“Maya,” Ledger whispered with concern. His hands wrapped around my trembling ones as my eyes refocused back on the class. I could feel a cool wetness against my cheek that confused me. I moved my hand up to brush away the offensive moisture.
I blinked to refocus in the class. I tried to ignore the three intense stares and focus on the task at hand. I didn’t want them to know how broken I was. When I was alone, no one was around to see me cry. No one was around to see the freak I was. The absolute devil I was. For once, no matter how temporary, they made me feel wanted, and I was in no hurry to lose that.
“What the hell happened in there?” Anani whispered while we moved towards the gym. I swallowed and shook my head. Jordan tossed me a wave and I was starting to feel lucky that I had made a real friend, just in case the boys didn’t want me.
My lip tilted down without permission.
“Maya.” Ledger attempted to grab my hand.
“I’m fine,” I crossed my arms tight enough to hold myself together, “really. Just a bad memory.”
“What caused it?” Henry asked quietly, his warm hand touching my back gently.
I shook my head trying to gather myself. “Let’s focus on gym, okay?”
I heard three dissatisfied sounds, then Ledger muttered, “fine.”
Except as the twins entered the locker room, I was gently tugged back by Henry. His eyes were swirling with a dark shade and this warm shiver crawled across my skin from the energy that circulated around us. He spoke quietly, “you can’t keep saying you don’t want to talk about it, Maya.”
I licked my lips and shrugged, “it was just a bad memory, what is there to talk about?”
Henry’s eyes darkened as he kissed my forehead and nodded toward the locker room. He was right. Friends didn’t keep secrets and I was keeping a lot of them.
Once in the locker room, I changed and tied up my sneakers. I looked down at the second-hand shoes and wondered how I would even go about getting a job. There were so many things I didn’t understand and it felt like I had no time to catch up.
The boys were waiting for me and I almost confronted them about the friendship thing, but when Anani grasped my hand and pulled me toward the class, I just couldn’t. I should have told him to stop. I didn’t want to though. I didn’t want to tell him that no one could ever be anything other than my friend. They deserved to know though. They deserved better. I was selfish though.
I really did have a devil inside me.