Beauty & Her Bruises

Chapter Twenty-Two

When I washed my hands and made up my mind to get out of the bathroom, Ashton had already disappeared from the hallways of the school. Dustin looked at me without staring at my face. He looked up and down my body once and twice but when he finally did meet my face, he attempted to smile. His smile looked fake though and it killed me that he couldn't even fake a smile towards me. Instead, he walked towards me and looked at my eyes. He didn't say anything but I'm sure he was searching for any lies that might give their way from in my eyes.

I couldn't keep my eye contact with him so I began turning away. This was probably the best indication that I was lying and that I had heard everything that he and Ashton were talking about. Dustin didn't bring it up though. He just walked alongside of me as his mind was probably imploding with deciding what he should do. His thoughts were probably eating away at if Ashton was telling the truth or not. I'm pretty sure that Dustin only thought kids at school were hurting me.

Not father.

I got in his beat up truck and he did the same. Neither one of us talked but as we started rolling along, he barely turned on the radio. I could barely make it out but Ryan Beatty was playing. When it got to the chorus came on, Dustin rolled the volume all of the way down and turned it off. We sat in silence and the ride felt a little tense. I could tell that Dustin was dying to ask and tell me something but he wanted to remain polite. He didn't want to scare me off.

When we rolled into the employee parking lot, we sat in the car for a minute or two. Dustin looked at me and when I looked at him, he adverted his eyes and started getting out of the car. I unbuckled with my seatbelt and followed him inside the library.

As soon as we walked in, I breathed in the scent and felt myself smile. I loved the smell of old books. As I would love to relive the memories, I followed closely behind Dustin because I didn't want Ruth to talk to me just yet. Knowing her, she would ask questions about the bruises on my face.

"Liam's working tonight, too," Dustin told me. I nodded my head and we went to the back where we had to sign in. As we went back, Dustin handed me my card and I looked towards his. His was almost filled this month which meant that he worked from the school ending to about eleven.

"You've been working a lot this week," I noted. Dustin looked at his card before beginning to turn red with his cheeks. He punched in and I did the same. This was the first little imprint on my card.

"I was hoping you would show up for work," he said. He looked back up at me and I couldn't help but smile. I'm sure that I was blushing at him but he made no move to tell me that I was. In that moment, he opened his mouth and I was sure that he was going to ask me about father. Instead, Liam came barging through and ruined the moment.

He didn't say anything but his bodily presence was enough to offset me and Dustin. We both stood awkwardly as Liam grabbed a water from the fridge and he sucked it down his throat. He looked between the two of us but didn't say anything. He knew that he had ruined something. Instead of leaving abruptly, he came up to me and stared in my eyes.

Just like Dustin had done at the school.

"How are you, Zara?" he asked.

"Fine."

Liam looked through my eyes again but I could tell that he didn't believe me. He looked at Dustin and then just nodded towards him. He left the room shortly after him and I stared at Dustin. He shrugged his shoulders but I could tell that in my absence, they have gotten close and are actually friends now.

Finally, when I looked at Dustin's eyes to see if he was going to ask the question, I just left him. He wasn't going to ask now that the moment was destroyed. That caused so much courage to ask someone if they were abused that it would put anyone at ease to get it done and over with. Unless they guessed wrong and that would bring misery.