Chapter Three: What are you Afraid of?

“I should go,” I said after a few seconds of awkwardness, wanting to be anywhere else but here in this moment.

“Yeah, you should. The front door is that way,” he said, pointing through to the common room where I had come from.

My eyes immediately rose to meet his face. His response was quite rude and unexpected, and I couldn’t help but feel offended that he just told me to leave. Who does this guy think he is?I was getting angrier by the second being in the presence of this guy, especially when his response was to just shrug his shoulders after a comment like that.

“As long as you leave and never come back, it doesn’t really matter to me."

My anger was building as each word left this guy’s mouth, burning away any amount of sadness or anxiety that floated throughout me. Anger wasn’t an emotion that I had felt since my parents deaths, but this guy made my blood boil in the first five minutes of meeting him.

“Who the hell do you think you are? Why are you speaking to me like that? You don’t even know me!” I seethed, as the fire rising in my belly pulsed through my veins.

“Know you? I don’t need to know you, that’s the most absurd thing I have ever heard,” he scoffed, “Believe me, this is probably the nicest greeting you’re going to get here.”

My brow raised at his words, trying to understand what he meant by that. There had to be some good people here, “So, this is the nicest, huh? Welcome Evanora, now leave?”

“More like welcome to hell, now leave,” he said, his face becoming stone faced.

“Why don’t you go to hell! You don’t get to tell me what to do, or where to go,” I said, my anger rising higher with each brutal second his eyes were looking into mine. His stone face is replaced by shock for only a second, before an annoying smirk flashed across his lips.

“If that’s the best you’ve got, then I’ll give you about an hour. You won’t last here, mark my words,” his sharp words batter me more then a physical punch ever could. Why was he being so mean?

“An hour before what?” I let out a laugh, trying to let some of the anger release through my words.

“Before something here scares you off for good,” he says. His gaze as serious as it was when he talked about the cursed toy set.

“Screw you, dude,” I said, clearly my words weren’t effecting him as much as his were effecting me.

“No thanks,” he said as his eyes travelled up and down my body. Whatever that meant, it sent a shiver down my spine. He takes a step closer, pinning me against the bookcase, his arms on either side of my head. Leaning his head down, he whispers in my ear.

“Maybe some other time though,” His mouth makes an audible click from his teeth hitting each other, sending another shiver down my body. I couldn’t help but shake at him being so close to me. I went from anger to excitement to fear all in about three second’s flat. How was he effecting me so differently, when I so much as never looked at a guy before?

I looked around the alcove, to see if anyone else was nearby to witness what was happening with me and this stranger. Where everyone had eyes for me earlier, it seemed as if the school had become a ghost town. Just me and this delectable stranger.

Looking up into the eyes of the stranger, I couldn’t help but shake my head. I think I know everything about him that I need to. This guy is trouble and I need to keep my distance.

“You know, you really don’t have to be such an a- “my words are cut off by his piercing voice.

“You’ve made the biggest mistake of your life coming here, Evanora.”

“You don’t scare me,” I said, trying to gain back my confidence, “Not one bit.”

He leans down a little closer, so close that our noses are almost touching. I can feel his hot breathe on my lips, and his thick black hair against my forehead. Why was he getting so close to me when I just met him?

“What are you doing?” I said, my voice coming out softly. I couldn’t get my heart to stop beating so fast. I could feel my body getting warm from the proximity of him, but it felt so wrong. He doesn’t answer me, but instead grabs the book I planned on reading from the table.

“You’re the one who isn’t afraid of the monsters,” he says putting the book underneath his arm.

“I’m pretty sure there are worse things in the world then monsters,” I say, laughing in his face.

“Hmmm“ He says, his chest meeting mine with every breathe. The closeness between us sending a whole new set of butterflies through my stomach, “If you’re not afraid of the monsters that go bump in the night, what are you afraid of Evanora?”

No matter how hard I tried to stop them, I couldn’t. The images of my parents’ car crash came flooding through my mind, followed by the memories of their bruised and mangled bodies. No matter how hard I tried to forget, it was the single most scary thing I had ever seen in my life.

Since I was the only close living relative to my parents, I had to identify their broken bodies. Seeing what the car accident had done to them firsthand was even worse then hearing that they had an accident. I will never forget the way my parents looked, limbs missing, cuts all over. I shuddered at the thought, as I turned my attention back to this impossible bully.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of when you’ve lost everything in your life that has ever mattered,” I say, tears pricking the back of my eyes, threatening to fall and break the wall of stone I had built up.

As soon as the words had left my mouth, his entire body had tensed. He didn’t say a word, but his eyes didn’t leave mine. His body had gone rigid, as if I would touch him, he would shatter into a million pieces. Even his once angry eyes had gone still as if only stillness had remained inside of him. In these few moments, a thought crossed my mind.

Maybe, just maybe this guy just had much agony inside of him as I do. I can barely see any layer underneath the stone he has built around himself. It reminded me so much of myself that I couldn’t look away. I could feel him calling to my own pain, as if it were his own. Something about his stone filled eyes called to my soul, begging me to release it into his.

Maybe, just maybe, we were more connected then I thought.