Stolen Secrets

Stolen Secrets- Chapter 3

~Jeff~

When I got to English this morning, Natalie was already sitting at her desk next to mine. But I was late again, like usual, so this wasn’t a surprise.

What was a surprise, was how lonely she looked. I would have thought that with her great looks, and her being a new student, people would be talking to her, trying to corrupt her and stuff.

But no one as there. It must be a gift from god to have someone as angelic as her, sitting by herself, next to my desk. And I wasn’t going to complain anytime soon.

“Morning Natalie,” I said sliding into my desk and trying not to sound as happy as I was. It was 8:30am on a Tuesday morning, normal people aren’t happy then. I didn’t want Natalie thinking I was a freak.

Her entire body tensed, but when she looked up and saw it was me, she relaxed, but only slightly. Was I that scary? I like to think not.

“Hi,” she said slowly like she wasn’t quite sure what was happening.

“So how was your first day of school?” I asked. I had wanted to ask her yesterday, to make sure she was okay, but by the time I got to her locker she had already disappeared. And I hadn’t wasted any time, I had gotten there two minutes after class ended. So like every other sane person, I now believe that Natalie is magical. She was like Houdini, but way more attractive.

Natalie shrugged. “Different than what I expected,” she commented.

“How so?” I asked leaning back in my chair. I figured we still had a couple of minutes left until Mr. Anderson showed up from his morning flirt session.

“People talked to me,” she said with a shrug.

“That’s what people do.”

Natalie shook her head. “No people don’t talk to me.”

That was another very sad thing that Natalie had said to me and I had only known her for 24 hours. To cover up how mad I was that people treated Natalie badly, I said, “Now here is the part where you tell me you are a serial killer psychopath.”

I got only a small smile for my efforts. “Why do you care so much?” she asked. 

I shrugged. “You’re my friend. Am I not allowed to care?”

That must not have been the right thing to say because ducked her head and let her hair fall between us, much like she had yesterday. The only difference was, today her hair was curly. But the effect was still the same. She was hiding from me, she was scared of me. Her hair was her shield.

I wanted to say something to Natalie that would fix what I said. I racked my brains for something to say, but it was hard. I didn’t know what I had said wrong, and I didn’t know her story. I didn’t know how I could upset her more with just a small comment.

So I kept my mouth shut and looked at the back of her head. Her long red hair fell to the middle of her back and perfectly hid her face from me. I wondered if it would feel as soft as it looked.

I mentally shook myself. I was one of the school losers, it would do no good daydreaming about the irresistible new girl.

Mr. Anderson came in from walking Ms. Thyna to her math class. And he began the lesson, five minutes late. Not that any of the teenagers present minded.

Normally I was focused on the lesson. But today, like yesterday, my eyes kept wandering to the redheaded beauty sitting next to me. It didn’t matter that her hair still prevented me from getting a glimpse of her face, she just radiating this force that made it difficult to look away.