Chapter 3

Elle shivered and ran the back of her hand across her face, feeling the trail of moisture that was quickly freezing on her cheek. She shivered again, in spite of the coat, and glanced up at Jeff.

"What do you want?" She asked, not without hesitation. Elle was still quite off-balance from the sudden turn her memories had taken. She was trying to summon up her usual venom, to get Jeff to leave her alone in peace, but in her heart she knew it was pointless. She just didn't have the energy for venom right now. And, truth be told, wrapping his coat around her shoulders was probably the nicest thing anyone had done for her in quite a while...

"Nothing... Nothing at all," Jeff said, with a neutral expression. "I just didn't think you really wanted to deal with the teachers right now... You really looked like you could use a break from everything going on, especially when we were upstairs, so I thought we could come down here and just sit for a little while." He sighed and looked around at the deserted courtyard, the grass lightly covered by a thin blanket of fresh snow, giving the place a calm, peaceful look -- hardly like it belonged in the center of a bustling school like Northwoods High. Jeff turned around and looked back at the shaking girl across the table from him and was suddenly sure of one thing; some of the shaking wasn't from the cold. There was something very, very wrong with this picture. While Jeff didn't know her very well at all, he'd picked up on one thing almost immediately: This girl didn't seem to have anyone on her side.

And that, he thought, is a problem. He'd been there himself in the past, before his family moved to Glenwood, and he had the scars to prove it. The only thing that had kept him going was his studies. He was a straight-A student, and planned to keep it that way. He wouldn't settle for anything less than top-5 in his class, and he was even solidly in the running for valedictorian. If it weren't for his determination to graduate, to achieve something with his life, he couldn't imagine where he'd be. Heck, even with his determination, it'd been a rough year or so.

Jeff was broken out of his train of thought by a noise from across the table. He looked up to see Elizabeth looking at him, expectantly.

"Lost in your own world there?"

"Something like that. Just thinking about... stuff." He replied with a shrug.

She sighed. "I know the feeling," she said softly. Elizabeth suddenly looked up at Jeff with a quizzical expression. "Why are you here, Jeff?" She asked, almost whispering. "I mean... Why are you sitting here, talking to me? Why did you walk me down here? Why didn't you just tell me where to go and send me out on my own and go spend the period with your friends or something?"

"Because," he replied quietly, "it seemed like you really needed someone on your side today."

"What would you know abou..." Elizabeth started to say.

He held up his hand to stop her. He may have lacked experience, but he could see this one coming a mile away. She was about to tell him that he had no idea what she was feeling and to leave her the hell alone. Which he didn't want to do. Not yet, at least. It was obvious that she was hurting, whether or not she wanted to admit it to him.

"I know more than you think. I've been there myself, Elizabeth. Before we moved here last year, I didn't have anyone. My parents and I didn't get along. My sister and I could barely stand each other. And I didn't have a single friend. I know what it's like not to have anyone. Whether or not you want to believe it, I know what it's like to go to bed hoping you won't wake up in the morning. I looked into your eyes today and what I saw scared me. I remember what it was like to feel like that, and I don't care how much of a bitch you might have been, I don't want to see anyone else going through that. If it weren't for my plans, I would've killed myself last year... As it was, I came close. I don't want anyone to feel that alone."

"You don't know a thing about me. What makes you think I want you here?" Elizabeth replied, starting to get worked up. The thought that he had been able to see all that today was enough to scare the shit out of her. Even now, though, there was another feeling deep inside, beside the fear. In a deep, dark part of herself, she wondered why no one else had ever seen it.

Jeff shrugged and looked away, squaring his shoulders and taking a deep breath. "Tell me you don't, then. Tell me to leave you alone, Elizabeth, and I will. All I'm trying to do is offer you a shoulder to cry on, if you want it. It seems like you're drowning out there, and I'm tossing you a lifeline. If you don't want it, fine, I won't bother you again. I just thought that maybe you could use a friend today."

Elle didn't know how to reply to that. Fortunately, Jeff saved her from needing to. He glanced at his watch and stood up, brushing the snow off of his pants.

"We need to get going; we've still got to collect the rest of those attendance sheets. If we move, we can probably get done in ten or fifteen minutes, and you can go back to whatever it is you really want to be doing. If we don't get them done the office will be all over us, though, and I don't think you need any more trouble today." Jeff said tersely.

"Heh. Not hardly." Elle replied. "And I don't want to get you in trouble, either," she said very softly, brushing the bit of snow from her pants and slipping Jeff's coat off her shoulders. "Thank you, for the coat, I mean..." she whispered again, so quietly that she couldn't even be sure she'd spoken the words aloud. Jeff just nodded, holding the door open for her and taking his coat.

The two students went back upstairs and continued collecting the attendance sheets, mostly in silence. Elle had a lot to think about. She knew, in her heart, that Jeff was right. She did need a friend today. What she didn't know was how to deal with that. Towards the end of the period the silence finally got to be too much for them both, and they started talking again. Not about anything significant, just the idle chatter of two people working together, but it made her feel more at ease with herself.

Elle found out that Jeff worked in the office again during last period -- when she had a study hall. She didn't say anything to Jeff about it, but when they were back in the office collecting their stuff at the end of the period she poked her head into Dr. Smith's office again.

"Would you mind if I came back here during study hall?" She asked softly, hoping that he said yes.

He looked at her for a minute, trying to figure out what had gotten into her. Elizabeth Miller wanted to volunteer to work in the deans' office? That was enough to shatter his entire worldview. He wasn't about to question it, though.

"Sure, just come down here. I'll make sure you're not marked absent from study hall."

"Thanks," she replied, turning to leave.

The rest of the school day passed in a haze. Elle had never been one to pay too much attention in class, but today she was totally out of it. She couldn't stop thinking about their conversation. Something he'd said kept running through her head: He hadn't asked her for anything. For that matter, he'd said point blank that he didn't want anything from her. That wasn't the world she lived in. In the world she lived in, everyone wanted something from her. You never got something for nothing. If someone held out a hand to help her up, she expected the other hand to hold a knife. Here he was though, telling her flat out that he didn't want anything from her, and the people that were going to take something from her never said they didn't want anything, they just took. But Jeff wasn't taking; he was giving -- or at least, he was offering. He was offering something that in her heart she knew she wanted. He was offering her friendship. It wasn't just what he'd said, though that was a part of it. People lied all the time though, especially to her. It was that he showed it, too. The little things he did like putting his jacket around her when she was shivering - backed up what he said. People would lie straight to your face, sure, but would they be nice while they were doing it? Not really. Not that she'd ever known. She just sat there at a table in the corner, her thoughts going around in circles in her head. It wasn't until the bell rang signaling the end of lunch that she realized how long she'd been sitting there. She had spent her entire lunch period sitting there thinking. For the first time that she could remember she hadn't even tried to get high at lunch. Of course, she also hadn't even tried to eat, so maybe it all balanced out.

By the time her study hall rolled around, she knew one thing for sure. She wanted to spend some more time talking to this guy. She wanted to get to know him. Mostly though, she wanted -- needed -- a friend.