Hollow Twilight - A LitRPG Novel

Chapter 21

"I don't remember when I agreed to this being the hangout spot," Kari said through a mouthful of fries. She pointed her plastic fork accusingly at Reid across the table. He watched her hair rustle with the motions, perfectly straight at either side of her head. Reily snickered between them, occupying another bored chair to sit at the head of the table. Issac was drawing some sort of design for Maple in order to prove a point Reid hadn't been paying attention to.

"Just kind of happens that way," Issac replied, his tongue wiggling out the side of his mouth as he redid a line. "One day I'm all hanging out at school, the next day these two clowns are all dancing around me and then I'm dancing and here I am."

Kari's eyes narrowed and she stabbed into more fries on her plate. "I didn't dance though, I don't dance. You'd know if I dance."

"Doesn't have to be dancing. Could be like, anything. Also, there see, it works." Issac held the sheet up in front of his face, tapping at a particular point.

"Only on paper." Maple batted the paper down to the side. "Sorry, Kari. It just happens."

"You don't seem very sorry," Kari countered. "If you were, you wouldn't be here."

"Very true," Issac said, retrieving his fluttering diagram as it hit the linoleum floor. He sat back up and his hair shuffled with him, covering up his eyes until he flipped his head back and reset it. "But also we do have to talk to you."

The scraping of a chair behind Reid sent a ripple down his spine. He felt someone else bump into the back of his seat as they passed. He was suddenly very aware of the cramped space, of other conversations he could hear. Laughter and clattering, shouts and whispers. He caught bits of words and he tried to snap out of it. He stared past Kari to the small stage at the far end of the room.

The curtains were closed, pretty much always were unless the stage was in use. He'd been behind them plenty of times, watched as someone ducked past them right then. There wasn't much back there, a couple of folded chairs usually, but people would sit in a circle and eat lunch and hang out and it was cool for some reason. It was intensely quiet there, even if you were talking, all the sound fading into the fabric of the curtains.

He and Maple had skipped class back when they had started here, just a random day, a random skip. Maple had brought sour candies from the bulk store. Issac said he couldn't leave class, attendance was super important in his specialized classes or he would be booted from the program. They had eaten all the candies together.

Reid's mouth was still filled with memories from that day, that very peculiar feeling of not being able to taste anymore. They went too far. They got to the bottom and were so confident their tongues were dead that they scooped up the powder collecting in the bottom of the bag and downed it. Even when they were having a coughing fit, laughing and dying, doubled over from the intensity of sugary, sour flavour, nobody had come by. Just the two of them in their own little universe.

"Right, Reid?"

He blinked and looked to the side. Maple was staring at him. "What?"

"Oh my god," she replied, rolling her eyes towards Issac, who nodded like a disappointed parent in agreement. "If I wanted my degree in space studies I could just write a paper on you. Wow."

"B plus burn," Issac chimed in. The two shared a no-look high five before Maple continued.

"We need to join the Flock, fight Paragon, yaddy yaddy, all that stuff from a couple days ago. You forget in between? How exciting is your life?"

Reid glanced at Reily. Their eyes met for a second before snapping away. In his peripheral he could still make out her cheeks as they got rosy. He felt a little heat in his own neck.