Leroy
Raven walked through the school’s exit relieved it was over.
”I need a nap...” she thought to herself, as she walked she felt the weight of her school books and homework assignments in her bag and sighed thinking, ”How many hours this time?” By now she was already halfway home at least a mile or two from the school she estimated.
She kept her stride walking eagerly, wanting to collapse on her bed. To contemplate getting her homework done or putting it off for another day.
She played with her purple hair shimmering in the light of the sunset. Her pink cheeks puffed a bit in frustration. “Damn this beautiful mess on my head...” she thought scowling.
As her house was just in sight a thought, that crossed her mind a lot these days, shot into her mind. ”Where’s my phone?“.
Her hand searched her blue jean pockets, but she was coming up short. She dropped the bag and dug through it searching for her phone but still not finding it.
“I lose EVERYTHING my hands touch,” She groaned frustrated.
A little alarmed she closed her eyes and thought back to when she last had it.
”Think...think...think...I left art, then I went to lunch...then I played on it in trig and I got caught...“. Her eyes suddenly opened “Crap! I left it in class!“.
She grabbed her book bag and started running to the school, trying to make it there before it closed.
“Damn me for forgetting the most important thing in my life!”
She dropped her bag behind a tree she would get it later, she thought, it was slowing her down.
She rushed to the school almost running into a tree and tripped a considerable amount of times. Finally, after what seemed like endless running, she made it to the school which was ( by a miracle) not closed.
She stopped at the front double doors panting like a dog, bending over to catch her breath. She whipped up and her purple hair laid to rest on her shoulders quite nicely.
Taking a second to look around she noted that the parking lot was deserted except for one car a red one. “Of course no ones here, it’s like 8:00.” she had left late due to detention for the days events of texting in class.
For a second she thought she saw a pair of eyes looking at her in the dark parking lot. She blinked, rubbed her eyes and looked again, they were gone. Shrugging it off she entered through the school doors into the dark corridor too eager to get this over with. Her footsteps echoed through the deserted halls on the dirty floor, she whipped her head around looking for the stairs.
Climbing up the corridor stairs, she remembered that her class was just around the corner.
As Raven walked through the dark hallways she stumbled upon a tall dark figure. “Hello,” it said nonchalantly revealing it was a young man. The shade ran from his face as he walked towards her, her heart jumped in her chest. she froze internally kicking herself for forgetting her phone.
He had brown hair, a brown jacket on and a black shirt.
She searched for his eyes but his face was covered by...a red and black mask?
She forced her lips to open and squeaked “Hello...“. The boy looked down at her.
“Why are you in school at this hour? And all alone?“.
His voice was like silk but hard and even. At this point, she had gathered her thoughts.
“Oh-I just left my phone in trig...” She said pointing her thumb in the direction of the classroom.
The boy had a hint of disapproval in his voice and said: “It’s dangerous to be all alone by yourself especially in the dark”.
The boy’s tone changed and raven automatically stepped back.
“Right I’ll look out for that...” she said quietly.
“I can give you a ride” He offered. She looked up at him.
She immediately shook her head “No that’s fine I don’t need a ride..” she said getting more nervous by the second.
She calculated how to defend herself just in case he tried anything...She braced herself for a knee-jerk reaction, punch in the throat, there was a really good move she couldn’t remember- her brain was too full with the worst-case scenario.
He smirked under his mask and said “Fine, go by yourself.” he leaned in closer “Lots of guys would love to... ‘influence’ a pretty little thing like you..”
Her eyes widened a bit, she looked down “That’s like the most stalkerish creepy-murder thing to say” she muttered.
“And a lot of guys would say more things than that, I’m sure you know,” he said amusement layered his voice. “Then again if you came with me it would be quick and easy,”
“Why do you even want me to go with you???” She said looking up suddenly with piercing eyes.
“To be honest I don’t but, I have a morality thing you wouldn’t understand,” He said shrugging.
Raven thought about it for a minute more.
“And how would I trust your so-called morality? I can’t even see your face to see if your lying, trust me if I could you’d be out on your old butt,” she said smirking -clearly milking it- thinking she’d won the battle.
He shrugged again and said “Fine, but just know this city isn’t the cleanest ever and let me see.. it is about 8:00 pm. Pretty late .” He said checking his watch. “The best option you have is to ride with me.”
Raven was in deep thought mode, on one hand, she could trust this stranger get into his car and pray he didn’t kidnap her forever and eventually kill her. On the other hand... free ride...
A couple of minutes passed as Raven was still in deep thought.
He yawned “You gonna make up your mind anytime soon or not? I don’t have all night.”
After one more minute of thought, she finally came to a conclusion.
“Are you sure?“, she asked not really believing him. His tone had unmissable enthusiasm and amusement he chuckled and said, “Sure, why not?“.
After Raven grabbed her phone, from her teacher’s desk, she and the boy left the building and were already headed to his car.
The boy’s name turned out to be Leroy.
Raven rewinded the last minutes of time in her mind analyzing them closely trying to see for sure if he was dangerous or not. He looked over at her and chuckled.
“I’m not a serial killer you know.“. he said dully.
she automatically blushed light pink, lying she murmured, “I don’t think you’re dangerous...“.
He laughed keeping his eyes on the road, “I know your lying.” he replied.
“How so?” she asked a bit intrigued but with a hint of annoyance.
“Well if you insist. I read your mind”. Raven had stayed quiet at first that she looked away pretty annoyed. she muttered, “Now who’s lying?“. He looked over oblivious and defended, “It’s true! I mean how do you think I knew exactly what to say to get you to come with me?“.
”Sure,” she thought. ”As true as me being a dwarf... “.
“You’re a dwarf?“.
She jumped and almost hit her head on the ceiling of the car. “How did you do that?!“, She demanded.
He laughed “I think we’re eliminating this you’re a dwarf thing too fast”, he as sarcasm layered his voice.
“How???” she demanded not letting it go.
”I told you I read minds. Sorry," he said somehow inside her mind.
She jumped again this time hitting her head on the ceiling. As she rubbed her head she stared at him shocked. “Is your head okay? ” he asked innocently amused at her distraught.
Raven ignored his snarky comment but let it go it wasn’t so unbelievable that there were others out there. She checked her watch and sighed”I have to go...“. ”Lucifer will get impatient if he doesn’t feed fast enough...”By this time they were already at her house (courtesy of directions given as they were walking to his car), she just wanted to get out and go to bed. She opened the door but Leroy grabbed her arm.
“Wait a sec, who’s Lucifer?” he asked with uneasy curiosity. She looked at him alarmed “N-no one!” she pulled her arm away and walked quickly to her house before he could say anything else.
She called back to him “Thanks!” as he stared after her confused at her abrupt exit. Raven quickly opened her front door and locked it behind her.
She put her back to the door and sighed relieved. “He almost figured out about Luci...” Thinking about the demon inside her, she took off her shoes kicking them lazily on the floor.
She looked over to her desk thinking about her homework deciding to put it off to tomorrow.
After changing into a spaghetti strap shirt and sweat pants -her version of pajamas- she went on the have one of her regular nightmares.
