SHADOWS

Chapter Two: Jerk Alert

Nancy groaned as she rushed into the Springwood diner for her morning shift. For one, Marge had wagged "the finger" at her, which meant A, a reduction on her already small paycheck, and B, she would get a nice talking to in the office before the day was over. As for the second big part, well...it wasn't like Nancy actually enjoyed serving black coffee and scrambled eggs for four hours anyway.

"Rough night, Thompson?" a man called out from the kitchen.

"Might have been better if you were around, Jared." Nancy said, "How'd you do without me?" She ran over and grabbed the nearest full plate.

"Oh, just lovely. I burned the first round of toast and almost dropped the frying pan on my toe."

Nancy chuckled. "Sorry I missed it. What booth is this order for by the way?"

"Five. Make it quick."

Mood slightly elevated, Nancy stepped out of the kitchen and made her way over to the customer.

"Here you go," she placed the food on the table, "Eggs over easy and bacon on the side. Enjoy."

The person looked at the plate, then at Nancy. His green eyes shifted in confusion.

"Is there a problem with your meal, sir?" Nancy asked, hoping that Marge wasn't roaming around the booths.

The young man shook his head, then laughed a little, "No, there's nothing wrong with it exactly, it's just that it's not what I ordered."

Nancy's brows furrowed. She checked the number on the plate again. "Oh! Oh. My bad, that's for booth four, but there's no one in booth four...whatever. I'll just take it back and then get-"

"No, no. Relax. It's fine. I always order the same thing. This is a good change for me." The man smiled at her. He had a nice smile. And nice dark hair, and a smooth face..and..

Nancy straightened out the wrinkles in her apron. Well

damn. I haven't thought this way about a stranger since high sch-

"Nance, you done yet? We're backed up here!"

She jumped at Jared's yell from the kitchen.

"I'm so sorry, uh, I gotta go." The words tumbled out of Nancy's mouth in a nervous wreck.

"It's fine. Thanks...um..." His eyes searched her apron.

Nancy looked down, "Crap.. I must have forgotten my name tag too. I'm Nancy." With that, she ran back to the kitchen before he could respond.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

In her small college economics class, Nancy was sure only about one thing. If you stayed there long enough and got on the teacher's good side, he'd let you pass, even if you did nothing but zone out, which is what Nancy ultimately did after one of her tiring shifts at the diner.

"Now if you look at the recent trend in sales here..." Professor Micheals paused to pull out a chart on the projector screen.

Blah. Blah. Blah. Just fast-forward so I can go to Literature and get my degree in that.

Yawning, Nancy tapped her pencil once more before receiving a paper ball to the back of her head. She whipped around, amused, to find her friend Jessica waving at her.

"Grow up." Nancy stuck her tongue at her.

"Look who's talking." Jessica whispered.

"Ahem, ladies."

Nancy turned to the front to find her professor glaring in her direction.

"This may be a far smaller class than most colleges have, but I do expect you to act like college students and behave. Understood? Miss Thompson, Miss Bernett?"

"Yes sir." They said in unison, which both caused them to giggle hysterically, as immature as it was.

"I really don't know how you two-"

Professor Micheal's scolding was cut off by the creaking of the classroom door. A young man with dark hair and a handsome face came into the room, wearing a collared shirt and khakis, he was replica of the person Nancy saw at the diner.

"Ah, Mr. Thomas! Good of you to come in!" Professor Micheal's said, "I was just about wondering where you were-"

"Yes, yes. Sorry I'm late." The man shook the professors hand and faced the class, "Shall I begin my presentation then?"

"Absolutely! Now class, this man here is the very special guest to our curriculum I told you about in the beginning of the year..."

The rest of Professor Micheal's words were drowned out by the sudden suspicions going through Nancy's mind.

His quite the looker...

...Well no kidding.

But there's something off about him, I mean, it's not like everyday our small dumpy college gets a man like this...

Okay, now I'm starting to overthink. Can't afford to get paranoid now...

Breathe, Nancy.

In and out, Nancy.

One more time, Nancy.

Now Nancy-

Nancy-

"Nancy!"

Nancy started and looked around bewilderingly, "Huh?"

Professor Micheals huffed. "Would you pay attention, please? Mr. Thomas just asked if you would like to assist him in demonstrating something on the projector."

"Oh, uh no. No thank you I-"

"I think you owe it to him for not focusing when you should be. Get up there and have a go at it." Professor Micheals crossed his arms.

"But I won't know what-"

"Just go! He'll tell you."

"Okay." Nancy straightened herself up, "Alright. I'm going."

She side-stepped her way through the aisle and rose up to the projector. Mr. Thomas gave her a warm smile,

"Give me your hand." He whispered.

