say I had updated so I also refrained from looking at messages or anything.
I have lots of updates to post today so I'll take a nap and continue when I'm done.
This is a double chapter update! It took until Friday to write so technically it should be 3 chapters but to be honest that really feels like too many chapters to post all in one go...
Chapter 29 is a long one though ! So hopefully that should make up for it....
Another argument broke out during break in the lunch hall where people were settling down to chat and eat either snacks they had brought or the school sold. Even before it began it was clear just from the way they walked together that there was a kind of unresolved tension crackling between the group.
It had started just as I was queuing up to pay for the first thing I'd grabbed out of the shelf, a box of chopped baby carrots and a bit of hummus, when the spat suddenly resulted in a skidding chair and a loud yell and I turned just in time to watch Adam shove Pierson, having apparently been shoved himself.
"You wanna joke about it bitch?!" Pierson snapped at him. "Go sit somewhere fucking else you fucking cunt." He shoved him back, harder.
"Pierson!" Snapped Patrick.
"Come on man he wouldn't do that! Wait for us to check out the user's IP address man..." Tariq shoved him gently away from Adam.
"When will you calm down? No one wants your fat cow of a girlfriend!" Adam hissed back at him.
There was a rustle of interest now, a couple 'ooh's' from the students sitting at a distance, the rustle of activity as the attention turned on them properly now. A boring school day had started with a gloomy set of clouds hanging around outside like security guards and for most of us the our prospects for anything thrilling happening had been noticeably low.
The rowdy group of boys that nearly always stuck close together was fracturing before them, and whether or not they knew who the lads were, a drama like that was much better savoured in in person than on television.
The supervising teacher was probably the only one who was stubbornly facing the lunch lady for a chat, unwilling to turn around and look at what the commotion was unless she absolutely needed to.
It wasn't like they never argued with each other, and occasionally shoving and shouting did ensue, but to my endless disappointment in the past this never failed to resolve itself in some way.
When a teacher did interfere to 'save' one member of the group they were publicly shot down by all of them and ultimately ended up looking a bit foolish.
I picked up my carrots and moved slowly in search of a seat.
It was a habit to search for an empty table.
After the rumours that started in my second year in the school and other more public incidents it was clear that being near me meant possibly standing in a corner of the public social perspective that they didn't want to be in. I could see the slightly uncomfortable looks on their faces when I sat near them, occasionally shuffling further away from me, or sometimes even getting up and pretending they meant to leave.
Pierson breathed heavily, staring Adam down as he got closer to him despite Tariq shoving his arm between them. A gentle shove could have pushed the two of them into a kiss with how close they got, nose to nose.
I sat down, the only empty table only two tables distance from them.
"Come on Pierson!" Patrick grabbed his arm and tried to pull him back.
"And you shut up as well..." Nathan muttered to Adam. "What's the point in saying that shit..."
Adam scoffed. "Like she isn't fat or what? I'm not gonna lie when he's trying to say I'm trying to get up in her knickers and shit."
Pierson's nostrils flared.
"Even if it wasn't you," He stabbed him in the chest with his index finger. "You fucking insult her again and I'll feed you your own nuts."
This time the group seemed to be quietly siding with Pierson, and although no one said anything the way the eyes turned on Adam made it somehow clear that they were expecting, or even requiring, him to agree.
Adam just looked more pissed, contemplated his words for a bit, long enough that some of the surrounding conversation at the other tables began to slowly pick up again, albeit at a lowered volume.
"Since when do you care? You keep chatting about how you're gonna get her to lose weight when she's out of her mum's house!"
"That's my business you fucking dick!" He pounded his own chest and screamed in his face.
It was so loud that the hall lapsed into a momentary draft of silence that stretched past the point of him finishing the explosion and went on for a good minute.
In time for this crisp silence that rushed through the hall I absentmindedly bit into a baby carrot and that small, clear crunch, was perfectly amplified, as if through a speaker, to the lads two tables away.
I chewed it slowly. Crunchiest carrot in the world.
Slightly delayed a number of the group, one by one, turned to look at me.
I looked over at them.
Pierson's face was flushed in places from anger, Adam was surprisingly pink as well, his jaw clenched, he was the first to look back at his friend.
Patrick also looked over and narrowed his eyes at me too, while the others slowly looked back at the issue at hand he continued to stare at me, as if waiting for something, his glare seeing his eyes narrow further. I thought I saw some confusion on his face, maybe he suspected something...
Realising I was the most likely culprit of this prank if they did indeed find out the texts were not from Adam I feigned nervousness and pressed my lips together, hunched my shoulders and turned away, looking down into my food.
It was hard to describe how strange the mimicry of self felt, but I could feel there was something missing. Sad eyes. I looked down and remembered the pain I felt in the past, the oppressive toxic waste cloud hanging over my head, knowing, anticipating running into them later and hating the way my legs felt weak at the thought of getting up just from fear.
I felt the attention slide off of me.
Later, during my next lesson, I would sit and examine my nails.
Was it really possible to find my IP through the app? There would be multiple, I'd connected to different networks after all, school, the shopping centre, home... They shouldn't have a record of our IP address though, because I didn't have an account on the app before I made one to mess with Pierson, the only way to find out what mine was, was to go through Colby, and none of them knew about him.
Then again... I drummed my fingers on the table quietly. I wouldn't put it past them to quite literally force me to connect at home and check my IP address...
