Assisting Victoria

Part Five

            Mitch and his friends noticed the jacket right away as I walked into class. Of course they would though. It was covering up their work of art.

            “Whose jacket do you think she stole?” one of the girls asked.

            “Yeah, no way should she afford a jacket that nice,” one of the other girls added.

            I hated to admit this, but they were most likely right about that part. It was a really nice looking, thin, fitted, black, leather jacket. Leather jackets were never cheap. It looked amazing on Tori though, I probably wasn’t doing it as much justice.

            I ignored them and walked over to take my seat by the window. I didn’t want them to find out it was hers. I could only imagine what they’d to.

            The hour was going by really slow and eventually my teacher’s boring lecture put me to sleep. I rested my head on my desk and closed my eyes until I started to dream. It was about Tori of course. How could I not dream about her while wearing her jacket that smelled just like her? She was there next to me with her arms wrapped around my waist.  It felt so nice to have her there.

            In another moment the dream switched though, and we were back at her place. Nothing serious was about to happen. We were simply sitting on her couch watching a movie while one of her cats sat curled up in a ball in my lap. I scratched behind his ears and listened to his soft purring.

            Tori smiled.

            “He doesn’t like many people you know.”

            I looked over at her.

            “He doesn’t?” I asked.

            That was kind of a stupid question, because she just told me the answer, but I couldn’t control the words that came out of my mouth as I dreamed.

            “No. You must be pretty darn special,” she said with another smile.

            I loved it when Tori smiled. She has an adorable smile and it was very infectious. Not to mention seeing her happy always made me happy. I smiled too and looked down at the grey ball in my lap. When I looked back up though, Tori leaned in to kiss me.

            I was loving where this dream was going, but I suppose all good things, to my disappointment, eventually have to come to an end. Our teacher, Mr. Olson, was standing next to my desk when I, very suddenly, woke back up.

            “If you fall asleep in my class one more time Miss, I’m going to have to send you to detention. Stay awake.”

            He walked away without saying anything else and I looked around to see everyone staring at me. Most of them turned away, forgetting about what had just happened and going back to their own little worlds. Mitchell and his friends giggled though. Of course they would.

            I leaned back in my desk and stuck my hands into the pockets of Tori’s jacket. Oddly enough, they weren’t both empty. In fact, I felt my hand brush up against something on the left side. I slowly pulled whatever it was out of the pocket, but only enough so I could see it.

            It was an envelope, but there was definitely something other than a note inside. I carefully took it out and opened the envelope. There was a note inside, but there was also a key. I examined the key before reading the note. I knew it was wrong to snoop, and I did feel a little guilty, but I was way too curious to let that stop me.

        You know what this is for.  - Heather  

Of course I had no idea what that could possibly be for, so I stuck it back in my pocket while all the possibilities ran through my head.

            It could have been her sister. I knew she had a younger sister, although I never knew her name. It could have been any female member of her family really. It also could have been a close friend. Maybe it was a spare key to a house, or a car, or anything. There were just too many options. I knew what it most likely would be though, and that would be a key from a significant other, because as much as I hoped she did, Tori didn’t like women.

            You may wonder how I knew this for a fact, but she used to be married to a man, and she was always making comments about men in general. I heard her talking with a fellow teacher a while back about whether or not she had a boyfriend and I believe she said yes. Crushed my poor heart hearing her say that, but what was I to do.

            I wondered after that if Tori had known the key and the note were even in the pocket when she let me borrow her jacket. It’s a good thing I’m not the type to steal. Otherwise, that could have been bad for her. I’m sure whoever this Heather lady was didn’t want her key in the hands of some stranger, even if I had no clue what it was for.

            After class was over I stopped to talk to Lauren in the hallway.

            “Hey, nice jacket,” she said. “Where’d you get it?”

            “I’m borrowing it,” I told her.

            “Yeah? From who?”

            “Guess.”

            Her eyes got wide and she looked around to make sure that no one was listening.

            “No way! Tori?”

            “Shhh…” I whispered, because I still thought she said that a little too loud, even if no one was really around to hear it.

            “Yeah. You know, because of the spaghetti accident and all.”

            “Well that was really nice of her,” she said. “You know… she didn’t have to do that.”

“Oh stop it. She’s just really nice. She would have given it to a lot of other students too I’m sure.”

“Whatever you say Kels. Whatever you say.”

We talked a little more about how I was feeling, the whole lunch ordeal, and how Lauren’s crush on Kevin was really tearing her apart when she had to watch him flirt with his girlfriend all the time.            I understood how she felt a little. It had happened to me in the past too. Plus, there was that one time Tori said she had a boyfriend.

I had nothing more I could say that would cheer her up, so I gave her a hug and went on my way to my next class. I only had two more hours of wearing the jacket. For the first time in a long time, I hoped they went by really slow.