Atlas Grove, once a dancer with dreams of dancing under the stars, now lives petrified in the shadows of abuse. To escape her living nightmare she must keep her head down and work hard, being her senior year this is her last chance to get out. Altho...
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"Hey? Atlas?" The sound of my name flutters my eyes open. Vixxie and Carrie crouch down beside me.
"You okay? You bolted pretty quick out of there?" Carrie moves to sit down.
"Yeah, sorry I didn't mean to worry you, I just had a headache, needed to get some air." Lyings become a second language to me now, it just comes naturally.
"Well do you mind if we join you for lunch?" Vixxie sits on my other side and pulls out a foil-wrapped package. I shake my head with a small smile.
Carrie pulls out a salad pot and starts talking to Vixxie about the school and the extracurriculars. I join in here and there but Carries pretty much got it all covered, giving a low down on the cliques and what extracurriculars open what doors here.
As Carries subtly points out the different groups around the courtyard I spot Brady, clowning around with a larger group of boys including the ones from class earlier. They're all laughing at something stupid I even catch Blaze smirking a bit as he continues chewing on his gum. That stops when he pans over to see me watching him, he raises a brow as I swing around letting my hair fall in front of my eyes, busying myself with the grass at my feet.
There's no way to even hide the fact I was directly staring at him. He's just so intriguing. All cold and brooding, not like the other football players.
"So what's the deal with the jock-straps?" Vixxie takes the question out of my mouth as Carrie gets to their clique.
"Well, there's the usual pig-headed idiots, who are lead by Connor and his minions. They're good players though. Then there are the more secluded players- still just as popular, if not more so since Blaze is the team Captain but they follow a... nicer route, that's Brady, Ethan, Blaze and Rutherford, a few others too." Carrie shrugs popping a grape into her mouth, I refrain from looking back over at them, "There's a bit of a divide in the team purely because Connor thinks he deserves to be captain, not Blaze.
"They seem alright," Vixxie agrees.
"Talking about us pompoms?" Ethan asks Carrie, startling me slightly when I realise the boys have wandered over here. Carrie blushes a little but catches her composure.
"Yeah, I was just telling Vixxie about the football team." She smiles, flipping her hair absentmindedly over her shoulder. Ethan nods with a smile and holds his hand out to help her up.
"All good things I hope." He smirks watching her flatten her skirt out.
"Uh yeah..." She drawls looking a little dazed, "Any way we've uh... we've got to get to science!" She says triumphantly gesturing to me and Vixxie to get up. She strains her eyes and nods her head towards the school.
"That's good because we've got science too," Ethan says walking off with Carrie.
I look at Vixxie who's concealing a laugh, that's the most flustered I've ever seen Carrie... not like she was being obvious at all. Vixxie and I get to our feet following the boys out of the courtyard.
