"Give me your number," I command the bastard boy from the woods as he shut his locker, almost jumping out of his flawless skin as he noticed me leaning against the row of blue lockers beside his. He obviously was not expecting me to interact with him, let alone demand his number. Considering he's met me more than once he should know that I'm not a very subtle person. I couldn't tell where this newfound burst of confidence came from, but I could tell it intrigued him as he smiled at me and furrowed his brows.
"Excuse me?" He laughed, fixing his backpack strap over his right shoulder after stuffing it with objects from his locker. It was the end of the day and after six hours of debating my decision to take our little relationship to the next level, I finally grew some balls and marched up to him with my head held high and pride held higher.
"I never repeat myself," I inform him, almost feeling every body part I have sweat as much as humanly possible out of pure nerves and anxiety. I wish every damn day that I had enough confidence to do things such as family reunions, parties and one-night stands. But, I guess had to have at least one flaw so I didn't become too big-headed for my own safety. "Also, what's your name? Unless of course, you'd prefer to stay bastard for all of eternity,"
"I admire you for being so bold towards me. And for that," He trailed off, holding his hand out which he nodded to, waiting for me to hand over my phone which I did after getting into the contacts app just to ensure that he doesn't lurk in my photos and find the embarrassing amount of screenshots I have solely because the text I sent was funny and I wanted to remember it whenever I feel sad. Handing the phone back to me, he smiled warmly. "Don't call me at weird crackhead hours."
Instead of verbally replying, I quickly click on his contact and begin texting my reply of 'I'll call you whenever the fuck I want to' and smirking slightly as his phone dings, his eyebrows rising upon reading the text from my unsaved number. "Now you have my number too uh," I trail off, dragging out the uh as I glance down to once and for all know his name. "Ethan."
"Hmm, like the sound of that," He hums to himself, looking down at me with a cheeky smile, almost as if he could sense the butterflies having a gladiator-style death match in the pits of my stomach. With one final look at me, he turned around and walked off out of the hallway.
Without his distracting presence, it becomes all too obvious how empty the hallways are besides little old me. The sudden lonely feeling clenched my heart in its greedy palm, but it wasn't the feeling of being alone that really scared me, it was how false that feeling felt.
I head towards the door quickly, fumbling in the pockets of my blue fur-lined jean jacket to fish out my rapidly dying phone. When I do, I quickly call my Nanna, holding the phone to my ear as my eyes dart around my surroundings as if I was a crackhead hallucinating.
When my Nanna finally answers after what felt like an eternity of rings, she is unable to get a word out before I begin rambling, almost sounding like I was drunk and slurring, "Hey, Nanna. I stayed back a bit late at school, would you be able to come pick me up?"
"Sorry, Honey. I'm out of town for tonight on a business thing. Maybe call Tram to come get you?" She replied sympathetically, clearly not hearing the desperateness in my tone. I was aware that my paranoia was almost certainly unjustified, but that revelation wasn't enough to ease my erratic heart.
I think about Tram and how I already inconvenienced him enough. I couldn't call him, especially if this whole situation is a part of my almost supernatural fuckedup-ness.
"Oh, that's okay. I'll call someone else," I reply, nibbling at the skin of my lip as the exit doors appear in my line of vision. I scurry to the doors, wanting to be on call with her when I get outside. The sinking feeling in my stomach slowly eased the longer I heard her voice and the closer I got to the burgundy doors.
In an instant, that sinking feeling came crashing back down when no matter how hard I tugged, the doors wouldn't budge. I try and laugh it off, "Oh that's weird, they locked these doors early,"
"Gracie, I don't mean to alarm you, but you have to get out of there now," Nanna spoke, my eyes widening like saucers at her calmness laced with urgency.
"Nanna, I don't know what happened in your generation but in mine, the doors being locked generally means I am unable to get out of here," I give my Nanna sass without thinking of it, all my efforts and thoughts focused on my pounding heart and sense of impending doom washing over me. I didn't wanna be here, I didn't want to deal with whatever was waiting for me in these hallways.
"Find another exit then," She spoke firmly.
"I'm new to this school, I can't even find the damn toilets. I've nearly gone outside a few times out of desperation!" I whisper/yell, trying my best not to alert any potential psychos of my location. I look around cautiously, taking a bold step forward once I see no one else roaming the dark halls. "Bastard boy should still be here somewhere. I'll see if he knows where an exit is."
"Who the hell is that?" She spoke over the phone. I hear some car horns over the other end followed by squeaking tires and loud wind. "Gracie, I'm turning around, stay hidden and whatever you do-"
I didn't get to hear the rest of her warning before my phone died all cliche-like. Maybe this will be a lesson to me as a reminder to always charge my phone while I sleep and not use it all day playing candy crush which sucks the life out of my battery.
