Love Is Timeless, Nameless and Faceless {#wattys2015}

Chapter 2

Two days after Chase's death, the funeral was held. Chase's parents asked me to speak but I declined. I could barley stand to think of him let alone speak of him. I knew that I wouldn't even make it through my first sentence without completely breaking down.

During the service I sat with Ella and Katie. I everything was pretty much a blur. There were lots of words said and lots of tears shed over the loss of my best friend. As soon as the burial was over I ran away as fast as I could. I never liked sharing my emotions with other people so I needed a place to get away and grieve on my own. I ran away from the graveyard and into the nearby field.

The field was huge. It was acres and acres of greenery. In the middle of it all was a massive tree. The tree was over two hundred years old. It gave lots of shade for me to hid in. I sat behind it and immediately lost it. I cried so hard that my whole body shook. I didn't feel like I was alive. I was completely numb with emotional pain and turmoil. I don't know how long I was there for. Eventually I stopped crying but I was still dead inside. I sat in silence behind the tree until I heard footsteps approaching.

I didn't really care who it was but I assumed that is was either Ella, Katie or my parents so I was surprised by who sat down under the tree next to me.

"Hello." Said a teenage boy with short dark hair.

"Hi." I replied without enthusiasm.

"I'm really sorry about your loss. I saw you at the funeral."

"You should go." I say being my usual honest self.

"What? I just got here." He said looking slightly shocked.

"Why would you want to stay anyway? You don't know me and I don't even know your name. I'm tiered and slightly depressed and not fun to be around right now." Yup, that sounded like a good argument to me.

"My name is Talen. I don't know much about you either other than the fact that your slightly depressed and a little rude." Talen said with a smirk.

"You'd be a little rude too if you just buried your best friend." I said bitterly.

His smirk quickly faded to a look of regret.

"That was a bit out of line. Sorry."

"Don't worry about it. It's not the worst thing that's happened to me today."

"You know, you never told me your name." Said Talen quickly changing the subject.

"No I didn't." I replied simply.

"Aren't you going to?" He asked bemusedly.

"No. I'm gonna go home." I said getting up.

I started to walk away and looked back to find Talen trailing along behind me.

"If you try to follow me home I'll run away screaming "RAPER!" at the top of my lungs. Is that what you want?"

Talen chuckled and put his hand on my shoulder.

"I've lost people too. Trust me you'll get better. Time heals all wounds." Talen said then began walking in the opposite direction.

"He is a really strange guy" I thought to myself as I continued my walk home.

I hardly got out of bed for the next two weeks. I just lied there and thought about everything. I thought and I cried until I fell asleep then I had a nightmare and woke up to start the cycle all over again. I pretty much stopped eating as well. I just didn't get hungry anymore.

My friends were concerned about me. Ella and Katie had gone back to school after March break. Each day I didn't go to school I got more and more texts from them. Katie tried to come over and see me but I told my parents to send her away. I had no interest talking to anyone.

After two and a half full weeks of lying in bed my mom decided that enough was enough.

"Honey, I know that your in pain right now but it's not going to get any better by lying here all day long. You have to go to school on Monday." She said to me in a soft and soothing voice.

"Whatever." I replied. I didn't really care where I was because I knew that I'd be miserable everywhere.

Monday came all too quickly. My mother woke me up at 7am to get ready. I could care less about how I looked so I through on a pair of sweat pants and a baggy t-shirt. I didn't even brush my hair.

Regardless of how much of a slob I looked my mom was pleased to see me out of bed. She drove me to school and I got there with 15 minutes to spare.

I didn't want to face my friends so I sat on a bench in front of the school garden to wait for the bell to ring.

"I'm going to start calling you Mother Nature because you seem to like plants more than people."

I jumped at the sound of the voice and looked beside me to see Talen sitting there smiling at me.

"You've got to stop doing that." I told him.

"Well how else am I going to get to know you?." He asked me.

"Why do you want to know me so badly? I'm really not that interesting."

"You are to me. I find you fascinating. Your a girl who lost her best friend, ran away from the funeral to sit under a tree then stayed home for two weeks then shows up at school looking like just woke up from sleeping on the ground for a month." He said still smiling.

"Wow, you really know how to complement a girl." I say emotionlessly.

"I just call it how I see it." Talen said with a chuckle.

I rolled my eyes at him at got up off the bench.

"You've got to stop doing that." Talen said.

I smiled to myself and continued walking away from that strange boy. I knew that it wouldn't be the last time I would see him, and I was totally ok with that.