There is a moment in everyone's life when they question themselves over something. Their genius or naivete, but something. Currently, Chord was questioning why he thought watching that one last episode of How To Get Away With Murder - a good seven times in a row - was a good idea. The reason for that is he had overslept, which caused him to run late for school. Normally, this wasn't so bad.
The reason he was up shit creek right now due to his idiocy was that he barreled into none other than Dakota Delacroix.
If Xander was a wolf, then Dakota gave the aura of a great white shark. Chord was rooted where he fell, after he tumbled to the floor, wishing the floor would just swallow him up.
Dakota was scary. Really, really scary. Though Xander made him nervous for obvious reasons, meeting eyes with this person made the blood in his veins run cold. The aura that came off of him was dark and dangerous, matching his face perfectly. Not to mention despite running into him head on, he hadn't been moved at all. He was built like a damn truck.
His hair was as dark as onyx, almost to the point it had a purple-like tint, falling just shy of his shoulders. His eyes were a mixture of brown and green, sharp as knives but endlessly hollow. Like they came from the bottom of a tomb. Both of his ears had black taper gauges and Chord also saw a pair of snake bites under his lower lip.
No matter when or where you saw him, Dakota always had that intimidating, angry look on his face. And he was currently looking at Chord like he was one second from murdering him.
Oh, shit. I'm gonna die. He's gonna kill me. He looks pissed off. . .
There were numerous rumors about who exactly Dakota was. No one ever approached him- not when his face was so scary. He was a bit older than the rest of the senior class, and that was because he was held back a year because of being in juvenile detention for some unknown crime he committed. According to the rumors anyway.
So he wandered the halls a lot, and everyone walked as far from him as they could when they came across him. No one knew if it was true, but everyone believed it was. Or that he was involved in a gang.
Up to this moment, Chord had managed to not see him up close. But now that he had, he could see where the claims stemmed from.
Chord himself didn't hold rumors too much, but that didn't mean having Dakota glare at him like he wanted to eviscerate him wasn't nerve-shattering. Because it was.
"I-I am so sorry. I didn't mean to run into you!" he fumbled as he rose, moving around Dakota as he followed suit. "E-Excuse me!" Before Dakota could say anything else, he ran off down the hall to first period.
I'm never oversleeping again. I want to live.
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When lunch came around, Chord was making his way to the library to meet Scarlett. He had to make a detour to get his lunch from his locker, and he only had to look behind him a couple of times while doing so.
So far, no sign of Xander since that confrontation in the bathroom, but Chord had a feeling sooner or later his luck would run out. Still, his luck so far had been good.
As he approached the library, he felt his heart start to race. He hadn't seen Scarlett since the movie night Friday, so this was the first he would be seeing her after she kissed him.
She kissed him. She kissed him. Him. Suffice it to say, if one assumed he was still freaking out over it after spending the weekend doing that, they'd be correct.
What did that mean though? It was bad enough he wasn't sure if that night was even a date - since Scarlett never said and he didn't want to assume - but now things just got more complicated.
Clearly, she liked him enough to kiss him. Unless Scarlett was just one of those people who kissed people at random intervals. But she didn't seem that type.
How was he supposed to act now? Did he continue on as if the kiss meant nothing? It definitely didn't feel like nothing. It felt like Chord's heart was going to burst out his chest.
Were they dating now? Or were they just friends who wer exactly friends and who also kissed each other. Friends don't kiss each other. Or do they?
"This girl's gonna be the death of me," he muttered, leaning his head on the wall "Either she's gonna kill me or give me a fucking heart attack. I'm not sure which is worse."
Deep breaths, Chord. Just walk in there and see what she does. That's the safest bet. If she mentions it, you can talk about it like an almost-adult. If not. . .act like normal? Freak out internally some more?
At the sound of laughter, he lifted his head as a couple of guys walked towards him on their way to lunch.
His phone buzzed as a text from Scarlett came with a picture of a Post-It of a doodle of a skull with the words: Starved For Affection.
