The moment I woke up I checked my phone for Nix's response, but there was nothing. All night I had been tossing and turning, waiting to see if he was okay, but even when I passed out h didn't answer. By the time I was dropped off at the school, my stomach was in knots. Nix wasn't waiting for me at the door this time.
During first period, I couldn't pay attention to the teacher at all. My worry was distracting me from everything, and I struggled from keeping myself from panicking. It wasn't like him at all to be gone this long without saying anything, and not knowing why ate away at me constantly. I had tried texting him a few more times later, but even after second period there was nothing,
I began to check my phone more often, and part of me thought I was being too overbearing. It wasn't like he had to text me where he was constantly and I could annoy him by fussing. However, he usually texted me without me having to prompt him, and the sudden change in his behavior made me feel like something had happened to him.
I wished then that I had gone on that trip with him. Maybe then I could at least be with him, where ever that was. Anything that would make this feeling go away, I would do it.
At lunch, Nix was still nowhere to be seen and neither were any of his friends. At first, it gave me encouragement to see that they were all gone, but then I thought about them all being in trouble to together and the feeling came back.
I sat down with Arian at his lunch table, hoping that being with a friend would keep my mind of things, but the moment I sat down, Eric avoided my gaze and Emily glared at me. "So you're going to join us now that your friends are gone?" she asked accusingly.
Guilt swarmed in as I thought about what she was saying. It was true that I was spending a lot more time with Nix, but I didn't think about how it meant I was avoiding everyone else. However, Arian looked annoyed with her instead of me. "As if you never left us for your soccer friends," he said sarcastically. "Since when was there a rule that he had to sit with us every day anyways?"
Emily sighed irately, but shrugged. "Whatever," she muttered. "Why are they all not here anyways?"
"I don't know," I answered, glad that I wasn't the only one that noticed. It didn't make the situation any better, but at least it made me feel as though I wasn't being completely crazy. "I am sorry for ditching you for them, though."
The rest of Emily's angry expression dissolved, and have me a small smile. "Actually, I can't say that I wouldn't do the same. It's pretty cool that they invited you, being an outsider and all."
I shrugged. Was I an outsider? It didn't really seem like it to me. Maybe the reason Nix wants to keep us a secret is because we don't match, I thought, but then I quickly dismissed it. If he really thought that, he would have never been with me in the first place.
When the lunch bell rang, I made sure to say goodbye to everyone before I ran out into the hallways. I didn't know what I expected to see, but more than anything I just wanted some type of good news. And that's when I saw him.
Nix was there, coming through the front entrance of the school the moment that I came down the stairs. He looked fine; in fact, he looked like he always did as if he hadn't been away to what seemed like a long time for him. The rest of them were with him too, and they were laughing about something as they came in, ignore everyone else. My first instinct was to rush over to him, but I held myself back. If he didn't want to contact me, it was possible that he didn't want to be seen with me right now. I couldn't think of any reason why, but I backed away anyways and went to my next class.
It was only when the bell rang at the end of the day that I dared to go look for him again. My phone still hadn't received something from him, and I wondered if I just wasn't getting his messages. I didn't want to be worrying about nothing this whole time, but I also wished that I was just being overdramatic. The only way I could figure it out was to talk to him.
When I found him, he was leaning against the outside wall of the school, smoking. It seemed so odd to me that I almost turned around. I remember him giving smoking up for me a few weeks ago, and after all the confusion of the day, I have almost convinced myself that he wasn't really Nix.
He didn't look up as I came close to him, but I also couldn't tell if he had seen me walking towards him. It was only when I touched his arm that he looked down, almost as if I derailed his train of thought. Nix looked me over once and then dropped his cigarette on the ground to snuff it out. "Follow," he said, and again I obeyed, but it felt nothing like the day before.
When were far enough from the crowd of students going home, he stopped and turned to me. "Sorry about today," he started. "We ended up spending the night and didn't come back until after lunch."
I nodded. "I saw you come in. Did you get my texts?"
Nix sighed then, and I suddenly felt as though he was annoyed, but he couldn't be. I had texted him so many times before, and he had asked me to as well. It was okay, wasn't it? "Yeah, but Rylee saw who it was from and asked why we were so close," he explained. "I was going to text you back but they were suspicious."
"Couldn't you have just ignored it?" I asked without thinking. I never spoke up against Nix hiding us, not really. I knew that he wanted to keep his friends that he wasn't ready, and I honestly respected that. "I'm sorry; I was just worried that something had happened."
He smiled weakly. "It's cool. And I would have, but they were asking too many questions. There wasn't anything too important to text you about anyways. Nothing much happened when we were there."
"But aren't I important?" I rushed again. All my feeling that I kept quiet about just seemed to be coming out without my control. I never realized how much it was bothering me, but now it seemed as though that I needed some kind of an answer, some kind of an excuse.
Nix's smile faded. "Why are you sounding like one of those girls all of a sudden?" he said, and then quickly took it back. "Sorry, never mind. Anyways, I all come over to you house later this week to make it up to you, okay? I got to go run now, though."
My throat felt tight but I refused to show my discomfort to him and smiled instead. "Sure. Have fun."
He nodded and turned away from me then, walking to go join his friends. When he was all the way out of sight and I sat on the ground and buried my hands in my knees, trying to understand.