I Told the Stars about You

Chapter 3- Broken pieces of a person

I walk into biology 25 minutes late. My eyes are puffy, my throat is dry, I smell of vodka and I can practically hear people's judgements from behind the door.

I open it and step inside as everyone looks at me.
The anxiety awakens in my body.
I take my left hand in my right to stop it from shaking.
I see her sitting there, caramel and hazel. She mouths something I can't quite seem to decipher. I'm not sure if I'm breathing.

"Good morning"

"Good morning Miss Brooks" I speak calmly. She looks at me as if I'm a piece of dirt on the sole of her shoe.

"Would you care to tell us where you were this fine morning that was so much more important than your biology class?" The room is silent. My breathing is controlled. I try to focus on her question. What was I doing?

"I missed the bus" Also known as, the excuse of the century for, I woke up late. They must be thinking I had a hangover, slept in and was still too drunk to run to the bus. All their faces say just that. All but one.

"Take a seat" She sighs in defeat and continues writing on the blackboard, talking about protein synthesis. She barely makes it a minute before she turns around and, at the sight of a raised hand, lets out a stressful breath that you would presume belonged at the end of a long day. Not at 8:45am. I somehow feel like this is the only thing I have in common with her.

"You guys should already know this, you started learning it when you were 15. For the love of God, what is it now Aiden?"

"I've just remembered Asher and I have to pick up the photocopies for our English project" I turn around at the sound of my name, but Aiden doesn't spare a glace at me. Not until we leave the classroom following Miss Brooks' comment about me missing way too much class today.

The first thing I notice is that we aren't heading to the photocopy shop. The second thing I notice is that Aiden is wearing a football sweater leading me he must have joined the team. As if he needed it as well as basketball. And the third thing I notice is that he doesn't have that judgemental look everyone else had plastered on their faces. Well, almost everyone.

Cass never judged me. I think she knew so much; she'd been though so much; she hid it all from me to protect me. But now all I can think about is what she thought, believed, suffered, loved. How I will never know.

I feel like I'm in a car that has just exited a dark tunnel. I'm looking out my window and trying to read what all the graffiti say, trying to process what they mean. But I get dizzy, I can't keep up, we're going to fast and I'm stressing out because in the attempt of seeing it all I haven't seen a single thing. So, I give up and look towards the sky because it doesn't change at the same speed the rest of the world does. Its stability calms me. I can breathe again.

Cass was those graffiti. Cass was the car driving over the speed limit. Cass was the headache that came when I tried to figure everything out. But she was also the sky. And it makes me wonder, how can somebody be so many things at once?

I'm so busy thinking I don't remember when we arrived at the music room, deserted at this hour, and took seats in front of a piano.

"Are you going to tell me the real reason why you were late today?"

"Are you deaf? I said I missed the bus" I'm not going to listen to this. I'm not going to put up with him for a single second more than I find necessary. I try to stand up and leave but he pushes me back down.

"What the hell, man? Let me go, I have nothing to say to you"

He stares at me for a moment and I distinguish pain in his eyes. Not pity. Not judgement. Just sadness.