Chapter Three

Two years prior

“Why did you do this?!” Cleo’s mom asked her, quite angrily. “You could’ve gotten expelled for this!” Cleo looked down, ashamed. Her mom sighed, rubbing her temples. “It’s hard enough trying to live happily without your problems, Cleo.”

“Don’t you think I know that already?” She asked, tears welling up in her eyes. “I hate her!” Her mom gaped at her with a look of shock and anger spread across her face.

“What did she do for you to hate her so much then?” Cleo sighed, not wanting to tell her mother anything. “You’re not going to say anything.” She sighed again. “Fine. Don’t. Just try not to do anything else. Please. It’s hard enough with dad already being gone.”

…

Raine pulled Riva along the path in the amusement park and pointed up at the large seated wheel that loomed above them. Raine smiled at her mischievously as they stood in line to get onto the ferris wheel. Riva smiled back, slightly regretting telling her that they should go on the ferris wheel. As they got into the small container it rocked beneath their feet.

“I swear if I die doing this, you’re coming down with me,” Riva said, looking at Raine. Raine laughed and began rocking the seat as they got higher and higher and higher. “Oh my goodness gracious we are really high up,” Riva whimpered in a high voice. “Getmedown,” she mumbled quickly under her breath.

“You’ve gotta get over your fear of heights if we’re going on the flippy ride later!” Raine said laughing. Riva smiled, missing her friend. She wondered if she knew. What had happened to them. What might happen. A flash of light halted the memory from the past in Riva’s mind.

Present day

This was the day that changed everything. Nobody would’ve seen it coming. Everything was perfectly normal before it happened. But when it did, it hit them. Hard. Very hard. It did it to everyone. It was the biggest shock of their lives. The scary thing was, it could’ve happened to anyone. Anyone could’ve been in that car. On that street. In the path of that one truck that passed that one red light. It wasn’t just anyone, though. You might be able to guess, and if so, you are correct. It was them.

Caleb: Heyyy… so I’m guessing you’re both having a freakout attack…

Noah: Dang right about that. Where the heck are you guys? Noah asked, slightly angry. Caleb began typing, unsure of where to begin. He groaned, still having not decided whether or not to tell him. He was his best friend, after all. He just didn’t think it was time. Not yet.

Caleb: ummmm… not at home or at school. Noah shook his head in annoyment.

Noah: you know what i meant. Where are you?!

Caleb: I don’t think I’m ready to tell you that dude.

Noah: you what? Caleb sighed in exasperation looking around at his surroundings.

Caleb: I can’t give you the details just… not yet.

Noah: when?

Caleb: Soon.

Noah: right, so aka, never.

Caleb: listen i really don’t wanna argue about this right now. Caleb thumbed angrily. I’ll give you the deets sometime this week, promise.

Noah: fine. Listen, Raine’s literally right in front of me so i should probably leave now.

Caleb: yeah, good idea. Raine’s the last person i want knowing about this, especially as soon as right now.

Noah: k, bye.

Noah watched Raine for a moment and thought about what Caleb had told him. Was it really that bad? Caleb didn’t even want to tell him everything so it must’ve been. He shook his head. Suddenly, Raine snapped her eyes open.

“Who was texting you?” She asked, with a hint of anger in her voice. Noah’s eyes widened. How did she— oh well, no point in asking now.

“Uh one of my friends,” he replied nervously. Raine raised her eyebrow at him. God why was he so bad at lying to her?

“Who was texting you?” She asked again, the anger increasing. Noah gulped back the fear in his voice. “Noah?” She was beginning to grow impatient.

Noah shook his head, sighing. “Caleb.”

“Caleb?! As in Caleb LOPEZ?!” She asked frantically. Noah gave her a small nod. Raine’s heart skipped a beat. They were okay. Wait— were they okay? “Why didn’t he just text the group?” She asked, a bit more calm now.

“B-because he wanted to—“ Noah paused for a moment, “he wanted to surprise you,” he said, trying to hide the hesitation in his voice. Raine raised her eyebrow for a moment.

“What are they planning?” She finally asked, almost excitedly.

“Uh… if I told you it wouldn’t be a surprise,” Noah replied with a tight smile. Raine smiled at him mischievously.

“You know I hate surprises. Plus, I could just act surprised after you tell me.”

“No… I really can’t… Caleb barely told me any of the details anyways,” he sighed, at least he was being honest about that. Raine frowned disappointingly.

