Anyways here's another update for you all and just a heads up, there will be no new updates for the entire month of March. I promise though that i will update again asap in early April! I'll explain everything!
I hope you all enjoy and just a small spoiler alert, the next chapter to this story things are going to start being found out soooo enjoy ;)
It was one week after Amy had confronted Gabe about Professor Cox and yet she still felt ill at ease about the whole thing. She couldn't help the nagging feeling that she had in the pit of her stomach that there was something that she kept missing. Yet every single time she tried to think about it, it faded away like fog.
Just then, before she could give her brain a bigger headache, Jazz burst into the room.
"Amy! Lance is back!" Jazz shouted out to her. Her eyes were glowing and she was beaming with a wide smile from ear to ear.
Amy couldn't help but smile back at her friend's happiness and excitement. She was excited to for Lance coming back, but every time she thought of him she couldn't help but think of that night. Amy shook her head mentally and reprimanded herself. Hadn't she decided that she might have heard wrong? They could have been talking about anything after all, and since she didn't know the whole story she could have accidentally rushed to conclusions.
She did need to talk about what had happened though with Professor Cox. Not the whole thing, but him dying definitely had to be talked about. For some reason, she had the sinking suspicion that Gabe had lied to her that day, and she wanted to give Lance the benefit of the doubt it assuaging her fears, telling her that she was being irrational and to not think any more on it.
Standing up Amy smiled at her friend. "Well, what are we waiting for? Let's go find him!"
Jazz bounced up and down in excitement. "Let's go then!"
They both ran out of the dorm room, bursting out of their building and running across the campus. It was true that Lance actually owned the biggest house up on the hill, or his parents did, but since they were always on business trips, or so he had told them, he decided to room down in the dorms where people came and went all the time. Lance always claimed that the big house was too quiet for just one person to live in and Amy had to agree with him on that.
Bursting into the dorm building for the boys, they quickly ran up the stairs. Guys walking down plastered themselves against the opposite sides of the walls in an effort to make space. Some called out catcalls and jeers as the two of them whizzed by, the two of them just ignored the calls and continued onwards.
Amy was never gladder for times like these when she wasn't limping anymore from her injuries. They had all healed up relatively quickly which amazed her but she shook it off. Even the ugly slap mark that had marred her face was practically gone, only a faint greenish tinge was left to her skin, and even that had mostly faded. This she was glad for as now, so she could easily write off what had happened should Lance ask. She had never been more thankful for freedom of movement since she didn't have to feel her constant injuries any more during the day or night.
Finally, getting to Lance's dorm room, they pounded harshly on it.
"Lance! Open the door for us! It's your two favorite ladies!" Jazz shouted at the door.
Doors opened on the other side of the hallways as guys' heads poked out to look at them. Some just shook their heads and disappeared back inside, while others watched for a time then started talking to one another as they noticed some of their friends. Some even just kept watching them. Amy rolled her eyes as this; the male of the species just confused her.
Suddenly, the door opened wide and Lance's beaming smile lit them up like torch. He looked healthy and his skin had a pink shine to it. His wavy brown hair fell in a gentle curtain around his face resting just above his chin. Blue eyes sparkled at the two of them as he took them both in. His body powerfully muscled, with broad shoulders. Amy could never get over how handsome Lance really was. He was a real downright heartthrob and any girl would want him; rugged in features and strong in body, he could make any straight girl swoon with his devilish smile.
"Jazz, Amy it's good to see you girls again!" Lance exclaimed to the both of them as he wrapped them up in a giant hug, sweeping them off the floor and into his tight embrace.
Amy and Jazz wheezed at the tight pressure on their significantly smaller bodies. Finally, Jazz seemed to get some air back into her lungs and gasped out, "Okay Lance…really need to loosen the grip right now otherwise my eyes are going to pop out like ping pong balls."
Amy winced at the mental picture that that created in her mind, but still sighed in relief when Lance reluctantly placed the two of them back on the ground. He smiled sheepishly at the both of them and rubbed his thumb under his nose, wincing as he saw them both rub their ribs. Looking at the two of them from under his thick brown eyebrows, he smiled.
