You Can Run To Me

Eighteen

Her last lesson was Law. That had to be her best shot at finding out his name, as it was the only lesson they seemed to share. Knowing that much was all well and good, but all it gave her was a time and a location – not a method. She had no idea how to do it without being glaringly, horribly obvious. Natalie wished she could run it by her friends, but she had a feeling that they would just shoot the idea right down in flames... and she also had a vague sort of feeling that they might be quite right to – not that she let that thought linger in her mind very long. Yet her mind was pretty much void of ways to do it. She needed help.

"Hey, can I ask you all something?" she said, inadvertently talking right over Bea. Bea looked very annoyed and opened her mouth to say some sharp retort, only to be stopped by the restraining hand on her brother on her arm.

"Let the girl speak."

"But-"

"Come on, it's not like you were actually going to say anything interesting," Luke said, receiving his own special glare from his sister. He turned slightly to speak to Nat. "Go on."

"Well, first I kind of have to confess something."

"What?" asked Rachel a little suspiciously.

"There's this guy in one of my classes, and he keeps staring at me." Her voice faltered slightly, but she forced herself to continue. "I don't know what to do. One night I could've sworn that he came into my room and we made out for ages, but no one saw. And he left me this locket at Christmas. And at the airpor-"

"But Liane was there the whole time. She said she would have seen you two making out," protested Sylvia.

"Who's Liane?" asked Rachel, confused.

"Oh, one of our roommates from the Law Trip," Sylvia supplied quickly. "She's actually quite nice."

"But I remember it, and it felt real!"

Simone rested a hand on her elbow briefly, "It's alright to have a crush on someone, but-"

"I do not have a crush on anyone, let alone him," Nat thundered, the outburst making Simone jump slightly. "He's practically been stalking me for weeks and- Sylvia, you were the one who told me he was staring in the first place."

"Maybe, but I never thought it meant anything. And I haven't noticed anyone staring at you for ages."

"Don't you dare," Natalie hissed. "Do not lie to me like that. Don't pretend that you haven't seen him looking at me."

"Natalie!" cried Penryn in surprise as she approached the table from where she'd been sat with her boyfriend up until then. "What's going on here?"

But Natalie couldn't answer. She knew that if she tried, she would probably blow up at Pen too. Instead, she stood up stonily, picking up her bag but leaving her food behind (again), and stormed out of the room. As she left, snippets of their ensuing conversation drifted over to her. "...crazy...imagination...pretend...joke..." She cast them from her mind, telling herself that they were the ones who were crazy, and clearly they weren't as good friends as she had thought. What was the point in having friends, after all, when they thought you were stark raving mad at the slightest provocation.

Natalie sat herself very carefully between two random students that she thought might be named Clarisse and Conner. She had never really paid much attention to them before, let alone held a conversation with either. She had always had Sylvia (or at least had her so long that it seemed like always), so she'd never needed to get to know them. But there was no way she was going to sit with her today, so she had had to pick out two vaguely familiar Law students to sit with: Clarisse and Conner. They certainly didn't seem to mind – to them, she was a popular, making it almost a privilege to have to move over one seat for her. Not that she talked to them anymore than humanly possible. She was busy, it seemed; busy day-dreaming.