Afraid • l.h

Chapter 7 • "Jack?"

"Yeah makes sense, well I'll see you on the bus later." I say and he pulls me into a hug for the second time today but soon enough some of his friends come along and I notice one of them is Alex so I smile and quickly walk in the direction of the coffee shop.

Once I get there I see Rosie and the other guys are standing outside waiting.

"Hiya." I say as I walk up to them and Rosie hands me a warm coffee.

"Hey." They all say and smile including Luke so that must be good.

"Do you want to go somewhere after school?" Grace asks me and Rosie.

"Sure, where were you thinking?" Rosie replies.

"How about the beach?"

"Sounds great. I haven't been to a beach in a while." I say.

"Me either, do the guys wanna come?" Rosie says.

"Sure I'll come." Calum replies with a smile.

"Luke? Michael? Are you coming or not?"

"Who's going?" Luke asks.

"Us four and Michael if he answers." Grace laughs.

"Umm... I don't think I can come."

"Oh okay. Michael?" Grace says a little disappointed.

"Sure I'll come."

As we walk up the steps to our first lesson I spot Jack looking in my direction and I give him a small wave.

"You're friends with Jack?" I hear Michael ask.

"Yeah me and Jack both used to live in New York and were best friends up until he moved and we lost contact with him and his family." I replied.

"Ohh, right." was all he said.

The bell rang for first class which was maths. Something that wasn't good to have in the morning.

"Hey Luke wait up." I called after him and he stopped and turned to face me waiting patiently.

"Are you okay?" I ask.

"Yes, perfectly fine thank you." he says a little sarcastically.

"I'm just trying to be a good friend. You can tell me anything and I won't say a word."

"Why would I tell you anything? I barely know you."

"I'm just trying to be nice." I say and walk off before I feel his hand wrap around my wrist and pull me back.

"Hey. Tilly. I'm sorry. I guess I'm just a bit shy around people I don't know that well." He said letting go of my wrist.

"Oh, it's okay. Although you did make it seem like you didn't like me or I had annoyed you." I say.

"No, of course I like you its just I'm not a very confident person." he spoke shyly as the door to our sauna of a maths class opened.

"Oh." was all I could say as I was a little shocked to hear that Luke was a insecure and shy person. Something still didn't seem right about it all though.

I took my seat in maths and my mind wondered to what I had just been told and I start to ask questions as my usual self begins to be worried about everything.

"Tilly?" My teacher said snapping me out of my thoughts. "You are listening right?"

"Umm yeah."

The half of the lesson I was actually paying attention to went pretty quick and we were dismissed in no time.

"Tilly, you have art right?" I hear Luke ask behind me.

"Yeah, why?"

"I have music and it's um near by the art block."

"Okay. Wanna walk together?" Luke smiles and we walk to next period.

"See you at break." I say to Luke we get to the art department and he smiled in response.

I walk through the double doors which take you into two separate classrooms. The floor is stained with paint and every other material they use in here. I really do like art and I find it very interesting how things are created and thought of that look so complicated but are yet so simple.

I see Alex standing alone and so I decide to go and join him.

"Hi." I say as I approach him.

"Hey, have you done anything for the project?"

"Nope you?" I say.

"Nope." He said and we both laugh.

Everybody walks in and we all grab our things for the project we are about to properly begin.

"Seen as we have no images to work with should we plan where we are going to go with this?" I make the suggestion.

"Yeah, good idea."

"So how do you know Jack then?" Alex asks. I forgot all about this morning and seeing him with Jack.

"Umm, we were best friends when we lived in New York."

"Ohh, Jack is probably my closest friend out of my whole group. Most of them are absolute idiots but Jack he is great, isn't he?" He laughs lightly.

For the rest of the lesson we sit at our desk planning while everyone else scurried around the room getting on with a piece for their project. Me and Alex both decide we should definitely try to get out to a city soon to take some pictures so we can start responding to our artists for the project. We got so engrossed in the many ideas we had for the project that we didn't realise everyone had packed away and was leaving.

"Staying?" Mrs Mason asked.

"No, not today Miss." I said as she walked into her office.

Once we had packed away everyone else had left and so we grabbed our bags and headed out.

"See you later." Alex says as I see Jack coming towards us.

"Hey guys. Tilly, Mum says you should come round for dinner one night so we can catch up with each other." Jack says excitedly.

"Sounds great." I said, happy to know his Mum wants to meet again because she was like a second mum to me. "I'll text you tonight to sort out a day." I added as I spotted Rosie from a distance.

I quickly walked over to them so I caught up but my mind was still on the fact that I didn't know how to break the news to Jack.

How was I going to tell him?

**

Hey guys thank you so much for reading this.

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