"Sorry girls, but you know how I get when I see my two favorite ladies," he said smoothly to them.
Amy blushed slightly at this, and Jazz just rolled her eyes at him. Knocking a light punch into his shoulder, which Lance frowned at, she asked him, "Lance, can we come in for a second? We need to talk to you right now."
Lance gave them both a curious glance then nodded slowly. Stepping back, he allowed them into the room. Walking over the threshold Amy took in what the boy's dormitories looked like. It pretty much was the same layout as hers and Jazz's just in this case it was the opposite way around with the hallway leading off to two rooms on their right instead of their left.
Lance closed the door gently behind them on the curious faces still peering outside and turned around to look at them confused.
"Okay girls, so what have I missed?" he asked them.
Amy fidgeted slightly. 'Well you missed a lot, I got straight marks in all my exams, almost raped by a professor, said professor dies shortly after that, and now I'm being completely paranoid for a really good reason about Gabe,' Amy thought to herself without voicing this out loud.
Instead, she kept her silence hoping that Jazz would take up this roll instead. She wasn't disappointed as Jazz started talking immediately after Lance had asked the question.
"Well have you heard the news on campus lately?" asked Jazz skipping right to the heart of the situation.
Lance frowned at the question. "Well I've heard rumors, but that's about all," he admitted to them.
"Like what kind of rumors?" Jazz persisted with him.
Lance rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. "Well, like rumors that one of the teachers committed suicide just a week ago."
Jazz and Amy both nodded slowly at this. Lance stared at the both of them; his eyes continuously darting from one to the other in disbelief. Slowly he started to chuckle aloud and walked over to one of the windows to look down at the grounds. Amy and Jazz looked at each other for a split second then turned to stare at Lance's back.
"I'm sorry, I must have missed the joke, Lance," said Jazz.
Lance turned to the both of them slowly. Amy could have sworn that she saw a guarded expression shining from deep within his eyes. When she blinked though to take a closer look the glimmer was gone and replaced by something that could have been sorrow?
Lance shook his head and sighed. "Honestly it's not Jazz, I just can't wrap my mind around something like this; its huge news."
Jazz nodded in understanding. "We know Lance; it's taken us awhile to fully wrap our own heads around what has happened."
Lance nodded. "Yeah, I'm sorry about that guys, I'm not laughing cause I find the situation funny, actually quite the opposite. Whenever I'm presented with a serious situation, like something like this for example, I laugh to deal with the horror of it."
Amy frowned to herself. Finally, she blurted out what she really wanted to say.
"Lance, could Gabe have anything to do with this?"
Jazz turned to stare at her with a disbelieved look taking over her features. Lance stared at her in shock and confusion and was that fear? Finally, shaking his head he laughed again at this.
"Amy why would you even ask something like that?" asked Lance in a dismissive tone. Yet Amy could have sworn that she heard a hard edge to his voice starting to leak through.
She shook her head and looked at the floor then quietly said, "Lance, just tell me the truth, please, and just trust me, could he have anything to do with this?"
Lance sighed. "No Amy he couldn't have. I've known Gabe for quite a while and I don't think he would ever do something like that."
"But Lace what if-!"
"Amy enough!" Lance raised his voice at her; staring with a mad glint in his eyes.
Amy flinched at the look. She felt as if she was just frozen to the floor at the icy tone that Lance had yelled at her with. Never before had he raised his voice at her, and it had taken her off guard. Why was he so sensitive about this? 'Well jeez Amy, your claiming one of his friends had something to do with a man's death wouldn't you be insulted to?' She thought to herself sadly. Shaking her head, she realized that maybe she pushed too fast and hard to soon. Or she made a huge mistake. People died by accident all the time.
'Maybe I just have someone, like an angel, watching out for me and making sure the people that hurt me get punished?' Amy thought to herself, 'no I don't want that, I don't want someone to get hurt because of me.'
