Darkest Fears

Chapter Three

Chapter Three:

Jayden:

I was going to kill her.

I felt the anger rise in me, as my eyes flickered to the empty seat that was usually occupied by a loud and obnoxious red head called Kayleigh.

I couldn’t believe that I had actually believed that she had meant what she had said about not screwing up my scholarship. She hadn’t even shown up for school since she had made the promise.

She didn’t even try.

I had known that this was how it was going to be.

I stared at the blank page in front of me, because I couldn’t even make a plan of what to do without her here. So I was sat here like an idiot.

And she was ditching school.

My jaw tightened just thinking about it. Didn’t she understand how important this was to me? I had made myself perfectly clear in the car park, which brought me to the one logical conclusion left.

She didn’t care.

And that annoyed the hell out of me. I had even gone as far as to ask the receptionist, Janice, to give me her home address so I could track her down and force her to do the work with me. But apparently they ‘weren’t at liberty’ to give me that information.

I would have gone around school asking everyone if they knew a way to contact her, but she didn’t have any friends I could ask. It was frustrating as hell. Whenever I asked something about her I always got given the same response over and over again.

She’s a bitch.

That seemed to be the only thing anyone knew about her. It was the only thing I knew about her.

Besides she likes to sit curled up in dark alleyways for no reason.

Clenching my hands into fists, I felt like a prick sitting here doing nothing, whilst everyone else was working on their projects. Because everyone else’s partners bothered to turn up to school.

My friend Kyle was glancing at me from the other end of the room, where he was working with James. Right then I would do anything to swap partners with him. Scratch that. With anybody.

But who wanted to be stuck working with Kayleigh Moore?

Frustration boiled through my veins. I needed this scholarship so badly, but I couldn’t get it unless I got straight A’s. My teacher was shooting me sympathetic looks from across the classroom.

He knew how hard I worked for my grades.

I let out a deep breath. She had looked sincere when she had sworn she wouldn’t mess up my chances on a scholarship. Okay maybe that was a lie. She had looked angry. But she hadn’t sounded like she was lying.

My thoughts went back to Monday. I could remember how pale her skin had been up close. Had imagined the way that her arm had shook under my hold? She had looked so weak. Just like she had in the alleyway. I had found myself being concerned for her, even feeling guilty for being too mean.

But apparently I hadn’t even gotten my message across. My words hadn’t affected her at all. Her skipping lessons just proved that. She had just been messing around, probably to get me to leave her alone.

It was stupid to think anything else, because she didn’t get emotional or shook up. She got angry at most, but nothing else. She was always calm and sarcastic.

When the bell rang, I stood up angrily, stuffing the useless sheets of blank paper into my school bag.

Dylan was leaning against my locker, waiting for me, when I had gotten out. I was still in a really bad mood. “Another no show?” He asked me with a small frown.