The Other Side Of Fear[1]

Chapter 22

An hour passed by before Archie had left my house that night. We all sat in the lounge acting like everything was sweet and fine; my parents and Archie sharing stories of his sports team and their jobs. He even delved into detail about how his Mom left gaining my mother's sympathies and making me feel physically nauseous. I sat there; eyes to the floor, trying not to cry in anger and allowed their discussion to continue until Archie called it a night.

He kissed me as he made his way to the door, to which I stayed frozen with my eyes dead open and remained silent until the door shut behind him. My parents didn't say a word; they just eyeballed me and glanced at each other not knowing what to say. I left the room without another look at either of them; I was disgusted that my own parents were being blinded by this animal and there was really nothing I could do about it; they believed him.

Monday came around too fast and I felt the familiar pang of anxiety as I strolled the school hall to my first class. I didn't want to be here even more now that I had no friends and I knew I had to be the one to apologise to Kady but I just felt like I didn't have any heart left in me; Archie had totally and completely numbed me from any emotion.

I entered my French class and scoped the room, which was still empty with there still being ten minutes until class. I didn't share this class with any of my friends or Archie, which was a relief to me.

Glancing at my usual seat right at the front of the class where I always sat alone, I dreaded the idea right now of sitting there and walked past it directly to the back. I placed myself right in the far corner of a double desk and put my head down until the bell rang and the class began to fill.

'You're in my seat,' a familiar voice said in a dull tone.

I sighed and moved my eyes up slowly to take in April's hard demeaner and angry stance. A few members of the class were glancing over, clearly astounded that I would sit in April Lakey's seat. For one, I didn't know. Secondly, I didn't care.

'So find another one,' I muttered and dropped my head again, causing murmurs amongst the students to stir.

'Move!' she demanded.

I moved my eyes slowly back up to her, dragging them open in an uncaring motion and sighed deeply as I looked right at her. I didn't even speak; I had no energy. My mind and body were completely exhausted at this point from everything that had went on in my life and this situation right here was nothing to me.

I stared into her eyes for a second before dragging my head back to it's downward position and waited for her to bark at me again. She remained still for a moment before pulling out the chair beside me and sitting down. I glanced slightly to my right in surprise and noticed her pulling out her books like this was totally normal. The other students were whispering a little but had turned away and I was thankful to her that she hadn't caused a huge scene; I couldn't deal with that right now.

The teacher arrived and the class proceeded for the next hour; not that I took in a word of it. I kept my head low and doodled on my notes until I could leave, feeling April's eyes on me every now and then. Her stares were starting to frustrate me and I looked right at her near the end of the lesson after I felt her gaze once again.

'What?' I hissed.

'Nothing,' she whispered, turning away.

'Stop staring at me,' I frowned and returned my eyes to my notebook.

'What's going on with you?' she whispered.

'Excuse me?' my head shot up and I frowned at her in surprise.

'You're not acting like you,' she stated.

'How would you even know that?' I hissed.

'Because you've jumped down my throat twice since you came to this school and would have happily fought me,' she whispered. 'You portray yourself as a badass. Right now, not so much. You look like shit and you didn't even put up much of a challenge to me just before.'