The Curious, The Truth, & The Dead

8

High school was not getting any easier. In the coming weeks, my life fell into a very dry and melodramatic routine. I got up every morning tired as hell, I put on the ugly red and black uniform, and I went to school, which was awful, mostly because I was ridiculously mediocre. Math was particularly painful, thank God my teacher didn't grade below a seventy so I was still passing. History was boring, Art was tolerable. Physics became slightly manageable because Thomas led the lab and got us an A every time.

Speaking of Thomas, at first, he tried so desperately to know my past and now he doesn't talk to me at all. We worked silently in Art and Physics. Only talking when necessary which was fine by me. He seemed to be in a bad mood, but I didn't ask him about it because if the roles were reversed I would not have wanted him to. Also, I didn't like him. He reminded me of the boys at my last school: cocky and confident.

After school, Mike had basketball practice and when I wasn't in detention I spent most of the time with my head in a textbook trying to catch up with the educational standards forced on me. At home, I spent most of the evening in my room doing homework or studying. We had family dinner every night but on weekdays it was relatively quiet. Noah would leave hastily to finish some work in his office, Lilly would do something around the house or work as well, and Mike would play video games or play basketball. I had asked Mike how he managed all his work but he had just shrugged and said it all came easy to him. I guess he had been working at this caliber his whole life while I had just been thrust into it a few weeks ago.

The only class I was doing well in was English. I enjoyed reading, so the classic literature was no challenge for me. Lilly had even bought me some books to read for fun when I found the time, although I wasn't having much luck with that. I would finish all my homework and studying well past a reasonable sleeping hour and often woke up way too early for school only for it to start all over again.

So much time had passed since I moved here. So much had changed and yet some things stayed exactly the same. Noah and I barely talked, I think there was a silent agreement neither of would discuss any of the things we were feeling. Lilly hated that though. She was constantly telling me to talk to him and encouraging him to do the same but what was there to discuss? I thought the conversation would be seventeen years too late regardless of what we talked about.

Nick and Garrett had yet to respond to my message what was really worrying. I had asked Jax if he knew anything but I guessed I had caught him at the wrong time and he angrily snapped at me and hung up. I felt so alone. Lilly and Mike didn't understand and Nick and Garrett who I thought would understand, were not here.

I hadn't made any friends. Most of the people at school were just too different from me. They spent all their time doing activities I had never engaged in. Horseback riding, yacht parties, golfing, dances, so many things I had never done. There were a few people who were nice enough to work with me in class but that was as far as my relationships with them went. So instead of hanging out with friends, weekends were spent studying or following Mike wherever he went. Mostly to the park or gym. Mike had tried to hang out at school with me occasionally but he ate lunch with his teammates while I sat alone, not that I minded much as it gave me more time to work on my never ending pile of homework.

I got used to my new life though as monotonous and foreign as it was, it was slowly becoming more and more normal. Like right now, if you had told me a month ago I would be shopping for a Halloween costume with my half-brother I would've laughed and chalked it up to a fever dream, yet here I was shopping with Mike for his costume.

He had asked me if I wanted one too but I felt strange buying and wearing a costume. Even when I was younger, we were never really rich enough to get new costumes every year, I mostly dressed up in whatever was around the house. Mike had told me the school let us dress up so we wouldn't have to wear the uniform on Halloween. I was just planning on wearing normal clothes, however, I tagged along to get out of the house. His driving was also improving when he focused, so that was an underlying factor as well.