Evie

I first saw him when I was three.

I was at the carnival, on the merry-go-round. I was on the unicorn. He was on the lion. After that day, he was everywhere.

He was my crossing guard all through elementary school. Every day, walking to and from school, I felt his eyes on me. I thought he was watching to make sure I got across safe.

When I entered the seventh grade, my history teacher went out on maternity leave. He was our substitute. For twelve weeks, "Mr. Burrows" watched me every day during the seventh period. I felt the same, cold eyes.

When I was thirteen, he was at my soccer games. I thought he was someone's dad- but nobody ran to him after the games. He left hurriedly. All through the games, I felt the same, cold eyes.

Which is probably why I'm here, right now. The cold eyes, the constant contact, the aura of danger whenever I saw him. All I want to do is go home.

But I can't.

'Another year, another school,' I think to myself. I walk into Erin Redanyou High School. Every year is the same thing: brisk new clothes, friends hugging eachother. I've never been a part of that.

I look left, then right, scanning the crowd for the familiar, icy eyes staring me down. I turn left into the freshman locker bank, and scramble towards my locker to turn the code, schedule in hand. Ditching my coat and grabbing my pencil case, notebooks, and textbooks for my morning classes, I shut the door. As I'm leaving the locker bank, a tall girl walks up to me.

"Hi, I'm Ariel." she says. "Are you new here?"

"I'm Evelyn. And yeah, how'd you know?" I ask.

"The incoming classes get tours. It's obvious you weren't here or just moved in. What's your first class?"

"Uh.. Freshman Lit. AH in E304. Do you know how to get there?" I ask.

"Me too! Let's roll," She says. As we walk down the hallway, I do what I was trained to do. I scan the crowd, looking for anything that stands out. For the eyes that have given me so much trouble in the past.

We go up a few staircases and down a long hallway, but low and behold, Ariel and I get there. We walk in together to an empty classroom except for our teacher. "Mrs. Bohanon. I hear she's pretty nice," Ariel whispers to me, and we find seats roughly in the middle of the classroom.

"Alright class, don't get too comfortable in your seats, I have a seating chart for y'all," she says, and she starts listing off names of students that I've never heard. Ariel and I listen for our names, and end up on the end of a row, Ariel behind me. As Mrs. Bohanon launches into the usual first-day-of-school spiel, Ariel attempts to describe everyone to me.

"That's Nicole. The only reason she's in AH is because her dad owns Nordstrom." She says. "But honestly, she's dumber than a rock."

The rest of the day is one giant blur of "where is this class?" and looking over my the final bell rings, I meet Ariel at my locker and we walk to the front of the school. "I'm bus 183, how about you?" She asks.

I weigh my options for answering the question. "Uh, my mom picks me up after school every day," I say. My first lie.

I spot the black SUV in the pickup line, and I check the plates and look inside to make sure it's Jennifer. As soon as I'm certain it's her, I hop in.

"Hey! How was school?" Jennifer asks me.

"Boring. But I met a really nice girl named Ariel. We have a couple classes together." I say.

"Evie, you know you won't be here longer than a year. I'm not sure if it's worth it to make friendships like this if in the end you're just going to leave." She says.

"I know, but it's nice to have someone here who I don't hate. It's not like we're best friends yet or anything, we just walked to a couple classes together."

We pull into the neighborhood and after a couple minutes, into the driveway, into the locked garage, then we walk into the locked house, and Kimmie meets me at the door, tail wagging.

"Hey Kims," I say, as I pat her head. Jennifer walks inside and locks the door. "I miss my family," I say to her.

"I know you do. But you know that it's safer if you don't know where they are," She says. "And anyways, you have me. I'm your honorary mother." She says, wrapping her arm over my shoulder.

"I'm pretty darn lucky to have you," I say, and we walk into the house.