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Chapter 5: Secrets

Carlos POV

I'm pretty sure I have never met anyone like Leigh before in my entire life. Even though it's been seven weeks since we met her, Leigh still hasn't been able to open up to us. At first, we were all concerned and frustrated that she wasn't getting more comfortable around us. But then, the more we watched her go through her daily routines, the more we began to suspect it was just her nature. In the beginning, I thought she was an emo. Or goth. I don't know which, both seem like such foreign concepts to me. Let me explain why I felt this way.

First and foremost, the girl wears nothing but black. Black, black, black. Originally, I thought maybe she only had like two outfits because she couldn't afford to buy more. But after…umm, let's call it "investigating", her closet while she was out helping some photographer with a photo shoot, I saw that she definitely had more than two outfits. All of which were black. She also wears heavy black eyeliner and always has her nails painted black. Logan says it means she wants people to ignore her, but so far it hasn't been working.

At school, people often give her dirty looks and gossip behind her back. I know she can hear what they're saying, mostly because those people don't really try to conceal their sentiments. But she doesn't care AT ALL. She just goes on about her business, not acknowledging anything. In a way, I admire her for it.

As much as I admire her for her individuality, something tells me the reason for her apathy goes deeper than her not caring about how people judge her. I think her past is much worse than what we've been let on. I remember this one time when we were all eating lunch together. It started out normal enough. We were having dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets, which are my favorite because James and I like to play with ours. Leigh was silent as usual, only speaking when someone spoke to her. I looked up from my T-Rex and saw that Mama Knight was staring at Leigh intently.

Quietly, Mama Knight commented, "Leigh, that is a beautiful necklace you are wearing! Where did you get it?"

I saw her head snap up, as she focused her attention on Mama Knight. She gingerly began to fiddle with the aforementioned necklace. I know I'm oblivious, but I'm pretty sure that's the only necklace Leigh owns, because it's the only one I've ever seen her wear. It's a pretty unique necklace that's hard to forget. The gem was this pretty dark green that matched Leigh's eyes perfectly. It hung on a silver chain. What set this necklace apart from all others was the fact that on the right side of the chain, there was a small silver bird. It was quite nice; I'd definitely buy something like that for a girlfriend.

Leigh hesitated. Before she spoke, I saw something that surprised me. I've never been known for being the smart one or as the advice giver, but I am good at reading people. I usually do this by looking into the person's eyes. As they say, the eyes are the windows to the soul. In the few weeks I have known Leigh, her eyes have always been void of emotion. Even when she'd glare at us, I saw nothing. It's like she only goes through the motions. But when Mama Knight asked her about the necklace, I saw something in her eyes flicker. Unfortunately, it disappeared before I could really see what it was.

I then heard Leigh say, "It was a gift…from a friend."

Mama Knight nodded. "Well, it's absolutely lovely."

Logan, James, Kendall, and I all glanced at each other. We told Mama Knight everything Leigh told us once we realized she could talk. We all agreed that it would be best to not bring it up and to not push Leigh into talking about herself. By the looks we exchanged, I could tell they read more into what Leigh said, too.

I think Logan has taken it the hardest. He always feels this need to pay people back when they do him a favor. And Leigh has done him the biggest favor of all, what with saving his life and all. Sure, we took care of her while she was recovering. We accepted her into our lives, no questions asked. But it wasn't enough for him. It wasn't enough for any of us. How could it be, when we're witnessing her just going through the motions of living? No joy, no anger…just nothing. Like I said, I really do believe she's had it harder than any of us can imagine.

There was this one time when we were all by the pool. Logan and Leigh were walking around, talking about Arthurian legend or something nerdy like that. I was gawking at the Jennifers, who had just made their grand entrance. Behind them, I noticed Camille. I saw her eyes narrow. I followed her gaze, and saw that it landed on Logan and Leigh. Once I saw her storming toward them, I realized what she was up to. I nudged Kendall and James, and told them. We started yelling, hoping to get Logan and Leigh's attention. But they were too far away to hear us. We watched helplessly as Camille approached them with her hand held high, ready to strike. We prepared ourselves to hear the smack, but it never came. I'm not sure what happened. One minute, Camille was about to bitch slap Leigh, the next minute Leigh had Camille's arm pinned behind her back, while her other arm was wrapped around Camille's neck. Logan was squawking at Leigh, trying to explain that Camille was harmless. Kendall, James, and I ran over to them, hoping to help before the situation got out of hand. As we reached them, Leigh let go of Camille, who at this point was kneeling on the ground and gasping for air.

