the man with no name [anonymous fanfiction]

two

I almost fell out of the chair, but Julie caught me.

"Are you okay?" she inquired, a worried expression on her face.

By then, the entire class was looking at us, and all I wanted was for the ground to swallow me.

"I'm fine," I stammered, not sure if I was trying to convince myself or them.

I looked around and my eyes automatically shot toward the window where I saw someone with a mask just moments before. There was nobody there, and it made me suspect that my mind was playing tricks with me.

"Julie, can you take your friend to the nurse's office?" asked the teacher, his voice more of an order than a question.

"Yes, of course," agreed my friend without hesitation, helped me up and the two of us left the class. "What the hell happened in there?"

"I don't know, I just think I saw someone and that made me extremely scared. I'm fine now, though. I don't need to go to the nurse's anyways."

"Are you sure you want to skip the first period of class on the first day of school, Tara? Is that really how you want to start your senior year?" asked Julie, but then a big smile appeared on her face. "If you do decide to skip, I have the perfect place. I also need to tell you about a bunch of stuff."

"Like drama that I have to know about?" I asked, not sure that I needed to know everything about everyone here.

"Just the basics," she cleared up then walked off, leaving me no choice but to follow her.

She led me to a spot under the bleachers. "This spot is probably the coolest out there. I can't count how many times I've gotten high here."

"You've smoked before?" I asked, then seeing her puzzled expression, I knew that I made a mistake. "I'm sorry, you just didn't come off as the type of person to ever get high. Especially not on school property."

"I get that. Would you be surprised that I had sex with Mr. Blake? The History teacher."

"No you didn't," I said, my voice full of laughter. "He is kinda hot, in your defense."

"Oh, he is very hot, Tara. And he's packing down there, let me tell you that," elaborated Julie, taking a joint out of her pocket. "Wanna smoke this?"

"Sure," I agreed, not sure how this was about to go.

Julie took a lighter out of her pocket and lit the joint, keeping it in her mouth for a while. She passed it to me and I took a puff. It was strong, definitely different from how I imagined it, but I liked how it tasted in my mouth.

Julie quickly took it from me and didn't pass it back to me for a while. Then, her phone started ringing and she looked at the screen.

Unknown number.

She picked up, excused herself, and walked away. I opened my phone and started scrolling through my feed on the new account that I made after deleting my old one. I did so because the threats I was receiving were way too much to handle and I couldn't resist but look at the messages half of the time, so instead I just deleted it.

Then, a black screen popped up and, extremely paranoid and high,  I thought I was going to pass out when a message appeared.

Turn around.

I did what the message said and there he was. The man with the mask.

He was dressed in all black except his mask and a hood covered his hair. I somehow felt as if I knew him, and knew that I saw him before. But no name came to mind, especially with the lack of any real attributes that I could give him.

"You need me more than I need you," he started, his voice deep and unrecognizable. "You just don't realize it yet. I know everything there is to know about you, Tara Scott."

"Why should I trust you?" I asked, knowing how naive I sounded. I knew that I had no choice at that moment. "And why do you need me?"

"You might know Habiba. I have some history with her, but recently we've parted separate ways, and I want us to rekindle. And I have a very straight-forward approach, so I'll try getting to her through you first."

"What's in it for me, though?"

I wasn't sure why I wanted to help this man, but something about him attracted me. It might've been the complete anonymity or something like that. But it made me want to help him.

"I'll help you get away from them once and for all. It's not hard for me to hide you even right in front of their noses. So what's it gonna be?" He asked, and even with the mask, I knew he was smirking.

"I'm not doing anything illegal for you, but I will definitely convince her to get back together with you to get away from them."

"I knew you'd make the right choice. It isn't that simple, but I won't scare you away with the details right now. Your friend will be getting back soon, so I better get going," he finished, turning around and started to go away.

"Wait!" I shouted before he went out of my view. He turned around and looked at me. "What should I call you?"

"Call me Anonymous, baby girl."