Freckles

TWENTY ONE

The infirmary was empty when Luke and Trey arrived. It was a rather small room and it looked almost abandoned. An unmade bed lied in the corner and a shelf filled with multiple medical supplies took up most of the remaining space. The nurse was busy typing on her computer and only dismissed Luke with a sign of the head. It seemed like she had better things to do than help a student. Appart from the sound of her fingers running on the keyboard, the room was silent.

"Hey Trey? Why don't you sit down I'll look for something to disinfect the cut on your cheek okay?" Said Luke as he started going through the shelves, the nurse not moving from her spot.

Trey sat in silence. He still couldn't wrap his mind around what had just happened. He touched his cheek where the knife had nicked him. He wasn't even bleeding.

So why had Ash gone wild like that?

"Aha! Found it." Exclaimed Luke as he saw the small white spray.
He carefully disinfected the thin cut before putting a band-aid over it.
"All done! Do you want to look into the mirror? I added a little something." He smiled.

Trey turned his head and saw the small pink band aid. He didn't really need it, but he appreciated the fact that Luke was trying to cheer him up.
"Thank you." He mumbled.
The dark thoughts came back and he pinched his eyebrows in frustration.

Luke sighed and sat on the stool next to the infirmary bed. "Okay what do you want to know Trey?"
"What? N-nothing"
"Don't lie to me, you've got that look on your face."

"What look?" Asked Trey, eyebrows rising again.
"That look! Exactly that one, when you look like you want to ask sometimes but you're refraining from it."

"N-no I don't look like that."
"Yes, yes you do. So what do you want to know? Come on it's your chance."
"Uhm.

How did Ash end up here?"

"It's that bad huh?"
"Why do you say that?"
"You just called him by his nickname. I'm not stupid Trey I know what it means. You're mad at him."
"Maybe..."

"Yeah you're totally upset I can see it. Well I can only reveal my side of the story, the rest isn't for me to tell."

"Your side of the story?"
"I've known Ash for a long time, I knew him way before we got here."
"Wait. You were sent here together? What, why? What happened?"
"Slow down, let me explain" Luke chuckled humorlessly.

"We were best friends. For quite some time actually. We met in kindergarten and we were inseparable. His parents would always joke about it. We even started high-school together but sadly, everything went wrong from here on.

His father died in a car accident while driving him to school one day. When the rescuers found them, Ash was desperately trying not to faint from the shock, and his hands were covered in his dad's blood. He tried to drag him from under the car, but because of the trauma his brain went through, he wasn't strong enough.

He was rushed to the hospital and survived but spent the next month blaming himself for his father's death. He didn't eat, didn't sleep, barely came to school and almost never talked to me. His mother desperately tried to comfort him but she was just as sad and lost as he was.

And then he started hanging around the wrong crowd, ditched school, ignored his friends who gradually stopped worrying about him and left him alone.

"But you didn't"

"I couldn't Trey.
He was so miserable and Jake was really a good person. He was like a second father to me so I thought I understood what Ash was going through. But in reality, I had no idea what was going on inside his head.