Facsimile

Chapter Seven

Tess nibbled nervously, chewing her lower lip, as she sat herself on the other end of the wooden bench. Her fingers picked at some loose threading in her jeans and she focused intently on that, attempting to ignore the looming conversation. Forebodingly, she attempted to appear nonchalant. Inside, she was chastising herself for being so immature, for acting like a child. But, in her head she tried to defend herself - that no one was supposed to have noticed her suffering and that her plan involved leaving this place and never looking back, before someone could. Next to her, Grizz's unblinking gaze was fixating emptily on the green in front of him, his hands clasped together, wringing between his legs. Not being able to stand the silence for much longer, Tess opened her mouth to try and formulate together a sentence, but Grizz beat her to it. 

"I can't just pretend that nothing happened", he hung his head, looking at his hands, "that I didn't see what I saw". His head turned slowly to look at her, his eyes once again full of pity. He wanted to approach this tentatively, so not to cause her to shy away and run. Since last night, Grizz had been kept awake, contemplating on every time that he had seen her with him. All the times, were his instincts were telling him that she wasn't as content with life and happy as she let on. That maybe she wasn't as perfect as people thought; that there was an underlying thing that was tainting her happiness. And now he knew the cause of it. It took everything in him not to stride towards the Eliot brother and cause him pain. His teeth were clenching painfully just thinking about it. He was bought back to reality, as Tess moved next to him, one of her hands lifting from her side to tuck a ringlet of hair behind her ear. She then sighed and tucked her legs comfortably beneath her body, shifting the direction of her body to face him. 

"I'm not asking you to forget it," the quiet, defeated tone of her voice, caused Grizz to swallow deeply, his insides clenching painfully, "just...," she sighed, mustering up the courage, she made eye contact with him, "don't tell anyone". Once again, she was willing to suffer in silence for the happiness of others. A minuscule part of Grizz's brain became angered with her; could she not see that she didn't have to suffer through everything alone? That there were people who honestly cared for her. Grizz turned his body to mimic hers, leaning against the side of the bench and bringing his legs around from the floor, placing them on the sear in front of him. His arms wrapped around his legs and he clasped his hands together on the other side of his knees. His eyes looked over her shoulder to see his three friends, one of which was the brother of the girl that sat in front of him. He hung his head once more in the gap between his legs and his body, already knowing what her answer would be to his next question. 

"Does Clark know?", he looked up to receive her answer, her facial expression dropped guiltily, her eyes filling with sadness, before she shook her head slightly. Grizz exhaled sharply. "He deserves to know Tess". As if being scolded,  Tess began to wring her fingers painfully together, the skin puckering white with the pressure. 

"I know he does", Tess leaned forward, dropping her hands onto her ankles, looking at all of the teenagers littering the green, she turned her head to look behind her, watching her brother. Her lips rose into a genuine smile as his booming laughter met her ears. "But, he's been through everything that I have, maybe even worse. And can you imagine how he would react?" she rotated her head again to look at him, her expression turning serious, "he would be plagued with guilt and it would just eat him alive. Besides, look how far he's come". Grizz nodded his head, listening to and grasping onto every word. He wasn't surprised by her answer, she had sacrificed her own happiness this far, why not do it until the end, no matter how detrimental it was to her. 

"Why are you so against people trying to help you?", Grizz clenched his eyes at his question, he couldn't prevent it from erupting from his lips. Couldn't help the underlying annoyance that was present within it. He knew that he was being a dick. But, his frustration was taking over, due to the adoration he held for the wounded girl in front of him. Seconds of silence ticked by between the pair.