When Perfect Meets Crazy

There were two things I considered myself excellent at. Ridiculously excellent at. The wake-up-from-sleep-with-no-prior-warning-and-still-kill-it kind of excellent. They were my academics and staying out of trouble. I had never been in trouble before, not even once. Not unless you counted trouble at home which I definitely did not. Nobody could go through life without being in trouble at home at least once. It is impossible and anyone who said otherwise was smoking a unique idiocy-inducing kind of weed. School, however, was an entirely different ball game. I’d never been in detention, never been yelled at, never been punished, never even gotten a question wrong in front of my classmates. I was that good. Of course, I had a teacher who didn’t like me. Honestly, I think it was born out of jealousy and his need to see all students fail but everyone else loved me so there wasn’t much he could do about it. The teacher was known for never giving any higher than a B and I was known for only getting straight ‘As’. When I finally took his class, I broke his record. He wasn’t a fan of that.

Anyway, the point is, I had a flawless record when it came to staying out of trouble outside my family life. The one time I had a serious argument with a teacher, it was about the correct answer to an equation. It ended with said teacher having to formally apologize to me because it was discovered that I was right. And let’s not even get started on my jobs. I was never late, never unsavoury to customers, never not the best employee. Needless to say, I always got promoted easily. I was that girl. The one who excelled in her academics. The star of the school. The one who represents the school, then district, then the state and so on, in competitions. The one people in places of power either doted on publicly or disliked secretly without being able to do anything about it. The girl everyone knew would easily go to an Ivy League school. The one who would have her pick of Ivy League schools. That was me. Staying out of trouble and being smart were my superpowers.

But in that moment, as I froze in the process of re-shelving the books, my eyes trained on Masked Idiot, I wondered if I was truly any good at a staying out of trouble. In the space of less than a week, I’d gotten yelled at by my mom, had a criminal somehow trace me home and break in, and to top it off, that same criminal was now showing up at my place of work. I clearly wasn’t half as good at staying out of trouble as I thought. This was trouble. Big trouble with a capital ‘T’ and not only had I not managed to stay out of it, I was fore front and centre in it.

The only reason I followed Olly to that stupid arena was because I believed with me there, she wouldn’t get in trouble. Objectively speaking, I knew I accomplished that but I couldn’t exactly call myself a master trouble evader if I never even considered the remote possibility of getting in trouble myself. First with my mom and now, with this idiot.

This could not be happening to me again.

The first feeling that ran through me when I caught sight of him was fear. Pure unadulterated fear. Adrenaline kicked in but luckily, so did common sense before I gave in to the irrational urge to run. To high tail it out the back door and not look back. Thank God too because how exactly was I going to explain taking off mid shift to my boss who would undoubtedly call my mother to inform her since it was entirely out of character for me. That was not a conversation I at all wanted to have. Oh, you see I have a perfectly reasonable explanation for that. A few days ago, I went to an illegal fight club and a criminal followed me home from there. And today, that criminal showed up at library so, obviously I had to run. Yeah, no. I’d rather die first than see how that would play out with my parents. My upstanding law-abiding role-model-citizen parents.

My flight instincts changed to fight. Never mind that I had too much to lose by fleeing, I had no reason to do it. This was my place of work and on top of that, I’d been coming here since I was a kid. It was my turf. Not once in all that time had I seen the idiot here and now, a few days after breaking into my room, he was ‘coincidentally’ at my place of work. I wasn’t that naïve. The idiot was actually following me. How. Dare. He.

Now, I was pissed. I slammed the book in my hand into the appropriate slot on the shelf before stomping over. My anger was plain as day.

“What are you doing here?” I snarled with all the viciousness of a lone wolf.

“Teeming information.” He shrugged nonchalantly. “That’s what a library is for, isn’t it?”

“Don’t play smart with me,” I hissed.

“Hmmm...” he intoned, scrunching up his face in a disapproving half-smile. “Didn’t you say I was all brawns and no brain? I couldn’t possibly hope to play smart with you.”

The idiot was actually trying to play smart. Did he think this was funny? For his information, I was beginning to seriously consider murdering him as an option.

I drew in a deep breath and reminded myself there were tons of witnesses around.

“I didn’t specifically say that but I’m glad we agree on that point.” My gaze, full of venom, narrowed in on him. “Unfortunately, even a dead clock is right twice a day. Meaning I still have to be careful. Now what are you actually doing here?”

My words wiped the smug grin off his face. “Dead clock?” His tone was flat, unimpressed and irritated.

It was my turn to adopt an air of condescending indifference.

you the benefit of doubt. There’s no way you aren’t a dead clock though. We did already agree that you were all brawns and no brains.” My gaze swept over him, lingering

He scowled.

made it clear

Impressing him was nowhere on my radar. I didn’t give a crap what he thought of anything, much less my job. He could drop dead for all I

I drawled in a tone heavily

was a kid who’d gotten a hemispherectomy -a surgery to remove half of his brain-

here,” I said. “Scowl when I

me feel unsafe at my place of work. I wasn’t the type to cower. He was

I saw your face, not that you’re a model or a celebrity whose face is worth anything, you think you need to keep an eye on me so your secret doesn’t get out or to be sure I’m not doing something against you or some

he

believe that you just so happened to stumble into my changing room right when I

you’re plenty stupid so don’t worry your pretty little head about just how stupid that is. Aim for the highest number you can think of and just know that your stupidity is much much higher.”

kidding. He was possibly the stupidest person I had ever met what with not being able to give directions properly, warning off someone who wanted absolutely nothing to do with you and

irritate heaven out of me but not stupid enough that your stupidity

was

expression evened out as though he wasn’t quite

“Not that it matters but to

mind. I had been so relieved, thinking I had finally found someone

was a black strip of cloth with eye slits. You were playing ninja dress up in June.” I shook my head in that ‘you poor stupid thing’ way. “Tragic,”

and confusion warring for dominance on

on, unperturbed, “if anyone applies themselves, they’d find out your real identity in a minute with that flimsy disguise. It hardly covered your face. If I actually knew you in real life,

have been over the top considering he now wore

all he could

jaw, fisting his hands as he struggled for control. If we were in an alley or a remotely private place, I might have been worried for my safety. Fortunately, not only could I hold my own, I wasn’t going to have to since he couldn’t exactly throw a punch in our very public surroundings unless he wanted to spend the next few hours in jail for nothing because I wasn’t going to let him get the punch in. I had a psychotic child kidnapper to thank for my self-defence skills. For

unheard for gang members or partners of a criminal to go after the kids of the cop who put them in jail. With a sheriff for a dad and a ruthless lawyer who almost never lost cases for a mom, we had huge targets painted on our backs so neither of our parents objected to our continued interest. We kept practicing with the deputies until we could pretty much teach

did

it down, Tasmanian or someone is going to report to security that I’m being harassed by you,” I said, pointing a finger over my shoulder to where I was sure my co-worker was seated. “Also, when you think about it, I should be the one who’s pissed. A criminal knows where I live, where I work and possibly, where I school. The top three places I spend my time. And on top of that, the criminal is stalking me.”

really badly wanted to be wrong