The Gift of Nothing | ✓

Cowards With Stories

Chapter 4 | Cowards With Stories

I went on with my regular routine. The routine I had before I compulsively went to the bookstore two days ago. It might've been an act of cowardliness on my part since it shouldn't have effected me the way it did. Those types of people shouldn't be in my life, because as Reece said, I'm not their friend.

My house, where I went directly after school was empty. Again, being like the coward I was, I skipped out on my parent's departure. But who cared if I showed up or not? Either way, they weren't going to give me a goodbye hug or kiss. They would've looked at me and tell me not to burn the house down. And that was all they would do. After that, they would be gone.

They left a note, though: We'll be back before you know it! See you in a month, love you!

I took a glance at it before pulling it off the fridge and throwing it out. The note left me feeling like the was an undertone of lies to it. In fact, they even used exclamation points. We somewhat fought yesterday, sure, but they made it seem like nothing happened. But I felt too violently, even when I made it seem like I didn't feel anything at all.

I dragged myself to the kitchen, taking one good look at everything we had, and finally deciding on popcorn. Sitting myself down on the couch, I skimmed through the channels before settling on a rerun of How I Met Your Mother. I managed to watch quite a lot within the next few hours.

I laid down on the leather couch, ignoring the current show, letting my eyes absentmindedly roam the living room. New sparks of anger flashed through the body as I observed the house for the millionth time. I absolutely loathed how there was nothing at all to remind me of my old house. No pictures of our whole family, no almost-broken vases, or familiar color combinations. My parents even bought another TV just to avoid remembering Theo. I never understood it. They would cry over him, yet they acted as if he never existed.

I guess we're all cowards.

There was a knock on the door, startling me out of my reverie, "Coming!" I hollered. I was wondering who it was as I walked towards the door. A murderer, possibly.

I cautiously opened the door, peeking through the gap. Luck just wasn't on my side, mostly because the people who I wanted to avoid the most was standing right out my house. Reece, Lizzy, Kate, and Luke were all standing there, all looking cold from the November air.

The first thing I couldn't help but notice was that I looked like crap compared to them.

"How they hell do you know where I live?" They were silent. I sighed, opening the door even wider. The four of them shuffled in awkwardly like they were excepting me to send them away. Instead I just watched them with careful eyes as they made themselves comfortable in my living room.

"Again, how the hell do you know where I live?"

"Google." Luke immediately answered, "Yeah, it was Google."

"You've got to be kidding."

"School directory." I mentally thanked Kate for not lying to me. Finally processing what she said, my heart lurched.

"You didn't find out my first name, did you?"

"No," I audibly sighed, "We specifically told the secretary not to tell us."

"Why don't you want to tell us your name, anyways?" Reece asked, curiously looking at me.

I've always been that closed up girl. When I first moved here, I obviously didn't know anyone, nor did I particularly want to know about the people were probably going to ruin my life. So, I stayed quiet around people. And somehow, Corey Taylor still managed to befriend me. He was the only person who actually made an effort to come talk to me when I moved here.

Around here, no one knew my first name. Well, besides the teachers, who I strictly told not to tell a soul. Again, Corey managed to squeeze out my first name. I wouldn't have told him in the first place, but the kid sure knew how to bug the crap out of someone. I ended up telling Corey quite a few things, in fact.

The whole thing was a dare. Corey never was my friend. Any day, he could use the information I gave him against me. Fortunately, he didn't tell anyone anything, as of right now. I was still hurt when he did that to me. But it was my fault, I was too trusting, too vulnerable, thinking he really wanted to be my friend.

"Chancellor? You alright?" I realized I zoned out.

"Peachy."

"Are you sure?"

"I think I would know if I was okay or not, don't you think?" I snapped. Luke, who had spoken, looked taken aback, along with everyone else. I glared at the floor, taking in a few deep breaths before calmly continuing. "Why are you here?"

Reece for up and pointed to where he was sitting moments ago. When I didn't move, he gently guided me towards the spot and made me sit. "We wanted to explain."

"It's not necessary--"

"No interruptions, thanks." Kate responded for Reece. I just rolled my eyes at that ironic statement.

"Anyway, you're right. We do ignore each other in school, and it does hurt. Just hanging out with people you will never really like, watching your real friends pretend you don't exist for several hours."

"Why are you telling me things I already know?"

"Because," Reece stressed, "Because I'm trying to tell you that no matter how much it sucks, it has to be done. People feel threatened by other people who are different from them. And if we step out of those boundaries and cross to the other side, it's like declaring something inevitable."

"It still doesn't make sense to me."

"Don't question things that don't make sense to you." Reece sighed, "We didn't choose this, it just happened. Could you please understand?"

~*~*~*~*~*~

Yesterday, right after Reece spoke those last words, I couldn't stop thinking about it. His side of the story made sense, yeah, but so did mine. I wouldn't apologize because there was nothing to apologize for. The message was clear to all of us.

Surviving the last minutes of English class was an accomplishment. I was happy that I could finally leave. The girls that couldn't stop arguing on Monday wouldn't stop watching me. Even my nonexistent paranoia started to kick in after a while.

Admittedly, I headed to the bookstore as soon as the last bell rang. Before I left school grounds, I noticed that the group left at different times. But nonetheless, they still met up at A New Chapter everyday. Maybe I'd be part of the whole custom they had going on.

Once we silently situated ourselves in the back room, I said, "I'm not going to apologize, you know?"

"We expected that." Kate gave me a wide smile. The rest of them nodded in agreement.

"Thanks." For once, I meant it.