Scarlett: It's terminal. Sorry to break it to you.
He laughed. Before he could send a reply back, his phone went flying when his shoulder ran into another, and it hit the floor with a heart-sickening crack face down.
Please don't let the screen break. Please don't let the screen break. He knelt to check his phone but a foot over it stopped him.
"Uh, can you please remove your foot? It's on my phone." He looked up at the guy, waiting for him to do as he asked. But he didn't.
"Oh, I am so sorry about that," he replied but the look of amusement on his face showed otherwise. "You really should watch out. You could break your phone like that." The guy knelt and picked up Chord's phone. "Oh, what do we have here?" His eyes lowered to whatever was on Chord's phone- most likely the texts he still had open to Scarlett.
"Can you please give me my phone?" A vein pulsed in Chord's head. He was already annoyed that his phone might be broken, but also this dude wasn't giving it back. "I have to be somewhere right now."
"Oh, you mean with Scarlett?" he remarked, laughing. "You know, it's such a shame she thinks hanging out with someone like you is going to end up as anything but bad. What exactly did you do to convince her to hang out with you? Or is she just so easy she'll fuck anyone she sees?"
"I don't think that is any of your business," Chord said, holding out his hand. "Wait, what did you just say?"
He pursed his lips, tossing his phone lightly between his hands. "What's wrong? Don't like me talking about your little skank?"
Chord furrowed his eyebrows. "Can you just give me my phone?"
"Why should I?"
"Because it isn't yours."
He stared at Chord for a moment, then handed his phone to Chord. "Sure." When Chord reached out for it, he retracted his hand. "Maybe I should see if little Scarlett would be open to hanging out with us first? If she is easy enough to mess around with you, surely she wouldn't mind us? How far have you gotten with her?"
Can this guy be any more disgusting?
"Scarlett isn't that kind of a person. Not that it is even any of your business."
The guy looked back at his friend. "Would you look at this? The charity case is being mouthy today. He gets a little side piece and he thinks he's hot shit."
"I guess he thinks he's in the right since he has a little girlfriend, Seth. His ego must've grown several sizes." His friend scoffed.
Seth ran his hand through his dirty blonde hair. "I suppose so, but you know what?" He took a step closer to Chord, jabbing his finger in his chest. "You aren't worth shit. You really should do everyone a favor by just leaving school. No one would miss you. After all, it's not like you come from money like us. You're not shit compared to the rest of us. You belong with your people."
"My people?"
As Seth and his friend jeered at him, a shadow fell over Chord, and he could feel the hair on the back of his neck rise as someone stood behind him. Seth and his friend's face paled as white as a ghost.
A gruff voice, like a smoker's, spoke. A low baritone. "I don't believe you are in a position to talk shit, Fords. Correct me if I am wrong, but didn't your father come begging mine for a huge ass loan to save your piss poor business from going bankrupt? He is still paying it off after five years."
Chord turned his head and froze when he saw Dakota right behind him, his dark eyes glaring at the two.
"Uh, well-" Seth began.
Dakota's gaze turned to his friend. "And, Ian, your uncle has a second-rate business whose profits barely exceed their expectations. I once heard my father say that you're barely swimming above the surface. So why don't you take your irrelevant opinions and fuck off?"
The two stared, afraid to say anything as Dakota took the phone from Seth's hand, handing it to Chord with a word.
He eyed the two in annoyance. Leaning forward, he let out a low growl. "Boo."
Seth and Ian ran away, each giving their own noise of fear.
"Wow," Chord said, watching where they left. "That just made my day." Looking at his phone, he let out a sigh when he saw the screen was cracked. He messed around with it, but half the time it didn't register to his touch.
He felt Dakota's eyes on him and as they met, Chord felt that unsettled feeling pop its ugly head again. Chord was a good height, about five ten, but Dakota was, at minimum, six foot.
For the next few moments, an awkward silence settled between them until Chord broke it.
