Life in Hiding

8 ~ Bad Day

Storming into school Monday morning, I'm furious.

My eyes scan the halls, for once fully in tuned to the crowd to ensure I don't miss my intended target. Everyone walks around in their usual morning haze, more than a few sporting pajama pants but I don't care.

"Hey, Sage." Zayne offers, appearing in front of me just as I locate my targeted person. "Bye, Sage."

Sending a wave over my shoulder, I march up to Chloe and grab her wrist.

"What the hell?" She demands as I drag her down to a less crowded part of the hall.

"Chlo?" Graham questions and I don't stop to apologize for interrupting their conversation. He can wait.

"Do you know what this is?" I demand, holding my phone in front of her face.

"I'm not stupid." She spits.

"Do you know how to use it?"

"Yes."

"Then why the hell were you unable to let me know you got home okay?" I whisper shout, struggling to stay calm.

"Well, I'm alive so how's that for confirmation." She shrugs, trying to shove me off of her.

I hold her in place. "Confirmation would've been nice Saturday night when I was pacing a hole through my carpet as I tried to figure out where you were."

"I was busy."

She was too busy to immediately text, I get that. It happens all the time to me. "Then why couldn't you respond to any of the texts I sent asking if you were okay?"

"Like I said," dead eyes stare up at me, "I was busy."

Busy doesn't cut it, but I pause my anger to take note of how shitty she looks. It's not her usual look scaring people away. There are bags under her eyes and knots all in her hair. "What happened?"

She stills, eyes flashing before settling on her usual glare. "Nothing."

Bullshit, something happened. "Chloe."

"I forgot to text, sue me." She manages to shove me off. "Careful, Rhodes, people might start believing you have a heart."

"I do and I care about people. Apparently, you now qualify as people." I'm not too happy about it either. However, when someone walks home alone after hanging out, one feels responsible for knowing they made it home safely.

Something that resembles a smile tugs at the corner of her lips, but she stops it. "It's not healthy to grow attached to people so easily."

Watching her walk away I want to scream. No one ever said I was healthy. 

*****

Chloe is late to Lit. I'm expecting Mel to give her a detention, but she pretends she was there the whole time. She doesn't even reprimand Chloe for writing in her notebook all of class. What she does do is call me out for not paying attention.

If it was possible for me to be embarrassed, I would be but I'm far more intrigued. Mel knows something.

I sit on that theory for the rest of my morning classes before approaching the twins.

"How possible is it for you to hack someone's email and contacts?" I ask Sterling as I take my usual seat.

"It's doable." He shrugs. "Highly illegal, but doable."

"Who we hacking?" Silver asks, propping his elbow on the table.

"Melissa."

The water Sterling was drinking is spit across the table, "Why would I do that?"