New Friends and Enemies

Kathy's POV

"Finally," Nessie said, "Why do the teachers have to be so slow?" she complained as we headed for the cafeteria, for lunch.

"They're only human, Nessie," I reminded her.

"At least neither of us have to worry about Acing tests around here."

"That's one good thing, I suppose," I agreed.

We stepped into the small lunchroom and looked around to see there were few students here. We were early; that wasn't something I was use to.

"Shouldn't we be looking for our friends?" I asked her, but it seemed she was already doing so when I saw her looking around, her eyes moving swiftly around the cafeteria.

Then, she suddenly turned around and waved, while calling the names, "Kaila! Grace!"

I turned around to see two girls who looked back and smiled when they saw Nessie.

They both had pale skin and were about the same height. One looked skinnier than the other who had glasses. The skinnier one had blonde hair with a streak of pink braided, hanging by the left side of her face and blue eyes. She had on a lavender shirt with a baby blue skirt and flats.

The other one with the glasses, had a brown headband on top of her frizzy brown hair and a green eyes. She had on a plain grey jacket, light blue jeans and black boots.

"Hey, Nessie!" the blonde said and she smiled at me, "Hi, you must be Kathy. I'm Kaila."

"And I'm Grace," The other girl said, beaming at me and extended her hand which I shook, happily.

"Great!" Nessie said, cheerfully, "Now we all know each other, so then shall we get some lunch?"

"You guys go ahead, I'm still waiting for my friend," I said as they went off and I handed Nessie my bag.

"Alright then, we'll be over there," Kaila said, pointing to a table near the lunch lines.

I nodded and turned to look around for Luke. After a few minutes of standing there and looking around like an idiot, I was ready to give up when he walked in waved at me.

I waved back and ran over to him, "You're here!" I said when I was face to face with him.

"I'm here," he chuckled as he saw how excited I seemed to see him here.

"So, wanna go and sit down. My sister's already sitting with her friends," I asked him, but he froze when I mentioned Nessie had friends.

"Maybe, I'll just go and sit by my friends," he said as he turned to go sit somewhere else.

I felt confused and hurt, but kept my posture and simply frowned and asked, "But why?"

"I'm sure they'll tell you exactly why you shouldn't hang out with me," he said coldly and left me there frozen and stung by his words.

Slowly, I made my way back to the table where Nessie, Kaila and Grace were sitting and Nessie looked at me in concern when I looked at her. I must've looked bad enough for her to see there was something wrong.

"Where's your lunch?" Grace asked me.

I tried my best to make a convincing smile, "I'm not so hungry today."

"Where's your friend?" Kaila asked.

I looked back sadly at where Luke was sitting down at an empty lunch table with his head down, "He seems to be busy with other things."

"What's his name?" Kaila asked, failing to see where my gaze went.

"Luke Choler," I said simply, and Nessie looked at them suspiciously as they looked at me as if I pulled out a gun to shoot them.

"Choler? Luke Choler?!" Kaila nearly shrieked and Grace widened her eyes at me.

"Yeah," I said unsurely, "Why? What's wrong?"

"Don't you know anything about him?" Kaila whispered fiercely.

"Kai, they've only been for a couple hours. We should explain," Grace said calmly to her friend.

"Right," she agreed and she looked at us seriously, "Where do we start with Choler?"

"He seems nice," Nessie said defiantly, but they just gave her incredulous looks.

"Nice?" Kaila asked, "How could that freak be nice?!"

"Have you ever tried to get to know him?" Nessie asked and Kaila and Grace shuddered.

"As if!" Kaila said, "The guy's completely messed up!"

"How so?" I asked her and I glanced back at Luke who was looking directly at me. But he didn't look angry. He looked upset, depressed.

"When Luke moved here with his mom and step dad year ago," Grace started, "He seemed alright, but he kept coming to school with all these…injuries. Then, he seemed to get more depressed everyday, so a lot of us thought he was just going some depression phase."

"But that wasn't the case," Kaila took over, "It turned out his mom was abusing him and when his step dad tried to stop her one night she almost beat him to death. Afterwards, she got arrested, but when they locked her up she refused to eat, sleep or do anything and she died."

"But how could you hate someone who's gone through so much?" Nessie asked and I nodded in agreement.

"Have you seen the way he looks at people?" Kaila asked, "Maybe I'd feel more sorry for him if he didn't constantly glare at everyone who comes near him."

I turned back to where Luke was and saw he still looking at me with the same depressed look in his eyes. Then before I knew it, I'd stood up with my bag and went to where he was.

I ignored the weird glances everyone was giving me and smiled at Luke's confused expression.

"What are you doing here?" he asked in a harsh yet confused tone.

I tried my best to hide the fact that his words stung and responded in an even tone, "I wanted to get to know a new friend I made on my first day of high school."

He looked at me in disbelief and said in a voice less icy, "Didn't Kaila and Grace tell you anything?"

I shrugged as I sat down, "I don't see what gives them the right to explain a history that isn't theirs," I looked back to him with a warm smile, "I wanted to hear it from you."

He shook his head at me, "Once you know the truth, you'll just leave like everyone and everything else has in my life."

"It's funny you should say that actually," I said to him, "My siblings, Bella and Edward, had gone through something similar to this if memory serves correctly. He'd told her that she should stay away if she knew what was best for her. But she didn't listen to him and now their inseparable." I laughed as if it were an old memory when in reality I hadn't even been born at the time.

Luke's dark expression lightened up in the slightest when I laughed and I smiled warmly at him. But I frowned when I saw he didn't have any food in front of him.

"Aren't you hungry?" I asked him and he just shook his head at me and responded sullenly, "My step-dad being in the hospital and all, it's not like I could just go up to him and ask for lunch money. And seeing as how this whole town knows what my mom almost beat him to death, they all try to stay as far away from me as possible, so a job's out of the question."

I knitted my eyebrows and bit my lip to erase the sad expression from my face. Luke saw this and smiled darkly in respond to my sympathy towards him. After a few seconds of silence between us, he finally said something, which caused me to slightly wince, "Are those girls paying you to be near me or something? You lose a bet on your first day of school?"

The pained expression returned and I looked at him, speechless. Did people treat him so badly it was causing him this much pain? He seemed so nice when I first met him. What was so different now?

Luke's POV

I looked at her and saw her face contort in pain all over again. I internally winced at that. She seemed so nice, I really did want to trust her, but I wasn't going to let someone in so easily after every single fucked up thing that had happened to me.

What was I thinking this morning?! Being all nice to her! How could I have been so thick-headed?! I looked back to see Kathy look down at her hands looking like she was about to cry.

I fought the urge to tell her I was sorry. I really was, but she would be better off talking to people who weren't so…complicated. I couldn't believe I had actually tried to get close to her this morning. She had just been so warm and cute when I saw her; I'd just opened up without meaning to.

But now I was trying to push her away and I was hurting her. This sucked! This really, really sucked!

"Well, then," I picked up my head to look at her when she spoke, "If you really don't want me here, then, I guess I'll go."

She picked up her bag and turned to leave and I had to fight the urge to get up myself and go after her.

It's for the best. It's for the best. I kept repeating to myself and clenched my fists under the table as I saw her sitting with her sister along with Kaila and Grace.

I bit my lip to keep myself from crying. This was the worst! And to think I'm going to have to do this every single freakin day!

Crap, I am so, so screwed.

End of Chapter 7 REMEMBER TO REVIEW!!!