Looking back up at Lance across from her Amy sadly nodded her head. "I'm sorry Lance really, I shouldn't have accused Gabe of this, and now I realize that I was so wrong. Please forgive me?"
Lance sighed at this and lightly pinched the bridge of his nose. Looking up at her after a few minutes of silence he nodded. "Okay Amy, I forgive you but just one thing, will you tell me why you actually thought that?"
Amy sighed again at this question. "Look Lance, if it's all the same to you I would prefer not to right now. I'll tell you one day and I promise you that just not today, I need more time and besides I've already made a fool of myself once I don't really want to repeat the experience again."
Lance nodded. "Amy I'm sorry, I didn't mean to snap at you it's just he's a real close friend of mine and I guess, I'm just really over protective of him, so please don't be to mad but how would you feel if one of your other close friends accused your other good friend of murder?"
Amy nodded her head in understanding as she had just thought about this herself. Jazz sighed in relief, as the tension in the room seemed to evaporate.
"Okay so were all agreeing at what happened to Professor Cox was just a freak accident and nothing more? Amy you're not going to still keep up this ridiculous notion that Gabe is somehow responsible for this, are you?" asked Jazz quietly.
Amy nodded her head quickly. Then before the other two could say anything more, she blurted out, "I'm just going to go for a walk, okay guys?"
Jazz and Lance stared at her in worry. Lance then spoke, "Amy are you sure? You can stay if you want."
Amy shook her head. "No its okay Lance, I want to get some fresh air anyways, and besides it's really nice out; I wouldn't mind going out to enjoy the weather."
Lance nodded at this but just before he said bye he frowned at her. "Amy, what's that over your cheek?"
She blanched and froze as she was turning towards the door. Jazz even seemed to freeze at the unexpected question. Amy's mind was whirling from all the thoughts passing through her. She could lie and say it was nothing and just the trick of the light or she could make up some kind of lame ass excuse and hopefully lead Lance away from what really happened.
Swallowing past a sudden lump in her throat Amy squeezed out one sentence, "Oh it's nothing Lance, Jazz just accidentally opened a door in my face a week ago and the bruise is still fading," she replied faking a cheery smile and eye roll.
Jazz stared at her with her mouth dropped down to the floor at Amy's blatant lie. Amy quietly tried to signal with her eyes for Jazz to play along and also trying to communicate to her a silent apology. She was amazed at how hard Professor Cox had slapped her that evening. The bruise was a few weeks old and still had a slight greenish tinge. She had borrowed some concealer from Jazz and covered it the best she could but other than that, it was out of her hands. She needed Jazz to play along though. Seemingly, to get the unspoken message Jazz barely nodded her head.
"Oh yeah Lance, that was all my bad!" Jazz exclaimed from behind him rubbing the back of her head nervously with her right hand. Lance turned to look at her with an eyebrow arched at the little girlish pixie. "See I accidentally swung my door open so fast that I hit Amy right in the face with it; she's been wearing my concealer for like the last week to hide the bruise."
Lance was quiet for a moment then a wide grin split his face as he threw his head back and started laughing. Jazz and Amy shared a quick look at this, Amy conveying gratitude to her friend, while Jazz was somewhat confused as to why her friend wanted her to lie in the first place. After a few moments, Lance seemed to have calmed down and looked back at the two of them. Wiping a tear from his eye, he chuckled quietly.
"Well I have to say Amy that that doesn't surprise me that Jazz did something like that," Lance, said quickly, "she's always doing something along those lines anyways."
Amy smiled a shy smile at Lance, quietly agreeing.
"Well I'm just gonna head out for now guys," Amy said, turning on her heel and waving behind her back.
"Okay Aims, but we all gotta hang out again sometime soon and watch another movie!" Lance shouted at her retreating back.
"I'll see you in the dorm room, girl," Jazz said to her as she started to walk out the door.
