Just How Life Is.

Just Hw Life Is. Chapter 14

“Yo! Troy!”

I turned to see some dude running up to Troy and I. He was some druggie; I don’t really pay attention to the druggies of our school so I didn’t know who he was.

“Yeah?” Troy questioned him as he came near.

He looked from Troy to me and a smirk came on his face. “Who’s she? You’re new girlfriend or “buddy”?”

My eyes widened at him. I looked at Troy and he looked surprised and angry.

“Neither of you are saying anything,” said the druggie his eyebrows rising, “I’m right aren’t I?”

“No you’re not,” Troy said in a quick, crisp voice.

Druggie looked at me, “Well do you wanna be my buddy?” His eyebrows wiggled.

I slapped him and walked away, I heard Troy laughing.

~*~*~

I sat down at the lunch table then looked up; Faith was staring at me. “What?”

She crossed her eyes then looked back at me.

I threw a French fry at her, “You high?”

She laughed, “Nah. Just trying to get you to talk…. And creep you out.”

Chloe laughed, “That is fun.”

I rolled my eyes, “Whatever.” Then I saw Jake walking over to us, but he had that same druggie from earlier following him. They came over and stood by us. I raised my eyebrow, “Hey Jake, who’s your new friend?”

He rolled his eyes, “This kid is not my friend,” he turned to glare at druggie, “He’s just following me.”

“Why?” Chloe asked.

Druggie looked around, “I was looking for that Danny kid.”

“Again, why?” Chloe said.

Druggie looked around, then looked at his wrist like he was wearing a watch, “Oh! Look at the time. I gotta go.” Then he hurried away.

“Crackhoes are weird,” I said. They all laughed.

“I wonder why he was looking for Danny,” Jake wondered, sitting down next to me.

“Yeah, that is pretty random. He hasn’t been around a lot though,” Chloe said, looking down at the table. Faith nudged her elbow, smirking. Chloe slapped her arm, “Shut up!”

I chuckled, Chloe probably liked Danny. Jake shook his head, “Don’t wanna know. I’m getting food.” So he stood up and turned, but he didn’t notice that Troy was walking up. Neither of them were paying attention so they bumped into each other and fell to the ground.

They both let out a funny “oof” sound. Jake landed on his butt, but Troy managed to fall on his back. Wow, he must’ve really been zoning.

“You guys ok?” Faith said, chuckling a little.

Jake rubbed his head and got up. Troy was frowning as he got up. I wonder if that hurt him.

“Heh, sorry man,” Jake said to Troy.

Troy shrugged and gave a polite smile, “It’s ok, I wasn’t paying attention.”

“Same,” Jake laughed, then walked off to the food line.

Chloe leaned over to me, “That conversation seemed awkward,” she whispered. I nodded.

Troy grunted quietly as he sat down, then he looked at us, “Can I mooch some food off you guys?”

We all chuckled, Chloe pushed her box of fries over to him, “Here, I don’t want those.”

“Thanks,” he said.

Then Danny showed up and jumped in the seat next to Chloe. “Hey guys,” he said in a hyper yet distracted voice, looking from side to side.

“Some druggie was looking for you,” Chloe said to him.

“Crap,” he muttered.

“Yeah, what was up with that?” I asked him.

“I don’t know,” he shrugged carelessly.

“Psh, sure you don’t,” said Chloe.

Troy seemed uninterested in this conversation, but I was interested and it seemed so were Chloe and Faith.

“Is there something going on?” Faith asked.

Danny tapped his fingers on the table for a moment, “Nope.”

~*~*~

The conversation at lunch pretty much ended. It was pretty awkward. Jake came back and was confused and Troy left shortly after. But one thing was clear; Chloe was pretty upset with Danny.

I was walking down the hallway with Jake after the final bell had run. We were just talking about random stuff then Jake stopped mid sentence and was looking somewhere with a confused and questioning look.  I followed his gaze and he was looking at Troy walking down the hallway.

“Uhh?” I said.

Jake shook his head and looked at me, “Sorry.”

“Umm.” I wanted to ask him about their awkwardness to each other. Oh, just do it. “So um, you guys seemed pretty awkward today…”

He was quiet then laughed a fake or nervous laugh, “Well we did bump into each other.”

“Hmmm. I don’t think it was that kind of awkwardness though…”

Jake looked around then pulled me over to the side of the hallway; out of range from others’ hearing.

“Well, ok. So we have the same gym class, but no one ever sees him in the locker room,” he paused to shrug, “But today I forgot a book in there, so I went back and he was changing his shirt, and holy fuck. There was some bad bruises on that guy, and a bandage on his back.”

Well crap.

“Did he notice you?” I asked.

“Well I kind of cursed so he turned around and quickly put his shirt on. So that was some added awkwardness. But dude, where do you think that crap came from?”

Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap. What do I do? “Hm. I don’t know. Maybe he really does street fight, or maybe he got jumped?”

“Maybe… Hmm, random,” He said.