I shove my phone into my back pocket, carrying on slowly and quietly through the school to try and find an exit. Chances are, all the doors will be locked, but after I remind myself that I am not acting out a movie and this is real life, my heart rate lowers in speed. The first place my legs took me was the library because the worst thing that has ever happened in one of these bad boys was a loud gasp.
I don't even know why there are no teachers around, usually, they stay for a few hours past the end of school every night except for this one apparently.
The library was quiet, the lights all turned off and the windows hidden by the many large bookshelves, only the skylight to illuminate the many books filling the room. It was so dead silent that I could hear the floorboards quietly squeak underneath my Converse as I lightly took a small step into the room. I hated the fact that my breathing sounded like an earthquake in my ears, but I was too scared to make any distracting noises on the rare chance that someone was in here with me, waiting for me to turn the wrong corner.
A green light catches my eye, the glow peeking over the top of a bookshelf like a sun slowly rising over the distant hills. I sprint to the place where the glow was originating, weaving in and out of rows of bookshelves to try and get to it as fast as possible. The sign displaying the word 'exit' entered my sight like an angel guiding the way, a smile of pure relief gracing my lips as my hands wrap around the metal door handles and began to pull with all my strength, only to realise that these doors were also locked. "Oh, come on! this is unfair!"
"I agree." A faceless voice speaks from behind me. My heart jumps from my stomach to all parts of my body, thumping rapidly as I spin around to be met with an unfamiliar face smirking at me. I could feel every hair on my body stand up tall from fear, my legs wobbling from pressure when I hear the sound of a gun's safety click off, a sound I've only ever heard on the TV now the sound I'll hear before death. The man's arm had risen up to point the gun towards my head, keeping his smug smile prominent and never letting his cold eyes leave my scared and watery ones for so much as a second. "Now say goodbye, Gracie McAdams."
"I'm not sure how to say that." I gulp, squeezing my eyes closed to try and avoid the cold-hard metal of my end. I open my eyes, ignoring the blurry parts I saw from tears so I could look the man in the eyes "Which goes first? The 'fuck' or the 'you'?"
His eyes narrowed into slits, glaring me into my grave before he clocked the gun, ready to put me into it for real. I wish I could say goodbye to my family before I'm killed, but that's just not my reality. My eyes close again and a gust of air slowly left my lips, calming me down so I don't die the way I lived, a total fucking spazz.
I hear the gunshot go off, but I don't feel the warmth of the blood leaving my body and trickling down my face. Upon opening my eyes I see the messy-haired head and grey t-shirt-covered back of Bastard boy, or Ethan as his parents liked to call him instead, wrestling the gun out of the strangers' hands. It hit the floor, a bang ringing through the room loud enough to distract the man trying to kill me so that Ethan could grip my wrist tightly but gently, dragging me out of the room so fast I barely saw the library leaving my vision. The next thing I see is him barricading the door of the men's bathroom, trying to stay as quiet as possible although he was pacing back and forth with, what I assume to be, worry.
"I don't think I should be in here," I comment, lips pressed into a thin line. My 'healthy' coping mechanism to stress is making sarcastic and stupid remarks at the worst possible times. When everything is getting overwhelming I become more Gracie than what should be possible. For example, when my mum died my first reaction was to ask my brother and father 'So, which one of you is getting tampons for me cause it will not be I'
"Well, would you like to go back out there with him?" He asked, a slight annoyance hidden in his voice which I do not blame him for. I've grown used to everyone around me getting annoyed with my personality and behaviour but that fact just makes me act weirder out of fear that one day I'll lose everyone because of how I act.
"You're right, I'll just, uh, sit here amongst the urinals and piss-stained roof- how the fuck do high school boys not know how to aim, I mean, come on!" I descend into a rant/ramble of how I could do better with a dildo attached to a water gun and a dead arm. I haven't used the girls' bathrooms yet but I'm sure that their walls would be covered with shitty insults towards each other instead of what I hope to be wasted balls of wet toilet paper tossed against the white tiles.
"I would try and tell you to shut up but I've realised that you try for about two minutes to keep quiet before giving up and continuing to be, well, you." He spoke, stopping his fast and stressful pace as he stood away from the doors, moving to stand in front of me where I sat on the edging of the row of sinks. It didn't seem like it on the outside, but I was freaking the fuck out over three very important reasons.
one. there's a random maniac with a gun looking for us so he can put a bullet in my skull.
two. I'm stuck in this shitty school with said maniac and a hot stalker.
three. I can feel the hot stalker's stomach touching my knees and holy fuck that shit is solid.
"Anyway, I'm going to courageously ask this even though I can feel my brain drooling, but, who the literal fuck was that prick, why did he try to kill me, how does he know my name and how did you know where to find me?" I spit out questions in the moments when my brain hadn't completely shut off to protect itself from the biggest freakout in history.
