Leah was waiting for me in Government the next day with the same apprehensive look she'd given me the night before.

"How are you feeling? You left in quite a hurry last night."

"Fine." It wasn't a lie. I was high as fuck. I tried to avoid smoking before school but yesterday had taken a huge toll on my already poor mental health. I needed to back off this girl I'd decided. She and her perfectly happy family were no good for me and vice versa. It was like mixing water and oil. No, it was like mixing gasoline with fire. I was already a caustic individual, capable of destroying things. With her in the mix, it'd only get worse.

"Alright," her eyebrows were furrowed and her expression motherly, but she left it alone. I was eternally grateful she wasn't one to pry.

Glancing down and twiddling with my black and green flannel, I was unable to meet her gaze any further. I did not want to talk to her. I didn't want to talk to anyone. I wanted to disappear in my head and be left alone. Thankfully the teacher came in and started lecturing.

I'd decided I would start eating lunch in my car. It would be easy to make up excuses why I couldn't hang around Leah and in the classes we shared, I would keep conversations to a minimum. I hadn't figured out how I was going to get around the project, but I'd come up with something. She was a smart girl; she'd get the hint. I only prayed I wouldn't have to be rude to her, it wasn't her fault I was a self-destructive mess incapable of having meaningful human connection.

Later that day when lunch rolled around, I made the excuse I'd left my lunch in my Jeep and had to go get it. Tallulah asked if I wanted her to tag along but I declined, encouraging them to go on without me. I felt somewhat remorseful for lying to them, but it was for the best. Operation Isolation was a go and the idea of being alone and being able to breathe again was not an opportunity I was willing to pass up.

I was sitting in my car ten minutes later, seat back as far as it'd go with my feet perched haphazardly on the door frame enjoying a Marilyn Manson song and nursing a joint and a bag of mini Oreos when a familiar voice interrupted my mastication.

"What are you doing?" his voice burnished yet somehow always serrated.

I glanced up over the edge of my sunglasses to see Leah's brother standing inches from where my combat boots were dangling. His blue-tipped ebony hair was disheveled handsomely just like last time and I had to suck in a breath. All the weed in the world couldn't subdue the swirl of emotions that flashed through the amygdala of my brain and spread to various other parts of me.

"What's it look like?" my own voice was airy as I fired the rhetorical question back at him. He was watching me with his oh so familiar glare as I held the joint in his direction. "You want in?"

It was as if I'd completely forgotten my original plan the moment he was in the equation.

He contemplated the notion momentarily before rolling his eyes and walked past me out of sight. I shrugged my shoulders and returned the marijuana cigarette to my own mouth and inhaled. Whatever... his loss.

I nearly jumped out of my skin as he appeared on the passenger side of my car and opened the door, hopping in easily and stealing the joint right out of my mouth with one hand to bring it up to his own and take a long measured toke.

"You think I'm stupid enough to stand out in the open and get high?" he growled. I couldn't come up with a response to his sane logic. To be honest, I thought he kept walking. I wasn't sure how I felt about sharing the small space of my vehicle with him.

The nebulous high preoccupying my brain kept my blood pressure surprisingly stable as I took in the scenario. Judd Birch was sitting in my Jeep smoking my weed and here I was trying to get away from his sister. It seemed preposterous, almost comical.

I couldn't stop the chuckle from escaping my past my lips.

"Something funny Black?" he mirrored my posture, relaxing into the seat before handing me back my joint. The smoke broke into a thousand smaller clouds as he exhaled it and it hit my dashboard and dispersed.

"No not really. Just seems like I can't escape the Birch family no matter where I go," I hadn't meant to answer so honestly and for a second, I worried I'd hurt his feelings although something told me otherwise. He seemed like a big boy. He could take care of himself and whatever I threw at him.

"You and me both," Judd snorted. He like his younger sister, didn't feel the need to pry.

A surprisingly comfortable silence fell between us as the song ended, the only sounds piercing it were our respective respirations until even that came to an end as the joint shortened until it was burning our fingertips as we passed it back and forth. I pondered how it was so easy to sit here with this boy who just the night before made my heart race like mad. Should I say something? Was I being too quiet? It donned on me quizzically how much it meant to me in that moment that this raven-haired young man not think I was a total loser.