“Must be a huge surprise if they couldn’t even show up at school for it,” she said.

“Y-yeah…” Noah replied glumly. Noah turned to look in the opposite direction. A feeling of guilt swept over him. She was going to be very, very, angry when— if, Caleb ever explained to them what had happened. He was dead meat.

…

Cleo stared at the empty seats around her. What? They had been dismissed? For what? For making the teacher pity them? They were such suck ups. Cleo rolled her eyes in utter annoyment. “Thank you so much Mrs. Millers.” The sentence replayed itself back in her head. Thank you my butt, Cleo thought to herself, rolling her eyes again. It wasn’t fair that they could just manipulate the teachers like that. All they did was get ahead a couple pages on the packet and they got a free period. Maybe she should start doing that if it’s so easy to get free time around here.

Her phone buzzed inside her backpack. Mrs. Millers was still rambling on about this week’s assignment. She could sneak a few looks. Unzipping her backpack as quietly as she could, she slipped her phone out and opened the topmost pocket and pretended to look for something in that pocket while she checked her phone. Looking up at the teacher one more time, she opened the notification she had gotten in her messages.

Luke: hey! Cleo smiled and began to send her own reply.

Cleo: i hope you realize I’m currently in class

Luke: yea, i just couldn’t wait any longer to text you :). Cleo’s face warmed.

Cleo: :) same math is so boring.

Luke: well it won’t be tomorrow. I’m coming to school! Today I’m picking up the curriculum

Cleo: omg yay! This is awesome! Glad we have assigned seats together :D

Luke: really? Even better!

Cleo: well at least in math we do. Plus some of our table mates aren’t so… swell.

Luke: oh… who’d we get?

Cleo: you know who and her little friend group :|

Luke attempted to hide his happiness in the text. This meant Raine was sitting with them.

Luke: aw :( it’s fine as long as I’m with you I’ll be happy C:

Cleo: ye same. Can’t wait to see you tomorrow, Cleo thumbed quickly the teacher was walking around the class. Math teacher alert gtg bye

Luke: aw kay, bye D:

As quickly as she could, Cleo stuffed her phone deep down into her bag and wrote down what the teacher had written on the whiteboard. Mrs. Millers walked past her table. Cleo sighed with relief. A couple more seconds and she wouldn’t have made it. She scowled as she continued thinking about Raine and her little coupe. At least Luke was coming tomorrow. Hopefully it would be a better day.

…

Caleb sat in the pale blue bed, looking over at his sister. He frowned. She still hadn’t woken up. He sighed, looking over at his phone again and contemplated when he was going to tell Noah. He didn’t want to freak them out even more than he already had. Especially not Raine. If she found out about this… it wasn’t going to end well. He wondered what Noah had told her. His mom came into the room.

“Dad’s doing a bit better right now,” she said, with a tight lipped smile. She sat down on the edge of the bed with a creak. “How about you?” She asked, rubbing his arm.

“Eh,” he croaked, “been better. Way better to be exact.” He said, wincing, “can you maybe not touch that?”

“Sorry sweetie,” she said, snatching her hand away. She glanced at Riva and frowned. “We’ve all been better, Caleb, trust me.”

…

The rest of the school day passed more or less the same as that morning. After their free period they went to Spanish class and afterwards went to make up their Math class. Raine seemed fine, but then again she could look perfectly fine after having emotional breakdown so Noah wasn’t sure about whether or not she was fine. The last bell finally rang at the end of Home ec. Noah decided to go back to the student lounge and check his messages again before beginning the walk home. As he neared the front door of the building he realized Raine was in there sitting on around the table they were sitting around before. Noah gulped and turned around. He didn’t want to lie to her anymore. His phone buzzed.

Raine: I see you over there Mr. Peters. Noah turned back and found Raine smiling at him through the glass door. He groaned a bit.

I have to go home, he mouthed, pointing behind him.

Raine: Well then why were you about to come in? He began to type his reply.

Noah: I thought I’d forgotten something, but I didn’t

Raine: Oh, okay then. Talk later. Raine gave him a small hesitant wave from her chair. Something was up, but she couldn’t quite tell what. Noah waved back at her quickly and speed walked in the direction of his house. He’d done it again. He wasn’t sure how much of this he could take. His chest felt like he had a hole in it, slowly growing every time he did it. He knew it was probably for her own good, but he couldn’t do this anymore. If she asked again, he was going to tell her, he decided. Clenching his fists, he continued walking. This was becoming a huge problem.

