affinity

23. pranking

Stuart's P.O.V

"Where is she?" I ask, pacing around as Jordan pulls grass from the ground and throws it in the air. It's been more than a hour since I've seen her and I'm getting worried. What if she did something to herself again? She was struck and heartbroken, I could see it in her teary eyes when she got irritated with me. A part of me felt horrible, that I could've done something to not make her feel this way.

The one girl I thought I would never see cry, much less have tears in her eyes. I wish I could have made her feel better.

"She's probably gone hiking or something. Give her some time. Whatever Luna said wasn't cool and I know that she doesn't want people to keep coming to her and asking her if she's alright. She's clearly not." Jordan says after a moment. He watches me pace around the dark grass while I bite my thumb.

"Hiking? You should've seen her hand. It was bleeding like crazy," I say, piking up the rock which she probably hit herself with.

Jordan blinks as he looks at the rock. "She did hit herself. Hard. Again, why did she do that?"

"She's angry, what else? Anger takes over yourself and it's hard to fight it," I say, tossing the rock around in my hands. I chew the inside of my cheek as I see the specks of blood visible on the hard rocky surface. She shouldn't have done this to herself.

Jordan stands up and brushes his hands on his jeans, "Well, you wait for her. I'm sure she just wants some alone time. I'm going inside to see what's going on. Seems like we're not doing anything today."

Jordan pats my shoulder as he jogs towards the cabins behind me. After several minutes of pacing and kicking rocks, I find Stella walking towards the creek.

I sprint towards her so quickly that she almost falls. She balances herself with her hands out in front of her. "Whoah! Careful."

"Hey," I notice the bandage on her hand, "Oh, good. You went to the nurse's office."

"Yea, Jennie forced me to go."

I'm surprised by her comment, "Jennie forced you to go? So if she didn't tell you to go, you wouldn't have gone? Wow, Stella. Great job. Bleeding is not okay, getting angry and throwing rocks on yourself is not okay." She doesn't care about getting hurt. She shouldn't be like this.

"Yea, I know," she sighs as she sits on the grass. Her fingers trace the bandage on her hand as she bites her lip.

"Do you get what I'm trying to say? Don't hit yourself. I know you're-"

"Can we not talk about this? I know everyone is talking about it but I don't want to. So would you please?" She avoids my eyes, focusing on the creek in front of her.

"Okay." I shouldn't make her anymore angry. She needs some time to settle down. She might end up doing something stupid again.

She doesn't say much until Gus comes running down the hill, tripping over a stick and suddenly tumbling down. He shakes his head as leaves and twigs fall off, "Whoah!"

"Nice entrance Gus," Stella says in monotone, her eyes focused on the creek.

"Where were you?? Everyone's asking where you were!"

"Everyone as in the whole camp or everyone as in you guys?" She asks, throwing a twig that had fallen from Gus's head in the water.

"Everyone as in us. Last I checked, Jennie was the one who talked to you." he says.

She nods, "Yup she was."

"Okay.... then.... are you okay?' He asks, glancing at the side of her face.