Fate

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Seventeen

Life was hard. No debating it. Strangely, it was kind of relaxing to step into someone else's house that had problems. It helped me, to at least, slightly, forget about what was going on in my life. For starters, Zayn had my complete attention during my second period despite Mrs. Hollowell becoming irate when she called me out a couple of times for not paying attention. Even worse, Zayn smirked, seeming to know I was focused on him which was more irritating.

The fact he, and let's face it, everyone else in the world probably knew more about my family history than I did. I understood mom not wanting to talk about it and I doubted she'd told anyone else. However, other people did know. Which was even more annoying. Especially, when you had Kenneth, who alluded to things all the time but gave away very little information. Not that I knew whether he was telling the truth or not as he was either angry, drunk, or both.

Zayn said Eric and Mom hadn't had an affair. Kenneth seemed to think they did, but then again he accused her of cheating with everyone including the mailman depending on his mood. How did he know that? He wasn't close to Eric, despite the fact, Eric seemed to want to be. An affair could very well have been the reason for Zayn's anger. Perhaps that ended the relationship between his parents? Eric and mom knew each other and Kenneth didn't like him.

I still didn't personally believe an affair between them had occurred. What about Mom and Alec? I hadn't even had the chance to see them interact. However, I had noticed Kenneth had seemed to particularly dislike him, perhaps worse than Eric. Hadn't he always accused mom of having an affair with a particular person? Could that person have been Alec? It was possible though it was still a little difficult to picture my mom being an adulteress. Even if once more I thought she was justified if she had.

Mom loved Kenneth so much that I still found it unbelievable. If it had happened mom had still chosen to stay with him despite how he treated her. So you'd think he wouldn't be so angry when she had chosen him. Then again, I was getting a little ahead of myself. It could be Kenneth was just jealous of Eric and Alec as he was a jealous person. Both men were fairly successful while he worked at a factory that made furniture. Even so, we still had a nice enough house so he didn't need to complain or feel jealous unless it was because they were better people than he was.

Then there was everything else going on with Zayn. If he knew more about my life then I did, why didn't he tell me? If nothing else he might be the one I needed to get information from. Though how much could he know about something he wasn't around for? He couldn't know that much about them after all. Though I was curious to know what his mom and my mom's friendship was like. So what had ended their friendship? Why had Kaylin never said anything about it either? It didn't make sense and the fact Zayn could hold the cards to what I wanted to know was unsettling.

Then there was Miles. I'd been lucky enough to have Melinda and company ignore me when they'd walked by me in the hall. Maybe they decided to cut me a break but I doubted that. They hadn't cut me any slack since they started bullying me so why would they now?

I'd been at my locker when he'd approached me, looking at me with pity which I hated. "Gem?" Miles' voice was soft and concerning and frankly, it surprised me.

I sighed, shutting my locker closed before turning to him. "What?" I questioned a little hateful, not in the mood for him adding confusion to my life right now.

He'd not made fun on me yet which was a plus but I wasn't sure why his personality was constantly changing. His forest green eyes flashed with a tint of hurt at my less than happy attitude. "Are you okay? I heard about what happened this morning with your dad." He asked showing his concern. This had to be a trick, right? There was no way he was worried about me.