around my scars, calum hood

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

━━ Dawn Graham,
March Twenty-First. ━━

"So . . . Basically, you're sending me to a Private school."

"Not actually." Calum waves me off, "It's a school where you have to wear a Uniform, and pay to get in—" Calum paused, "—Oh. I guess it is a Private school."

"You have to pay?" I firmly ask.

"Dawn! It's no biggie, really." He waved me off again. "You also get ten minute breaks between classes."

"Okay fine. It's a lot better than my last school, which is an A plus in my book."

"How was your last school?" Luke asks, picking up his tea and taking a sip.

"Well, Aiden's friends didn't like me very much so they kind of picked on me. It was just stressful." I murmured.

"Who is Aiden?" Ashton questions.

"He's. . . Well, I guess he's my fake older brother?"

"Oh, I see."

━━

Calum watched as I put everything onto my desk and sat back down onto my bed, smiling the whole time.

"You've got a busy next three days." He hums. "You know that?"

"Yeah." I frown slightly.

"Hey, Don't be nervous." He puts a hand on my shoulder. "It'll be a piece of cake! I promise. The first day's always the easy part, it's a supply day. We are gonna buy your favorite food and get a ton of school supplies! Maybe some other things." He hums, "And then on Monday, I meet with your principal and then on Tuesday it's your first day."

"That's in three days.'' I said nervously. "Cal, I'm nervous."

"Hey," He faces me fully. "You have nothing to worry about. You're an amazing person, and anything who doesn't see that is absolutely insane. Okay?"

I nod, "okay."

"You're brave. I believe in you, Dawn." He assures me. "Now head to bed, I'll see you in the morning."

━━ two thirty am. ━━

I was still very much awake and thinking about my school.

It's a private school, I hope everyone's head is not stuck up their ass, and rude. I frown when that thought enters my brain.

What if I'm not good enough for people with their head stuck up their ass?

I had resorted to playing white noise, or the occasional brown noise to try and help me sleep but even that wasn't helping. So, I got up and sat down at the guest desk.

I wrote down things that made me happy, because maybe I can find these things, and find comfort again.

Fall movies. Scary movies. Autumn colors. Haunted houses. Halloween time. Hocus pocus. Halloweentown. Hubie Halloween.

Goddamn, Dawn. I thought to myself. Are you a Halloween obsessed freak?

I let a small smile on my face appear when I think about fall. It won't be fall for a while, unfortunately. A girl can dream.

When I lived in Toronto, my mom– or, who I thought was my mom, she wouldn't let me watch anything on the TV often, I had to earn it, which was not a lot.

I sighed, annoyed at myself and I shoved the notebook far away from me. I turned my chair around and stared at the guest room.

It was extremely bare. I hadn't put anything on the walls; there were no decorations, no nothing.

Hell, I haven't even put my clothes into the dresser quite yet or unpacked my things.

This was so hard for me to do this, but I understand Calum is trying to make me as comfortable as possible, and I appreciate it. He's done more for me than anyone else, and it's been like under a month.

I appreciate him.

━━ Ten Twenty-Three AM. ━━

I felt a hand go onto my shoulder, and I sprung awake. "What the fuck—"

"Dawn," Calum said, his eyes a little wide from my sudden jump. "What are you doing asleep on the desk chair?" He grabbed my hand and helped me off of my desk chair, steadying me up. "Are you okay?"

I yawned in response, "Yeah."

"Okay good, c'mon. Let's get to the store!"

He left in a rush and closed the door behind him, and I quickly grabbed some clothes from my suitcase and changed as fast as I could.

I got into gray sweatpants and a crew neck from my suitcase, and rushed down the stairs.

"Good-morning." I say as I meet the eyes of the four people in the dining room.

"Hello, Dawn." Luke hums, not looking up from his phone.

"Okay, let's get going."

━━ Target. ━━

Me and Michael stood and watched as the three others tried to decide which type of cookies to buy from the cookie aisle.

"Oreos are the best." Ashton argued.

"No, Chips Ahoy are." Luke argued back.

"You guys are mental," Calum said, walking up to the two and holding up Thin Mints. "These are the literal definitions of perfect."

"Here's a suggestion," Michael said, "We buy one each?"

"Fine." Calum grumbles. All of them gently place their cookies into the cart and we move on.

"Can we get peach tea?" I ask.

"Of course! After we find avocados, I promise.'' Calum smiles down at me.

"Thank you." I hum and look in front of us.

By the time we ended the shopping spree, the cart had accumulated a ton of snacks, dinner ingredients, two ice cream tubs, one sorbet flavor, and three types of cereals.

"We shouldn't come to the store hungry anymore." Ashton remarks with a joking scoff.

"Agreed."

━━ At Home. ━━

"Let me help." I mumble, grabbing two things out of one bag off the counter and putting it into its place.

"You don't have to, peanut." Calum says, watching me put the two things away.

"I really want to." I smile warmly. "I love organizing and putting stuff away."

"Alright, Thank you. If you don't want to anymore, that's fine. Okay?"

"Yes, Calum."

We put everything away in comfortable silence, and soon enough all of the things were put away and the reusable bags sat in the middle of the island counter.

"That was a lot of work," Calum chuckles, bringing me into a hug.

"I agree."