Careless, Reckless Decisions | ONC 2021

Chapter Seven

I was already dreading today. I wasn't even out of bed, but I knew that hiding myself, and keeping secrets from everyone was going to be tiring.

I sighed deeply and slipped out of bed.

This was going to be a long day.

"Sweetie! Hurry up! You don't want to miss your bus!" My mom called from downstairs, making me groan inwardly.

I usually wore some cute ripped jeans and a sweater. I didn't want to look out of the ordinary, or different, so I picked out a bright yellow sweater with long sleeves and dark wash jeans.

This would be the first time in a long time that I would come into school without any of my homework done.

But I honestly didn't care anymore.

Now that I think about it, why did I care so much about school anyway? It seemed like a waste of time, and it was less bearable now that John was gone.

Who would I fantasize about?

The only thing I would be dreaming about now is how I would redo everything and never hang out with John.

Or better yet, never go to that party.

Choking down my regrets, I fixed my hair and hurried down the staircase.

"Thanks, Mom. Bye!" I snatched some yogurt off the counter my mother had prepared for me and dashed out the door.

Just holding the yogurt bottle was hurting my hands, and I again felt like bursting into tears.

I still hadn't come to the term that this was my life now.

Running and hiding from everyone and everything.

I couldn't trust anyone anymore.

"Get in!" I snapped my head up and realized that I had been standing at the bus stop, unmoving.

"Oh! Sorry," I stepped onto the bus and faced the direction of all the staring eyes.

I usually rode with Kia, but today she didn't come to my house.

If it was any other day, I would have been texting and calling her non-stop. But for some reason, I now had the tendency to not care about things that used to matter to me.

I took a seat up front, putting my headphones in, and making sure to hide my hands under my backpack that I put on my lap.

My hands were truthfully not even badly scratched up, but I didn't want to give anyone a reason to place me at the scene that he went missing. It was too much of a risk that I wasn't willing to take.

But then again, everything I did seemed to become risky at one point or another.

. . .

Kia didn't show up at school today, and somehow I felt like it was my responsibility to know why.

People that I didn't even know the names of kept wandering up to me, asking where Kia was and when she would be back at school. People kept asking me what happened to her, and if she was ok.

It made me wonder if people were that concerned about John or not. Or if people would ask about me if I was gone.

All of this also made me realize that the only friend I had was Kia. Literally. The only person I was known for was Kia's weird, but smart best friend who didn't socialize at all.

I was a side character in my school, just like I was at the time of the murder.

But unfortunately, I was still a big enough side character that everyone knew the name of.

At this point, it was the last class of the day, and I just wanted to go home and surround myself with blankets and food.

I was exhausted and wondered why I didn't just wear gloves, to begin with. Everything would have been so much easier.

Mr. Evans was droning on and on, and I didn't feel like having my ear chewed off today.

So I did the thing any normal teenager would do when they wanted to get out of class.

I raised my hand to go to the bathroom.

Bad mistake.

"Yes, Jenna?" Mr. Evans looked away from the smartboard, and at me.

"May I use the bathroom?" I asked quickly, just now realizing my sweater sleeve slid down, and I yanked my hand down.

"Yo, what happened to your hand?" A guy that I've never seen before asked, capturing the attention of the entire classroom.

I still had nothing, and spot-on answers were always the worst.

"Oh...I uh-" I stuttered, laughing nervously. "I cut it on a can opener."

The boy shrugged, probably not believing a word I said.

And at that, I sprinted out the doorway, and to the bathroom where I continued to scrub my hands.

Washing my hands over and over was a habit that was starting to grow on me.

As I was in the bathroom, pumping more soap onto my hand, my mind drifted to the boy that asked me the very question that I've been dreading the past few days.

Even if I didn't know people's names, I could usually tell if they were in my school, or one of Kia's many friends.

Leaftree Highschool got a lot of new kids, so I decided to place him into that pile.

He still vaguely seemed familiar, but I pushed it to the back of my head and walked back to class.

As I strolled back into the classroom, I was instantly bombarded with eyes.

All of a sudden, I felt like they knew what I had done. I felt like they knew I was a monster.

But one pair of eyes stood out to me the most.

They were narrowed, and a darkened grey.

The person they belonged to was the boy that had asked me the dreaded, evil question.

"Jenna, are you alright?" I quickly snapped back into reality, registering that I had been standing in the front of the class, locking eyes with a strange boy.

Mr. Evans gave me a funny look and continued to stare me down.

"Uh, yea. No, I'm totally fine." I quickly walked down the aisle, ignoring all the stares I was receiving.

And that's when it hit me.

The cold, brutal truth.

The strange, grey-eyed boy was one of the few kids who were playing truth or dare with us that night.