Another Lifetime

Chapter 1

DeAnna Kastell

I dropped into my seat, pulling my phone from my pocket. "You okay, Dee?" Jessie asked me and I got a text at the same moment.

"Yeah, just didn't sleep well last night," I lied to her and opened the text. It was an unknown number, or at least my phone didn't recognise it but I did. The number was burned into my memory because of a promise I broke.

'Unknown: A promise must never be broken. - Alexander Hamilton - X'

"Did you stay over at Brian's?" Jessie asked me, nudging me like I was holding out on her.

"No, my brother got in late so I didn't get to bed until late so I didn't sleep well," I told her and that wasn't a total lie. I didn't sleep well when I didn't know my brother wasn't home.

"Frank's a grown man, Dee, meaning he doesn't need you to wait up half the night worrying about him," she told as my phone buzzed again.

It was another text from the same number. I didn't want to read it but I did because I needed to read it.

'Unknown: These violent delights have violent ends - Romeo & Juliet - X'

He always quoted, ever since the first day of met him, he'd quote almost anyone if it fitted the situation. It always made me laugh how he would quote these famous historical figures but refused to go to History or English Lit. classes.

"Brian?" Jessie asked me with a little smile; my best friend was far too emotionally invested in my relationship, definitely more than I was but that's because Brian could never compare to what I felt for him, and he knew he was a rebound or at least that he came after an ex I had really been in deep with.

"Spam text," I lied to her and dropped my phone into my bag. It was probably just someone messing with me for him. He would have found out that I hadn't been keeping my promise, which is what the Alexander Hamilton quote was about, and he'd get even, always got even no matter who it was, which is why he sent the Romeo & Juliet quote afterwards but I was seriously praying that his feelings for me and our history would stop it from getting too violent.

Mr Montrose walked in, "phones away please," he said and everyone else put their phones away. I pulled out my sketch pad instead, something to keep my hands busy. I'd started drawing because of him and I hadn't been able to kick the habit when everything went wrong.

"And a warm welcome for our new student," he said and I looked over to the door. It was him but it couldn't be him. He was locked up in a different state and he hated school with a passion so severe that I'd never seen anything like it since.

"Griffin, Sir, Griffin Kingsley," he said and he couldn't be here. It had to just be bad dream, just a really odd bad dream where he showed up in my new life but then I'd wake up on the couch waiting for Frank to come home.

"Now, I like to systematically embarrass my students and you're just in time for the attempted embarrassing of Miss DeAnna Kastell," he said and I wanted to sink into a hole in the ground because he recognised my name the second Mr Montrose said it but he managed to keep his face fairly neutral.

"Sure," I said as Mr Montrose gestured Griffin to the empty seat behind me and Jessie. I got up, taking my sketch pad with me because that's what I always showed off. I always showed a new piece of work when it was my turn to be embarrassed.

Except I'd been working on a piece that I didn't want to share, an image of Griffin the first time I saw him. I flipped to the one I'd been working on before, a pastel drawing of a sunset, a sunset I'd seen with Griffin.

"I call it 'cliché pastel art piece'," I said and flipped the pad around to show it to the room. This was the only time I showed off my work, when I had no choice but show my work or talk about my life so I went with the safe option on this.