Castle in the City

39

"There's gotta be something we can do," Natalie shook her head.

Aria agreed, "It can't end like this. Damien is family."

Justin agreed, "Facts, we gotta find a way to fix this somehow."

"Do you know where any of your parents' safe houses are? Maybe we could check those," Zach suggested.

Nico shook his head, "They don't tell us that type of information."

"It's pointless," I shook my head. "We've been searching for him for three weeks now. It would take a miracle to find him, and even if we did get that miracle, what next? I'm going away to college in a week. Majority of us are. Where would he stay? How would we protect him? The only thing we can do is wait."

Nico sighed, "Sagacity's right. Even if we were to miraculously find him, we'd still be at a loss at how to protect him. We should just wait until everything dies down and he comes back...whenever that is."

"So this is really it?" Junior asked. "This is like a shitty ending to a book. It can't end like this."

I shrugged, "Only this isn't a book, Junior. There's nothing we can do except wait."

"Right...we'll wait for book two," Aria said with a head nod. "Things will self correct."

"What if your parents still don't want y'all together when he comes back?" Zach asked me.

I shrugged, "I don't see why they would oppose us being together, but if they were to, I'd like to see them stop me from seeing him."

"So we just sit around and wait?" Justin asked, and Nico and I nodded.

"Our parents had said he'd be away for a few months," Nico said. "Maybe he might be back in time for you guys' Christmas break."

"Yeah, maybe," everyone else replied in unison.

Six months later

"Hey, Sagacity," Ashton smiled as he ran up to me from across the hall.

We exited the building together as I kindly smiled, "Hi."

"Are you coming to the game tonight?" he asked. Ashton was a football player for the school.

"Maybe. I don't know," I shrugged.

Ashton I formed, "Well if we win tonight, we're gonna celebrate at the diner."

"Yeah, Justin and Zach told me already," I nodded. Both of them were on the football team too.

Ashton scratched the back of his head while nodding, "Yeah, well I just thought I'd let you know. I think it would be fun if you made it."

"Okay," I said with a gentle nod.

"Also, do you have a partner for the project in Mr.Adams' class?" he asked, and I shook my head.

"Would...you like to be my partner?" I shyly asked. To be honest, Ashton was a bit intimidating to me, but he was very nice to me at the same time. I guess I was just intimidated by the fact that he was very popular and played a sport. He reminded me of the type of boy you would see in a drama series or read about in a drama novel.

He lightly smiled, "Yeah, sure. I have practice everyday, but I get off at five. Is that cool?"

I smiled while nodding, "Yeah, the theater club I'm in ends at that time too."

"You're...into theater," Ashton nodded with a surprise face.

I playfully frowned, "Why that face?"

"Just surprised. I'm finally getting to know something about you other than your name and that your cousins with Junior and friends with Zach," he chuckled. "You're a really closed book."

"Am not," I chuckled. "It just takes a while for me to warm up to people I don't know."

He smiled, "So get to know me. Come to the game- at least for your cousin and friend. Aria and Natalie always show up."

I playfully rolled my eyes while saying, "Fine. I'll come."

"Great. I'm number fifteen, by the way," he said.

I smiled, "I'll look out for you then."

A bunch of guys wearing football jerseys walked over to us and began dapping Ashton. A few that I knew greeted me as well before the captain, Blake, said, "Coach wants us there as soon as possible. He wants to do a meeting before practice. We should get going."

"Aight," Ashton nodded. He then looked at me and smiled, "See you later?"

I gave a gentle nod while smiling, "See you later."

Ashton and I then went our separate ways- him with his teammates to practice and me alone to theater.