She Wears Toms, He Wears Converse

Chapter 27

"Putting out fire with gasoline doesn't work."

Astrid's P.O.V

It has been one week. Each day that passed, Carter grew even more anxious. He was hiding something from me. However, I thought that he would tell me when he was ready, I didn't know that he would've have kept it hidden this long.

It hurts to know that he can't trust me with one little thing when he knew so much about me. He told me about his past, so how could this be any more difficult to say?

"What did you say to Carter?" Her sneering voice pondered as I secured my closed locker with the shiny silver lock that you received at the beginning of high school.

"What do you mean?" I wondered. I had said a lot of things to Carter, and if she wanted to know something, she was going to have to be more specific.

"Don't play stupid, Astrid." She began. "Last week, I gave him a choice: Me or you, and he picked you along with being outcasted. What the hell did you say to him to make him change his mind?" She inquired. My mouth flew open, could that be the reason that he was acting a little strange?

"I-I don't know Vicki. I don't control him. The decision was entirely his, so if you want answers, you should ask him about it." I spoke.

"Your lies are so useless, Astrid." She spat before placing a hand on my shoulder and shoving me back. Her actions caused me to slam into the locker that I had just recently closed; a loud crash followed shortly after my body had made contact.

I listened to the sound of her menacing heels click down the corridors as I was left with one thought on my mind: Why didn't she shove me when my locker was open? Of all the terrible thoughts that could've been swimming through my mind, I chose that one for the simple fact that the school lockers aren't necessarily painful; they just make an insane amount of noise. If she really wanted to harm me physically, she should've pushed me in when my locker was open, because, with the abundant supply of crumpled papers and books, there had to be at least one thing that could cause me harm.

I decided that I had thought through the subject long enough, so I pulled myself off of my locker before traipsing off to the fifth period. At least it was the last period of the day.

The entire confrontation must've taken a few minutes, and we were given five minutes between classes to gather our required items and place ourselves where we were supposed to be. You may be wondering why I was aimlessly stepping through the halls when I should be jogging, but truthfully I didn't care about being late. Typically I was in class a few minutes before the bell. However, the reason why I signed art as my fifth-period class was that the teacher didn't care if you were late by a few minutes, as long as you got there he'd greet you with a smile.

The bell blared, signaling that classes were starting as I slid through the door.

"Good afternoon, Astrid." The teacher greeted.

"Good afternoon," I whispered before making my way to the desk next to Harlow.

Noticing that Carter had pulled a chair up to the desk that Harlow and I usually shared was only adding validation to my previous thought. Was he acting weird because being outcasted wasn't all it was summed up to be? In movies and stories, the protagonist is almost always the least liked person, making them completely underestimated; however, in reality, miraculous things don't happen just because you're ignored. Being left out is shown as this great opportunity in stories and movies, but let's face it, stories and videos are nothing but tales. There's nothing to envy about being invisible. Sure, it comes with its perks, but wishing for isolation isn't usually the first thing people would want.