Harper
The sound of my annoying alarm woke me from my sleep. Groaning, I opened my eyes and slapped my hand over them as the harsh sunlight hit my face.
Last nights events slowly crashed back down to me making me smile a little. Ace was so kind to me. I'd never really excepted that from him but I guess everyday you learn something new.
About someone.
Though, I am still terrified of him, I don't know, after last night, he doesn't seem that bad. He danced with me, brought me home and he was... nice. But why? Why was he so nice? To me, out of all people.
But again, it did feel... okay? Like I didn't feel like I wanted to run away from him.
I snapped out of my thoughts as my alarm rang again. I sighed and pushed the stop button. God, I fucking hate that sound.
Here's to another day!
I got out of bed and went into my bathroom. I took a shower, quickly washed my face, did my usual makeup.
I picked out a pair of light washed mom jeans, a white cropped tank top and a black jacket and changed. I paired my outfit with a some jewelry.
I grabbed my bag when shoved a book in there along with my school stuff and headed downstairs to the kitchen.
There was no sign of my mom but Eliot was sitting on the stool by the counter, eating an apple.
"Hi." he greeted. I smiled at him and went over to the fridge and grabbed some yogurt, something I was suddenly craving right now for unknown reasons.
I put it into a small bowl, added some berries and starting eating. We finished up quickly and he was already out the door. I slipped on my shoes and followed after him.
We walked towards his school and once I dropped him off I walked to mine.
I made it though the parking lot, passing by random couples making out and annoying people talking. I subtly scanned the area for Ace but to my dismay, there was no sign of him... yet.
A wave of disappointment? Washed through me but I shook that away and reminded myself that he's probably really busy or just late. I spotted the twins and headed over to them.
I'm just going to assume he's late, though.
Nicole gave me a smirk and I rolled my eyes at her, already knowing what she was thinking. They saw what happened last night.
"So... Ace is a gentle men? Who would've thought?" Nick said, sounding very impressed. I laughed and nudged his shoulder playfully.
"I did!" Nicole chimed in.
"It was just a one time thing, guys." I told them, silently hoping that it wasn't.
Yeah Harper, who are you trying to convince?
"Sure." he said. I shook my head and he was about to say something back when the sound of multiple motorcycles pulling up to the parking lot interrupted us. We turned our attention towards that and as expected, it was Ace and his crew.
They were parked in the spot almost right next to us.
He took off his helmet and I caught his gaze and offered him a smile, he nodded once at me and I saw one corner of his lips twitch upwards for a split second. I looked away before he could see the slight tint of pink of my cheeks.
"Hey Ace!" An annoyingly high pitched voice squealed from right in between us. She was the 'It girl' of our school. You know, very pretty, rich, has a lot of 'friends', kind of mean, white.
And her name is Amy.
She went right up to him and jumped on him and something formed in the pit of my stomach, I chose to ignore it but Ace only pushed her off of him and gave her the coldest glare I have ever seen.
The feeling went away and I bit my lip to hide my smile and attempting to stop myself from laughing.
She fell to the ground and stayed there, staring up at him with a pout. Okay. Eventually she got up but she still lingered beside them.
Nick laughed very loudly, causing her to look over at us and glare and catching the attention of everyone else. I slapped his arm and covered his mouth with my hand.
He just licked my hand and I immediately let go, wiping his germs off of my hand onto my pants.
"Ew." I said with a grimace. He narrowed his eyes at me.
"It wasn't funny." I whispered, trying to hold in my laugh.
"No but did you see the way she fell." he said and that's all it took for me to burst out laughing. He looked at me in disbelief yet amusement. Nicole just stood there, eyeing us, like we were crazy.
"Idiots." she muttered.
Amy stormed over to us, when she noticed that Ace was staring at me and Nicole quickly dragged us away.
"Run bitches, run!" Nick shouted, as we ran through the parking lot into the school. We made it inside the building and I let out a breath of relief.
"Did you see her face?" Nicole said, laughing silently.
The silent laugh.
"Yeah it was like..." Nick said whilst imitating her expression making us all laugh again.
