[Luke]
It's so dark and so impossible to remember the night that changed me. I haven't received The Punishment yet, but I will. I cannot avoid it after what I've done. The darkness is crushing me from all around. It's squeezing me and it's going to squeeze me until I'm left gasping for air. I need to get some real air into my lungs before they collapse under the pressure. I got up and stumbled blindly to the window, throwing it up, making it nearly smash it's own hinges. I sucked in a sharp breath, timid to let yet out again. I knew that I had been too loud when I heard footsteps that I could easily identify as my mom's deciding down the stairs. They're light and airy, almost absent. I closed the window slowly and slid down the wall.
[Layla]
"Layla, you need to get up for school!" my mom yelled from downstairs. I groaned and mentally counted all the reasons that I most definitely did not want to get up for school.
"I want to kill myself." It was the first thought that ran through my head when I entered my school building. Well. Maybe not at this exact moment, but it sounded better than being here, that was for sure. At least when I was at school, I had friends. My friends wanted to be around me when I was in school, because I had some sort of status in school. I wasn't popular, that was for damn certain, but I knew a lot of people. It was when I was at home that people didn't want to hang out with me anymore. No one wanted to hang out with me. Not even my closest friends. Which sometimes made me question whether they were really my friends at all.
"Alex!" Someone called his name. The boy that I had been in love with for three years. It was almost routine for me to react to his name now as if it were my own. I turned my head to see who it had been and it was Lauren. "Can I wear your jacket again? I'm so cold." she whined. He nodded once and began sliding out of his hoodie. I cringed. I hope I didn't give off the vibe that he had loved me in return, because he most certainly had not.
"Can we please leave, Matt."
"I mean..." he sighed, but looked at me sympathetically. I knew that he didn't want to leave. He felt safe in this room, but I always had constant anxiety here. I hated seeing them together after my deep past with Alex. "If you really want to." Matt said slowly. I tried to stop these feelings because I knew how much he wanted to stay here, but I couldn't do it.
"You love me, right?"
"Of course I do, Lay. You're my best friend." Matt said. I took a really deep breath. Matt really was one of my friends. He sometimes even hung out with my outside of school. But not often. See, because he actually was popular so he was always busy with other people. But when he actually found the time to spend with me, we were inseparable.
"Can we just leave then? All together? I don't want to do this today."
"You mean leave school?" he asked, beginning to wring his hands. God forbid that he do something that could get him in trouble under authority. I nodded. Tears began to fill my eyes. This wasn't a way of manipulation. I just really needed to be somewhere else. "Ok, ok. We'll go. Don't worry about it. Let's go." Matt said, bidding goodbye to our other friends. "Wait here." Matt said when we got to his car. "I forgot my notebook." he said, stalking off. I pulled on the handle of the door and realized that he hadn't unlocked it before he left. Thanks, Matt. I sighed and dropped my bag on the ground and climbed onto the hood of the car to wait. I crossed my legs and put my sunglasses on before looking for Matt to reappear, but he was taking forever. I wasn't afraid of the school security officer finding me. He was probably eating lunch at this time and I wasn't afraid of authority like Matt was anyway.
"Shit!" My head snapped to the left where I had heard the curse come from. A boy was bent down, picking some of things up from the ground and shoving them back into his backpack. "Shit, shit, shit." he mumbled, taking large strides towards the doors of the school.
"Late?" I asked as he stormed by. He looked at me but said nothing. If anything, he grimaced a little bit. Was I really that ugly? I sighed and tried to place a name with a face. Lip ring, blue eyes, blonde hair, black skinny jeans, flannel and a dark hood and beanie covering the top of his head. I couldn't figure out who it was.
"Ready?" Matt asked, with his backpack now over his shoulder. He unlocked the car and we both slid in. The air conditioning was immediately blasting, but I was quick to bring an end to that garbage. Matt was not going to freeze me today.
"Do you think I'm ugly?" I asked Matt. He took his eyes off of the road to look at me. "No." he said, almost questioningly. "Why do you ask? Did someone say something to you?" he asked, defensively which made me smile.
"No, no. I was just wondering. Besides, it's about what people don't say." i said, leaning my head against the window. Matt put a hand on my shoulder reassuringly before returning it to the steering wheel.
"So, where are we going, Smarties?" he asked.
"Can we go to the library?" I asked, taking one of my books out of my book bag. Matt let out a long, extremely drawn out groan.
"But I hate reading. You know that." he sighed.
"I really need to drop this off and pick a few things up, though." I said. "Besides, it's not like you have to read."
"Fine, fine." he said, giving in like he always did. "What were you talking about earlier? Who didn't say something to you, leading you to believe that you are ugly?" Matt asked.
"I have no idea." I said.
