Keeping Superman’s Secret

FOUR

The rest of the week continued uneventful, and when Friday morning began I thought it would be just like any other normal day. Although, the day turned out anything but normal. Joey picked me up for school just like any other day. I had my own car to drive me to school, but it was so much better just to carpool since the parking lot at school was always chaos.

Crime in the city had thankfully ceased mostly for the rest of the week, there hadn’t been much more action on the news involving our superheroes. I cursed myself every time though, as Onyx crossed my mind even when I didn’t want him to. Thankfully, our lives seemed to have gone their separate ways, and we had yet to even come close to crossing paths again. Yet, I still wondered what secret he said I knew, and it was going to drive me crazy thinking about it all weekend long. So I’d picked up some extra shifts at work, hoping to keep myself distracted until I’d forgotten him entirely.

My first class passed as usual, where Joey and I sat together passing notes back and forth. Then, much to our classes' dismay, my English teacher gave some weird rant about the play we were reading in class. The group of boys that sat in the row behind me made some snarky comments and I couldn’t help but laugh.

“Hey,” one of the boys said, tapping on my shoulder, and I gave him a small smile. Noticing he sat between two boys that I’d known since elementary school. They, however, were focused on their phones, and paid no attention to me.

“I’m Matt,” the boy who had tapped me on the shoulder smiled back at me. I twisted my pencil around my fingers, feeling nervous. I really didn’t want to talk to him, but it would be rude to avoid all conversation, so I had sort of already found myself stuck.

“Allison, are you new here?” I asked, realizing I didn’t recognize his face, which was rare for me. Thanks to Joey forcing me to join the yearbook committee with her every year since ninth grade, I knew most faces in our school. His short brown hair stood up in spikes atop of his head like he’d spent a fair amount of time this morning styling his hair. I looked him over quickly, noticing he was dressed a little too nicely, in my opinion, for school, wearing a button-down shirt and dark jeans.

“Yeah, I just started last week, been trying to work up the nerve to introduce myself to you,” he flirted with me and I smiled awkwardly back. He was cute, but I wasn’t really looking for any type of relationship right now, I just wanted to finish school and leave high school in my past. Plus, he really didn’t seem like my type. Not that I was sure what my type was, but he reminded me too much of my ex-boyfriend Nick, and all I knew was that I needed something different from that. Nick had been a nice guy, but life with him just seemed a little too boring for me and I had enough of that at home.

“No need to be shy, anyone around here will tell you I’m easy to talk to,” I replied, then turned my head back to the front of the classroom, pretending to be focused on the lesson. That wasn’t a lie, I had lived here my whole life and was friendly with almost everyone in town. Plus, I was way too avoidant of any type of conflict to ever say anything rude to anyone. Having to see them every day and deal with the aftermath of awkwardness sounded like my worst nightmare. Thankfully, Matt seemed to get my signal and stopped talking, and I practically ran out of the classroom before he could try to catch me in another conversation.

At lunch, Joey and I decided to eat in the library. I studied for my calculus class at the end of the day while she flipped through last year's yearbook searching for a prom date. This was a usual routine for us. While I preferred to focus on school, she wanted to focus on boys. And as she liked to say, the yearbook was the best way to find the perfect boyfriend because you could see the whole sea of fish in one place then pick your best target. Plus, if there were photos of them in any of the extra-curricular sections, that was a bonus, because then you at least knew something about them.

I told Joey about Matt, and she instantly started imagining him as my dream prom date. I groaned as usual and continued to deny any interest in him. She, however, became very interested at the prospect of a new guy at our school; a guy who wasn’t already in her yearbook collection of potential prom dates. So, of course, I promised to point him out and introduce her if I ever saw the opportunity.

See, up until this point, the day had passed entirely like normal. Passing notes with Joey, the awkward conversations with boys I didn’t want to talk to, finding Joey’s future prom date. All of these were things I would completely expect to happen on today or any other normal day at school.

It was between my third and fourth period classes that everything changed. I was the last one in my calculus class to finish my test after my teacher let me take a couple minutes past the bell. Therefore, as I walked to my fourth period class I was already 5 minutes late and still had to stop to switch my books. I walked up to the locker, opening it up, when I heard the most awful sound shrill through the air, a loud bang and the entire school was silent. I jumped back, quickly turning around to search where the sound had come from. My back pressed against the cool metal lockers, my own breathing picking up with adrenaline and just as suddenly, a loud bell rang long and clear, three times. My heart crashed into my chest, knowing that could only mean one thing. That was a gunshot. There was a shooter in the school, and I was stuck in the hallway alone.