Colors

Seventeen

A/N: I'm not even going to mention the photo... Also I'm sorry I've been away! I'll explain at the end of the chapter my loves!

Due to the fact that I was slowly turning into... Something purple and I had to hide that from everyone around me, I suddenly found myself falling behind in my classwork. I'd only just been keeping up with my subjects before I met Mitch, it didn't take a genius to know that I was going to be six foot under when it came to school work.

The first few bad marks I got weren't enough to concern me, I was too preoccupied with mending my heart and worrying about the fact that I could possibly be killed. I mean, how much worse could it get? So I didn't think about it. I tried my best but as test papers rolled in, I suddenly realised that I was in deep shit. Which was the exact reason that I was terrified upon hearing my parents call my name one night after school.

"Scott? Honey, come downstairs for a minute, we need to talk..." My mother said in her always soft voice, one that was put on to cover any and every emotion known to humankind. That voice was scarier than yelling, that voice was scarier than anything my father could threaten. No one knew what came after that voice, it was always different. 

"Okay, I'm on my way!" I called toward where she was and quickly pulled my jumper down over my head, yanking my sleeves over my hands and checking that there was nothing I missed. After checking for the tenth time, I shuffled into the lounge room where my parents were sitting and bit my lip hard.

"You wanted to talk?" I asked softly and put my hands in my pockets. I made sure to stand in the doorway so I wouldn't be too close to any possible lectures or outbursts but when my father pointed to the chair next to him, I followed his movement and sat down.

"We're really worried about your grades..." My mother started, reaching over to place a hand on my knee.

"Oh." I looked down, trying my best to feign any form of negative emotion in order to pretend that I cared about my grades.

"We aren't mad..." My father began to carry on from what she was saying but I looked up and made eye contact with him, stopping any noise in the room.

"I've really been struggling recently and I'm sorry, I should've talked to you." I looked at each of them and then smoothed my hands through my hair. "I've done all I can on my own but Kirstie has promised to start tutoring me in the subjects I've started to drop in." I assured the two slightly shocked adults looking at me and stood up.

My mother was the first to recover and stood up, straightening out her skirt with that unreadable smile. "Oh, okay. Just know that we're here for you and that we're really proud of how you're working through this." She patted my back as I left the room and I went back up to my bed.

Proud. I wondered what they would say if they found out the truth. Proud. Of course there would be the anger and frustration at me and probably the disowning that would come along with that. Proud. They wouldn't be proud. They wouldn't be happy with what I was doing.

***

The next day was just like every other. I got to school and did the boring assigned work, then went to lunch and sat down with Alex to talk about the classes we'd just had. The usual routine that often bored everyone out of our brains but we had no other choice. That was until everything shifted.

"Um, hi. Can I sit here?" My head snapped up and I frowned slightly as I saw a boy that I'd never spoken to before smiling apologetically down at me. His blue eyes flicked to Alex and then back to me again and I relaxed a little bit. This boy couldn't harm a fly.