Amy gave the both of them the thumbs up as she quietly closed the door behind her. Walking back down the dorm room hallway, doors still propped open from the inhabitants in the rooms, she started to reflect. Lance always struck her as someone that was protective over their friend's well-being and all, but something wasn't really adding up to her in her mind; that conversation that she had overheard him and Gabe talking about outside kept making her feel slightly nervous. If Gabe was somehow a convict, what had he done? Or was it something completely different?
Amy sighed to herself as this thought spun around in her head for what felt like had to be the thousandth time. She knew there was no way of getting a real answer unless she asked one of them, and to do that would be to admit that she had overheard them and look like a complete snoop whether she meant to overhear or not.
Then there was Jazz. That eye thing that she could have sworn she had witnessed her friend do not too long ago, gave her the shivers, but she just shrugged it off thinking that it could have been the lights. Frowning to herself, Amy knew that it was a feeble excuse and she had never seen them go crimson before, but really what other choice did she have? She liked to believe that there was something else out there; she just didn't know how far she would believe exactly without being a witness to it with her own eyes.
The next thing that she still had to wonder about was Gabe himself. He said that he never touched the professor. Could she believe him? He promised that he wouldn't and Amy really wanted to believe him on that but was it smart to let her guard down on something like this when her gut was telling her otherwise? I guess it really came down to whether she felt like she could trust Gabe and whether or not she thought that he would ever hurt her. Both answers were yes and no on those two questions. Yes, she thought she could trust him and no, she did not think that he would ever hurt her.
Stepping outside finally into the fresh air Amy breathed deeply and closed her eyes. She listened to the wind whistle through the still bare trees, how it carried that cold scent of winter. Opening her eyes, she looked up into crystal clear blue skies. Smiling Amy vowed to herself as she looked up at the great blue expanse above her.
'I mean it from this point forwards, new start about Gabe,' she thought to herself, 'if Gabe told me that he had nothing to do with it then fine he didn't. I'm just being paranoid now and its becoming annoying, not only to myself but to the others as well; besides, it's not like I knew what I would do if he was really doing something around the campus, but I shouldn't judge him on rumors, suspicions or situations that have arisen without any hard proof.'
Nodding to herself Amy decided to walk around campus. She was briskly walking and thinking over all her classes and what she still needed to finish that she wasn't paying any attention to where her feet were taking her. Suddenly, she collided with a hard and immovable wall in front of her.
"Oomph!" Amy let out a surprised gasp as she took a few steps back from having lost her balance with colliding into said wall.
"Oh I'm sorry!" said a deep masculine voice in front of her.
Amy shook her head to clear it and looked up…and up. Standing in front of her had to be one of the tallest men that she had ever met in her life. He stood probably 6 foot with short shaggy brown hair. Large, soulful brown eyes looked down at her in concern. He sure was handsome she had to give him that; even Lance would have a run for his money with this guy.
"Are you okay?" the man asked again, "look I'm really sorry that I was standing right in front of you, I didn't know you were coming up…"
Amy laughed nervously at this. "Oh no I'm sorry! I wasn't paying attention to where I was going, you know focused on other things like school for one."
The man laughed with her as she explained. Just as she was, about to introduce herself another man came running up to them. He was shorter than the one standing in front of her. He also had short brown hair but not as shaggy as the taller one. Green eyes graced his features with flecks of hazel in them. While he was shorter, he also had muscle like the taller one. Both had extremely good bodies and looked like they kept in shape; both blessed with good looks.
"Hey Sam, I found a girl to talk to," said the shorter man to the taller one.
Amy turned to look at the one in front of her. "Oh so your name is Sam then?" she asked innocently.
Dean did a double take, finally noticing the petite blonde standing in front of his brother. He smiled at her and stuck his hands into his jeans pockets.
"Hey there, and who might you be?" he asked her.
Amy cocked an eyebrow at this blatant display of flirting but didn't say anything on it. Unbeknownst to her Sam rolled his eyes at his brother flirting with this college girl and had to hold back a smirk, he had a funny feeling that Dean wasn't going to get too far with this one.
"Oh my names, Amy," Amy answered sweetly as she held out her hand politely.
Dean stared at the hand, shocked for a second, then lightly grabbed it, and shook hers.
