Chapter VII

After Grace practically tackled someone to the floor, she felt relief of being out of that bathroom. The hallucinations were getting far worse than she has experienced. They never touched her before. Am I going crazy? She thought.

A set of warm hands were placed on the hip bones of her body. She could hear the thumping of something against her ear. Not realizing that this collision resulted to her laying on top of another person, she gasped.

"You look like you've seen a ghost." His breath blew at the short blonde hairs in front of her eyes. Grace was immediately embarrassed and avoided eye contact.

With no response escaping her lips, he began to chuckle. "As much as I like a pretty girl laying on top of me, I think we should get up." Referencing to the crowd of students staring at their dilemma, his lips pulled into a smile as his eyes gleamed down on her.

"I-I'm so sorry." She finally said and pushed herself away from him to stand up. She reached her hand down to help him up and once they were both standing, they locked eyes for several moments. As if waiting for the other to speak, the boy pursed his lips and knitted his brows together.

His eyes were a golden brown and he seemed just as mesmerized as she was. He had dirty blonde hair, almost brown but it was short on the sides with a bit longer length ontop. One half curled strand hung down on the right side of his face. Her hand still in his from pulling him up sent a feeling of electricity into her body, a sense of familiarity. She winced and pulled it away, "I'm sorry." She repeated.

"You've said that already." His smile hadn't faded. His gazed locked on her like a target that even made his heart pick up a beat. Weird, he trailed in thought, this girl..

She opened her mouth to say something but he beat her to it, "Sam." He blurted out. Her expression was confused as if he read her mind. She blinked her eyes and held out her hand, "Grace." She breathed out.

He looked at her hand and chuckled once more, "I think I preferred our original introduction on the floor." Raising his brows sarcastically to give her a wide eye look, he continued awaiting her reaction, "Do you greet everyone that way?"

Embarrassed again, her cheeks turned a little red. "I uh, no. I just was.." she pointed to the bathroom over her shoulder, unable to put her sentence together. For a moment, she forgot the unforeseen events that transpired in the bathroom moments ago. Her mind was clouded with fear and confusion, but it immediately melted away when this boy was here. The sudden engulfed feeling of terror disappeared and didn't bother to resurface for air even when Grace was remembering the tangible feeling she experienced. It was excruciating to have brought this behavior to school. Maybe she wasn't quite ready to tackle this challenge yet. Or at all.

"Um..nevermind." She breathed out weakly. Their eyes still targeted towards one another, refraining from looking elsewhere. They studied each other, taking in each other's appearance as if they'd never see each other again.

Their gaze was abruptly broke by the bell ringing to get to first period. "I gotta go." She looked at him once more, "I'm sorry again." She turned away from him to go to her first English class but he surprisingly followed her.

They both entered the classroom and she sat next to Melody. She mouthed to Grace 'who is that?' But Grace shrugged her shoulders in response.

"Thank you for deciding to join us. Miss Vixon and Mr. Clarke." The teacher lifted his head from the desk with a smile, but Grace didn't recognize him. She glanced over at Melody who was staring down Sam with a desirable glare then looking back at the teacher.

He dressed too professional for high school but he was actually attractive, and young. His eyes were hazel in color with short black hair that had the front pieces fixed to stick up a little. The length of his hair complimented the short shaven beard he possessed. She narrowed her eyes at him, feeling a sense of familiarity.

"My name is Mr. Fynn." He picked up a piece of chalk and wrote on the board. Catching his breath once he turned away from the class, he stiffened his posture and cleared his throat before turning around. As if trying to control an inner alienated being inside of him, he managed to steady his breathing to greet the class once more.

He put the chalk down and patted his hands to dust them off.

"And I will be your new Literature teacher."