Them, the bell rang and we reluctantly went out separate ways. I walked to my locker, opened it and grabbed my note book then closed it again.
"Harper." A deep voice called from beside me. I hummed in response, knowing that it was him.
"Ace." I stated, nervously looking up at him. He raised an eyebrow at me curiously.
"Are you alright?" he asked, his voice was emotionless but I detected a small trace of concern in it.
"Yeah. I'm okay." I replied, he nodded, silently asking me to walk with him. I smiled and we went to class together. This time, I remembered we both had french.
There was a comfortable silence between us, one thing I noticed about him was that he never really talked much yet sometimes, like right now, he looked like he had a lot to say but he chose to stay quiet.
We entered the class exactly on time and found two seats at the back.
I opened my notebook and started taking notes as the teacher started the lesson because I needed to pay attention, I was basically failing this class.
French is one of the most confusing languages to have ever existed. In my entire sixteen years of existence I have never been so confused by something.
As the teacher talked, I frowned, trying to understand what she was saying. You'd think that because both english and french had the same alphabet, kind of, it'd be easy but no.
I knew some words but it was hard to keep up, she talks very fast.
I glanced over at Ace, and he was already looking at me with amusement in his eyes.
"Here." he said, gesturing me to give him my notebook. I did and he wrote down the important stuff that I missed.
Okay mister nerd.
I stared at him, stunned. But I'm not complaining. He gave my notebook back to me and I thanked him.
"No problem." he replied, turning back to the front.
Forty five minutes later, the bell rang and we walked out of the room together.
With only a curt nod, he walked off in the opposite direction from me. Sighing, I stared as he disappeared through the crowd.
____________________________
I just finished my late shift and I was walking down the empty streets. It had to be almost eleven at night.
I had one earphone unplugged so I could still hear what was happening around me and my house keys in between my fingers, you know typical things to do as a young woman walking alone at night.
You know when people say shit like 'Don't walk alone at night, young lady' or 'Protect your daughters' well that's bullshit. Instead why don't people start teaching their sons how to fucking behave.
Honestly.
What a society we live in.
I sighed as I passed through a sketchy looking area. Earlier, I decided to take a shorter route to my house, and I know, that's not the best idea right now but want to go home because I have to pee.
Suddenly there was a terrifying scream and a few gunshots that echoed through the night, coming from the alleyway that was just a few feet away from me.
My heart dropped down to my stomach but I was obviously very curious as to what was going on over there.
Idiot.
I quietly went over in that direction and peered around the corner. There was a wall and a huge garbage bin hiding me and I crouched down a little, so I got the perfect view of what the hell was happening.
But I wish I never did.
I gasped and covered my mouth with my hand at the frightening sight.
Laying on the ground, were three people, who were either dead or soon to be and before them stood four others. And I immediately recognized two of them.
Ace and Grey.
They were standing there, with guns in hand and there was blood all over the ground. The three dead bodies or should I say corpses had their eyes wide open and in between them was a bullet wound.
I wanted to scream.
I must've hit the bin or something because they all turned in my direction. I felt frozen in place as I heard someone's footsteps approaching me.
Shit.
Shit.
Shit.
I held in my breath and placed my other hand over my mouth to stop myself from both crying and screaming.
When the person was standing directly in front of me, only then did I realize that it was Ace. The street light illuminated the dark area where I was hidden and he was staring straight at me, with an expression I could not read.
He looked back at them and said, "It's nothing. Just the wind." and then walked away not giving me another glance. I let out a heavy breath, relieved.
They walked out of the alleyway, leaving the three bodies behind them, well and me, fortunately.
I got up but still bent down a bit and I bolted towards the streets, not once looking back. I ran all the way to my house and locked the door as soon as I got in.
I took off my shoes and headed upstairs to my room, unable to shake if the uneasy feeling.
I shut my door behind me and placed my bag on my desk chair. I walked into my bathroom and stared at myself in the mirror.
Only then did I notice that I was shaking and tears were running down my face. My mascara and eyeliner was obviously very smudged.
