"I keep telling her no, but she doesn't listen to me. She's kind of making me uncomfortable." I explained. I was in the office of a lady who was in charge of discipline or whatever. Just, anyone higher up than me I would gladly go to.

"And you say she followed you home?" She asked.

"Yeah, I never told her my address, so, either she like, looked it up or something or followed me. I just, don't want her around me anymore."

"I'll see what I can do, Jess, okay? I'll try to talk with her." She nodded and I stood up to leave.

"Thank you. Good luck." I muttered the last part to myself and left. I felt a little better she didn't just tell me to ignore it or whatever.

"YOU TOLD ON ME?" A voice screamed behind me. I whirled around and was face to face with an angry Lydia. Hold up, Angry? She's rarely angry.

"How could you tell on me? I was trying to be nice, and accepting of your identity! And you tell on me saying you're uncomfortable? William?" She nudged me in an, unfriendly way.

That triggered me. I was shook. She was scaring me now, like, legit scaring me. I don't handle yelling well. Especially out of nowhere and in front of many students.

"L-Lydia, stop.." I stuttered but she continued, coming closer to me.

"No! All I wanted was for you to be happy, and for you to have friends! I never see you talking with anyone other than me! I just wanted what's best for you and you return my deeds with this? I was told to stay away from you!"

I didn't even know what to say. I just wanted all the eyes off of me. Wait, she wanted what was best for me? She wants me to be happy? "If you want me happy, leave me alone!" I countered. "You never do! You're always in my hair, asking to hang out, wanting to do stuff, I say no, but you continue! Do you know how uncomfortable I feel day to day when you're around me? How is that making me happy?" She reeled back, her expression changing instantly.

"Oh, I'm sorry.." She said awkwardly. I didn't want to be there anymore. So, I turned around and left. I left, got into my van, and headed home. I was just glad tomorrow was Saturday. I had the entire weekend to get all this hopefully out of my head.

It was Sunday night and nothing left my head. Nothing was forgotten. I was terrified to show my face at school tomorrow, and I think my mom and Owen could tell how anxious I was.

"Are you okay, Jess?" Mom asked.

"Yeah, just, got a test tomorrow." I said quickly. "Uh, math test."

"Did you study at all?" Owen asked.

"Yeah, I did. I studied at school on Friday."

"Then you'll do good, kiddo." He smiled. "What's it on?"

This is when I began to panic. I didn't have a math test, and honestly, I didn't even remember what we were doing in math. I also didn't want to tell them about Lydia. They would definitely do something about it and I didn't want them involved. I had a feeling though my hesitation was making them concerned that I actually didn't study so I had to blurt something out. "Logarithms. And, stuff like that."

"Ah, that shouldn't be too bad." Owen said. "Do you get to use a calculator?"

"Yeah, I do."

"Easy as cake."

"Owen's pretty good at math, so if you need any help, Jess, he's the one to go to." Mom said. I only nodded. Honestly, I wasn't sure if I wanted to go to bed at all. I didn't want tomorrow to come, but if I didn't get to sleep, I'd be exhausted, and it would come eventually anyways. Well, I mean that kinda just answered my brain. I decided to go to bed early, but, not actually sleep. I just watched YouTube videos until I ended up passing out.

The next morning, I was a nervous wreck as I got out of my van. Have I ever said how popular my family was? My mom is a really good waitress at a fancy restaurant, and in this small town, everyone knows everybody. People who have been served by my mom know me, and we're all kinda this big, like, family or friend group or whatever, even though I know like, no one. So when I walked into school, my panic attack rose even higher. Students gave me sympathetic looks, some told me they were sorry for what happened, and others wanted to chat and get to know more about this situation. Me, I wanted to FORGET this situation. Talking more about it would definitely get Lydia deeper in whatever deep water she was already in, and I didn't want to escalate things that far. Cause I'm that nice of a person.

I didn't see her anywhere though. She wasn't there. I figured she was definitely skipping. It didn't problem me because the more people chatted with me, the more I opened up. I didn't talk about Lydia, but I talked about other things. Like other people's math tests and mine, and what we were gonna do the next day if we found out we failed. Don't people talk about those kinda things? I wouldn't know, no one has ever talked to me as much as they did today. Once I got home, I really wanted to sleep. Social interaction really drains my soul and energy.

"How's that test?" Owen asked as I walked in the door.

"Fine, I think I did good." I sighed. "Busy day."

"Glad to hear it, champ. Hey, your mom and I are gonna go on a trip this weekend, wanna come?"

"Sure, where to?" I set down my backpack.

"Just over to the next town. None of the towns here have what I need for my house and we gotta pick up some stuff from Home Depot."

"Cool, yeah, I'll come." I liked road trips. Music and watching scenery go by was my favorite pastime. I couldn't refuse that offer.