My Teacher, Louis Tomlinson

Chapter 18- It was the best of times, it was the worst of times

Skye's POV:

The next couple of weeks were a new form of hell.

Turns out, either Mr. Tomlinson chickened out of telling Gary about my cutting or Gary simply doesn't give a flying fuck about me, because I was never asked about cutting and nothing was done to stop it.

So naturally, it got worse.

It got worse for several reasons. One being the fact that everyone in the school seemed to know about it. Another being the fact that I began to push Mr. Tomlinson away: always finding a way to get out of class before tea, never speaking to him, and never making eye contact.

Ever.

A third reason was the absolute lack of sleep I was getting while the workload at school continued to increase due to the ever-approaching finals. And even when I didn't have too much to do, I was unable to sleep due to fear and flashbacks of my mother and father.

I'm not sure which was worse, the good ones or the bad ones.

For instance, I had one flashback from when I was about seven and I had a school play. Both of my parents attended sober, and afterwards (I had one line, by the way. "Who is she?") my father handed me a bouquet of flowers and the three of us went out to dinner at a local pizza parlor. After, we got some ice cream. I had chocolate, my mom had vanilla, and my dad had cookies and cream, I remember.

Then another flashback would come, this one when I was thirteen. Several years earlier, it had been discovered at school that I had shitty vision. My mother took me to an optometrist, who suggested I get glasses. I picked out the ugliest pair ever, a pair kind of square-ish and copper-rimmed. At the time, though, I thought it was a great idea.

By the time I was thirteen, they were so small they gave me headaches from all of the head-squeezing. On that particular day, my father had asked me to mop the floor before he got home from work. My thirteen-year-old brain completely forgot, resulting in a very angry father. When he returned, he asked if I'd done it, and me being a shitty liar, I said no.

He picked up the object closest to him, which happened to be a glass pitcher of ice tea my mother made and swung it into my face.

The impact was so great that the pitcher actually shattered into pieces, along with my stupid, tight, copper-rimed glasses.

He then yelled at me to clean it up, so I blindly picked up all of the glass (resulting in many cuts on my hands and arms) and mopped the floor.

My mother was going to take me to buy new ones, but my dad persuaded her that I was old enough to take care of myself.

That was when I secured my current job at the Mexican restaurant. At the time, I was only getting paid in tips. The restaurant couldn't legally hire me because I wasn't of age, but now I get a small wage in addition to tips.

Two months.

That's how long it took to save up enough money for glasses. I still wear the pair I bought. I still remember how happy I was when I got them. Proud to have earned them. Excited to be able to walk outside and see the trees clearly for the first time in months.

New glasses weren't the only thing I got out of that dreadful encounter. The next day at school, my science teacher noticed my cut-up hands as we were doing an experiment. She asked to speak to me after class, and that's when I told my first lie to authority.

I told her that I had lost a ball in a thorn bush and had to dig it out with my bare hands, and she totally believed me. I was quite impressed with my abilities, to be honest. Nowadays, I'm a fantastic liar.

My mom had no idea that my dad was the one who broke my glasses. He told her I'd dropped them and accidentally stepped on them. She totally bought it, partly out of fear, I'm sure.

There's only one thing that haunts me about my mom to this day.

We never had a funeral for her.

The past is in the past, I guess.

Joe came round a couple times a week. I'm not sure why, but I was no longer used as a form of payment. Whenever we were alone, though, he kept apologizing to me, so maybe guilt was part of it. He seems like a really nice guy, but I can never forgive him for what he did to me. He's also a druggie, which is kind of disgusting, especially since he does it with my dad often.

The only good thing that really happened in this time was my friendship with Ashton. We had the entire class every Friday to work on our song with our partner, and Ashton always found a way to make me smile. We got work done for maybe thirty minutes each time before throwing the towel in and just talking. He did most of the talking, of course. He didn't seem to mind, either. He would talk about his family. He's the oldest of three with both a sister and a brother. He's very protective of his younger sister, Lauren, who is quite outgoing when it comes to boys, and he loves to play board games like candy land with his younger brother, Harry. His dog's name is Indie. His middle name is Fletcher, and he hates it but I think it suits him, but not as well as Ashton. His family and closest friends call him Ash, which I do on occasion now. He can play the drums, piano, guitar, and saxophone, and his favorite food is spaghetti. His favorite subject is art, not music, but he still loves music all the same, especially since he has a friend now.

He even told me about his insecurities. I asked him how he coped, and his answer surprised me.

He cuts too.

I wanted to share my experience with cutting, but I chickened out. He said his family was helping him through it, but we exchanged numbers and I told him to text me if he ever felt the need to and that I would always be there for him.

The great thing about him is that he never asked me anything I was uncomfortable with answering. His questions to me were always on the lighter side, like my favorite animal (seal) and my favorite foods and what not.

Basically, I couldn't ask for a better friend.

A/N: Sorry, filler chapter. But hey, I updated :)