"I like having you as my friend." Those words hit me like a ton of bricks. I couldn't help but grimace, feeling my heart break a little when he had said that. He didn't care about me the way that I did him. How could I have been so stupid to think that he did? It was probably the romantic part of me, and I knew that I was going to have to ignore that feeling.

I blinked and looked into his green eyes, hiding my hurt and anger behind a mask. "Well, if that is it, then you can go and be a Junior, now." I looked away from him and gathered my books, ignoring him and Cami. I didn't take the bag that Luke had in his hands, not wanting to take it and feel as if I was just sort of charity case. "I don't need to be protected, Luke. We can still be friends, even if you are in a higher grade than me." I stood up and glared at him, feeling a little bit angry but mostly hurt. "I'm not some charity case." With that, I walked away from him and went to my locker, sulking.

He didn't know what he was doing to me. He didn't know that sometimes he was all that I thought about. He didn't know that my heart only pounded for him. He made my hands clammy, but I didn't know if he knew that.

Life was hard for me, and sometimes, I couldn't help but wonder if I was actually cared for. I mean, my mother didn't really care about me at all, or she doesn't show it. All she cared about was me doing whatever she told me to do. And my father, well, I didn't want to think about him for the time being.

I shook my head, breaking me from my thoughts. All I knew was that I had to go through the motions until I was able to find something or someone that I could hang on to. I just had to trust that they wouldn't leave me, even if I pushed them away.

***

"What's the matter with you, Miss Lone?" Ms. Gables asked when I walked into the classroom without Luke by my side. There was a frown on her face, as if she didn't know why I was annoyed or something.

"It doesn't matter," I replied, going over to my seat. I sat down, placing the books that I needed under the seat. I had went to my locker and stuffed my bag in there, knowing that I wasn't going to be able to use it.

Whispers appeared around the room, and I knew that most everyone knew that my bag had broken. News traveled fast in a school that had only about 1,000 students, so I was sure that everyone knew what had happened.

"Silence!" Ms. Gables exclaimed, silencing the whole class. She glared at them, probably hating the fact that they were disrupting the peace and quiet of the classroom. Her nostrils flared, indicating that she was in a bad mood.

You know, she probably does care about you, Voice said.

I held back an eyeroll and a snort, knowing that what it had said was not true. She didn't care that they were whispering about me. Ya right, when pigs fly, I replied, sarcastically. She doesn't care about me. She never had and never will.

"Miss Lone," Ms. Gables said, breaking whatever Voice was going to say. She looked at me, narrowing her eyes. "Would you like to call your mother to bring you a new bag?"

"She wouldn't leave the house," I replied. "Nor do we have another one. So, there is no need to call her."

Snickers filled the room, because everyone knew that my mother would just stay indoors and let me or my father go outside and do something. Some said that she had turned into a vampire, which was really stupid. Mom, well, I used garlic in some of the foods that I cook, and she was still living after she had eaten it.

Ms. Gables clucked her tongue, probably annoyed with my mother's behavior. "Well, you better have a bag tomorrow, do you understand?"

I shrugged my shoulder and stayed silent. I wouldn't be able to get a new bag, but I should be able to sew that one up, even though I didn't know how long it would stay sewed up. Oh, the joys of not having enough money. It was just so fun and dandy, since I wasn't able to get things that I needed. Please, note the sarcasm.

My stomach grumbled, but it was still soft so no one heard it. I was hungry, but I wasn't going to say anything. I knew that no one would help, and I was mad at Luke, because, I was sure that he didn't know what I was feeling about him.

I wasn't going to say anything about my feelings, because I didn't want to be rejected by my best friend. It would, also, make our relationship weirder if we broke up, and we were still friends. So, I was going to suffer silently. He would have to make the first move, if he did love me the way that I did him.

I placed my head on my arm and just let myself sink into my thoughts that swarmed around in my mind. I knew that I had to pay attention to what Ms. Gables was saying, since I was in class, but I needed to think things through and come up of a plan that could actually save my life and probably the life of my father.

Luke should be the last thing on my mind, but he seemed to always be the thing that was on my mind all the time. He pushed all thoughts of my taken father and the all the stuff that I had found out yesterday about who I was out of my mind. He even pushed on how I was supposed to get money and find a job, but I didn't really care about that. I would find something, even if it meant going against my mother's wishes of staying home.

I would rather work and get grounded some more than stay at home where I felt so unloved and not needed. Hell, I would rather live outside and face the Darks than face the coldness of that place.

If only I could see the future, then I would know what would happen to me and then my mother. I would see if our relationship would straighten out or if it would stay patchy like it was now. I guess I hoped that it would be the second one, but I wasn't going to wish for it. I didn't need to know that bad.