Listen ~ The Maze Runner ~ Newt

19 ~ Thomas

Later that morning, breakfast had an eerie coldness to it. The thought if Newt's tear-stained face haunted me everytime I closed my eyes, his heartbreaking pleas ringing through my head like a persistent echo.

I could tell Teresa knew something was wrong, because when Aimee gave Thomas a sad, knowing smile, she had said nothing else. And normally, Aimee is always one to spark up happiness in the darkest of situations, but I think the weight of what we were doing and how wrong things could go within the next 24 hours really started to toy with our minds. Her mind.

~~~~~

When I had finally swallowed the last mouthful of my breakfast, everybody had their eyes trained to me. Teresa's seemed confused, and reading. Aimee's were concerned and sad. And Thomas' were afraid, yet brave and ready. Each of them seemed to be trying to tell me something silently, and I think I know what each was saying, but I knew I wouldn't be able to leave this room without each of them wanting to talk to me.

As if on cue, the second my spoon was placed back into my bowl Teresa jumped up from her seat. "I uh... I need to get to work. Um, Dani can I speak to you first? Alone?" She declared to the table, throwing daggers to me through her eyes so that I would go with her. I slowly nod my head and stand up too, smiling to the others before the inevitable happened.

Thomas jumped up too and nodded for Aimee to follow, his hand slipping into Teresa's. "Well we need to go too, so we'll just wait down the corridor for you." He says, addressing me for the last part. I take a deep breath of relief and follow Aimee out of the room, who was following the 'couple'.

The boy pulled Teresa into a tight hug once we were in the corridor, and would not let her go until the tears that had brimmed in his eyes had webbed away once again. Though it was an unsual action for Thomas to have made, Teresa melted into the hug after a few seconds and forgot about the worry she had towards him. That much I could tell.

The two pulled away from one another and stared into each other's eyes, Teresa's searching Thomas' for any clue as to why he was acting weirdly today. Thomas' lips inched towards the girl, but Teresa shied away after her eyes had fallen upon Aimee and I. She smiled apologetically at him and moved out of his embrace, walking a little way down the corridor to talk to me.

As I passed Thomas I could see the tears forming in his eyes again, but he quickly shook them away and moved down the other end of the corridor to stand beside Aimee.

I reach Teresa and she pulls me a little further down the corridor, looking behind us every two seconds to make sure we were far enough away from the others before stopping. "T, what's wrong?" I ask her once we stop, seeing we had moved a good 50 feet away from our friends. "I-I'm not sure. Something's off with Thomas, like really off. He's being overly touchy with me and just overall wanting to spend a lot more time with me." She says with a frown, her eyes flittering back to him.

"Is that a bad thing?" I ask, raising my eyebrows. I always knew that Thomas had a thing for Teresa, and I was almost certain that Teresa liked him back. But now she's saying this I don't know...

"No! No, it's great. It's just-" She pauses, looking for the right words, "Different. Like there is some other hidden motive behind it. He also seems quite out of it, like something is bothering him but anytime I ask him about it he just dismisses me. I know you two are closer than he and I are, in a friendship way, so- Has he said anything to you?" She asks, a worried frown setting into her features.

Oh shit.

I take a deep breath and gulp, praying to god that she was too busy looking at the boy to see my change in behaviour. "Ah, no. He hasn't said anything to me." I lie, looking at the floor while I tuck a piece of my hair behind my ear. When I bring my eyes back up to meet hers, I see her expression has somehow dropped even more. She presses her lips together and shuffles in her place.