Nancy complied by holding out her palm.

He smirked, "Cool. Now hold this," He placed a blue marker in her hand, his fingertips brushing her skin.

Nancy's cheeks grew pink at the contact, she couldn't help it. "What am I supposed-?"

But "Mr. Thomas" didn't listen, and continued speaking, "Now, as useful as Nancy is as a marker-holder, I must get back to the stock exchange..."

Really? I'm just standing here the whole time?

After Mr. Thomas lecture, papers and pencils were being shoved back into bags, makeup being tucked into purses, and most of all, the female body of the class were chatting away as usual, only instead of the wild raves they were planning this weekend, the main topics happened to be:

"God, did you see Mr. Thomas's bod-"

"-He's pretty hot, I'd totally-"

"-real smartass too-"

"-I heard his family's rich-"

"-heard he's young and single-"

"-Can you believe he's our age too?-"

"-bullshit. Bet he's taken-"

And so on and so forth. Typical girl mush. But Nancy had learned to ignore it, and with the suspicions she had, it only made it harder this time.

"So what do you think of that Thomas guy?" Jessica piped up beside her as they walked out of the classroom.

Nancy turned to her friend in disbelief, "Christ, Jess. Not you too."

Jessica rolled her eyes. "Oh come on. You don't get men that like here everyday...just tell me what you think of him."

Nancy turned around. Mr. Thomas was close by, but enough of her classmates blocked the way between them.

"I think he's an asshole."

"Oh please. You don't even know him!"

"All I know is that his parents are rich and that he called me out in front of the whole class. That gives him a 90% chance of being a jerk."

Jessica laughed. "Rumors, sweetie. Rumors."

Nancy sighed, "Look, it's just that the guy is giving me a weird vibe, alright?"

"What weird vibe? He's cute and-"

"And that's all there probably is to him, Jess! I mean, the guy-"

"Um, Nancy, he's-

"I know. I know. He's hot, cute, and smart and he's in our economics division, but that doesn't mean he still not-"

"Nancy he's-" Jessica looked urgently over Nancy's shoulder.

"He seems like a normal guy, I know. Now call me insane, but the vibe I'm getting just feels a little off. Do you think we've seen him someplace before or-"

"No, Nancy, your imagination is just on overdrive."

Jessica groaned. Nancy coughed and turned around, seeing a smug looking Mr. Thomas with a briefcase in his hand.

"The name's John Thomas, and I'm sorry that if brushing hands with a

guy makes you so hot and bothered. Just remind me next time that you're a prude virgin so we can take it even slower." Chuckling, he pushed through Nancy and down the stairs.

"That freaking-!" Nancy made a move to follow him.

"Shh!" Jessica pulled the back of her shirt, "Your not helping anything by doing that! This isn't high school!"

Nancy shoved Jessica off, "Well, for one, it will help me feel better, and two, maybe I can find out who this guy really is. So let me go."

Nancy went down two flights of stairs and eventually caught up with John in the lobby.

"You know, you've got some nerve talking to a girl like that!" Nancy grabbed his shoulder.

"And you have some nerve trying to play detective and sort me out as some freak! Do you think that's a good flirting technique or something?" John glared at her, "It's just creepy."

Nancy exhaled deeply. "Okay. Look, yea. I'm...I'm..."

I'm what?

"-sorry....It's just that.."

Umm.

"I had this really weird nightmare yesterday and it's made me kind of freaked out and I guess I starting thinking too much about the whole thing."

It'd be so much funnier if it weren't true.

John just stared at this statement, then half-jokingly said,

"Well... I guess that's right. I mean, no offense, your cute and all, but you look really stressed out right now."

He..believed me? Wow I- Oh, wait, can't blow my cover.

Nancy pressed her hands to her face, "Yeah. That makes sense...it's so awkward. Thanks a lot, Mr. Thomas."

John reached into his pocket and pulled out a cigarette. "Call me John. Wanna smoke? It helps your nerves."

"Sure. I could use one."

Nancy followed him outside. The night breeze cooled her burning face.

"I'm sorry about that whole virgin thing, too. I was just messin'

around." He handed her the cigarette and lit it up.

"It's fine. I overreacted. I just need to chill, ya know?"

Nancy took a drag of her cigarette, soaking in the nicotine for a few moments.

Out of the corner of her eye, Nancy saw something move.

she noticed it was Grey fedora hat tumbling across the street.

"What the-?"

John moved his gaze to her, "Something wrong?"

And just like that, the hat was out of sight.

Nancy blinked twice, took another puff of her cigarette.

It's not his hat. It's not his hat.

"Nothing. I just thought I saw somebody. That's all." She gave him what she hoped would be a convincing smile.

God. I need some medication.