When Lines Blur

Chapter Sixteen

Gabe looked at him, "You're upset."

"She grew up so quickly," Micheal replied simply, "I can remember her best art piece being crayon scribbles."

Gabe rolled his eyes and continued walking, "I wonder what will happen today."

"You mean in regards to our new friends?"

"Well yeah," Gabe said, "I'm sure the whole school thinks you planned to kill them. And suddenly we're going to be very close to them all. I'm sure Salem will be thrilled."

Micheal chuckled, "Salem is going to be wondering what the hell to do with six new people around to bully."

"True. Wanna bet that Jaxson, Austin and Ryan are already bothering them?" Gabe asked.

"Why didn't you include Shawn in that?"

Gabe rolled his eyes, "Shawn is going to be doing Maddox's job of worrying about Adrian."

"You know," Micheal started, "Looking back at it now, I realize why you and Shawn always went to bat for them. It was kind of obvious you and him definitely were doing it for more reasons than just kindness."

"You're just to dumb to notice."

"Clearly I am," Micheal said as they walked into the school. Just as the two had expected, Jaxson, Shawn, Ryan and Austin were already grouped up with their new friends.

Braxton looked over and smiled seeing Micheal. Salem elbowed him in the side, "We get Brax. You're gay. Chill the fuck out." No one said anything about Salem's smile upon seeing Gabe though.

"So Salem's being a dick today," Micheal asked, "everything else the same as always?" Salem flipped Micheal off and hugged Gabe.

"Well Ryan's not off in the stars so no," Braxton said.

Ryan rolled his eyes, "Don't tempt me."

"Um," Levi said, "It's kind of our job. It's your fault for calling us demons."

"Not Demons, Devils," Gabe said, "There's a difference."

Levi rolled his eyes, "Whatever."

"I just now realized I have to put up with all 12 of you at all times now," Lucas said, "Adrian wanna shoot me?"

Adrian raised an eyebrow, "Can I?"

"No," Shawn answered immediately. To Micheal's surprise, he wasn't holding Adrian's books, instead Maddox was holding them. It took Micheal a moment to realize that Shawn did it on purpose, Maddox liked feeling helpful. Austin was standing next to Maddox, his earbuds in and listening to music. Micheal was tuning out the minor argument between Lucas and Shawn about Adrian shooting him, instead he was observing. He picked up the habit from Braxton when they first started hanging out to be honest, Micheal realized how telling people's body language could be. For the first time, Micheal noticed someone was nervous before Braxton noticed. Micheal didn't think much when he first saw Zeek crack his knuckles, but when he saw Zeek try to do it again shortly after he knew something was up.

Micheal waited to see if Zeek did it again to speak up, and once seeing that Zeek did try to crack his knuckles again. Micheal spoke up, "You okay Zeek?"

"Hm?" Zeek looked over at Micheal, his eyes then darted to Braxton. Zeek smiled weakly, "Yeah. I'm okay."

Austin pulled out an earbud, and they all could hear how loud his music was. "Zeek, I couldn't even hear what was going on and I could tell you lied."

"Okay and?" Zeek said, "I'm not getting my ass beat. So drop it."

"What did you do Zeek?" Salem asked. Zeek stayed silent.