Fragile Bones

Chapter Twenty-Six

I shifted awkwardly in front of my class, tapping my fingers together. The clock ticked aimlessly, matching pace with my fidgeting. Too many pairs of eyes were looking at me and Asher, expecting one of us to start this dumb presentation. It's kind of odd, actually. We had been working on this project together for so long and now here we were, finally coming to an end with it. I was left wondering if Asher would still talk to me after this, but it was a silly thought. He's interacted with me in several ways that didn't include working on the assignment. Coming over to my house and watching a movie, going to a pet store, and other miscellaneous adventures.

Mr. Henderson cleared his throat expectedly. "Whenever you two are ready, you can start." He sat at his desk, tapping a pen against a sheet of paper that undoubtedly had the rubric for our grade.

I glanced at Asher out of my peripheral, expecting him to be as confident as he always seemed to be. I was half right. He sure appeared to look sure of himself, but I couldn't help noticing the tiny tapping of his foot. With anyone else, I would have assumed it as a small nervous tick, but with Asher I had to second guess. He usually exuded a (rather unhealthy) amount of confidence. Perhaps even he still got nervous with public-speaking.

"Well, it's nice to be welcomed back into school and have to do a presentation immediately. I'm warning you now Mr. Henderson, I only read a couple chapters." The class snickered and my teacher rolled his eyes. "Kidding."

As Asher began the presentation I tuned him out, and instead stared at the tile floor beneath me. The yellow hue from our presentation reflected onto the floor, and covered the room in a marigold tint.

God, I felt so tired.

I always seemed to lack the adequate amount of sleep that a teenager should have, but I was feeling abnormally exhausted. It was easy to ignore this morning since I was meeting Charlie and was looking forward to seeing Asher again, but now that I was standing still with nothing to focus on, it came crashing into me like a wave. I almost wanted to stay home from school tomorrow just so I could nap or something before I remembered I was supposed to go to the doctors tomorrow. The thought sent an anxiety tingle down my stomach, where it was already churning from my nervousness to do the presentation. Not to mention hurting from the emptiness that lay inside of it.

One problem at a time.

Luckily, I wasn't zoned out enough to miss my cue when my part of the slideshow started. Asher nodded at me slightly to indicate my time had arrived, and I began speaking.

•••

"See, was that so bad?" Asher asked me, leaning against the front of my desk. Students around me were in a flurry to pack their things and get to their next class, but Asher didn't seem to have any care in the world. I glanced at him for a second, but he was watching students leave the classroom.

"Yeah, I guess not," I replied, collecting my belongings. Even though Asher didn't seem to care about getting to class, I still did. My grades had been slipping a little, and I wanted to try and get back on top of them. Part of that meant actually showing up to class.

I yanked my hood up to cover the top of my face, knowing that Mr. Henderson was the only teacher to actually enforce the no-hood rule. None of the other teachers cared about dress code at all, and I was a little thankful for that. Probably the only thing Lindsay and I had in common. If teachers decided to dress code everyone, she wouldn't be able to wear her low-cut tops everyday.

"You feel like hiding today or something?" Asher questioned. He pushed the hood out of my face a little, so it was situated more on the top of my head. His fingers brushed against my forehead briefly, sending tingles through my body.