untitled | calum hood

nine

Evan woke up in the middle of the night, with a arm slung over her waist. She looked at her surroundings remembering where she had fallen asleep. Her fingers softly wrapped around Calum’s wrist and moved his hand off of her, feeling a breeze of cool air move over to replace his tan arm.

She lifted herself off of the bed, squinting her eyes to substitute herself from wincing in pain. Her ribs and limbs were tender, aching with every movement. Evan was willing to risk the pain because she just wanted to go home.

She grabbed her uniform that was neatly folded beside the bed, looking down at herself wearing a t-shirt that almost resembled a dress. She thought about changing back into her uniform, but decided against it because she was only just capable of walking, let alone changing.

She softly slid her school shoes on and quietly left the room, top toeing out of the hallway looking for the front door.

Luckily for her the hallway was still lit up so she avoided running into any of the cabinets, although avoiding anything didn’t work in her favor when she walked past a boy slumped on the kitchen bench eating cereal.

“Where are you going?” Evan looked up to Michael who was crunching away.

“I was just going to go home” Evan said softly licking her bottom lip which slightly tasted of metal.

“At 1 in the morning? Why don’t you just sleep here till the tomorrow?” Michael had stopped eating by now and his eyes were scanning over the bruised and battered body in front of him. He was questioning why she was going to leave at 1 in the morning, but she was confused why he was eating cereal at 1 in the morning.

He couldn’t just let her go in the middle of the night, luckily he was awake otherwise she would have started walking, and lord knows what would have happened to her.

“Thank you for taking care of me, but I really should go, I don’t want to be anymore of a bother” She whispered. All Evan wanted to do was to go home, she felt guilty that these boys had taken on the responsibility of her wellbeing.

Michael stood for him seat and walked over to her, stopping her from taking any more steps towards the front door.

“Look Evan, I know all you want to do is go home right now but its probably best if you just stay” She looked up at him through her glossy eyes and shook her head.

“Let me drive you then” Michael walked over to the table and grabbed his car keys heading towards the door.

“You don’t have too, I can walk, Michael honestly, you have done too much” She called out, he simply headed out the front and went to sit in his car waiting her.

She stepped out and the cool breeze hit her, making her hug her blood stained uniform pile tighter to her body. Opening the door and slumping down in the car seat, Michael immediately turned on the heat.

“He really likes you, you know” Michael said a matter of fact-ly.

“He shouldn’t like me, I’m no good for him” She said looking out the window, tucking her blue hair behind her ear. She could feel the dried blood tangled in the strand, she couldn’t wait to get him and sit in the bath for hours on end and cry.

“That’s not going to stop him, he’s going to keep trying” Michael started reversing out the drive. Evan continued to sit, now with silence, everything hurt, her heart, her body and her face.

“Do you know who did this to you?” Michael took his eyes off the road to quickly glance at the fragile girl beside him before returning back to the road.

“No” Evans voice cracked, she felt like crying again.

“You can talk to me, I’m a good listener” Evan sighed at him, she never got to talk to anyone anymore apart from Bailey.

“They told me to stay away from him” Evan eventually got out, while raising her hand to wipe the tear away from underneath her eye.

“Him? As in Cal?” Michael was gob smacked. He thought to himself how crazy it was that someone would inflict harm upon another person all because of a boy. His best friend.

“Yeah, that’s why this happened” They were approaching her house as Michael started to pull onto the curb. He knew where she lived because Calum would always mention it was near the bus stop. She didn’t question how Michael knew, she wasn’t in the mood.

“Was it Joan?” Michael felt his blood boil, so he said the first name that come into his head when he thought about someone who was cruel enough to do what they did.

“It was 3 girls, one called Cass and one was Steph, but I think I heard someone say Joan before I passed out” Evan’s palms began to sweat when she remembered the other voice that made its way into the conversation before she blacked out.

She knew that voice and she felt uneasy.

Evan grabbed the handle of the car and pushed it open, before stepping out Michael grabbed her arm lightly. 

“Wait, talk to me Evan” He pleaded, he wanted to know more about what happened, he wanted to sort it all out. But he knew he couldn’t, he knew it would only make the situation worse.

“I have to go Michael, there’s someone in this town that knows too much about me” With that, Evan walked as fast as her sore limbs could take her and inside her house. Where she locked the door and ran to her bedroom instantly breaking down, feeling hollow inside her heart as if the tears pouring from her eyes were draining her out of anything left in her.

Evan was scared, the voice that spoke ever so clearly replayed and replayed in her mind when she finally clicked onto who it was. Little did Evan know, that it wasn’t just one person in the town that knew about her, it was several and all of a sudden the rumors were becoming the truth.