What Should I do? | Shawn Hunter

xix. Summer Blues

SUMMER WAS A long one. The days were sweltering, and the humidity was a killer, and it was a good thing in Kardern's opinion that he spent most of his time indoors and sticking to himself.  Kardern retreated into himself and avoided the outside world at all costs, much preferring to turn to the company of their books instead, in order to drown in the world of ink and words so that he didn't have to confront the fragments of a broken heart.

He could still remember the feel of Shawn's lips on that day that he was pushed up against the lockers that day and as hard as he tried to forget, he couldn't. It ran around his head like a train on a train track, endless and on a loop. His own kind of special torment, as Shawn in real life was continuing to distance himself from Kardern ever since they had that conversation in the hallway that ended with a kiss. 

Kardern felt his stomach twist and clench with every second that passed because that meant it was closer to having to go back to school. Three months had gone by in seemingly a blink of an eye, and perhaps his dad was right when he said he shouldn't spend so much time in his head, or otherwise life would pass him by, but he couldn't find it within himself to face his reality right now. 

Because that would mean facing the reality that he was heartbroken.

It wasn't just heartbreak that he was trying to avoid. If it were just that, it would have taken him a while to get through it, but he would've survived it. He survived his mother leaving after all, and surely that was supposed to hurt more, but regardless, it wasn't just his heartbreak that was making him dread the start of the new day tomorrow. 

It was mostly what would follow him when he went to a school bigger than he was used to. Kardern had gotten used to being feared and recognised; he had gotten used to being the big fish, but now he was moving to a bigger pond, and he knew within that pond there were going to be bigger fish. 

Would they eat him alive?

Kardern had relied on his reputation that had grown into something he couldn't control after his mother had abandoned him. Some things he did, but other things had been wildly exaggerated due to rumours and kids' imaginations. Kardern had used that to his advantage and used it as some kind of shield to prevent people from getting too close to him.

Would news of his anger issues travel over to the bigger school? Even the younger grades that weren't around when his. When his anger issues started cropping up, people had been warned to stay away from him as best they could, and that suited Kardern just fine because he found solace in the pages of books, more so than being around his peers.

He was broken, broken from something more than his mother leaving, but that was when the cracks started to show. It wasn't fair. The only person he had ever felt not broken around was Shawn -- or maybe they were both broken and just. Trying to find a place in a world that doesn't quite accept them.

But now even Shawn didn't feel like the comfort he once was, and he wasn't talking to them about the shift in their friendship, as he refused to talk about the kiss, while that was all Kardern wanted to talk about, but was too nervous to attempt to broach the topic.

So maybe that was why Kardern was wallowing on his last day of Summer, instead of enjoying his last day of freedom with his friends. It wasn't like he had many friends to begin with, and he really couldn't hang out with them because Kardern was trying to give Shawn the space he sorely wanted.

That was why he wasn't expecting the doorbell to ring, and Kardern had to drag himself off the sofa with an old blanket wrapped around his shoulders. As if it would protect him from whoever was at the door. 

Maybe he could get them to go away without saying anything 

When he opened the door, however, it was to come face to face with Cory Matthews, and that set a flurry of emotions to be released in his stomach. He expected the face on the other side to be Shawn Hunter, and he wasn't sure if he was relieved or disappointed that it wasn't Shawn and was, in fact, Cory.