Leah's POV

It was finally Friday and we were getting ready for the weekend, which meant one thing, Rae's date with Liam was coming up soon! Hers was on Sunday, and they'd planned to go to a local diner and then go to the movies. It sounded like her perfect kind of date so I was more than excited for her. All we had to do was get through this day!

It has been a weird week to say the least, I'd not seen much of Conor or Liam and, as always happened in a college, gossip was flying around about why. There was no denying they had a huge bust up last week, but they could have fixed it now, right? Instead rumours circulated that one had injured the other to the point they couldn't show themselves in class. Another was that they'd both been suspended. A further was that they were being homeschooled by their parents now... whatever it was, I hoped they were both alright. The past few lessons without Conor were almost unbearable, no one to pass notes to or help protect from whiny popular girls. It had been boring.

The bell rang for the beginning of class and I headed to English. As always, I took my seat and stared out the window at the younger students, wondering what lives they were leading. I guess this was another class of boredom and grief, listening to the popular girls talk about clothing shops while I imagined head butting the table until I passed out just to stop hearing them rabbit on. My heart began to sink, the sadness was coming over me quickly. I hope this day goes quickly.

"Loraini." Conor took his seat next to me and turned to look at me, one eye sporting a dark purple bruise. He offered me a crooked smile.

"My Go-" I began, but cut myself off. "Are you okay?" He rubbed the back of his neck with his hand.

"Yeah, kind of, thanks." He looked around the room. "You're the first person to ask me how I am, everyone else is more interested in Liam." He rolled his eyes and I sensed some type of hatred coming from that.

"Is everything alright between you? I mean you were great last time I saw you!" I asked, instantly regretting it. I shut my eyes as I mentally cursed myself. "You don't need to say if you don't want to. Sorry!" He let out a small laugh.

"I see you're as good at small talk as I am." I returned it with a quiet laugh, remembering the texts he'd sent me. "We're okay, just boys being boys." He said, but the feeling didn't reach his eyes. He was lying to me, I was sure of it.

"I'm glad! So what are you up to this weekend?" I changed the subject, not wanting to keep talking about something that was clearly making him uncomfortable.

"Nothing." He said into his bag as he pulled his books out of it. "Liam's on dates all weekend. No sports is on. I guess I'll have to find another way to entertain myself!" He threw his books on the table with some force behind them, before kicking his bag under the table.

"That makes two of us then! It's Rae's date with Liam on Sunday, so our plans are long gone." My subconscious was screaming at me to ask him to meet up but my head was telling me it was a bad idea. I could be studying in that time, making sure I got the grades I needed for university... "Did you want to hang out? I mean you don't have to, I was just wondering." I stumbled through, just about making a sentence. To my surprise he looked up to me with a grin on his face, nodding as soon as I'd finished.

"That would be great, thanks!" He beamed. "When and where?"

"My dad will be working so you could come to mine if you want? There's a few takeaways down the road... it's up to you though." Once again I was rambling. For some reason, the pure excitement had left me unable to formulate proper sentences without hesitation. I felt like a fan girl who had just been given meet and greet tickets.

"Amazing, how about 1pm? That's around the time they're having their date isn't it?" I nodded in agreement and we fell into a happy silence, as always pretending we were working.

"Conor?" Katelyn's voice was back. We both slowly turned out heads in her direction.

"What?" He snapped, anger laced in his voice. Katelyn was shocked at the tone of his voice, but tried her best to hide it from him and her friends.

"I was only going to ask how you and Liam were..." she spat back.

"Well we're both here so it's pretty obvious isn't it?" He retorted.

"You don't have to be so rude about it, I only cared about how Liam was anyway." She scoffed, angering him more. He stood up, sending his chair skidding backwards across the wooden flooring with a squeak.

"Then stop pestering me all the time! Go ask him yourself, although he probably has less interest talking to you than I do!" The room gasped and stared at Katelyn, who wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry. Her stone cold exterior wasn't working as well as it had been and you could see her bottom lip quivering. "Screw this!" Conor threw his stuff in his bag and walked out the room. It remained silent for a few seconds before the hubbub began, people saying how he'd changed, how something traumatic had happened to him, how he was going to get in trouble. I put my stuff back in my bag, excusing myself to go and find Conor. I checked the field, the carpark and the science block, before running through the English and maths blocks. If I was Conor and I needed some quiet time to think, where would I head? Someone where no one can say anything to me, or make a noise in my direction then I can't retaliate... I'd need to go somewhere like...

The library.