9. Someone Like Her

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HOPE

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HOPE

What could be better than skateboarding through the town on an early April morning filled with the fragrance of steamy coffee, pine trees and the raw spring breeze tickling against my skin?

Yeah, no. I missed my bed already.

When I arrived at the vast green building towering in front of me with the bold silver letters EverGreen High attached to the front, I wheeled inside and through the crowded corridors. I rode past the same old students chattering away by their lockers, some complaining, stressing, yawning and others laughing and chattering away.

Several months ago, I would've seen Nathan's arm around Maya by her locker, surrounded by jocks and cheerleaders, including Bree. Heaven and Owen would walk past them and just then, Maya would put her leg out, causing Heaven to trip over her shoe and go slamming down on the floor. She would sometimes get a nosebleed, other times a raging headache. Laughing, Bree would pull out her phone and snap pictures of Heaven's big butt and so would a bunch of other students.

Owen would get angry at Maya, but then Nathan would take a frightening step towards him. Owen would reluctantly back away and help Heaven up before walking away with her.

I saw situations like that with the school's kings and queens bullying the outcasts every day several months ago.

Now, I saw something completely different. I saw Maya, but a shockingly different one, a real one, smiling in a completely different way that made her face light up, wrap her arms around the town's bad boy's waist from behind. He was opening her locker that I had by now understood that they shared.

She would pull Cayden's hood down and he turned around, smiling warmly. And then he leaned down a little to kiss her before they started talking.

Moments later, Bree and Owen walked up to them. Bree bragged about something. Owen grinned at her, proudly. And then the four of them headed to class together.

I kicked my skateboard a few feet forward, past the school's king who stood leaned against his locker, his golden laugh leaving his mouth while his jock friends encircled him. I wondered if anybody else noticed the mask he wore. How he only showed what people wanted to see.

Then, on cue, the basketball team's coach would lock his dark brown eyes with me from the end of the hallway, his dark skin glowing under the fluorescent light and a faint smile tugging on his lips before he shouted. "No, skateboarding in the halls, Lance!"

I abruptly halted and offered him an apologetic smiled, holding my hands up in surrender. "Sorry."

He gave me a small smile and the moment he disappeared around the corner, I kicked the ground to wheel my skateboard forward even faster than before.

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