Ninety-Nine Days

Mysterious Men

Ninety- Nine Days

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Chapter Two.

||Mysterious Men.||

With a few seconds to spare, Rina decided to spend it up on the rooftop of her school. She had arrived a bit early, thinking that there would be traffic along the way. Surprisingly, the roads and freeways had not been as hectic as she had thought. With a cup of coffee in one hand, she climbed the long flight of stairs one by one, her footsteps echoing off the plain white walls.

She prayed silently to herself, hoping that no one would be up there that morning since it was the favorite spot for stoners and other miscellaneous groups. As she reached the last step, Rina thought she heard laughter coming from the other side of the blue metal door. Thankfully, with the door having a small rectangular window, she was able to look outside. She was filled with relief when she found the roof empty. No one was present. Taking a glance over her shoulder, she found a group of three girls walking past the stairs, giggling in their conversations.

Shaking her head, Rina reached out a hand and opened the door, stepping out into the morning sun. The bright rays were too intense for Rina’s eyes, evoking the young woman to squint as she walked further out. The door closed with a soft click. She did a better investigation of her surroundings, but found no one around. Good.

She only had ten minutes to indulge in the quietness before the bell rang, so she was going to take advantage of the silence and finish the sketch she had due that day.

Rina swung her brown handbag off her shoulder and dumped it on the floor before taking a seat on the cement ground. Placing her coffee to her side, she opened up her bag when loud laughter broke her supposed solitude. As she spun around from where she sat, wide eyed, she found a male student leaning against the rail lining the roof with a cell phone pressed against his ear. The school uniform he was wearing was just like the ones many of the male students attending the school had to wear; black shirt with silver buttons, black khakis pants with a pair of dress shoes that seemed quite costly. She was sure of this because this one guy she recognized wouldn’t wear clothes that were anything but costly.

She slowly turned away, as if she were a deer who had been caught in headlights, and quietly chanted a mantra. "Please don’t see me," she whispered to herself, looking down at the floor. "Please don’t see me."

Liam Williamsons. Her school’s favorite quarterback for the football team. Everyone knew who he was. Even those outside the school acknowledged him, or at least heard of his family. After all, his family had built the private school. Liam ran the school more than the principal did. If he wanted to talk to you, you had no choice but to converse with him or you'd be targeted, and there was nothing worse than being a target at school. Students who worship the ground he walked on would do everything in their power to make sure your life meant nothing in the world. One student last week had to suffer through humiliation after humiliation and no one bothered to step out to help him. Not even Liam, who just stood there, expressionless, as eggs were tossed from every direction, hitting the poor sophomore in various parts of his body.

Whether Liam supports the bullying or not, Rina wasn’t sure. If he did, she was pretty sure he would put a stop to it.

“Oh? Tonight? Hmmm… I think I can make it,” she heard him say, a teasing tone heavily laced in his baritone voice.

Rina weighed out her options. If she was to move, would he stop her? If she was to continue to sit there, acting as if she was invisible, would he miss her on his way out? She looked around her area; her ears trained on his voice, and found that there was nowhere to hide.