The music was blasting in my ears as I walked for a few seconds. I needed the music. If it wasn't for it, then there would have been no way I would have been at the gym. Yeah, it was primarily old people that chit chatted about their kid's wedding or the how they hated their neighbors. I didn't care about them and didn't want to hear them as I exercised.

Speeding up the treadmill, I ran and fast. I felt my legs weep in fatigue but that didn't make me stop. My mind willed them to keep moving faster against the rolling belt that was underneath me. Mostly due to the music that made me almost break out into total dance mode and my brain wouldn't allow sleep with the notes blasting through my ears.

Faster. That was on my mind. To go faster, and make the mile as fast as I could. There was no way the granny next to me was going to beat me.

I never really tried to pay attention to the people around me. But something caught my eye. Hair, red hair. The curls bounced slightly but they were still restrained to the back of the person who wore them.

"Hey!" Melody tried to speak over my music. My thumb pressed the volume button on my phone to make it louder. I didn't want to talk, mostly because I didn't know her and that she went to school. Though I did break the rule and talk to Thorin but that was because I was forced to. It didn't help that he knew my name.

There was a tapping on my shoulder. No, it wasn't the long strand that held the wires to my headphones knocking themselves against me as I continued to sweat my ass off. It was the tapping of Melody's fake black nails. They were long and black, looking like talons that could pierce through your chest to get to your heart.

I had to let out a few short breaths as the speed of the treadmill went down to a normal walking pace. It would have been hard to make out anything with the puffy breathing I had. My breathing slowed down to the point where I could actually communicate.

Melody waved with a cheeky smile. "How are ya?"

"I'm okay," I said slowly. Again, I didn't like to break my rule. "how are you?"

"Great!" She said excitingly. "I'm so glad I found this gym." Her blue eyes rolled with exaggeration. "The one in town had too many guys." She swatted at the air as I cringed.

That was the whole point of me going to that gym. No one that I saw at school went there to judge me. I'm not saying that they would go full out teen movie on me where they would push me in the locker room, hell I'm nowhere near a locker room at that school. But is there still a risk? Yes. And I'm not going to take it.

"Do you want to be gym buddies?" Melody broke the silence between us.

The shoelace that was supposed to help me with my shoes decided to untangle themselves and flung themselves underneath my shoes. I think they were so shocked at Mel's question that they were like "nope, gotta die" and proceeded to try and shorten my life.

I picked up my feet, balancing myself at the slow paced treadmill. There was a smile on Mel's face before she grabbed my hand and proceeded to despite her skinny body, pull me into the weights area of the gym. Her skin was cold when her hand wrapped itself around my wrist despite her hauling my ass.

"Do you want to go first?" She said, putting on the boxing gloves the gym had provided. I shook my head, nearly giving myself whiplash. There was no way in hell I was going first, I didn't fight, not even verbal. Well besides with my mom.

"No thanks."

She shook her head at the punching bag before proceeding to punch it like she was the fucking hulk. A deep breath came out of her as she went back at it again, swinging a hard left and then right and back at left again. Each time, the bag thudded in pain as the Irish girl sweated over it. There was a vein in her neck, it popped like a vampire's dream while she unleashed hell onto her nonliving opponent.

"Mel." She ignored me.

"Mel!" She ignored me again.

"MEL!" I screamed over her short gasps.

"Ya?" Her breathing was shorter, shorter than mine after I finish a jog.

"You okay?" I furrowed my eyebrows. I'm not really the therapist of the town, but there was something on her mind or that she was a natural born killer.

"Pfft." She snorted. "I'm fine." Her nose crinkled along with her lips. "Totally." She punched the bag once more. "Fine." Melody added another punch after her words indicating that she was totally not fine.

I looked around me and even at the time on my phone. My insides nearly died when I noticed I had only been to the gym for a total of ten minutes. I had to stay, for my body and for my embarrassment. The girl at the front desk would think that I was weird for only going to the gym for ten minutes. I had to get out of there somehow, like digging a hole out like some naked mole rat.

"It's just that Thorin is pissing me off. This is the first time we've actually lived together and I seriously hate it." She looked at me with angry eyes.

