Friends are just known enemies

Chapter 5

“What happened to your foot? And your hand?” Alex asks the second I walk in. Still limping obviously. I raise my eyebrow at him and he just nods.

I don’t talk about Jason’s bullying and harassing anymore, it’s been the same since I went to high school. “Well, here’s something to cheer you up” Alex said, a smirk on his lips.

I grin, every time I see him he’s in a great mood. I don’t think I ever saw him sad. And he knows me so well, he knows exactly what to do to get me to smile again.

He pulls out a shirt from beneath the counter and I squeal, running towards him (which must look ridiculous but who cares) and grab the shirt, nearly ripping it from his hands.

It’s a black Of Mice& Men –Shirt with the a mask and some lyrics of the song “Would you still be there” printed on it.

“It’s perfect” I whisper, but then I pull myself together and hand it back to him. “Too bad I’m broke” As you can guess, my parents don’t have a lot of money and I don’t earn a lot at the coffee shop.

I learned to live with the feeling of seeing something and wanting it so bad, but not being able to afford it. “And don’t you dare giving it to me for free” I say, holding my finger up, joking to be serious when Alex opens his mouth.

He looks at me like a school boy accused of something he did and I laugh. “No, but seriously. I’m a strong, in-“ “-dependent woman blablabla, I know but I also know it would make you happy” He interrupts me and I sigh.

“It’s half price for you, deal?” He says and I know if I don’t agree he’ll just sneak it into my bag. So I roll my eyes at him, put the money on the counter and take the shirt.

“No wonder you’re not earning a lot with this. Giving everything away for free to one of your only costumers” I tease and walk up the staircase.

He glares at me jokingly and I chuckle, then I open the secret door to the roof. I read for about two hours or so, I don’t really know since I’m lost in the world of Hollow Pike and I brought dinner with me.

But it’s grown colder and darker, all signs for me to go. I’m nearly done with the book, Alex picked exactly the right one for me, like he always does.

“See you Alex” I shout while walking out the door. He’s probably somewhere in the store, putting away CD’s or listening to them. As I turn around the corner, someone presses me against the wall.

“Wow, a pretty catch I got myself there” A tall, muscular man is standing in front of me, his breath reeking of whiskey. He comes closer and I push him away. Well, I try to.

“Get the hell off me!” I push harder, but he just laughs. “You’re not going anywhere baby” He whispers in my ear and I want to puke.

I am too weak to escape his grip, so there is only one thing for me to do: I kick him between the legs and when he lets go I run.

My ankle hurts and it feels like someone set it on fire, but I keep going. After a few minutes, I’m close to the bus stop and I don’t hear him coming after me.

I breathe heavily and I feel my ankle swelling. This day is just going great. I don’t think I ever was happy to see people, but when I get to the bus stop I am.

***

I get home and walk straight into the arms of another drunk man. Just this time it’s my father, which doesn’t make him anymore friendly.

“HAVEN’T I TOLD YOU TO BE HOME BEFORE 9 PM?” He shouts, grabbing my arm violently. I glance over to the clock.

“But it’s a quarter to 9” “Are you talking back to me?” He says, his grip tightening and I wince. He must be insanely drunk to be this furious.

After glancing over at the clock too, he let’s go of me, but still glares at me like it’s my fault that he’s wrong and I quickly go up to my room before he can find another reason to get angry.

I put some gel for muscle injuries I found in my bathroom on my ankle and put a bandage on it but I didn’t have much hope. I considered changing the bandage on my hand, but it would probably just rip off the skin, making it worse again.

So I left it on. I finished Hollow Pike and then went to sleep, while wishing I could live in a book, with mysteries to solve and romances to have.

***

I open my eyes when the first notes of Reckless & Relentless play. Rolling around in bed, I try to convince myself that I should get up because today is going to be a great day.

Needless to say I don’t believe my lie. At the end of the song I finally push myself out of the covers and get dressed. As always I wear black skinny jeans, ripped because they are my old ones, a plain black shirt and my leather jacket.

Now that it’s fall again, I don’t constantly have to fear a heat stroke anymore and I’m glad. But I would never abandon my black clothes, not even in summer.

I go down to the kitchen, grab a bowl and some cereal and quickly scoop it in my mouth before my dad wakes up. Then I have to run because I’m late.

Fortunately, the paper throwing kid isn’t on the bus this morning and I can listen to my music undisturbed. At least I get some peace before I have to suffer through my personal hell again.

Friday is the worst, because I don’t have any of the subjects I like. It’s just mathematics, geography and physics. Endless hours of teachers talking about sine-curves, light-rays and other things I don’t understand or care about.

Surprisingly, I don’t see Jason or any of his friends, so there are no incidents during the whole day. After my last class, I get out of school and for a change I don’t feel completely horrible.

I sigh, now it’s time to go to work until 8 in the evening. But I have a feeling something is different about today.

This is just a kind of boring, short filler chapter, but the next one is going to be really interesting ;) Comment your feedback and vote, it's much appreciated :D

(Btw do you like the new cover?)

Love you all :*

Jay