"My names Dean, and obviously you've already met my brother, Sam," Dean replied to her.
Sam smiled at her and Amy smiled at the both of them.
"So, what exactly brings you two here?" she asked them curiously while looking from one to the other.
"Oh just checking the wiring in some of the buildings around here, making sure their still up to par," Sam quickly offered an explanation to her.
Amy nodded as she accepted the reason. "So you guys are electricians or something?"
"Or something," Dean said doggedly.
Amy gave him a confused and curious stare. Sam quickly cleared his throat and she turned to him again. Giving her a tight smile he asked her, "Amy, could you point us back towards the main building?"
"Oh yeah sure it's just over that way, I have to go this way anyways back to my dorm," Amy told them politely as she pointed off to her left.
Sam and Dean nodded to her. "Well it was nice meeting you Amy," Sam politely responded to her, Dean nodded his head.
Amy smiled at the both of them. "It was a pleasure to boys."
With that, she turned on her heel to walk to her dorm. Dean suddenly shouted at her from behind, and she turned to glance at him in confusion; she saw Dean waving something in the air as he came walking up to her.
"Hey, did you drop this?" he asked her as he held it out, "we assumed it was yours considering Sam swears it wasn't there when he got here."
Amy lightly takes the item and looks at it sitting in her palm. It's a candy bar, a Snickers to be exact. She frowns slightly to herself s she tries to remember where it came from. Suddenly, she realizes that she's wearing the coat that Gabe gave to her that one night a few weeks back. He must have had that sitting in there, and I'm just finding it now she was thinking to herself as she smiled up at the boys.
"Thanks guys, but it's not mine," Amy admitted to them, "but I think I know who this belongs to so thank you."
Sam and Dean both shrugged at her and gave her identical goofy smiles.
Amy quickly stuffed the chocolate bar back into her pocket and started to walk away. 'Oh Gabe,' she thought to herself as she smiled at the thought. She guessed it was his way of hoping that she would feel better soon, and she had to admit it did bring a warm feeling inside.
She was almost to her dorm when she saw an older boy wearing a red and white football jacket yelling at another boy. The one doing the yelling was probably about 5'7 or so Amy thought. He had dirty blonde hair, a pudgy kind of build and small piggish eyes. He was jeering at the other boy as he yelled at him.
The other boy was significantly smaller than the other guy. He had dark hair, possibly black, guarded eyes, and a small stature. He definitely wasn't as pudgy as the other guy, but he was lean and Amy had to bet that if she needed to bet on someone that could win a race of the two it would have to be the smaller boy.
Walking closer to the two arguing guys she could overhear what they were saying to each other.
"Look Steve, you can't keep over working all the players the way you're doing!" yelled the smaller man.
"I can do whatever the hell I want you little pansy so shut up and just do what I say!" yelled Steve, "I'm captain of the team not you so it's about time you learned that!"
The other guy sighed and rolled his eyes. "Seriously, just because you're the captain does not mean you have to work all your players as hard as you're doing, and it certainly doesn't mean that you can be a complete jerk and a bully also!"
"Say that again you little jerk," said Steve threateningly.
Amy felt as if she had to step in at this point before blows were going to be thrown. She didn't want to get involved but it felt wrong to her to be the bystander and let it all happen. Swallowing hard and mustering up all her courage, she walked over to the two arguing boys. They both stopped and stared at her as she came up to them.
"Hey, I couldn't help but overhearing back there-"Amy started to say but just then the bigger guy, Steve, cut her off.
"Well obviously you could since your interrupting us now," scoffed Steve to her.
Amy tensed slightly at his condescending tone of voice. She was shaking slightly not having stuck up for very many people before, and that was including herself as well. Still she knew that she had to stand her ground, something inside of her was telling her to take a stand, and she would try to listen to it no matter how much she was starting to get scared.
'Jazz is much more cut out for this than I am that's for sure,' Amy thought to herself.
