Darkest Fears

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fourteen:

 

Maybe he hasn’t read them yet. The thought was a hopeful, but pointless one. I knew Jayden well enough to know that by now he would have at very least started the stack of letters I had given to him yesterday.

Maybe I should have taken his offer. He had actually given me the option to hide away, to not show him the letters. Would it have been better if I had done just that? I certainly wouldn’t be on the verge of a heart attack from anxiety right now.

I shook my head at myself. Jayden was Jayden. He’s a kind-hearted, trustworthy, amazing person. He wouldn’t just stop talking to me. Surely not just because of the letters. That wasn’t like him.

But then again what was his reason for talking to me in the first place? I’m Kayleigh Moore. School bitch and social outcast. We were opposites. But for whatever reason he seemed to deem me worthy of his time.

But maybe.

Maybe he’d read the letters and change his opinion on me completely.

Maybe he’d finally realise I wasn’t worth his time.

Maybe today would finally be the day he did the smart thing and cut me out of his life.

I just hoped with everything in me that ‘but maybe’ wasn’t going to happen. That he’d read the letters, and still be able to see me the way he did a week ago. That he’d still give me the same smile. That nothing would change.

Whilst my thoughts tossed, uncertainty churned my stomach; maybe I would have even thrown up if I had eaten anything in the last 24 hours.

My insides clenched as I entered the school building. The first thing I noticed when I walked in was Dylan Keen, talking animatedly to a large group of his friends. The second thing I noticed less than a second after was that his best friend, Jayden Parker, was nowhere to be seen in the crowd.

I would have noticed straight away if he were, because Jayden had this way of standing out in large crowds. Even before I really knew him I knew that much.

Jayden Parker. Boy wonder. Star athlete and whiz kid all rolled up into one. A blonde haired, blue eyed, dream child.

Of course he stood out like he did.

My stomach sank realising he wasn’t there. My insides warred between relief, disappointment, and worry because I knew that that meant he wasn’t in school today.

If he was he would be with his friends, like he always was.

I tried not to let the voice in the back of my mind telling me that it must have something to do with the letters, convince me that this meant bad news.

Coincidence. I wasn’t going to jump to conclusions when it came to Jayden. He always found a way of surprising me somehow.

I walked to my locker, staying to the side of the halls and out of sight, trying not to let myself be put out.

I couldn’t blame him, or expect him to know how disheartened it made me to know he wasn’t there, the exact day after I had handed him what felt like a part of my own being.

A part of me needed his reaction. Whilst the other part of me, the pessimistic part, didn’t want to know his reaction because whatever it was it couldn’t be a good one. What positive response was there to something like this?