THORN

chapter three

Alexandria Green

Finally I made it to the training room. With a bright blush to my cheeks, I head silently into the gym so I can put my things down. I've been ignoring Niall's questioning stares for the past 5 minutes, him  probably wondering what the fuck just happened. 

I wish i had an answer for him.

I ignore the questions rambling in my mind and turn to walk towards the weight rack in the corner of the room. To my surprise, I can see Zayn standing over there due to his back facing me and seeing the tattoos once again crawling out of his t-shirt onto his neck. I'm not sure why he comes so early but it's better than being late I guess.

I've never gotten a good look at any of his tattoos between any of our short encounters, but I believe that the one on his neck appears to be a dagger. I tap his shoulder lightly while standing behind him, waiting for him to turn around. He doesn't seem to notice the first time so I tap his shoulder again with just a little more force. As Zayn begins to turn around a voice from the other side of the room grabs my attention.

"You know if he doesn't answer you the first time maybe he doesn't want to talk to you" A British accent speaks, one that I now know belongs to Louis Tomlinson.

I glare at him  from across the room for his unneeded rude comment about me and my own conversation. I didn't even know he was in the room yet. Instead of responding back to Louis, Zayn turns me by my left shoulder so we are now standing face to face in the corner of this training room.

He pulls out his earbuds that I hadn't noticed before, silently explaining that that's what kept him from noticing me before. "Sorry, I promise I just didn't hear you" He talks first, responding to Louis' assumption of him not wanting to talk to me.

"No, No it's fine Louis just wants to get on my nerves" I shrug.

"Ignore him he's not worth your time or patience" He laughs lightly.

"I try my best" I respond and playfully roll my eyes thinking about Louis and his attitude. "I should probably grab these and set up for class so Niall isn't   waiting for me " I explain while grabbing two weights in both of my hands.

"Let me help with these" He says while grabbing the remaining weights off the rack. "And I hope you know I always enjoy talking to you" He adds.

My cheeks gain a spike of heat rushing towards them for the second time today,  as I silently walk next to Zayn with the purple 12 pound weights in both of our hands.

I walk towards Niall who is unfolding the gym mats, and place the weights on the ground with Zayn following behind me. I thank him quickly for going out of his way to help me and hurriedly leave the training room to go grab the last of the supplies for today's session.

I see Rori at the end of the hallway, turning my back so I don't have to make awkward small talk with her after what I witnessed this morning. She kept her head down, without even noticing me as my feet echo throughout this silent hallway. I see the steel case placed on the back wall which holds the weapons I went out here to get.

After a couple more feet and hearing the gym door behind me open and close due to Rori entering the training room, I look over the giant padlock attached to this safe and enter the 4 digit code to unlock the padlock to this gigantic steel safe.

I'm not sure why they put all the weapons for training in a locked metal safe because everyone here most likely already own their own. The giant lock collapses in my head after putting the correct code into it, and I start to look over my options of weapons.

I scan the rows and rows filled with different types  of knifes, daggers, handguns, and even some nunchucks. My eyes fall towards the hand daggers, reminding me of Zayn's tattoo and grab as many as I can into my pockets. I should've brought a bag or something with me but thankfully all the daggers have a thick leather covering, that protects me from the blades digging through my thin pockets.