Trying to live

Chapter 28

The bell alerted me that class ended and I hurried the corridor along to get to my locker. I noticed some of the girls and boys were staring and whispering as I walked past them. I remembered the moment where everyone stared at Henry and me as we entered the classroom together. The whole room was consumed by silence. 

It wasn't like Henry still held my hand, he dropped it along the way but we stood next to each other and then we bumped into each other as we both decided we'd enter the classroom at the same time. 

He steadied me, his hand barely touching my elbow. My gaze swept over the room and I was glad that Juliette wasn't in it or she would have had her hyena moment. But Henry's other friends including his cousin and my brother were here. 

Priya just rolled her eyes while Jake stared wide - eyed at us. Scott gave me a look but other than that he ignored me. His girlfriend Franny sneered at me and Leah's reaction had the same amount of boredom as I had when I didn't care about something at all. 

When my eyes met Cam's, my heart stopped for a second. His eyes were cold and a hint of anger was in them but when he saw me looking at him, he gave me a small smile. But the smile was gone as fast as he produced it. I glanced at Henry, his jaw clenched and his whole posture was kind of stiff and tensed up. I realized that Cam's coldness was directed at Henry and not me. Did something happen between them? They were inseparable, almost like twins but now they both looked like they're seconds away of hitting each other with a fist. 

Lastly, my eyes found Wyatt's and his questioning look resembled my own cluelessness of this whole situation. Henry moved forward and suddenly everyone found their voices back and greeted him. Everything moved forward and the deafening silence turned to dust. 

My eyes were glued on Henry and the way he met his friends. With one move of his he swept the moment away. It was as if nothing happened at all. My brother said something to him and Henry started laughing. 

How easy it was for him to blend in.

I felt so out of place, knowing that I had no one to go to. I always told myself I didn't care but when I saw my old friends talking and laughing I realized I did care. My classes went fine if I had Rose in them because she was talkative and she didn't make me feel alone.

Yet, I never considered her as my best friend and kept her at arms length. I never told her anything. Some things that weren't too bad she had to get out of me. Part of me liked Rose but the rational part of me knew that I was just using her. I felt bad for it but I always told myself that I needed to protect my heart and myself first and everyone else came after me.

So, what if she'd get hurt. I got hurt too and no one cared about me. 

But in this classroom I had no one. I couldn't consider Cam as my ally because he was mostly with Henry and his friends. Though Cam and I built a connection that may ran deeper than I thought, he'd still choose his cousin over me. 

The same went for Wyatt - we never really speak to each other except when we accidentally bump into each other in the halls, at lunch or at Royals because he was my CC buddy. Other than that we had no connection or I wanted it to be like that.

Might be because of my reputation.

I knew I was standing far too long at the doorway, so I moved along. I pretended I didn't care. I didn't care that Henry discarded and ignored me after his brilliant idea of us going to class together. I didn't care that my classmates were staring at me though they thought they were very discreet about it. I didn't care that I was alone because I knew that this would happen to me after all I made this plan of losing everyone in my life.