My goal is to post twice a week but with a full school and work schedule, I am not sure if I can accomplish this. Here's to hoping! Also look out for the <>!

Lots of love,

DarlaH

Stella POV

"You don't want me to go in there?" dad asked as he rolled down his window to look at me.

The last thing I needed was my father coming in making me look incompetent. I was almost an adult, I didn't need him to walk in with me. That was no way to make a good first impression. Sorry, not going to happen. "I think I got it. But thanks for the offer."

"Ok! Sounds good. Just call if you need any help," he said, eager to leave so he could get into his fancy law firm. It's small actions like this that confirmed that I was just impeding on their life that they had set here.

I smiled at him, then left without another word into the school I knew nothing about.

Checking in with the front desk was easier than I thought it would be and minutes later, I had a class schedule in hand walking down a nearly empty hall.

<>

With my head held high, I walked into the first class I had and walked straight to the teacher. My mom always told me to make a good impression I had to seem like an adult. I needed to respect the teacher if they wanted to respect me. "I'm Stella," I said to the man behind the desk waiting for his student to come in.

"Ah, the new girl. Great to meet you. I'm Mr. Thompson. I made a packet for you to catch up since school started over two weeks ago," he said as he handed me a stack of papers that were bound together with a paper clip.

"Thank you," I said as I put them into my backpack.

"Of course. So would you like to introduce yourself to the class? Or would you like me to do that?"

"If you would be great if you could introduce me."

"Ok, suit yourself. Well go ahead, take a seat. Any seat will do. Just find one."

"Thanks," I said as I sat in the first seat that was open.

Before long, students started to pour into the classroom. Before they found their seats, all stopped to stare at me for a second as if they had never seen a new girl before. And maybe they hadn't. Maybe I was something completely new to them, but that thought didn't set me at ease. I was never a popular girl, I never had many friends, but as they stared at me I couldn't help but feel like they wanted to be friends with me solely because I was something completely exotic.

"So you're new?" a girl asked as she slid into a seat beside me. She smiled as she brushed her bleach blond hair off her shoulders. She was the first person who said something to me but I wasn't sure if I wanted her to state that.

"Yup. New girl, that's me. They should give me a badge or something for this."

She chuckled as if my sarcasm was enjoyable. "Now that would be cool. Anyhow, I'm Alice."

"Nice to meet you. I'm Stella."

"So where are you coming from, Stella? We don't get many new people attending school so sorry if it's too personal."

"No, not a problem at all! I'm from LA."

"Ooh, I've been there once. Saw the Hollywood sign and stars. It was pretty awesome."

Of course, she would say the most typical things to do in the city, but my favorite things in LA were far from what she would enjoy seeing, I was sure of that. "Yeah, I would say LA is pretty awesome."

"Then why are you here?" She instantly covered her mouth as if regretted asking that question. "So sorry, you don't have to answer that."

I smiled at her outburst, making me realize maybe she wasn't as bad as I originally thought. "Mom went on a sabbatical for her university and couldn't take me. So I'm here with father."

"Ah ok! Well that sounds exciting. Sucks for you through that you couldn't have gone with her."

She couldn't be more right. "It's ok. It could be worse."

"I guess you are right. Anything could be worse," she chuckled, then turned to her textbook as the teacher cleared his throat. "Anyhow, what time is your lunch? You can sit with me."

No one had ever asked me to join them at lunch and I couldn't help but smile at the feeling of being included. "Sure."

"Great!"

"Ok, enough chatting... as you may have noticed, we have a new class mate in our mix. Everyone say hello to Stella," Mr. Thompson said as he point towards me.

I quickly waved awkwardly and waited until the stares stopped.

This same terrible pattern of introduction repeated all morning long until I got a sweet break during lunch. Luckily, no one would introduce me here.

As I walked into the fairly large cafeteria, looking for Alice, we quickly locked eyes and I joined her at her small but already crowded lunch table.

"Hey guys, this is Stella. She is part of the gang now," Alice said as I walked up to the table.

The crowd nodded obediently as I sat down.

"So how has the morning been?" Alice asked with a smile.

Terrible. The last thing I liked to be was the center of attention. I did not enjoy being introduced every class period, then have people stare at me as if I was something so foreign. "It's been alright."

"Oooh great to hear!" she beamed, not sensing my sarcasm. She then turned to the rest of the group and dove into conversations about the upcoming spirit week.

Uncaring what she talked about, my eyes wondered across the cafeteria, glancing at all the people within the room, trying to study everything about them. They all acted so different from the school in LA I attended and a part of me worried I wouldn't fit in well enough to call this place a home.

My wondering eyes quickly stopped as I caught gaze of a boy who stared at me for a moment before looking back at his food. He seemed out of place, sitting alone at a table as if no one wanted to sit by him. With a room packed with people, I found it fascinating that no one sat beside him. "Who is he?" I asked Alice, not caring that I cut her off from the story she told to the group as I pointed to the boy discreetly, afraid he would know I was talking about him.

Alice instantly stopped talking to look at who I was pointing to and stared at him for a second before looking back at me. "Grayson? Oh, he's just a loner. A bit of an oddball if I do say so myself."