"Sorry," Leigh said emotionlessly, "Reflex." She then turned and left, without so much as acknowledging the rest of us.

"Are you ok, Camille?" Logan asked, his voice shaky.

Her coughing ceased, and she nodded. "Yeah, I'm okay. Who was that?"

"That was Leigh," Kendall replied, "But we really couldn't tell you more than that."

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Now, you're probably thinking, "This girl's a psychopath, why are you hanging out with her?" The truth is, she's actually really nice. Once you get passed her tough exterior. I can't even begin to tell you how many times she's helped us out in a jam. Like the time that crazy ass photographer wanted to shoot us as matadors in space on a snowmobile. Funny enough, she was his assistant the day of BTR's photo shoot. When she saw what her boss and Griffin wanted us to shoot us as, she jumped to our defense. When that failed, she helped us distract the photographer and came up with the idea of shooting a secret photo to give to Pop Tiger. It worked brilliantly, except for the unfortunate coincidence of our picture being on the other side of Dak Zevon's. Which made us feel even worse about her losing her job. She reassured us that it was fine. Actually, she said she was relieved that she didn't have to work for some crazy, narcissistic man anymore. We promised that we'd find her another job, but she said she already had a few things lined up. I wasn't sure if I believed her, but I knew there was no point in harassing her about it.

Perhaps the most surprising thing about Leigh is what I learned about her tonight. She's a songwriter. And, more importantly than that, she actually gave us one of her songs. It was after the whole "Any Kind of Guy" fiasco. We were eating dinner, and the guys and I were complaining about how Griffin wanted ANOTHER love song with the word "baby" in it. In the middle of our rant, Leigh intervened.

"I have a song," she spoke softly.

James looked at her. "Really?" He really did his best to hide his astonishment, but it fell flat. Leigh didn't seem to take notice, because she got up from the dinner table and left the apartment. A few moments later, she came back with a piece of paper in her hand. Silently, she handed it to Kendall. He began to read the lyrics to himself, his eyebrows disappearing underneath his bangs from raising them so high.

"Leigh…this is really good," he said after reading it, passing the sheet to the rest of us.

"You really wrote this?" I asked when I finished reading her song.

She looked at me funny. "Yeah. Why is that so hard to believe?"

"Umm…well, I just figured this wouldn't be your kind of thing-" I began, but she cut me off.

"Because of the way I dress." It was a statement, not a question.

I gulped nervously at the accusation. Well, I guess it wasn't really an accusation, more like the truth.

She chuckled mirthlessly. "You don't give me much credit, do you?"

Before I could respond, James saved me by saying, "Well, I think we all truly like this song. You'd really let us use it?"

Leigh shrugged. "Sure, why not? It's not like I really have a use for it."

"We'll need to show this to Gustavo, but I'm sure he'll love it, too. Thanks, Leigh, this could really save our butts," Logan explained.

"I think I'm going to go back to my place and crash," she responded, obviously not used to be thanked, "Good night."

We told her good night and she left. As soon as the door closed, the three boys spun their heads to glare at me.

"What the hell was that about, Carlos?" Kendall exclaimed.

"Ummm…"

"Yeah, seriously. 'I just figured this wouldn't be your kind of thing.' Could you be any less tactful?" Logan added.

"Look, I'm sorry! I wasn't thinking. I feel terrible about it." I responded, chastised.

James sighed. "Well, knowing her, she'll never bring it up again."

I know James was trying to make me feel better about my faux pas, but I could tell we all wished she would bring it up and react in a normal way.

Noticing the time, we all decided it was time to go to bed. We had a really early day in the morning, especially since we now had a song to show Gustavo. As I crawled into my bed, I couldn't help but think about Leigh.

What could have made her this way?

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Haha, poor Carlos. Oh, and I do realize the two episodes I put in this chapter are out of order, but I didn't think it was that significant to correct lol. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed it! Stay tuned for chapter 6! Remember, reviews are welcomed, but no flames please!