Chapter 3

Hope put her head down and tried to concentrate on the worksheet once it was placed in front of her. Beside her, she could tell Connor had come into his element. Unfortunately, she still had the headphones on. Because of the Mute Charge track, she was unable to hear the danger until it was too late. The next thing she felt was her head striking the desk as the pen she'd been holding smashed into the right lens of her glasses. She was able to close her eye quick enough and the pen itself was a cheap and flimsy piece of crap just like the rest of the school supplies she'd been given by the care home. It splintered under the force of the impact in such a way that she only just avoided any pieces going through and into her eye.

With a scream of fury, Hope was on her feet in an instant and spinning to face her attacker as her headphones fell down around her neck. It was Alesha standing behind her with a smirk on her face as Hope ripped her glasses off. The damage was causing the right lens to act up, the colours she was seeing bleeding into one another and sometimes flickering into her usual monochrome vision. That was bound to give her a headache, so she set them down on the desk before turning to face Alesha.

"You think you can just show me up and get away with it?" Alesha snarled. "Come here!" With that, she went to grab Hope by the hair. Seeing it coming, Hope reached out and gripped Alesha's wrist with surprising strength. With her other hand, she grabbed the raven-haired girl by the throat. She made it look inhumanly effortless as she lifted her off the floor and threw her onto a stationary table under the window just behind them. The almighty crash it made as well as Alesha's screaming had the door flying open in a second and a teacher from the class next door came bursting into the room.

"What the hell is going on in here?" she bellowed. Hope sprang away from Alesha like she was boiling hot, bright white hand prints left behind on Alesha's neck and wrist. Alesha was screaming in terror and the teacher was storming into the room on the warpath. And Hope knew that pulling the headphones back up would only make things worse. She was just going to have to brace for impact on this one. "Somebody had better tell me what in the name of god just happened here or so help me-!" Connor raised his hand. Hope felt her spirits begin to rise. In that moment she didn't care whether he was unwilling or unable to lie. What mattered was that he told the truth at every turn.

"Alesha slammed Hope's head into the desk and broke her glasses then tried to grab her hair so Hope grabbed her by the wrist and neck and threw her onto the stationary table." Connor said in one breath. Okay, so it didn't completely get her out of trouble. Still, it was better than nothing.

"Which one of you is Hope?" the teacher asked. Hope raised her hand. It was a pointless question anyway since Alesha was still lying on the stationary table. The teacher turned to her, picking up the ruined glasses and looking them over before handing them back to her. "Go outside and take a minute to calm yourself down. I'll be out in a minute to hear your side of things." Hope nodded and took what was left of her glasses, heading outside. Once out there, she was free to pull her headphones up and put the Mute Charge back on so she couldn't hear the teacher shouting at Alesha.

Finally getting chance to think after the chaos that had just occurred, she turned her glasses over in her hands. The damage was potentially fixable. It was only the right lens that was busted. But she was dreading Max and Chloe finding out. In that moment, she got the scent of a cheap cologne that masqueraded as an expensive one. She could recognise the difference easily. And sure enough, she turned her head to see Mr Wells standing there with an expression ranging between anger and concern.

"And why are you out here and not doing your work?" he asked as he looked her over. She didn't want to turn the Mute Charge off and could just about hear him even with it on. "And what happened to your glasses?" Guessing that his hearing must have dulled when he got old, Hope just pulled open the door by way of a response. The shouting inside became clear and made Mr Wells take notice. He headed inside and Hope shut the door behind him. She didn't care what was being said. She didn't want to have to listen to that.

As she let go of the door, she noticed the bright white hand print left behind by her touch. Exactly the same as had been on Alesha's wrist and neck. There was another hand print too. This one was much larger and was further up the door where Mr Wells had pushed it open further as he went in. What was this? She'd never seen this before with her glasses on. And as she watched, the bright white prints began to fade slowly. She was transfixed as she saw the whiteness vanish bit by bit.

"Hey, Rain!" She looked over to see a girl who used to be in the same care home as her walking by. The two had always got along decently but unfortunately she'd been adopted much earlier due to being a couple of years older.

"Hey, Dani." Hope said, trying to hide her annoyance. "You know that's not my name. I'm Hope."

