Hollow Twilight - A LitRPG Novel

Chapter 26

"What?" Reid rubbed his eye. He liked feeling the pressure against his skull. At least it was feeling something.

"I said are you alright?" Reily's blue eyes popped in front of him, staring straight into his face. A wisp of blonde hair strayed across her forehead before she tucked it back. "You've just been really out of it for the past week, you like barely say anything on these walks." They both paused in front of an intersection. Reid felt the air rush past with each car going by.

"I haven't seen any of you in the caf," Reily continued as the light switched. "Like none of you are in there, you're all off eating lunch somewhere or something. Did you like have a fight?"

"No we didn't...it's not...it's different than that but I don't really want to talk about it, we'll be fine."

"That sounds really confident." Reily giggled to herself. Reid felt his stomach flitter for a second in response but it wasn't like before. A flash of Mr. Crawford's corpse put it to rest. Reily just kept bouncing along, like she always did. He liked that, he enjoyed her next to him, he really did, he just wished she could come down to his level sometime and get this part of him. But he couldn't do that to someone else. They deserved to be happy.

"Sorry I'll get better about it."

"You're allowed to be sad if you're sad you know." Reily's words struck Reid in the chest. He hesitated in his steps for a moment before continuing, trying his best to appear unphased. None of this felt right to him or...deserved. He hadn't earned someone trying to care about his feelings when they barely knew him.

A sudden burst of wind kicked up a swirl of dust and Reid had to shield his eyes. He looked up to the sky, the clear sky with the shining sun in it. It was a crisp day but when you found yourself caught in the rays of the sun, it was beautiful and warm. It was all wrong.

"Shouldn't it be raining or something?" Reid mostly mumbled to himself.

"Uh, the weather doesn't react to your emotions." Reily reached across and flicked Reid on the forehead. "You make me feel like I'm being followed by a dark cloud though. All gloomy and sour. Is this about that missing teacher? I thought didn't have classes with him."

"What?" Reid perked up, eyes bright. Mr. Crawford's mangled body flew through his mind, reflections of his blood cast by the ice surrounding him. He felt the familiar tightening across his chest as his heart rate soared. Somehow the pulses were stronger, thicker. He could feel them in the back of his eyes, the blood rushing through his vision. "No it's not that. I didn't even know him." He didn't even know why he lied, it was just a default reaction. It was like he had been caught breaking a lamp, he was a little child being scolded. It wasn't him, it was never him, he didn't do anything wrong.

"I mean I knew him," Reid continued, trying to recover. "But not like knew him knew him, right? Like he was a teacher and whatever and I like saw him sometimes."

"Yes I got that." Reily beamed in her usual way. "I hope you and your friends start talking again though, that was just starting to get fun at lunch."

"We hung out like once."

"That's what start means." Reily stuck out her tongue and started to jog away as they approached the school.

"Wait." Reid didn't know why he stopped her. He really didn't know what was going on anymore, why he was saying or doing anything in this conversation. He just knew he needed to end it but that he didn't want to see it stop. He wanted to talk, to just be sad. And she said he could just be said. "I'll tell you some...stuff. If you...could you hang out on the weekend?"

Reily placed her finger on her lips, staring upwards. "Hmm, I guess I could if it was like, if you came on Saturday but it would have to be at my house."