Gritting her teeth together, she looked up at Steve. "Well you shouldn't treat people the way you do! It's mean and he's a person to!" she exclaimed gesturing over to the other boy, "everyone deserves respect and if everyone treated each other with kindness this place wouldn't be the way it is."
"Why you-"Steve started to say but was interrupted by a loud cough that came from the side of them.
They all turned and Amy saw Gabe standing there. None of them had even seen him walk up or heard him for that matter. He was incredibly quiet to have done that. Right now Gabe was staring at Steve with a hard glint to his eyes, perusing the younger boy up and down. Steve glared at him but shifted nervously from foot to foot under Gabe's intense stare.
"Is there a problem here?" asked Gabe somewhat innocently to the untrained ear, but Amy had heard this tone of voice, it was the voice that said either treat each other nicely or back off and I will make you. She tried to hold in a smile at Gabe and instead looked at Steve to see what his reaction would be.
"No problem at all," Steve said to assure Gabe, "just having a friendly conversation."
Gabe stared at him hard, Amy saw Steve swallow deeply, and a small drop of sweat run down the side of his face.
"I think you should beat it kid," said Gabe sternly, "I know trouble when I see it and I've heard enough with my own two ears so get lost."
Steve looked as if he was about to object but then something caught him. He seemed to pale slightly before Amy's eyes as he stared at Gabe. Turning her attention back to her friend, she noticed nothing different about him, but something had obviously happened that she missed to cause Steve to react the way he did.
Nodding nervously he quickly spun on his heel and dashed away.
Amy and the other boy watched him go then turned back to Gabe who was still standing there. He offered each one of them a broad smile and whistled.
"Well I don't think he'll be bothering you guys for quite some time anymore," Gabe said to them both, nonchalant, as he took another candy bar out of his pocket and un-wrapped it.
Amy rolled her eyes as she watched this display for what felt like the hundredth time, then asked, "Why do you say that, Gabe?"
"Because I know bullies, the trick with them is to stand up to them and show them whose boss. Once you do that, they scamper off faster than a dog with its tail between its legs," said Gabe in explanation.
The other boy that was standing next to them looked at Gabe and nodded in thanks. "Hey man, thanks for that, he's a real dick, treats all the guys like shit and over works us to the point where there have been a few collapses."
Gabe frowned at this and shook his head from side to side. "I'm sure he'll get what's coming to him soon man; in the meantime though take care of yourself and stay cool," Gabe replied winking at the boy.
The boy flashed a smile at them and nodded, turning around he started to walk in the opposite direction towards the boy's dorms.
Amy turned and looked at Gabe standing next to her.
"That was nice of you to step in," she remarked smiling at him, ignoring the uneasy concern over Gabe's last words in his sentence.
Gabe shrugged at that. "Ah any decent person would have done that."
Amy just rolled her shoulders at that. "Maybe, maybe not."
Gabe smiled at her then asked with total seriousness, "So how you feeling Aim's? Any better?"
Amy sighed and nodded her head. "Much better Gabe actually, thanks for asking."
Gabe stared at her sadly. "Want to talk about it yet?"
Amy shook her head as she smiled as a way of an apology towards him. "No Gabe, I'm just not quite ready yet, but I do promise you that when I'm ready to talk I will talk to all you guys."
Gabe nodded his head sadly at her; accepting her explanation graciously.
"Well I better get going, got a lot of stuff to do," Amy smiled at him trying to cheer up a little.
Gabe gave her one of his comical smirks and said, "That's the Aim I know, always studying, what an Einstein!"
Amy laughed at this and nodded. "Yup that's exactly who I am! Einstein!"
Gabe laughed with her then slowly started to turn away as Amy started to walk again.
"See you soon Aim!" Gabe called back to her retreating form.
Amy smiled and turned around to wave good-bye. As she did and looked behind her, she noticed that Gabe was nowhere in sight. Frowning to herself Amy scanned the whole immediate campus for a sign of his presence and found nothing to show her that he had been standing there the whole time.
Amy's frown deepened as she turned back to keep walking. She couldn't help but think one thing all the way back to her dorm.
'Are my fears actually rational?'