"Sorry." Dani cringed. "I keep forgetting." That was when Hope noticed something weird. Dani had one shoe in her hand, the foot that was covered only by a sock leaving a bright white trail of footprints on the floor. "Oh, yeah." Dani said, catching her looking. "A bird pooped as it was flying overhead and I moved out the way but didn't realise it got my shoe. I need to go clean it off. What about you?"

"Got my glasses smashed." Hope said sullenly, holding her glasses up.

"When did you get glasses?" Dani asked, confused. She hadn't seen Hope since she'd left the care centre when she'd found her new home, so she wasn't exactly up-to-date on everything.

"Wanna meet up sometime and I'll tell you all about it?" Hope hadn't really been able to meet up with friends before, so it was a new thing for her to ask. Still, she didn't suspect Max and Chloe would mind.

"Sure!" Dani nodded eagerly. "I need to go or the teachers are gonna wonder what's keeping me. And I can hear other people coming so it's not safe to talk here. See you round." With that, she headed off in the direction of the girls' bathrooms, a trail of glowing footprints from one foot left behind in her wake. As an experiment, she closed her right eye and held up her glasses. Sure enough, the intact lens showed colour but no glowing footprints. As soon as she removed them again, the glow was back. Looking back at the door showed the prints there had faded. That was good. That meant she both didn't have to worry about someone else being able to see the glowing hand prints she'd left on Alesha and Alesha showing her parents and using them against her. It seemed like only she could see them and only with her glasses off. They faded after a few minutes too.

Before she had any chance to ponder on it any further, Mr Wells came back out with a face like thunder. She looked up at him, wondering if he'd notice if she kept her headphones on through the verbal blasting she was inevitably about to take. But nothing happened. He simply gestured for her to follow him and walked in the direction of the office. She followed nervously, realising she was in too much trouble to even consider running for it. Her gut sank through the floor with nervousness, but she endured it and pressed on.

When they got to the Reception office, Mr Wells gestured for her to sit in one of the chairs. It was a rather plush one rather than the usual uncomfortable plastic ones and she realised it was the sort students were sat in when they were about to be sent home. Still, it wasn't perfect. She could feel the stuffing creak uncomfortably under her small frame as she sat down and she could practically smell the used chewing gum stuck under the seat. She tried her best to ignore it as Mr Wells picked up the phone and started dialling.

"Hello? Mrs Caulfield-Price? Yes, you've probably figured out from the voice. It's good to hear yours again... Well it's actually Mr Wells now. After Blackwell's destruction I took a step back and decided to take a job at Arcadia Bay Elementary. That's why I'm calling, actually. Unfortunately, young Miss Callows has just been in an altercation. We don't think she's the one at fault. The evidence is in her favour. There has been some property damage and we need to get the parents in to settle this matter. Also I have taken the decision that if you'd like to take her home for the day in the wake of this incident then you're more than welcome to do that... Perfect. Well, I shall be seeing you and Max shortly, it seems." He put the phone down and then started dialling again. This time to try and reach Alesha's parents. Hope braced for impact. Arcadia Bay was no stranger to storms, but she had a feeling that Max and Chloe when they were angry would make the one that wiped out the town all those years ago look like a cloudburst.

As it turned out, she was right. She saw the pickup pull into the parking lot not five minutes later and two very angry women storming up to the door. They blew in like a hurricane and nearly took the doors off their hinges as they stormed into the Reception office. They had faces like thunder and Chloe was already spouting threats to take Hope out of school and homeschool her. Hope found herself wishing there was a way to turn up the Mute Charge, but sadly the headphones were already maxed out. Her eyes met Max's for a second and Max's expression softened considerably. She made her way over and crouched down by her.

"Hey, sweetie. How are you doing?" She embraced her gently, her hand coming up to ruffle Hope's hair and bumping the headphones. She did a double-take, only just seeming to notice them. "What are these?"

"Connor let me borrow them." Hope replied. "They help when things get too noisy. He said I can keep them until I get my own. He's giving me the charging lead tomorrow."

"That depends on whether you're in school tomorrow." Max said, her tone light as though she was telling a joke. "And since you're not wearing your glasses, I'm thinking the property damage in question was- Ah! There we go." She spotted Hope's glasses on her lap and picked them up, turning them over in her hand to study the damage. "Wait there, honey. We'll be back in a minute or two." With that, she took the glasses and went into the office after Mr Wells. Even with the bubble of nothingness that the headphones helped create, she could quite clearly hear every word. She knew that Chloe's swear jar would be getting more than a few donations tonight. That was if Max didn't choose to let it go since she was equally as angry. At that moment, the door opened again. The woman in a pinstriped skirt suit with straight black hair who walked in opened her mouth to ask a question before registering the voices and turning to head in that direction. Hope had to applaud her bravery.

