Waiting for the Sunrise

chapter one

Rebecca Birch's Point of View:
Friday, October 15th-

The lights flashed in my eyes. They were too bright, my eyes went black. Then there was a deafening crash.

"Rebecca!" My dad cried, then nothing.

I woke up soaked in sweat. My whole body ached from memory of the nightmare. I checked the time on my phone.

4:27am

Wow, it was late for me. Almost 6 hours. I groaned, rolling over and turning on the lamp. I slid on shorts over my underwear and pulled sneakers over my feet. I sighed, remembering it was cold. But I didn't care and kept going, slamming the door shut behind me. My mom likely wasn't home to be woken by it.

I pushed my legs off the ground as soon as the cold air hit me, not wanting to let myself shiver. I ran until the first car's lights hit my eyes. That was my stopping point every day. Some mornings I would run for hours, other days only 20 minutes. When I got back home I looked over work for tests, showered, and got ready for school. Will picked me up at 7:15 every morning.

"Good morning." He said as I shut the door to his car.

"Hi."

"I brought you coffee. How long did you run?" He asked, trying to smile and make conversation.

"I slept in today." I technically didn't lie, because I had slept in a little.

"Good. It's cold this morning." I nodded, Will didn't know that I ran because I didn't sleep. He thought I didn't sleep because I ran.

We pulled into the school lot without much talking.

"Are you gonna eat with Mrs. White today?" He asked, I nodded and got out of the car. Mrs. White was the school psychologist, who's only agenda was to fix me. "Okay, have a good day. Love you." I gave him half a smile.

"You too." I walked towards the building as he was still getting his bag out of the backseat. Nobody looked at me as I entered, everyone had moved on past the fact that I wouldn't be talking to anyone anymore. Kasey was waiting at my locker when I got there.

"Hey." She smiled.

"Hi." I opened my locker and traded my physics book for the calculus one.

"So I was thinking maybe you would wanna come to the game tonight? It's senior night, I'm sure Will really wants you there." I looked at her with my eyebrows raised. "Come on, Beck. Please? Just the first half and I'll drive you home. You could sit with the soccer team." She paused. "Or just me and you..."

"No, Kase. I'm sure I'll have a lot of homework anyways." I shut my locker and looked at her disappointed smile before walking towards English.

I sat through all 9 periods, focusing on strictly academics, as usual and eating lunch in Mrs. White's office who to my pleasure happened to be absent.

I met Will at his black Acura after school. The handle was coated with rain drops. He was jogging to the car where I was waiting.

"Hey. Gonna have to hurry to bring you home. I have to be back here at 3 for the game." I shrugged, not that we ever took very long, all he did was drop me off, but I did live a ways away. We got in the car, his phone began playing mozart through the speakers, as usual. We sat in silence for a bit.

"Hey Will?" He looked at me, with almost excitement that I had something to say in his eyes.

"Yeah?" He looked back at the road.

"Do you want me to come to your game tonight?" He didn't say anything for a second.

"Beck... What are you talking about?"