Blind To It || Dylan O'Brien Fanfiction

4

Chelsea

Home. Walking past people. Ignoring everyone on my porch and in my yard. Taking Becky up to our room and locking everyone else out.

Morning. Get ready for school. Get yelled at by Phillip. Get on the bus.

School. People. Questions.

I go to the bathroom and open the handicap stall. It's big enough for me to sit on the ground.

I toss my backpack on the floor and slide my back down the wall. It's not like I actually slept last night. I was awake, listening for the slightest noise, the softest creak that could be a person. Of course, there was nothing, and of course, it will be me who will have to deal with the people who feel the need to talk to us. Phillip won't be doing anything productive. Drinking to vanquish his hangover? Sounds about right.

The tardy bell rings. I don't get up. Instead, I pull a book out of my bag and try to focus on it instead of everything else.

Twenty pages in, I realize I don't even know the main character's name. This is worthless, I'm waiting time. Maybe I should just go to class...

No. I'll go to my locker and see if I have anything in there to distract me. I don't have a phone, just a landline, so that's completely out of the picture.

My mistake.

My locker door looks fine, but when I open it, I find all these little notes.

Drunk.

Child beater.

Druggie.

Some I would never read aloud. I crumble them up in a ball and walk them to the trash can that sits in the hall. So stupid. Ridiculous.

I hate it here.

Everything goes from worse to even worse.

Mrs. Slim, my guidance councilor, comes clicking down the hall in her heels. She's, ironically enough, huge. She has a special desk and chair so she can fit.

"Shelly! I've been looking for you," she tells me.

"Chelsea." I'm scowling.

"Oh, that's right. Follow me to my office, dear?"

Shoot me in the eye, dear?

"Pass. I'm already late for class," I respond like it means the world to me.

"You've been excused."

I should've skipped.

I glare darkly. "I'm not interested."

"I'm not asking."

"Neither am I," I shoot back, closing my locker. I swing my bag over my shoulder and proceed to walk past her. I hear her heels clicking behind me.

"Where are you going?"

"Home. I'm not feeling too well."

That was almost the truth.

"What about you come and sit in the nurse's office."

"My home is much more comfortable, I assure you."

"But Chelsea, you really have to stay here. It's the law."

I turn around, agitated. "Honestly, I don't care about that right now."

Plus, I'm pretty sure she's wrong.

Someone grabs my shoulder and I push away a flashback.

I take a deep breath. "Take your hand off my f-"

"I thought we were friends, Chelsea."

I turn around and look my school security guard in the eye. "I've never spoken a word to you, so either you're a real stalker, so you're just trying to scare me."

He looks confused. I search him with my eyes.

"You're trying to intimidate me into staying here, but honestly, you're just picking a scab," I say with a roll of my eyes. My hand is on the door.

I feel him grab both of my shoulders and he drags me backwards. I try to squirm free. He can't do this, can he?

My stomach drops to my feet.

He was there that night, I'm sure of it. He's the one who made me look like someone had smashed half my face in with a car.

"You did this to me!" I can't restrain myself.

He lets go of me. In surprise, not confusion. I can see it in his eyes.

I'm right.

Dylan

I get called to the office. Forgot my lunchbox. Again. I walk up the hallway, which is dead silent. Weird. There's usually at least one more person.

I guess not today.

The reception desk, where my lunchbox is, is right by guidance and the nurse office. There's two doors next to a large desk made of plastic that's designed to look like marble. The floors are ugly blue tile throughout the whole building.

I see my lunchbox. I snatch it up and begin to walk back to class, but I hear voices coming from guidance. I glance at the security camera. It's been broken sense before Christmas break. Might as well do some eavesdropping.

(( idea by primsbraids ;)))

"I just... I just want Becky to be happy, but she's... She's been growing up there and I just... I don't want her there."

Chelsea. Defiantly Chelsea.

"Why don't you want Becky at your house?" Mrs. Slim asks, trying to sound reasonable.

Chelsea shakes her head. "I... I don't want to talk about this," she says in a shaky voice, getting out of her chair. My cue.

"Chelsea, why don't you want Becky at your house?"

Right before I leave, I hear Chelsea's reply.

"He hurt her," she says so lowly I could have imagined it.

Anger swells up in me. He. Someone hurt Chelsea. Her father. Now he hurt someone Chelsea cares about.

I need to talk to her. I need to get to him.