I couldn't stop myself from thinking about what happened earlier and how Ace just stood there, in front of those bodies, killing them with no remorse at all.
Everyone was right. He is a monster.
I stared at the razor blade on the counter and for a second I was actually going to grab it but I immediately shook away those hurtful thoughts and gave myself a mental pep talk.
You're okay, Harper. Everything is okay. You're strong.
I took in a few deep breaths and washed the smudged makeup off of my face. Deciding to take a long one, turned on the shower. Getting in, I relaxed as the warm water hit my skin.
When I was finished, I stepped out and wrapped a towel around myself and brushed my teeth.
I went back into my room and almost screamed loudly as I noticed a tall shadowed figure standing by my window.
I instantly turned on my room light, revealing who it was. I stiffened and my breath got caught in my throat.
It was Ace.
Is he going to kill me now? Is that why he came here?
But his current state snapped me out of those thoughts.
His hands were bruised up and so was his face, I couldn't see it that well because he is wearing a black shirt but I'm pretty sure I could see blood dripping from under his shirt.
He winced at the bright light but his eyes trailed over my figure and I pulled my towel tightly against me. He managed a small smirk but his expression remained blank. I carefully went over to him.
"Harper." he greeted, his voice was strained. I nodded at him.
"Here let's get you cleaned up." I offered, avoiding his gaze. I guided him to my bathroom and he leaned against the counter while I grabbed some rubbing alcohol, bandages and a wash cloth from the cupboard under the sink.
I gestured for him to take off his shirt and I gasped loudly as I saw the wound on his lower abdomen. He didn't even seem fazed.
I put the washcloth under warm water and used it to clean off the blood. I carefully applied the alcohol on his wound to disinfect it, he didn't flinch. Once that was done, I gently placed a bandage over it and patched him up.
Next I had to take care of the bruises and scars on both his face and hands. I started with his hands and held them while I cleaned the blood off then I wrapped the bigger bandages around his hands. I felt him his gaze on me the entire time.
I was standing in between his legs and there was a tension in the room, as I was very much naked under my towel and him being shirtless. I felt his breath against my neck.
I swallowed the lump in my throat and brought the washcloth up to his face and gently cleaned the fresh scars. I cupped his face a little with my hand and he tensed up, so did I.
Oh my god.
When I got all the blood off of his face I did the same process and put on smaller bandages.
Finally, I looked up at him and he slowly placed his hand on my waist and the other on my lower back, bringing me closer to him.
I felt his lips press against the side of my head, leaving a lingering kiss there. My cheeks flared pink but luckily he couldn't see that.
"Thank you." he said. I met his gaze and smiled.
Yeah. Just forget about what he did earlier Harper!
"Of course." I replied, immediately pulling away from him.
"Forgive me." he said, and I knew what he meant. I wasn't supposed to see what he did earlier.
"Okay." I whispered. He shook his head and pushed himself off of the counter, taking a step towards me.
"I didn't want you to see that." he said, I nodded.
"It's too late now." I told him. Sighing, he stepped away from me and walked out of the bathroom unit my room again. I reluctantly followed. He sat down on my bed and ran his hands through this hair frustratedly.
"You're scared of me." he stated emotionlessly. I shrugged.
"You're a pretty scary dude." I said. His lips formed into a faint smirk.
"You shouldn't be." he said quietly, that I almost didn't hear him.
Excuse me? You just killed someone but okay.
"Why's that?" I asked.
"I would never hurt you, Harper." he said. I pursed my lips, clearly not knowing how to respond to that. I was shocked, but I didn't show it. I kept a calm expression even though inside I was freaking out.
What he just said shouldn't have this kind of effect on me.
I nodded slowly and the atmosphere was pretty awkward, well to me at least.
"Um, do you want something to drink or eat?" I asked stupidly. He chuckled under his breath, something I never thought he'd do around me.
I honestly didn't even know he knew how to laugh.
He only shook his head in response. Amusement swirled in his eyes.
"Goodbye Harper." he said, getting up and walking over to the window. I sighed quietly as I watched him leave.
Disappearing into the night as if he was never even here.