Stuck With You

13: Something is off

I didn't fail the project in Humanities. Hallelujah. I half expected I would. Thankfully I didn't. To celebrate my success, I had made myself brownies. And proceeded to eat myself sick.

Then fall break happened, which helped my general mood immensely. I slept through the entire vacation since I hardly got sleep normally. My fosters were kind of annoyed at my laziness, but I ignored them. And they of course, stopped caring.

The day school got back in session, I basically had to drag myself inside. I didn't want to deal with any of it. I was so done with homework and the people at school. The only thing that kept me going to school was the fact I could graduate and leave in a few months.

Anne was waiting in front of my locker with Jackson. They were adorable, I had to admit. But did they really need to make out against my locker?

I cleared my throat loudly. "If you're done, I would like to hang up my jacket."

They pulled apart at last, and Jackson grinned. "Welcome back from the dead, Rylee."

I rolled my eyes. "I'm not the only one that used the break to sleep." I pushed past them and opened my locker. "What were you guys up to?" I looked them up and down. "Not sleeping?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

I wrinkled my nose. "Ew." I put my jacket away and turned back. "Only a few more weeks until next trimester. Excited?"

Anne shrugged. "I guess. I won't have math anymore, so that's a plus."

Jackson ran a hand through his hair. "I actually don't know my next schedule yet, so I have no idea."

"Well, I for one, am very excited." I said, grinning. "I have the dumbest classes, meaning I have easy A's."

Anne raised her eyebrows. "Like what?"

"I'll a library aide, then I have poetry, which you apparently don't do anything in except listen to poems, and I'll be an office aide."

"Dang, you did get an easy schedule. What else?" Jackson asked, seeming interested.

"I'll also be a teacher's aide. And my last class is photography. In that class all Mrs. Goodwell has you do is take pictures." I brushed my shoulders. "Yeah, I'm that smooth. I can coast next trimester."

Jackson looked disappointed. "I should have had you help me put my schedule together this year."

"That's totally your fault."

"Don't rub it in."

I smiled. "I just did."

"So did you want to-" Anne was cut off by the bell ringing. She waited for it to stop and then continued. "As I was saying, did you want to come to Jackson's party this week?"

"You're having another party?" I asked, giving him a dead pan look.

"What? My parents haven't been home much this year. I'm merely taking the opportunity."

I laughed but shook my head. "Sorry, no can do. Parties aren't my scene."

"Suit yourself. I'll be having another one at some point and you can come to that one. You have to see that my parties are actually cool."

I shrugged. "Maybe I'll crash one at some point. But right now, it's a no. I gotta go."

We went our separate ways for classes. I couldn't wait to be free of this.

* * *

Something was off.

I glanced back to see Kason's empty seat at the back of Humanities. I wouldn't normally notice, but he wasn't here the day we got back from fall break. And I hadn't seen him. That was a week ago.