♡ ꜰᴏʀᴇᴠᴇʀ ɪꜱɴ'ᴛ ꜰᴏʀᴇᴠᴇʀ ♡

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THE WEEKEND WENT BY too fast, and soon, I found myself again walking through the school hallways at the end of the day, my books to my chest as Cassie rambled on about the tit-for-tat drama that happened on the cheer team.

"She's just mad that I'm on varsity and she's not." She rolled her eyes like she always did when she was frustrated. "She thinks she deserves it just because she's pretty or something."

I looked at her. "If you hate it so much, why don't you just quit?"

She furrowed her eyebrows at me. "I don't hate it."

"You sure act like you do."

She sighed. "I don't hate it. I just...don't like it when the other girls' heads get too big."

I nodded. "Which is all the time, no?"

She chewed her cheek. "Even if I wanted to, I wouldn't. I could get a scholarship to go somewhere real nice."

Sometimes I forgot that Cassie even wanted to go to college. It seemed that she loved working in a bakery so much that she would've just opted to be a housewife, like everybody else. But that was what I admired about her: she never settled for the second-best option.

I, too, wanted to go to college, but I couldn't do any sport good enough to save my life, much less get a scholarship. That was why I stressed so much about work — you do the work, you get the good grades, you get the recognition, you get the scholarship. Easier said than done, though. As the years ticked by, I got more and more stressed that I wouldn't get recognized. I prayed to God for a miracle: a college recruiter stumbles into the diner one day or does a luck-of-the-draw pick for who gets to go to their university — anything.

Cassie and I eventually went our separate ways, her to the locker room to get ready for practice and I to the front steps to make my way home.

Ponyboy told me that morning that he was finishing a test after school, and Johnny didn't even go that day, so it was just me walking home.

It was the first day in almost a year that I'd walked home alone, and it felt weird. I would think of something to say for a split second only for the thought to fall dead when I remembered the only company I had was myself.

Anxiety crept up inside of me as I walked further and further from the school, the atmosphere slowly growing quieter and more eery. I couldn't help but feel eyes looking at me, persisting like an itch in the back of my head. It eventually became too much to bear and I quickly glanced behind me, only to see an empty sidewalk stretch for blocks.

I turned back and shook my head. I was being ridiculous: nobody would try anything in broad daylight in the middle of downtown.

I tried to shut off my thoughts, but every car that drove by made my eyes dart around anxiously. I could've sworn one car lingered behind me for almost a whole block, but I shrugged it off. I'm just paranoid, I thought, Jonathan's in prison, Cary. You can relax.

Over and over again, I told myself that. You can relax. It helped a bit, but not enough for the gut feeling to go away.

Another block down the road, and the car still lingered. Maybe I accidentally wandered into a slow zone where the roads were so bad you couldn't go above five miles an hour, but no. It was the same route I took home every day, with the same roads.

Finally, I glanced behind me: a hundred yards down the road was a beat-up black Mustang, slowly dragging down the road. I turned back towards the sidewalk, my heart racing. I wouldn't go home. I couldn't. Whoever they were, it was obvious they were following me. I racked my brain for places to go — other than the lot, there really wasn't any. Even there, I would be alone.