The Guarded One ✔

Chapter Twenty-Nine

"She's back today, huh?" Tyler starts while we all walk down the hallway nervously.

"She ain't a stranger" Duncan declares, "She's still Hay"

"Exactly that's why we need to make sure she doesn't feel alienated" Jess explains.

"She won't" Tyler assures us.

As hard as it is to admit, it will be difficult treating her as though nothing happened.

She was gone for months, her body was laying lifeless in a bed and we were forced to sit back and watch.

"Jason?" Jess cocks a brow.

"What?" I roll my eyes at her. 

"She's not a stranger" she looks at me firmly, "okay?"

It has been two or so weeks now since Hayden has woken up. She has memory troubles and none of us knows how severe it actually is.

What if she's forgotten something significant?

It was different with Duncan. He had forgotten events that occurred a month or so prior to his accident. Hayden's entire memory is like Swiss cheese.

"Look" Duncan cries before quickly walking towards the girl standing at her locker.

Here goes nothing I guess. She's early for once. Maybe she forgot that she wasn't ever punctual.

"Hay!" Duncan greets her while she stands lost in front of her locker "You're back!"

"You're extra as fuck" Hayden laughs before hugging Duncan.

We watch as Hayden focuses her eyes on the people in the distance staring at her.

"Don't worry...it'll stop eventuality" Duncan reassures her before pulling away.

Jess smiles "Are you ready for bio?"

Her eyes widen before looking back over at her locker "yeah it's just...I can't get my locker open...the combination is different..."

My heart sinks when I look over to my friends. They underestimated how bad her memory is.

Immediately I approach her locker, which is two doors down from where she is standing and put in her combination.

It opens first try.

"Thank you," Hayden says quietly before pulling out her books. "I don't like Mr Carson all that much...he's hard to understand"

"He's from Canada, not France" Duncan chuckles.

"He pronounces his Ts like Vs dun he?" Hayden cock's my brow.

I furrow my brows. No, he's doesn't. Mr Carson talks slowly and clearly. 

"That's Mr Weber" Tyler corrects her, "the shop teacher"

"Than which one's Carson?" Hayden asks when shutting her locker door. 

"The one that you said resembled Brad Pitt" Duncan informs.

"Nah, still don't remember," she shrugs.

I roll my eyes. This conversation is torture. Is this what it's going to be like for now on?

"You'll know when you see him" Duncan reassures.

"He's got one of those faces" Jess explains. "It's hard to unsee it...and his abs are just—"

"Carson is twice your age" Tyler looks over to Jess in disgust.

"So what? I'm allowed to admire" she laughed.

"Not when it's your forty-eight-year-old biology teacher" Tyler shakes his head.