Lost Hope

TEN

〡↻ ◁◁ II ▷▷ ↺〡

The next day, Athena woke up late. She quickly threw on her school skirt, blouse, her baggy leather jacket and battered white trainers. She threw her hair into a messy bun and splattered a bit of concealer under her eyes then added a layer of smudged eyeliner before grabbing her backpack and rushing down the stairs, still spreading concealer under her eyes.

"Shit," she hissed when she turned to the clock and realised that there were fifteen minutes left for class.

She rushed to the kitchen, ignoring Blake and Isaac who were seated around the table, on the barstools and opened the fridge.

"Quite late, aren't you, love?" said Blake with a grin, watching as she dropped a bottle as she grabbed her salad from the fridge.

"Fuck off," she sneered, unhooking her café uniform from the side and thrusting it into her bag.

She looked around and cursed again when she realised she left her skateboard upstairs.

"Trouble in paradise, darling?" taunted Blake, looking amused.

"Why don't you go fuck yourself, you bitch?" she snapped at him, running to the door when she glanced at the clock again.

"I bet you want that yourself! See you later, love!" he called, laughing.

"Wanna hear the truth, Blake? Anyone welling to fuck you is just too tired to wank!" she yelled back, slamming the door shut and breaking into a run, Blake's laugh echoing into distance.

When she reached the school, she paused, panting before walking in and looking around for Chris.

She found him taking his books out of his locker.

"Hey, diddums." She grinned at him.

"Funny," he scoffed before he too grinned. "Hello, Thee-Thee pooh."

"Hilarious," she mocked, her smile falling into a frown when she noticed he wasn't looking her in the eye. "Everything all right?"

Chris looked up from his locker and stared at her for a moment before nodding. "Peachy, why?"

"You seem off," she noted, shrugging, her worried eyes making him look away.

Chris shook his head dismissively. "Just didn't get a lot of sleep yesterday."

"You're such a liar," she said after a minute of studying him.

The bell rang and he raised his eyebrows. "That's the bell. See you on break."

She scowled. "Saved by the bell, bastard."

He saluted her, grinning slightly before heading to class.

Athena grabbed her books and went to the only class she didn't share with Chris: Biology.

She sat next to Evelyn and set her stuff down. Evelyn took one glance at her and quickly changed seats. "Bitch," muttered Athena.

"Isn't she?"

Athena looked to the side and Jacob was standing there.

He nodded at Evelyn's seat. "All right if I sit there?"

Athena shrugged. "Doesn't matter."

Jacob nodded and sat.

"Hold up..." She frowned. "You're not in this class. There are twenty-two students in this class, I know all of them. You're not here."

Jacob grinned, leaning his elbows on the desk. "Pretty smart, aren't you?"

Athena narrowed her eyes and he laughed.