Haven

.3.

After that day we didn't see her for weeks on end. My friends had gone back to normal as if nothing happened. They even stopped coming to the café.

But I didn't.

Every day after football practice I went to the café and waited. Waited for the mysterious girl to come back. Months came and went and still I would not give up.

My grades dropped and my teammates complained, saying I wasn't concentrating enough but I didn't care. All I could think about was her and why she hadn't appeared for such a long time.

When I tried talking to my teammates about her all they gave me were strange looks and asked : "Which girl? What are you talking about?".

I never asked again but it nagged me as to how they could forget such a beautiful face.

***
On a particularly sunny day I was seated outside of the café and along came the boy out of my class, who had saved her.

I wanted to get up and interrogate him about her whereabouts and wellbeing but in a blink of an eye he had disappeared into thin air. Baffled I looked around to see if anyone else had seen that phenomenon but no one acted strangely as if they had seen something paranormal.

***
My life at home was in shambles. I would wake up have breakfast, go to school, then to the café and stay there. Then I would leave the café late at night and go home to repeat the cycle.

Not that my family cared about me, they probably wouldn't notice if I killed myself, I was nothing to them.

All my life I had strived for affection from my family, to gain their respect.

When I got my acceptance letter to the best college around? Nothing more but a nod of the head and the request to bring them another beer.

When I was made team captain? They didn't even come to the game nor congratulate me.

When I was the second best student of the year? My father hit me for not being the first.

No, life at home wasn't enjoyable, which was why I found such comfort in watching her, feeling as if we were somehow connected and in the same situation.

But now she had disappeared and I didn't know why, it killed me inside to not know what had happened.