Here is the next chapter! A new POV for this one. It's pretty short, but my net chapter is fairly long, so hopefully, that will make up for it.

Please enjoy!

~TH~

Katherine looked down at her phone, Her thumbs typing away through her touch screen gloves. Yes she was going to Darcy's party this weekend. No she didn't really want to. Yes her dad was making her.

She was about to push send on a message when she collided with someone. They both fell to the ground, her phone still tightly held in her hand.

"Oh, shoot, sorry." A voice said, the other person scrambling to their feet.

A hand was reached out from above her and she accepted it. Even through the glove she could feel the icy coldness of the hand.

"Sorry, I- Oh, Katherine, hey." Jack. It was Jack Kelly, from History. He rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly.

"Don't worry about it, I wasn't paying attention to where I was going." She watched him. He was shaking. He was wearing that same grey sweatshirt that he wore everyday. She understood favourites, but she couldn't remember ever seeing this guy NOT wearing it.

He laughed nervously, "Same." He was hugging his arms close to himself.

"How long have you been inside? You look like you're freezing."

He looked startled, "Oh, uh, not long. The, the heater went out last night at my apartment. Not a big deal, just cold for the moment." He let out a short laugh.

"Are you going to be able to get that fixed? I mean it's getting kind of cold out." She realized that this was the first time she had actually talked to Jack about something other than the project.

"Yeah, yeah, my guardian said it should be running by the time I get back."

Guardian. Interesting.

"Well, here." She pushed her phone into her pocket and pulled off her gloves. "Maybe this will warm you up faster."

He shook his head, "No, Katherine, I couldn't. There yours-"

"I've got hundreds of them at home."

"Your parents-"

"Won't even notice that they're gone. Trust me, Jack. Take them." She held them out again and this time he took them.

Jack slipped them onto his shaking hands. He laughed as they stretched. "I think my hands are a bit bigger than yours."

"It's fine. The material is made like that. And you can keep them so don't worry about stretching them."

He smiled at her. It was quite possibly the first time she had ever seen him smile in an unironic manner. It was kind of cute.

"Well, uh, thanks." He said, "See, ya later." He nodded to her and walked away.

~N~

She didn't see Jack after the initial run in until history. Katherine assumed that he had normal classes, while she took almost all AP. This was the only history she could fit in her schedule, so that's the only reason she had met Jack in the first place. She was still trying to find out if it was a good thing. He seemed sweet enough this morning, but her experience with him in class was very sarcastic and flippant.

Jack was in the hallway outside of the library, looking down at what she assumed was his phone. David turned to her, "Do you think he has actually done anything yet?"

She shrugged, "Probably not. I guess we'll see tonight."

Jack came in and sat across from them, dropping his backpack beside him. He smiled, but he looked extremely nervous. "So, uh, where are we at? Do we have an outline yet?"

She raised her eyebrow. He seemed to suddenly be taking an interest. His leg was bouncing up and down rapidly.

"We were still working on the out-"

A loud vibrating sound came from across the table and Jack flinched, his hand moving to his pocket.

"Sorry, just ignore that."

She nodded, "Okay, so we have most of the loose outline written but-"

Jack must have received three texts in a row. He closed his eyes and took a shuddering breath. Then he smiled a very weak, unrealistic smile.

"I'm sorry, but I should probably answer that."

He pushed away from the table and went out into the hallway and towards the bathrooms.

"What was that all about?"

David shrugged, "I honestly couldn't tell you. He's an interesting one, that's for sure." He paused, shaking his pencil. "Do you have any lead? I just ran out."

"No, uh, I got a pen." She rummaged through her pencil pouch to see if she had anything else. "Jack might have some." She reached for his bag.

"I doubt he would appreciate you going through this thing."

"Lemme just check the side pocket. " she unzipped it and was met with a small bottle. She pulled it out. "Concealer?"

"What?"

"Oh, in Jack's bag, he's got some sort of liquid concealer. Why would he have that?"

"I don't know, maybe he likes it, put it back."

"If he liked makeup wouldn't he be wearing more than just this? It's not even noticeable."

"Maybe he's embarrassed?"

"Could be..."

"Maybe he just has bad acne. It's none of our business. Wait, he's coming back, Katherine!"

She slipped it back in and zipped it up. He sat down with a nervous smile. His hands were shaking and he looked unnerved.

"Sorry about that."

"No problem," Katherine smiled, "is everything okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, it was just my foster dad."

Right. She remembered he had said guardian this morning.

"Oh, is your heater fixed?"

"Heater?"

"You know, this morning you said your heater broke."

"Oh, right! Sorry, yeah. He said he was able to fix it this morning. So that's good."

"Yeah." She said back. He fidgeted under her scrutinizing look.

Davey cleared his throat, "Uh, so, I was thinking that tonight when we meet, Kath, you can bring your computer and-"

"Tonight?" He looked slightly panicked.

"Yeah," Katherine answered, "You know, we talked about it last week. Six tonight at Jacobi's."

"Oh, right, I just, uh, forgot that that was tonight." He shrugged.

"Is it a problem?" Her mind shot back to her previous assumption that he hadn't even started on a visual aid.

He shook his head, but definitely looked nervous, almost sick. "No, I'll, uh, I'll be there."

"Good," there was an awkward pause in the conversation as Jack had a far away look in his eyes.

David again cleared the silence, "So, I just realized that neither of us have your number. It'd probably be a good idea to exchange them."

"Oh, uh, sure." Jack pulled out his small phone and laid it on the table.

Katherine didn't hesitate to pick it up and watched as Jack seemed to flinch, She probably didn't even want to know what he had on it.

"No password?" She laughed.

"Yeah, uh, don't need one, Nothing important on there. And, uh, my foster dad has an open phone policy, disabled the passcode. Supposed to keep me accountable or somethin'." He mumbled the ending but didn't respond. She opened up messages, Jack looked nervous, like he was about to snatch the phone away. The only conversation up was the title Spider. The text that was showing just said, "Yes, sir."

She was about to click on the message when David cleared his throat. Jack was visibly shaking, though he was trying to hide it. Checking her curiosity, she opened a new conversation, typed in her number and sent herself a text.

"I'll just send it to Davey and he can text you."

"Sounds good." He practically snatched the phone back.

Dave smiled hesitantly and clasped his hands together. "So, should we start with freedom of speech?"

~TH~

Katherine, bless her, is what we call book smart. She's simultaneously observant and oblivious.

Next chapter is already written and edited, so I should have it up tomorrow, depending on the response of this chapter.

I hope you enjoyed!

Stay safe my friends!

Gosh bless,
Jamie