"Sir," I raised my hand and Mr Stone looked over at me, looking a little startled by my existence. I hadn't really spoken to the guy before. "I need the toilet."
He frowned but reluctantly let me go.
Stepping outside felt kind of freeing.
My life now was full of comparisons but I couldn't help it. Suddenly I was no longer afraid of the hallways, afraid of being far from the semi-protective eye of the teachers.
I didn't expect to meet Arran as he headed back down the stairwell, on the route from my history class to lockers near the school entrance.
As I climbed down the stairs and the lights switched on one by one, activated by movement, a set of eyes flashed up to look at me.
I stopped for a moment, freezing instinctively in front of the guy as he leaning on the inside window sill in the middle level of the stairs, the quarter panel of the window opened, his hand was outside. Broad shoulders stretched across as both arms relaxed on the lime green painted sill.
I stepped down a step.
By virtue of the relaxed position the white dress shirt pulled taut around muscle that seemed unusually well defined for a guy at any age.
I continued down the steps slowly, he turned back to the window, breathed out and a curling, twisting spirit of a cigarette escaped his lips and climbed partially out through the opened window.
My heart knocked slightly unevenly in my chest as I approached him, my skin felt itchy whenever I got near.
How long had he been here and how still, that the sensors had assumed there was no one inside the stairwell and switched off the lights?
"I can return Akuma to you this evening." I told him quietly as I approached, since he didn't greet me I thought it was pointless to do the same.
He hummed, tapping his cigarette on the window frame. "How is she?" He asked me smoothly, still looking out of the window.
He looked down at me as I approached though, and glanced further down at my hands, his eyes narrowing briefly.
"She's fine..." I mumbled. "I got stuff for her... I'll give it to you... since I won't need it."
Maybe I sounded a bit sad because he stared at me for a moment, if there was pity in his eyes it didn't show, just nothing but blackness supported by white walls.
He looked down at my hands again. "You wear gloves?"
"What?"
"To handle her."
I frowned, puzzled. "What for? She only hates my stepmother. She's a sensible cat." I smiled wryly.
He stared at me for a while longer, taking another drag of his cigarette as his eyes slid over me. "I don't believe you." He said after a long moment.
I blinked at him, not sure what to say to that.
He looked over my face, slowing down on my cheeks, staring for a moment and then suddenly reaching out, brushing my face just barely with his fingers and my heart nearly burst into some kind of wild and confused Taiko drumming, my neck and hands suddenly clammy in an instant.
But I didn't move away, nor push his hand away, or even make a disgusted expression even if just to protect myself from an incoming accusation of being gay.
"What're you doing?" I asked slowly.
He hummed. "Your face is looking better."
My heart still pounded clumsily. I was very close to him. I should have moved back, when did I get so close? Was I even that close?
I waded through these puzzled feelings to be able to speak. "Yeah... Speaking of which..." I took a deep breath. "You wanna punch me?"
I should have specified at lunch time, not now, but in the moment that slipped my mind, because I was distracted.
He raised a brow, looking down at me with an expression the was the equivalent of a wall, but one that that nice eyes and nice lips and an enviable body. "Not really." He said after a while. The dark, cold look he observed me with making me feel a bit foolish.
I took a half step forward despite the chaos in the back of my mind, brushing even closer with the electricity that passed between us. "Do it as a favour?"
He tilted his head slightly as he looked me over, and then suddenly stepped in close to me so that this time I did step back sharply, surprised and taken off guard I looked up at him and was immediately appalled by my suddenly cowardly reaction.
He smiled slightly, his lips curving. "You're afraid of me but you want me to hit you?"
I shook my head slightly. Not afraid. Right? Just nervous... nervous around him when I wasn't nervous around anyone else...
"You're a masochist, is that it? It would explain a lot..." He hummed as he leaned, just barely, into my space.
I felt intimidated for the wrong reasons.
I licked my lips unconsciously as I leaned back slightly and manually stopped myself, steadying my arms and legs, letting the strange feeling of a current around him wrap around my neck as he got close.
I kept my breath even. "Could be..." I replied smoothly.
I chose the most confident answer, the calmest, least bothered one, but I didn't expect or know what to make of the slight ripple of something strange in his eyes, as if I was watching something lift its head inside and peek through the windows of his eyes.
It reminded me of the dead guy, what the guy I was talking to was capable of, and even more strangely than anything else, it sent a wave of heat running through me. Awareness making my skin feel strange. My eyes locked with his, my lips numb.
He looked me over, but it felt different this time, better or worse, eyes that left a trail behind them. The low light of the afternoon drafting a cooler edge to his olive skin, it was the yellow hallway lights that kept one side of him illuminated with false warmth.
I couldn't blame anyone other than myself for instinctive glance toward his lips that felt almost involuntary. But the moment it happened he caught it, immediately, sharp as an tack.
He squinted at me slightly, as if I was a strange animal he was trying to figure out.
I pretended I could breathe just fine as I took a sudden step back and started fast back down the stairs. The sound of my own footsteps loud in the narrow hallway.
"I'll be busy tonight, give her back tomorrow." Arran spoke with a smooth resonance from the top of the stairs as I rushed down.
I stopped briefly at the bottom of the stairs, nodded up at him, and then continued down, feeling awkward, hot and strangely panicked.
[A/N] As always, a big genuine thanks to the WPC, and a thousand fresh-from-the-laundry hugs to my supporters on patreon.  â .°( ËáµË )â¡.°â