They Came In Hoodies

Chapter 19: What Happened?

Look out for the <>! And happy Monday!

Stella POV

I sat down in my chair in class and made eye contact with Gray for only a second before we both looked away from each other. I frowned as I looked at my hands, wondering why I was even trying to grab his attention. The memory of him in the field played on repeat on my mind and I couldn't get it out. Seeing him come out of that gate wasn't what I thought about, though. His story haunted my dreams as if that were the only thing that mattered in my mind.

When I woke up the next day, I thought it was entirely a dream, cooked up by my stressed out mind. But I was surprised when I saw him come to class the next day with only a small limp. His face looked completely normal and for a second, I was confident that what I saw was a dream. But when he ignored me, I realized that what he said and what I saw the day before were all true.

Gray told me his story, straight from the source, but I couldn't understand his motive. People needed motive to kill, and he had none. There was destress in his voice as he told me, as if he hated that day just as much as the school hated him.

But he admitted it himself, he killed the boy. Gray was a killer, but I couldn't wrap my mind around it. He wasn't evil by any means, in fact, he cared more about others than I think he realized himself. So none of it made sense. As much as a headache this was, I decided to keep my distance until I made sense of it. He wanted that as well, clearly, and I thought it best for both of us for space. However, in the back of my mind, I still thought about how he danced with me at homecoming and a part of me longed for him to speak to me again and maybe one day, he would hold me like that one more time.

All these contradicting thoughts dizzied me. I didn't understand why was I still interested in him if I knew he was a killer. Maybe because I still couldn't believe it, even when he told me the truth himself.

I snuck a look at him again before more people came into the room. His black sweater looked comfortable in warm. He pushed his sleeves up to reveal pink scabbing on his wrists, which confirmed that he still wasn't healed from whatever happened to him. Unware of me watching, he stared at his notes as he wrote something, a scowl on his face as if something was bothering him. I wish I knew what that was.

"So what is going on with you two?" Alice asked as she sat down beside me, breaking me from my internal thought battle. To be honest, I had this internal battle every time I had a class with him, and time didn't make it any easier.

I shook my head as I quickly changed my attention to her. "With who?" I asked as I pulled out my textbook. We both knew exactly who she was talking about, but I still wanted to play dumb with her. Not wanting to fuel her 'I told you so comments', I didn't want to admit anything. She knew that something happened between us, I was just lucky she hadn't brought it up thus far. It allowed me to get my thoughts in order, or come up with some lie I could tell her.

"You and Grayson. It was like you two were all in love at the dance and now you aren't even making eye contact with one another."

I frowned, knowing that she wouldn't stop asking until she got an answer. "We had a fight." And that response was all she was going to get. She wouldn't know what about or for what reason, but that simple sentence would be enough for her. Already I could see her thinking about what to tell me. She warned me from the beginning to stay away, but I refused to listen to her. She would at least tell me that.

"See, I told you he isn't what met the eye."

Even though I knew it was coming, I didn't need her jab right now. "Thanks for the reminder," I panned.

She nodded, then got her books out of her backpack. "Hey, on the bright side, I know this one football player that is interested in you. Can I set you up on a blind date?"