"This is the first time you guys have lived together?" His accent was stronger than her's. "I thought you guys were brother and sister?" Wait. Could it be possible that he was some boyfriend that she met and now they were having lover's quarrel? There's nothing to be jealous about, I wasn't interested. I just thought it was really awkward and dumb how their parents allowed them to live together.

She snorted. "If he was, I would have died by now." A sigh came out of her mouth as she stepped back and allowed me to stand in front of the bag.

I cringed at the warm feeling the gloves I had picked out brought. The warmth wrapped around my already clammy hands instantly. I wished I had some type of magical psychic powers that would have told me to picked another pair. Or just not go to the gym or even not to move to this damn state. But no, I just had to be a norm.

"So you guys aren't brother and sister?" A wave of pain shocked through my clenched fist and rippled through my arm. What really hurt was that the bag barely move.

"Nope, thank god. We're cousins, his mom and my dad are siblin's." Her arms were crossed as she frowned her lips as she watched me punch the bag poorly.

It wasn't my fight. I'm sorry I never had a reason to punch something.

"Then why are you guys living together then?" I heaved while taking a break from punching.

"Because someone just had to be stupid." She said, taking over the punching bag once again.

                                                             ********************

"May I use the restroom?" I whispered to the teacher at their desk. The teacher ignored me, though it was normal. Teachers didn't ignore me on purpose it's just I didn't make a big enough splash to let them know I actually existed. "Mr. Louis." I said with a more stern voice.

"Hmm?" He nearly bumped his head on the lamp that hung over him. I felt bad for the old guy because he barely knew what was going on. He was a nice guy, it's just that he didn't know what was going on for a lot of the time.

"May I use the restroom?" Once again, I asked. I should have counted all of the times I had to repeat myself to teachers. It's just I spoke softly to them because I didn't want to make a scene within the classroom. There was a possibility that someone would say something and I would be totally fucked for the rest of the year.

Mr. Louis nodded and I proceeded to quietly leave the room without anyone noticing. I quickly took a glance backwards before stepping out into the hallway and no one was looking up at me, they were either on their phones, talking to each other or actually doing their work. There was a small victory within me because once again, no attention was on me.

I was expecting the hallway to be empty but of course I had to be wrong. A group of girls were skipping with their book bags around their shoulders. They were all pretty, their clothes looked gorgeous on them and even their laughter was perfect. Their laughter was like angels singing while mine sounded like a hillbilly mated with a seagull and it was dying.

My breath was held in as I passed them to go further down the hallway. I tried to keep my eyes pointed away from them in case they could sense the staring. But I couldn't. Why? Because I felt their staring. For the first time, I noticed people looking at me. Thank god I was heading toward the bathroom because I was ready to puke.

"Isn't that the girl that Thorin was talking to at lunch that one day?" I heard them whisper as they passed me.

"Yeah it is." I felt the one who replied look back at me, staring at the ponytail that was on the back of my head. "I don't understand why though." She snorted.

Okay I had to give it to her. I didn't understand why either.

I thought I was safe when I continued to walk down a flight of stairs that I almost fell on and entered another part of the school where a bathroom was. Some would worry that they were would be in trouble if they took so long but I didn't. If the teacher barely knew I was there, it was okay for me to take my time. But I wasn't safe.

No, there wasn't another group that I was going to have to frantically hide from. But there were two people. A teacher and a boy. A boy I didn't want to see. A boy that brought more attention to me that i wanted to. Before this said boy, a group of girls wouldn't have noticed me.

"You need to get your act together or I'm going to kick you out of my class." The teacher warned.

Thorin smiled while leaning against a locker. The smile made the small band-aid on his upper cheek move slightly. Though his attire was dark, the Spongebob band-aid really helped lighten it up. At least Spongebob was also smiling, it wasn't the smirk that Thorin was giving the teacher, but they were smiling together.

"I didn't do anythin'" He tried to sound sweet. It didn't work.

"You were trying to start a fight." The teacher poked him in the chest. Pretty sure that was against school rules.

"Touch me again and I'll start another one." Thorin growled. He stood up, cracking his knuckles. The ones on his FIGHT hand really popped.

"That's it, you're done." 

Hey! Sorry this update took so long. Just something in me didn't want to finish this chapter. I also apologize that it's kind of boring. It'll get better, I promise. 

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