Side Note: I Think I Love You (Side Notes Book 1) - COMPLETE

Chapter 27 - Attie

Each passing second, my mind is overflowing with one thought:

Did I just do that?

Another beat passes.

Holy shit, I just did that!

Now, in my defense, I didn't think baseballs were that tough. I'm not a violent person so I threw the ball with the thought that it would only touch Chase's face. But the blood gushing from his nose is not an indicator that baseballs are part metal but that I threw it a little too hard.

This is the first time I've ever broken a bone—and it wasn't even mine!

I place both hands over my mouth and slowly walk backwards, until I'm far enough away from the tank to just turn around and start running back inside the main building. And I don't look back to find the shock on Jason's face, or the disappointment and confusion on Ian's.

"Just let her be, man," I hear Jason say from a distance. "Give her space."

What is he doing? I don't exactly know for sure but I keep running.

All those years of jogging with my family are starting to pay off because I run like I have some blessing of Hermes surrounding me. I barely make it to the computer lounge, where I had left my stuff when lunch began earlier, with time to spare.

Mr Ali glances up from the computer. A phone in hand and a puzzled expression on his face. Maybe he's just wondering why I'm panting but he doesn't say anything—just resumes his conversation. He's not speaking in English—at least, not entirely. I only hear a few recognizable words.

"I know, Winnie, but I can't skip today. It's important..."

I stop listening after realizing how personal the conversation is and just take a seat by the computer closest to me. I bury my face in Ian's hoodie and just let it out. All the months of anger and sadness escape me in the form of tears that get smeared all over my cheeks.

No one else walks into the computer room for the rest of lunch and I'm left there with no one but my physics teacher and my thoughts.

Not even the one person I actually want to walk through that door, the same way he had when I accidentally left that note in his locker.

****

"You should have seen it Amy!" Jason howls with laughter as he, Kelly, and Amy walk me to detention once school ends. "I shit you not, it was crazy."

"Let me see if I got this right," Amy says. She had a meeting for her yearbook class that went overtime and all she saw in the lunch aftermath was Chase with a broken nose, and me walking away from the courtyard with a shit ton of eyes following me. "You"—she points to me—"threw a baseball at Chase Hardwick's face for no apparent reason, and broke his nose?! What did he do to you?"

Jason and I share a quick glance at each other. That son of a bitch knows what he did but refuses to say that it was wrong. Do you know how much of a dumbass you have to be to not realized how fucked up it was? As stupid as Chase Hardwick is tall—and he's basically a skyscraper.

"I was trying to aim for the target," I lie.

"The target was two feet away from his face," Kelly points out. You're not helping!

"Who knows, Kels," Jason says. "Maybe she needs glasses like her boyfriend. Or a new brain."

"This was the last thing I'd expected you to get detention for," Amy admits. "A guy? Scratch that, I never expected you to get detention, period."

Yeah, I didn't think about detention when I broke Chase's nose. Anger had consumed me until I was seeing red that an hour later, I was called to Amy's dad's office and issued a detention. My first (and hopefully only) one.