𝐓𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐃𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐡 𝐃𝐨 𝐔𝐬 𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭

two

L E V I C O O P E R
_

Around school people know her, she wasn't a loner but she wasn't popular, until a year ago she just silent. At the beginning of high school she had quite a few friends but up until last year everything changed for her it seemed.

Stopped talking. Stopped showing up to class on time. Started skipping multiple days at a time. Stopped caring about classes and school work. Stopped acknowledging people. Now she stays in her own shell, away from everyone else.

She went from a straight A student, never missing any classes, had a multiple good friends, even a couple boyfriends but then at the start of junior year she stopped showing up everyday, misses classes to the point where she's now a straight C student.

Blair Alderidge, the girl who my mind just can't leave alone.

"Hey man, you good?" Harvey asks from his seat next to me. "You've been dozing off all lesson, even staring at a certain empty chair." He smiles but I ignore the last part.

"Yeah I was just thinking about stuff, that's all." I look back at Mr Harrison, the math teacher who thinks he better than everybody else.

"Listen up everybody, we have a test on-" Mr Harrison yells throughout the full classroom, only to get interrupted by the door opening and quickly slamming shut.

Blair walks in and takes her time as she walks to the only empty desk left in the room, her long brown hair thrown up in a messy bun on the top of her head and bags under her chestnut coloured eyes, an exhausted look written all over her face. White washed jeans covering her long legs and a black tank top on top, her school bag resting on her shoulder.

"Like to announce to the whole class why you're half a lesson late Miss Alderidge?" Mr Harrison crosses his arms over each other, his face full of anger as he glares at her.

"No, not really." She replies back.

"It's either you tell me why you were late or I get you suspended." He threatens.

"One, I have my own rights that include not needing to tell you my whole life story and two, surprise or not you don't actually have authority to suspend me you're just a math teacher, not a principal." She crosses her arms over her chest, copying his stance.

"That's it I'm calling the principal." He grabs his phone and leaves the class for a minute. Blair begins walking back through the classroom not giving anyone a glance, even though everybody's staring at her. She finally sits in her seat which sits infront of me, Harvey and Kian.

She places her bag down before laying her head on the desk, while the whole class slowly starts to look away. The fact that she's spoken more than a handful of words to anybody in the last two years, bringing everybody into an uncomfortable silence.

"Eyes up here everybody!" Mr Harrison snaps when he enters the classroom for a second time. "As I was saying, before I got rudely interrupted, we are having a test this Friday. So study the work and come to class prepared."

The class drags on for what feels like hours, the clock at the front of the classroom ticking every second.

I keep my eyes forward the while lesson, not leaving the back of her head, she doesn't move an inch through the whole lesson.

With only ten minutes left in the class the door opens once more and the school's principal walks in. "Miss Alderidge! My office now." She speaks through the classroom.

Her head lifts up from the head, looking even more tired than before. She grabs her bag from the floor and follows Mrs Henderson out of the classroom.

TILL DEATH DO US PART

Sitting on the school's bleachers with Kian on the step above me and Harvey on the one below me, painting his skateboard. The cold air surrounding us, a polar opposite from yesterday weather.

"What do you think happened to her?" I stare off into the distance, watching a group of kids in the younger grades run along the football field.

"Who?" The boys ask simultaneously.

"Blair. She used to be a straight A student, practically a teacher's pet, never missed a class and had a few friends but now she never talks to anymore or looks at anyone else, she's always missing days on end and when she does come to school she looks so exhausted where she sleeps all lesson." I take a bite of the ham and cheese sandwich that Kian made me.

"I don't know man, everyone changes at some point in their life. Life's shit and you just gotta live, some different to others." Harvey shrugs and goes back to painting his skateboard, again.

"Yeah but it wasn't even over the course of a few months it just happened over night." I point out. "And outside of school she's always got a kid with her, wonder what that's about."

"What are you trying to say?" Kian asks, finishing his sandwich.

"What if maybe that's her baby and that's why she's always missing school or coming in late, looking exhausted." The boys both go silent at my words, thinking deeply.

"Good job Sherlock, you pay so much attention to my life to guess I have a fucking baby." A different voice comes from the distance, walking closer. "Wouldn't you think that you've got an obsession with me?" Blair walks over to the three of us, with a glare sent on her face.

The three of us stare wide eyed, mouths agape at the teenage girl infront of us. "You go all quiet when I'm standing infront of you but when my backs turned you're making assumptions about my life." She stares right at me.

"Everyone does." I say, shifting uncomfortably.

"I know they do, they're all to pussy to actually say to my face." She adjusts the handbag on her shoulder.

"Are they true though?" The boys heads both snap towards me at my question.

"A few." She says, tensing her shoulders slightly.

"What ones?"

"Why would I tell you that? I'd be stupid to do that." She gives me a blank smile that doesn't reach her eyes and walks off.

"There's just something about her." I lean back against the bleachers, a determined look written on my face.

"Or maybe you're just pussy-whipped." Kian remarked.

"Where did that come from?" I say, slightly shocked at his answer.

"The way you're so desperate to find out about her personal that she keeps closed, and every time you see her you start foaming at the mouth." Harvey adds.

"I do not."

"That's not what your face says."

"I'm going to kill you two one day." I grumble.

-

J<3