On The Outside

Chapter 2

The school bell rang loudly in my ears, worsening the headache that had built up over the past few days.

It had been exactly four days since I had last seen the boy and it was driving me mad. I had barely got any sleep and it was safe to say I looked like crap. There was a part of me that knew I should take his warning seriously, but the other part of we wanted to ignore it and pretend that it never happened. Even so, he had got to me and now I couldn't think straight.

"Sammy!" a feminine voice called out.

Jumping towards me like an over excited puppy came Cara. I had known her since I moved in with Beth and even though she sometimes annoyed the hell out of me, she and Harper were the only people that I could actually stand in this hellish school.

"Guess what?" she squealed, her long brown hair hitting me in the face as she pounced on me, wrapping her arms around me in a constricting hug.

"I got us all tickets to watch The Battle of the Bands... LIVE!"

I laughed as Harper came racing towards us, a horrified expression on his face.

"Please tell me I heard wrong," he whispered.

"Nope," Cara beamed, pulling out the three tickets.

"No. Absolutely not. You guys are on your own," he said firmly, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

"WHAT!?" Cara shrieked. "Hell no, you're coming with us, mister."

The two continued to bicker, the scene was quite amusing. Harper, the massive football player, being scolded by tiny little Cara. With one final smack to the back of his head, Harper finally gave in, sulkily taking the ticket and stuffing it into his pocket. Walking back to me and wrapping his arm around my shoulder.

"Hey, Sammy. Did you get any sleep last night? You don't look so good." His concerned voice swept over me as I tried not to feel guilty.

"Uh, yea," I lied.

Cara's face scrunched up in disappointment, "Harper, do me a favour and knock some sense into this idiot."

Harper laughed, but lightly punched me in the arm. His hand reached forward and tucked a few loose strands of hair behind my ear.

"Seriously, though. What's been going on with you? You've been acting weird ever since you ran off on Monday."

I shook my head and wrapped my arms around the both of them, "Don't worry guys, I'm fine. Just a bit stressed, that's all."

Cara frowned but didn't push me any further. Instead, she continued to animatedly talk about how amazing it would be to finally see Battle of the Bands live, before darting off to class in a hurry.

Maths and English passed quickly, but science dragged on forever. My head lolled from side to side as I struggled to stay awake, earning myself a detention for not listening to the teacher's boring rant.

Harper, who sat behind me laughed as the bell went, coming up to my table and gathering my books together.

"C'mon sleeping beauty. Time for lunch."

"No," I grumbled, "Time for sleep."

We made our way to the cafeteria, taking the table by the window. My stomach grumbled, but I couldn't eat. I felt so sick. His words floated around in my head. I needed to be prepared, but for what? I stared out the window, watching the leaves blow in the wind. A pounding started in the back of my head and my stomach turned. I barely registered Cara coming to sit at the table until she was screaming in my ear.