Hunter

Chapter 12: A Day Never Forgotten

A few days passed since Hunter sent the text to Torey and no word came from her. Hunter sat at her sister's table quietly eating her turkey sandwich, lost in thought.

"Earth to Hunter?" Sonah said waving her hand in front of Hunter's face. Hunter barely changing the direction of her eyes, Sonah shrugged to Sam.

"Hey look Sonah there's Torey!" Sam pointed in a random direction, Hunter broke her gaze to look in the direction that Sam pointed seeing she was pointing at nothing. Angry, Hunter looked at Sam.

"Hey fuck you, Sam."

"Hey! Watch it, Hunter, you have no right to talk to your sister like that." Sonah said protectingly.

"She has no right to get my hopes up like that!" Hunter yelled.

"You better settle down before you do something, stupid Hunter." Sonah said standing looking down at Hunter.

"Oh yeah, stupid right? Like texting my true feelings to Torey?" Hunter started packing her stuff and grabbed her stuff and left the table angry. Sonah stood at the table in shock, she looked down at Sam and saw she shared the same look as she did.

"I didn't know." Sam confessed.

"Neither did I." Sonah agreed.

Hunter stormed away from her sister's table and started to head towards her favorite spot to be alone. Her spot was at the back of the theatre near the front door to the stage. A wall blocked the view of the door, and Hunter could easily be alone without anyone knowing. Even her sisters didn't know about this spot. Hunter dropped her backpack down and slid down the wall and began to finish eating her sandwich. Suddenly Hunter heard someone starting to walk around the corner to the door. She frantically started thinking who would know she was here. "Could it be Torey? or Sam and Sonah? Did they find my spot?"  Ruby turned the corner holding a lunch tray, surprised to see Hunter sitting there.

"Well I guess my secret spot isn't so secret anymore is it?" Ruby joked.

"Wait this is your secret spot too?" Hunter looked at Ruby with joy.

"Yeah, keeps me away from all the drama of high school and lets me think clearly. What brings you here to m- I mean our secret spot.

"My sisters pissed me off, and normally I would go to Alex's group but I'm trying to avoid him so I came to a spot when I would hide from both."

"Your sisters  pissed you off? What did they do?" Ruby set her tray down and backpack and slid down the wall opposite of Hunter.

"They got my hopes up about Torey. Now I realize I'm not very good at telling people about what's going on in my life, so they wouldn't know that Torey is a sensitive topic for me."

"What happened with Torey?" Ruby began to eat her Veggie burger. Hunter began explaining everything that happened the past few days. Hunter began to cry and Ruby set down her burger and sat next to Hunter and let her rest on her shoulder. Hunter began to understand that Ruby maybe would be a nice girlfriend and now she was torn between her first love or a friend she made in theatre that she's known forever.

                                                                                      *****

The school day ended and Hunter started walking to her bike when she saw Torey sitting at the table the girls would sit at at lunch. Hunter walked over and sat across from Torey.

"You're a hard person to find." Hunter said setting down her bag.

"Oh! I thought you would have left already?" Torey began looking around for an exit.

"Are you trying to avoid me?" Hunter grabbed Torey's hand. "Torey I don't know if you ever got my text, but I want you to know something.  I feel something for you that I've only felt one other time in my life and that was when I first met Alex. I want to be with you. I never knew that I was gay until after I broke up with Alex and you were there by my side comforting me. And I will wait for you if you aren't ready to get in a relationship yet. I will always wait for you."

"Hunter." Torey pushed Hunter's hands off her's." You shouldn't wait for me, We are never going to be together. I'm sorry but I don't see you in that way. I see us just as friends. Thank you for being so welcoming when I first got here but all I want to be is friends and just that." Torey got up grabbed her back and left. Hunter stayed at the table with her hands in the same position Torey left them. Hunter grabbed her back and quickly went to her bike. She threw on her helmet and started her bike. she pulled out of the driveway quickly, she saw the light was green and she turned left when a truck speeding through the intersection hit her bike and sent her flying head first into a street lamp pole. Her helmet flew off mid flight and she laid on the ground unconscious, blood trickling down her face.