Page 20 of Lessons In Grey

He didn’t exist and if he did, no, he would never come after me. “There was a football player a few years ago who had gotten access to the app,” I explained. “He was kicked off the team because he and a few of his friends came down here and a ton of strange things happened. Only to him though, he was basically a leper the rest of the year and now nobody has the balls to try and get down here. Just in case.”

“Did he end up being homophobic?”

I thought back to the last thing I had heard about him and nodded. “Actually, yeah. He went to prison for beating a gay couple half to death. They survived.”

He nodded, impressed, his features softened. “Eerie.”

I shrugged, leaning my head against the alcove wall. God, I was so tired. I didn’t even know how I was still awake. “It’s nice to have company,” I said, eyes lifting to his.

He studied me for a moment before pushing away from the frame of the alcove and stepping within it, hands sliding into his pockets. “How about I make you an offer,” he began, his voice low, melodic. The kind of voice that makes you feel something.

I blinked slowly, the cadence of the story having lulled me. “An offer, huh?”

He nodded, a soft smile touching one corner of his lips once again. I’d give anything for it to stay. “Hmm-mm. You let me join you in this peaceful haven during lunch, and I let you join me in my room during eighth hour.”

Why did he want me in there so terribly? I didn’t have the energy to question things right now though. All I wanted to do was rest my eyes. “You have to let me sleep.”

His eyes sparked as if I had made his entire day. “Deal.”

I lifted my heavy head as he used the inner wall of the alcoveto slide down to the floor. “Aren’t you supposed to be grading papers or something?”

“Then what would I do at home all night?”

My face grew hot imagining him sitting at his own table at his place, maybe wearing nothing but sweats. “Sleep?” I offered, glad the huskiness of my tired voice overpowered the weakness of it.

He shrugged, resting his wrists on his knees as he searched my eyes. “Sleep is overrated.”

My heart was floating in my chest, my stomach filling with the butterflies I so desperately wished would die. He was going to see too much if I kept looking, but fuck, I was just so goddamn tired.

My head fell back against the wall, and I could feel the exhaustion slowly pulling me under. “Yeah,” I mumbled.

“Do you have a spare piece of paper I could use?”

I nodded, gesturing towards my bag. “Take what you want, I’ve got plenty at home.” My eyes fell shut. I didn’t have the strength to fight.

“Thank you, Snowflake.”

6

Rags

September 15th, 2021

Ineededher like God needed nonbelievers. I was dying of thirst, and she was my glass of water.

Something had happened over the weekend. Something important. She looked on the verge of tears all day, there were circles under her eyes, her head hung as if she were trying to hide herself from the world.

I knew she loved hiding from the world, but she loved hiding from the world in the most quiet way. She walked with confidence, a secret light in her eyes as if she knew the secret to the universe and was teasing the world into asking her.

But not today.

Today she had made it clear in her silent way that she had wanted no oneto approach her.

This siren of a woman with such heavy secrets, was frail and broken, a flickering flame of light. She was shattering before me and I wanted to rip apart the world in order to stop it.

She was a mystery I needed to solve for fear of my own heart imploding within me.

I was suffocating, and she was my only breath of air.