"I uh, I meant to thank you for the weed the other night. It's pretty good shit." I glanced down at my lap awkwardly before meeting his gaze. The sclera redness that accompanied getting high caused his green irises to manifest themselves even more than normal. It was intoxicating and unnerving, even from two feet away. His features were more relaxed than I'd ever seen him, albeit still minutely annoyed. Was this guy ever happy?

Are you?

"Shut up."

"What?"

"I hate small talk," he clipped, looking away suddenly. His demeanor was suddenly less light-hearted, if one could even use such a word to describe Judd Birch.

Giggling, I popped a mini Oreo in my mouth. That made two of us.

"You seem to hate lots of things," I pressed. I was not Leah; I was not afraid to push the issue and enjoyed confrontation.

His signature frown was back, his face no longer relaxed. I was getting under his skin, and yet part of me was determined to see how much I could push this boy and whether he would push me back. Preferably against a wall with a hand between my legs.

"You talk a lot for someone who just last night was having a full-blown breakdown because my dad asked you about yourself," he mocked with a sneer.

An angry flame lit in my chest at the jibe, but I was more concerned and embarrassed that he had indeed noticed my emotional nuclear meltdown, forcing my previous confidence to smolder into nothingness. He was much more observant than I thought. I wouldn't make the same mistake again.

Suddenly his hand was on my right wrist, forcing me to drop the half empty bag of Oreos and causing them to scatter all over the floor.

"What the fuck man?" I half-shouted, attempting to pull my carpus out of his grasp but his grip was rock solid as he pulled my arm towards his face and used his free hand to pry my enclosed fingers back. I tried to ignore the fact he was overpowering me easily and suddenly there was a noticeable tension hanging in the air. That primal femininity raised its head again to give a curious sniff.

"Why'd you do this?" He was studying the four fingernail shaped scabs on my palm for a moment before looking at me for an answer. The vibe he was suddenly giving off was oddly paternal and the animal inside me lowered its' head glowering about being teased again.

"Why's it fucking matter?" I jerked my hand away and he allowed it, letting his own hands fall into his lap while he furrowed his brow as if contemplating something complicated.

He didn't answer, instead he opened the passenger door and leapt out, slamming it behind him and disappeared somewhere behind me.

"What the fuck?" I thought to myself shrewdly as I glanced up into the rearview mirror to see him storming off further into the parking lot until he was out of sight.

**

The encounter with Judd was an even worse idea than being around Leah. I couldn't get those emerald eyes out of my head as I drove home. So much for staying away from the Birch family.

I rolled my eyes as I entered my driveway, lurching the Jeep to an abrupt halt. My home was no American Dream. It was a hardly more than a two-bedroom shack, although it was in a decent neighborhood.

My father wasn't home oddly enough, but I pushed that thought to the back of my mind. He must've gotten stuck at work.

I'd just walked into the house when my phone went off. I didn't even have to look to know it was Leah wondering where I had gone at lunch. Except it wasn't.

It took every once of strength left in me to swallow the lump in my throat and text a reply.

If only that woman knew how badly I wanted to crawl into a hole every time she even looked in my direction.

I urged and begged the familiar dissonance to take over. I didn't want to feel the sensation creeping up from my trachea to spread up to my eyes and down to my thoracic cavity.

Unfortunately, it looked like I was on my own as tears welled up and threatened to spill. The inky tendrils of abandonment gripped my chest hard, squeezing the air from my lungs and threatening to stop my heart. I could barely breath. It was like plunging into the icy depths of a winter lake except there was no way out.

Tossing my phone as I crumped up on the nearest couch, a sob racked my entire body and forced me into the fetal position as hot tears slid down my cheeks. Wave after wave of desolation hit me, an endless tsunami of pent up frustration and rejection. I screamed as loud as I could, hoping it would reach decibels high enough to finally shatter the thin glass that was my resolve and let me drown already.

I don't know how long I laid there, an intermittent hiccup or sporadic sob occasionally breaking through my tired and sore body. There wasn't anymore tears to cry but the swirling depression sat heavy on my chest like a purring housecat, leaving me incapacitated and lonely. I was only able to feel a shred of happiness and relief when exhaustion finally overcame the sadness and plunged my world into black.