"What is it?" I question
"Did you know her?" My mom says back
"Who?"
"Her! On the television"
"Breaking news: Elizabeth Whitney is missing foul play suspected"
"Um, no mom we just got here. I don't know anyone yet"
"Oh. Okay then. Good, go to bed it's late I'll see you tomorrow"
...
My head pounds as I drag the covers off my sweaty body. Time for another shitty day at HVHS, this should be fun. Heading downstairs for breakfast I make my way into the kitchen and see a bag on the counter.
"your lunch love mommy 😊" reads a sticky note taped on the side.
"When is she going to learn I'm not five anymore" I think rolling my eyes.
Grabbing the bag anyways I start on my long walk to school lost in a cloud of thoughts.
"Hey!"
"Hey you!" Hearing behind me I turn around to see a sweaty Chase running towards me.
"H hey," he squeaks, out of breath "I, i saw you well I was walking"
"Oh? Cool I guess. Wanna walk with me then?" nodding he starts towards the school with quick, but steady steps.
"This place is beautiful" I say as we cross the reversing falls bridge.
"Yeah I guess" he replies taking out a camera. A different one this time, a brand I've never seen before.
"What kind of camera is that?" I coo loving the way he looks holding it to his eyes. I think I'm starting to fall for him and I've just met him. This could be bad.
"Its kinda like a Insta mini if you know what that is but much older and the photo comes out the bottom"
He snaps a photo of me in front of the water and hands me a blank photo.
"Its just blank" I say disappointed
"Be patient you'll see" as he says this black and grey lines start to form on the photo morphing into shapes.
"Oh" I whisper slightly embarrassed "you were right. Oh shit we're late come on we gotta go"
smirking he starts to jog. "Come on slow poke"
"Is that a challenge, I bet I'm faster than you any day"
"Yea it is. First one there wins" he smirks
"Fine let's go" I shout running ahead of him.
...
Sweating we both grab the door handles at the same time.
"We both win" I manage to mutter out of breath
"Yeah" he responds "see you in cl- class" I smile and start to walk down the hall, but before I get too far I feel warm fingers on my wrist and turn to see who's grabbed me.
"Would you like to go on a date tonight?" Chase asks me sending my heart on a roller coaster.
"Um, uh. Yeah that would be great" I mutter nearly forgetting how to form words, "I have to go to class bye" I spit out before turning away and nearly sprinting to my next class.
...
The day seems to pass slower and slower as the clock hands turn on my watch. My date with Chase is coming up, he couldn't tell me where we're going or what we're going to do before I ran off so my mind is going crazy trying to figure it out. Seeing him in my classes and not talking has made me worried. What if he's regreating asking me out now, what if he doesn't even like me? Its okay I'll be fine. I'll meet him by his car and he'll tell me then if he doesn't like me. Hopefully.
...
Three thirty rolls around and my chest squeezes with anxiety. Classes are over, I have to meet Chase. Grabbing my bag I put the chair onto my desk and head out to the hallway. As I'm walking I feel a hand wrap around my upper arm and jump a half foot off the ground.
"Didn't mean to scare you" Chase says laughing.
"Dude you gotta stop grabbing me like that" I respond my heart beating at the speed of light. Taking a quick swing in his direction I walk towards my locker.
"Where are you going?" Chase asks
"Um. To my locker to put away my books"
"Oh, okay. I thought you forgot about our date" he says smirking.
Forgot about it? Its all I can think about; but obviously I don't say that.
"Oh yeah, guess it wasn't the only thing on my mind" I respond laughing. We approach my locker and I open it with nothing less than my normal clumsiness fumbling the first time and unlocking it the second. Making a mental note to leave it unlocked from now on I turn to face my date.
"So" I say elongating the word "Where are we going?"
"We're going to a place to eat, wherever you want, and then I'm taking you to a campfire"
"A campfire? Um, why" I shudder knowing people will surely be at that fire.
"Because I want you to meet some people" seeing the look of horror on my face he quickly reconsiders it and says "we can go to a park instead or to your house"
"Lets stick with the park" I say with sudden confidence knowing my mom will be at the house.
...
"How's your food?" Chase asks smiling at me over the table.
"Its good" I respond staring at my fries and burger shyly.
"Ready to get out of here?"
"Yeah lets just take this to go or something" I say laughing anxiously. Grabbing my jacket I drop a ten onto chases hand and walk towards to the doors before he can refuse. Our "date" was super awkward the whole time and most of our conversations were about me. "Where are you from?", "tell me about yourself" etc. Everytime I tried to turn the conversation onto him he quickly found a way around it.
"Come on it's this way" he says leading me away "its a long walk but it will bring us close to where you live."
"Okay"
"Well what do you want to do well we walk?"
"Lets talk about you now. We talked about me the whole time it's my turn to learn something about you" I say pushing him lightly.
"Well there's not much to tell about me, I like to go for walks, I like eating food and I like pretty girls" he pauses for a second then adds "like you" blushing I kick a rock into a small patch of trees. Chase leads my to a bench and hesitantly pulls me onto his lap.
"You're beautiful" he whispers pulling me towards him slightly. Putting his thumb under my chin he makes me look at him again before I can look away, "I'm going to take care of you."
"Okay" I whisper back.
"Okay" he says kissing me before I need to come up with a response.
...
The kiss keeps floating through my mind. "I'm going to take care of you" what does that even mean. I don't have anything to do worried About, right?
I mean I did just meet the guy but he seems alright, besides the weird vibe I get when I look too deeply into his eyes. There's something behind them, but at the same time they feel like looking into a bottomless pit with nothing at the end except a empty space void of emotion.
The microwave beeps pulling me from my thoughts and telling me my pizza pockets are done. Grabbing them I head up to my room and put on YouTube; not being able to eat without watching something.
...
My eyelids Pull apart slowly and I realize I must've fallen asleep. My half eaten pizza pockets are sitting on my end table beside me confirming my thoughts. As I slept videos continued to play and I guess I fell down the unavoidable hole of which we call YouTube. Switching to a new video I eat the rest of my cold pizza pockets and go back to sleep thinking about food and seeing Chase tomorrow. Hopefully he'll kiss me again.
...
7:00 am
With only a hour until my bus comes I wake up grumpy and tired. My empty dishes still sit on my end table so I grab them and head downstairs.
The first thing I notice is the note on the counter and the second is the silence. Mom's gone.
Dear Alison
I'm so sorry we didn't get to speak much well I was here. I had to go back to work last minute, your lunch is in the fridge. I'll try to hurry home, see you when I get back. I love you.
Ripping the paper I toss it in the trash bin and grab the lunch mom packed. It's always like this I'm not surprised I just kinda hoped she'd be able to stay a little longer than one night in the new house, but whatever I guess. Pushing the thoughts aside I stuff the lunch into my bag, and stressfully run my hands through my hair deciding it's brushed enough. Ignoring the pit of sadness in the bottom of my stomach I pull out my phone and scroll through Instagram.
Authors note for the few people reading this: I'm going to be adding my photography onto the tops of the chapters if you like it you can find my Insta name in my bio.
YOU ARE READING
The camera man
Misterio / Suspenso(In editing) She thought she was finally becoming friends with someone, a camera man with a good eye and even better sense of humor, but that was before she saw his camera roll. "Who is this?" I questioned "What the fuck. did I say you could look a...