Raine watched as Noah walked away from the campus— with his fists in tight balls, she noticed. She suddenly had a strange feeling. Did he lie to her? No. No, he couldn't have. He would never do that. Right? Would he…? She got up and began pacing around the table. Did he really? She did notice he was acting odd today, it just never occurred to her that it was because he… lied. It all made sense now. Something was wrong. And he didn’t want to tell her. She left the building, not even bothering to take her backpack and began running towards Noah.

“Noah!” She yelled. Noah turned around with a pale white face. She knew. His nails dug into his palms. “What’s really going on?” She asked, her voice cracking. Noah sighed, rubbing his face.

“R-Raine I-I—“ he stuttered.

“WHAT IS GOING ON?!” She yelled, her eyes getting shiny.

“I-I was telling the truth about Caleb not telling me everything about what happened, I-I promise! I don’t even know half of what’s happening!” He yelled back. “Raine, I didn’t want to lie to you, I swear, you’re my best friend I didn’t mean to hurt yo—“

“Well you did! Okay? You did. You say I’m your best friend, why didn’t you just tell me the truth?” She asked, tears streaming down her cheeks now.

“Because. I-I don’t really know— I just didn’t want you to react like this!” He yelled. Noah realized his face was wet as well. “This is why we don’t tell you,” he murmured harshly. He took a deep breath and proceeded to take his phone out of his pocket. He handed it to Raine. “You know the password.” And with one last sad look at her, he walked away. Raine stood there in complete silence and shock. He just… left? She was speechless. What should she do? She wasn’t sure if she trusted him enough not to check his phone. After all, he just lied to her about the entire thing. Would she check it?

Her thoughts were interrupted by footsteps coming up behind her. They seemed to be slow and hesitant. The familiar jingle of the charms on her backpack alarmed her. She turned around slowly. Who could it—. She stopped. Her eyes widened as she gaped at the person who had her backpack in hand. He smiled awkwardly and scratched his neck in embarrassment.

“I saw you run out and… uh… leave this…” he said a bit quietly. Raine was silent. She stared at the tall, muscular figure before her. Was that… Luke? He looked so different! She thought he was gone. Everyone did. She didn’t know how to feel as the distressing flashbacks of her last year of middle school played through her mind. Anger, sadness, and even more negative feelings flooded her. Even a bit of guilt… she never wanted to get him involved. “It’s me… Luke? Remember?” He asked hesitantly. Of course she remembered. How could she forget? She was at a loss for words. “Raine?” Finally she snapped out of her trance and finally remembered how to speak.

“Oh, I’m s-sorry. E-everyone thought you were… gone,” she said, a bit quickly. Luke wasn’t sure how to feel. How was he meant to respond to that? Did she want him to be gone?

“Oh… well… surprise. I’m not,” he replied a bit disappointedly.

“Oh, jeez, sorry didn’t mean to offend you. It’s just a bit… surprising.” Luke felt a bit relieved. She was right, he hadn’t attended school for at least two weeks.

“Oh, I was at a competition,” he said, giving her a tight lipped smile, “I took up boxing over the summer.” Raine nodded uneasily. Should she really be talking to him? She wasn’t sure. She cleared her throat, looking at her backpack. “Oh, yeah, here you go.” Luke handed it to her.

“Thanks,” she said, clenching her teeth, “glad to have you back,” she looked away wanting to smack herself in the face. Luke looked at the phone in her hand and the other one in her pocket. He saw Noah give it to her. They seemed to have had a fight or something.

“U-um… “ did he really want to ask her? Raine looked up at him. Why was he so tall?! She felt slightly intimidated.

“Hmm?” She squeaked. She didn’t want to be rude, but she didn’t want to particularly be socializing with him either.

“A-are you… okay?” He asked, nodding in the direction of Noah’s small figure in the distance. She clenched her teeth even tighter. God he saw what had happened! The last thing she wanted was him knowing about more drama. “S-sorry, never mind, it’s your own business.” Raine nodded rigidly and walked away. That was the worst conversation ever! She sighed, biting her tongue. Glad to have you back?! Why did I say something I didn’t even mean? She’d never been so embarrassed in her entire life! She hoped never to have another encounter with him. Wait. Of course she would! He was sitting with her in Math! Raine groaned, looking behind her. He was still there. He was staring at her. She shuddered and began walking faster. Luke smiled a bit. That went well.