"Uh, thanks." Chord tucked his phone into his pocket as he continued making his way to the library. He could feel Dakota's eyes on him as he walked away.
Why the hell is he staring at me? I didn't piss him off from this morning? If so, why did he even intervene?
As he approached where Scarlett was sitting on the ground, legs crossed Indian style, trying to fold her twelfth failed origami crane. The discarded pieces laid abandoned around her as she had a Twizz. Sensing his approach, she looked up, her eyes lighting up.
"Chord! I was wondering if you got lost." She patted the ground beside her. "Join me."
"Have you still not figured that out?" He watched her curse as she tossed the thirteenth failed attempt. "Are you sure you don't want me to-"
"Silence." She pressed her finger to her mouth. "You may have nimble fingers, but some of us aren't so fortunate. It's a damn crane! I got this! And stop laughing." She puffed out her cheeks. "You're so mean. Laughing at me."
As he watched her brows furrow in concentration, Chord clenched his hands. She didn't seem to be nervous or acting any different way and it sure as hell didn't make his racing thoughts slow down.
Was it just him that couldn't stop thinking about it? Was it only him that wanted to do it again? Would it be weird if he asked her about it?
"Do-"
A shadow fell over them as Dakota stood over them with an infuriated look that could kill a bear. Or, rather, at Scarlett, who merely grabbed another piece of paper from her binder.
What was Dakota doing here?
"Alright Red, where is it?"
She didn't give him more than a side-eye, unperturbed. "Where's what?"
Dakota huffed, running a hand through his hair in aggravation. He knelt down, still looking intimidating with his wide shoulders and tall frame. "My god damn wallet. You know, the one you've been fucking pickpocketing since your midget ass moved here."
"Oh, that." Most people would be scared shitless when being stared down by Dakota, but Scarlett looked like the cat who ate the canary. "It's safe."
He leaned forward. "I told you to stop pickpocketing me. It's fucking annoying."
"And I advised you to learn to realize when you're being pickpocketed." She stuck her tongue out at him. "It took you, what, two hours to figure it out this time?"
"Yeah, I was in my fucking truck going off campus for lunch. Now give it."
She tilted her head, looking down at her folded paper. "Nope."
"Don't think I won't kick your ass just because you're tiny," he growled, acting like a dog backed into a corner.
"You wouldn't dare," she stated, poking him in his cheek with her teal-colored nail. Chord was pretty sure he got more pissed off when she did it, but he didn't move to do anything to her. "You may have been a cat or some shit in your past life, but I don't scare that easy, Delacroix. You're all talk, no bite."
She patted the ground in front of her, tapping the side of an aisle with her converse. "Sit like a good boy and you'll get your precious wallet back."
Scarlett and Dakota had a stare down for several moments before — to his surprise — Dakota broke eye contact as he laid back against the shelf. He sat with his legs spread, tapping his boot. "You're a pain in my ass. Do you know that? Why the fuck do I need to be here?"
"Because if you want your wallet back, you'll suck it up and enjoy this. Two, you said you owed me for covering for you with your mom the other night. Thirdly, you need more friends so I'm calling the favor in." Scarlett bit into the sandwich she pulled from her bag. She took out a giant bag sour patch kids, offering them to Dakota. He just glared at first before helping himself to some, grumbling.
"Why did you steal his wallet?" Chord arched an eyebrow. The idea of stealing from Dakota sounded like suicide.
"I prefer the term 'temporarily repossessed'," she replied, pulling the wallet from her shirt, taunting him with it. When he tried grabbing it, she quickly tucked it back in. "Down boy. Bad Dakota." She stretched her foot to block him off. "A little socializing won't kill ya."
"Says what evidence?"
As the two of them bickered — and Dakota tried stealing the rest of the Sour Patch — Chord was curious. What was their relationship? How do they even know each other?
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A/N: So remember the Dakota Scarlett mentioned like two chapters ago? Yep, dis is him. Thoughts?