The boy with dark blonde untamed hair picked apart of sandwich from across the cafeteria unaware I stared at him. There was something about him made me want to know him. Maybe it was because I was a loner myself or maybe it was because for a moment, I wanted to be by him because at least I knew there would be quiet. "I like loners."

As if not expecting that reaction, Alice frowned at me, then looked around at her friends. There was silence that fell on the table like a flip of the switch, it was like they knew something serious about him and were too afraid to say it out loud.

"What?" I asked, trying to get an answer from the silence.

"Oh... well, then I will warn you, people think he's dangerous or something. There is a rumor that he led some classmate into the woods last year and he was never seen from again."

"Well that's dark," I stated, not expecting something so dark to come out of her mouth or from this school to be honest. This place I thought would be cookie cutter, no drama place, but this story sounded like something I would hear from LA.

"Grayson is a dark person," another person at the table said. "He's a killer."

The boy stated that like it was a fact, like he knew that Grayson was a terrible person, but if he was really that terrible then why was he still here? Shouldn't he be in prison or something? "Do you know him then?"

Everyone around the crowed table frowned. "Not really."

"Then maybe you shouldn't state personality types unless you know for a fact."

He shut his mouth, not expecting that from someone as new as me. We were silent for a moment as he thought carefully about what he would say next. "So are you going to walk up and talk to him?"

I smiled at him. "Now that's not how loners communicate with one another."

"And you speak from experience?"

"What do you think?" I grinned even larger, letting her swim in questions she may have had. My mom would like to call me a loner, but I wouldn't say that. I just enjoyed my own company. With that, I stood up from my seat and gathered my lunch wrappings at the bell rang, showing that lunch was over.

"Listen Stella, I'm not going to tell you who to hang out with because my mom does enough of that to me. But I'm just going to say ever since they moved into town, stuff started happening," Alice said with concern.

"Like what kind of stuff?"

Alice shrugged. "I don't know really. But my sister is in the police department here and she told me this."

I couldn't help but feel frustrated by the comment. If they had no actual facts to back them up, then they should just keep quiet. "I guess I should be getting to the next class."

"I'll see you later."

"See you then."

As I walked down the hallway, I locked eyes with the boy named Grayson and for a second, we stared at each other in silence, either of us too afraid to say anything to the other.

People said nothing kind about him but as he stared at me, I couldn't help but feel drawn to him. His eyes held kindness that a killer wouldn't have. But if he wasn't a killer, why didn't he deny it? The school was terrified of him, but he seemed to accept it, however he didn't look happy about it. Grayson was someone that I wanted to know, the forbidden fruit that was impossible to get. I took a step forward to him, but he shook his head then walked off as if warning me to stay away.

By time I came home, Grayson floated around my thoughts like balloons in the sky, bobbing up and down before the breeze took them away, only to have another balloon take its place.

I sat in the kitchen looking for any traces of Grayson on social media, but came up with nothing. A frown traced my lips, frustrated that a young person like him didn't have a social media account. Even I had one, and that said something. I ran my hands through my hair, causing it to become frizzy. I wanted answers about Grayson, but why was it so hard to get them?

"So how was school?" Bec asked as she stirred a pot of soup, breaking me from my hunt for answers.

I shook my head to clear my thoughts, switching gears to talk to my young stepmother. She was talking to me and as hard as it was to stop what I was doing; I needed to be at least friendly with her. "It wasn't bad."

She smiled brightly at me as if that was splendid news. "I heard good things about that school."

"And you aren't from this city, right?"

She shook her head. "Born and raised in Michigan. I came for the skiing and got a job at your father's law firm, which made me stay. But it must be hard to be in a completely different school, making new friends. I am sure your friends back in LA are missing you."

Back in LA, I was never popular, never had many friends. I was just happy hanging out in my room with the fat neighbor's cat, but today; I talked to more people than I had in a long time. I wasn't sure if they wanted to be my friend or if they were just looking for something new and I fit the bill. "Yeah, they understand that I'll be back next year though," I said with a shrug, as if I had loads of friends missing me.

She smiled then tasted the soup. "That's good to hear. Make any friends here?"

I thought of Alice and the crew she carried about like accessories however I wasn't sure if she saw me as a friend herself. She had so many of them so how could I, a new girl, be a friend so quickly? "A few."

"Aww Stella, I'm so happy to hear that."

I nodded back at her silently. I was too... I think.

"Your father should be home soon. If you want to get a start on homework you are more then welcome to. I'll call you when the food is ready."

"Yes. That would be great. Thank you."

"Of course."

"No need to do that Bec," dad said as he walked through the front doorsteps.

I smiled at him as he took off his dress shoes on the polished wooden floor. "Hey," I said as he dropped off his bag by his office door.

"Wow, you're home so early. This never happens," Bec said, as she kissed him quickly.

He shrugged as he wrapped his arms around her in such a warm embrace that I don't even remember him giving that to my mother. "I had to be around for Stella's big day."

I know he was looking for something great for me to share, but I really had nothing. School was school and no matter where I was, it would always be the same. "It was ok. It's just school, nothing special."

"I heard you have Mr. Delli. You know I went to school with her back in the day?"

I shook my head. "No, but tell me all the details about her," I said, sensing that he wanted to talk.