There was no doubting who the woman was. She stank of perfume and Alesha smelled of the same thing but fainter. It was the kind of thing that was passed on by body contact. Like through a hug just before school. The straight black hair also gave it away. Even without colour vision, Hope knew black and white when she saw them. Without a doubt, she was Alesha's mother. And that made her doubly brave for walking towards that chaos.

Shortly after, Alesha was brought into the office. Hope felt some degree of pity for the teacher who was having to man Mr Wells' class while he was dealing with this. The whole thing was shaping up to be a nightmare-sized mountain of paperwork. She didn't know how long she was waiting but it was more than a minute or two as Max had said. Eventually, everyone emerged from the office. Chloe had a face like thunder while Max just looked downcast. Alesha's mother was hauling her screaming from the school by her ear. As the door banged shut behind them, Max came over and crouched down again next to Hope while Chloe looked tempted to start punching something. Or someone. It was almost worrying how her gaze lasered in on Mr Wells as he emerged from the office, his face totally flushed.

"Okay, sweetie..." Max said as she took Hope by the hands. "Since your glasses are broken, we're going home today. We've already phoned ahead in there and the company will be sending another pair of glasses through. You can come back when they arrive. Head back to the classroom and get your bag, okay?"

"That won't be a problem." They looked over to see Connor standing there, holding her bag. Hope instantly jumped up and ran to him, throwing her arms around him briefly before taking her bag. "I didn't know how you packed it, so I just put everything in there how I could get it to fit best. I think I got everything. Let me know if anything's missing."

"Thank you so much!" Hope gasped, pulling the bag onto her back. And she wasn't the only one with thanks, it seemed, as she sensed Max making her way over behind them.

"You're Connor, right?" she asked. Hope realised she must have spotted the headphones. Connor only nodded by way of a response. He wasn't one to say much to new people and Hope could tell Max instantly picked up on that. "Well thanks so much for lending Hope those headphones. Listen, she's not coming back to school tomorrow, so could you have your mom or someone drop the charging lead round to our place?" she asked. Wordlessly, Connor reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a card, handing it over to them. Max looked at it and took note of the number on it. Hope didn't have to. She'd seen it before and knew it off by heart.

Autistic Child!

For all enquiries, please call this number!

There was a number listed below it and Hope knew it went to Connor's dad's phone. Max nodded and pulled out a pen, writing it down on the back of her hand before handing the card back. With that, she got up and wrapped an arm around Hope as the two turned to leave. "Thank you. I'll call him when we get home." Connor nodded as he waved after them.

"Bye, Hope." Hope waved back as the door shut behind her. With that, she allowed herself to be led to the truck as Chloe fished for her keys. She wanted to say something, but decided against it. She knew Chloe wasn't angry at her, but still didn't want to risk setting something off.

Hope went to climb into the truck as Max and Chloe did the same. She was completely wordless and wondering what she was going to do next. It was only her first day and something had already happened that would put her off school for two days at minimum. She knew it wasn't her fault and she knew that no one would hold it against her, but for some reason she blamed herself. She didn't know why. She knew it was ridiculous and she knew Connor would tell her the same. Level-headed as she was, she knew he wouldn't lie to her even if he had reason to. So why was she unable to stop feeling like she was to blame?

Author's Note: You know, I had a thought as I was writing this chapter: I don't think there's a single fanfiction on my page for any fandom where characters have had a full day in school. At some point I'm going to have to correct that. I'll have to do a comedy story set in a school or something.

To OneNightLive: Hey there! Good to have you here. It's definitely been a while. Thanks for reviewing. And it's funny you should mention that about Connor when I was covering that in this chapter. And yes, there will be more of him in the future. And there's a reason Hope can do that with her jaw. And why her vision does what it does. As for what that is, you'll just have to wait to find out.

To everyone else, I hope you all really enjoyed the chapter. The next update will be Friday as usual. Have a great week and I'll see you all in the next chapter.