"I will answer all of that, I promise, but right now I need you to trust me and climb out that window." He avoided my questions completely, pointing to a small window near the ceiling of the bathroom, the sound of it swinging back and forth and hitting the window seal finally registering in my ears after the few minutes that we've been hiding in here.
"First, if I could fit through that window I wouldn't have self-esteem issues, I'll say that much. Second, I'm not climbing out of anything until you give me some answers." I shout as loud as I could without alerting the gunman of our location. How could I go from flicking this man in the head with a rubber to outrunning death with him in a matter of days? But, just as he opened his mouth to answer that question, a bullet flies right through the space between bastard boy and me, no gunshot to start it off which probably meant the gunman put a silencer on the gun and finally started to be a smart murderer. "Which window was it?"
We quickly scrambled to the window, even when standing on my tip toes I could barely graze the edge enough to collect dust on my fingertips. Almost instantly, Ethan holds his hands out like one of those boosts things on a horse riding saddle, gripping my dirty and yet again untied shoes to bust me up enough to see the city lights in the distance and the empty parking lot illuminated by only the streetlights and moon. After pushing the window wide open, I manage to wiggle my way through the window after some struggle and time, falling a fair distance to the ground but nothing some ice and sleep can't fix.
Holy. shit.
"Are you okay?" I hear a rough whisper from above, looking up I meet the worried dark eyes of the person who saved my ass tonight and I offer him a smile, pushing myself to a stand to nod and gesture him out, seeing how only his neck and up was sticking out of the window, staring at me.
"I'm not dead, thankfully. Hurry up before I die of hyperthermia." I reply. His smile suddenly dropped, taking mine along with it once I slowly realised his so-called 'plan'. "No. No, Ethan, don't try to be a fucking hero and use those giant arms to bust your way out!"
"I'll call you later, Gracie." Was his only response before he disappeared, ducking back into the dangerous building without a single noise.
"Get back here, Carly Rae Jepson!" I call after him, awaiting a response I knew wouldn't come. I began stomping my foot like a toddler who didn't get the thing they wanted by saying 'eh' repeatedly and expecting everyone to understand. "Shit."
I wanted to leave him behind, I really did. To just run off down the street until I hit the city then, buy a milkshake that I deserve after this bullshit then sleep all night on that uncomfortable floor, but then I remembered how he threw himself in front of a loaded and clocked gun to save my life without knowing anything about me. How he kept me hidden from whatever it was he was running from the night we met, and I just couldn't leave that smiling boy in my memories die after he saved a stranger with bleached hair and raging hormones. The only thing was when I got to the front doors of the school, my whole body was shaking from fear, and I had absolutely no idea how to open this door. My eyes trail down the door and stop at the padlock keeping me from entering, my hand gently holding and turning it as I study it intensely, thinking to myself
If my screams can shatter windows and explode brains, then surely it can break metal, right?
"Fuck it," I declare, crouching down to cup my hand around my mouth and the lock, for the first time since I was fifteen years old not trying to block out the agonising screams and pleas in my head, letting them become louder the longer I listened until I screamed, setting the prisoners of my head free until they finally had enough of being a small buzz in the back on my mind and decide to predict another death. Luckily, despite the scream being small, it was enough to shatter the metal. Looking to my right, I see that my scream rattled the doors enough for the door to fall off of its hinges, the metal handle rolling away before I smacked my hand down onto it, gripping it tight enough to turn my knuckles white as I entered the school all while mentally preparing myself for a jump scare.
I try to stay quiet as I jogged through the hallways, trying to follow the sound of them fighting despite having terrible echolocation. My only hope was to find Ethan alive or at least with enough time to save him. It was completely idiotic of me to run back into danger blindly just to save him when saving me was possibly one of the last things for him to ever do, but my mum would drag me to hell and back for being a coward.
I'm braver than that.
At least, that's what I told myself as I turned a corner, seeing the two men being tossed around by each other like rag dolls, and began charging towards them, door handle raised and ready to strike. When it did it hit hard, knocking the strange gunman to the floor with a single hit. His gun was nowhere in sight as he scurried away into the night, hand clenched on top of his head like an icepack.
Slowly but surely, my eyes moved away from the direction the crazy man fled to, meeting the now very much golden and glowing ones of what looked like Bastard boy, only scarier. My arms stayed in their position above my head, only my hands moving as their grip loosened on the metal bar, it slipping from my grasp until its high pitched clunk echoed through the school. It looked like the sound had caused his ears pain as he clenched them tightly. "Holy fucking shit."
He kept eye contact with me as his golden eyes faded back to their honey brown, turning from anger and adrenaline to sadness and regret so fast I almost doubted they were any different in the first place. I expected him to say something in his defence, I nearly got on my knees to beg for an excuse but instead, he turned away, running as fast as his strong legs would carry him in the opposite direction, never once looking back.