7. RIDES AND HATS!

*Edited

Maxwell's POV

A week later

The day was hot and bright, not the best combo in Lakeside. After the crazy week with Breanna, he couldn't deny it, all he had thought about after she left on Sunday morning was how crazy the entire thing was.

He felt awful and angry, that she was hurting and it may or may not be his fault. He had not been able to get her screams out of his mind, how she called out to her brother that night, how she kicked and shouted for him to wake up, he couldn't get the glare on her face to that officer that questioned her, out of him mind.

He had not expected her to be in school the next Monday, like at all, he didn't want to seem impulsive or suspicious, he would have asked her to stay one more night in his house. He didn't know what was going on in her mind, what she was thinking, if she had another nightmare, but he was sure of one thing, she was choosing to ignore it, her being here only proved it.

Immediately he saw her strut in for class, he desperately wanted to go over to ask her how she was, but she was a bit late and the class was already crowded, people would begin to ask questions, mostly because he had never actually out of will of his own heart struck up a conversation with a student before.

It would be weird and attract a lot of attention, people would start talking nonsense not knowing what had happened last week, he didn't want her to go through that.

He cursed himself for even caring. 'People die all the time.' He tried to convince himself, his head agreed, but not his mind.

He would have felt a little better if he could see her face through out the 2 hour lecture, but she was wearing a hat, it was not unusual for her. She always appeared with a baseball hat, bucket hat or a beanie, but at this time, he wanted to march right over and rip it off.

He desperately wanted to see her hazel eyes. Since the time she woke up in the hospital, her eyes had been brimming with tears, even when she laughed with Bear, they were glazed. He didn't comment on it, didn't want to annoy her.

He had never noticed her eyes before that night, he wanted to see what she looked like without crying, he wanted to be sure she wasn't crying, he wanted to see if she had any sleep at all. The fact that he couldn't see, put him in a more irritable mood through out the lecture. 

He suddenly wanted a lot of things. He cursed under his breath, he used to be barely aware of her existence before, but now, he couldn't even ignore if he tried. 

After 2 excruciatingly long hours, the class came to an end. He gave himself a little pat on the back for holding himself back. 

Dark clouds came over the once bright day and in a minute, it became gloomy and windy. He stopped for gas on the way, adding ten minutes to his journey, as he got on the high way, he noticed a traffic, which wasn't odd at the time of the day, but a number of people were grumbling and lot of horns were blared.

He got to see the cause of the traffic and it was a car that broke down, in the middle of the high way, he was about to drive off around it when he noticed the owner of the car.

The same girl that had suddenly occupied his thoughts. Swerving quickly out of the road, he didn't even register when he stopped and got down from his car.

"Hey." He announced his presence to the clearly distraught girl, sweating even with the sudden clouds. She kept trying to start the car, but it only gave more white smoke, that caused people to keep shouting.

She looked up to him, with a frown, probably ready to scream him off, thinking he was one of the impatient drivers cursing at her, but paused when she saw who it was.

Her baseball hat was long gone, she looked up at him with her chestnut shaped eyes, softening as she registered his features. Her hair was everywhere, his eyes lingered on a curl that strayed to her forehead. He bit down the sudden urge to brush it away.

"Professor Caines."

"Do you need help?." He asked, looking over at her jittery self. And as if to answer him, the car coughed out white thick fumes and died again.

"Yes," She gave a small nod.

"Here, lets push it out of the way." He offered, pocketing his own car keys and phone. She stared at him, momentarily disoriented, probably trying to understand why he was suddenly helping her and not screaming at her like the other people were.

She pulled the door open and she climbed out as they began to push the car to the side, to clear the road for others.

"I'll take this side, you go to the other." He told her, and before she went around the car, another girl, who looked about eighteen, came down from her own car and helped them to push at the back.

"Thank you so much." He heard her tell the girl, he wanted to smile too, to express his own 'thanks' but nothing came, he realized he hadn't gave a genuine smile in a while.

They pushed the car to the side and the girl left.

"Do you need a ride?." He asked her pointing to his own car in front.

"Yes please." She breathed a weak smile. "I'm just a few blocks from campus, I came to the bank." She explained.

"Right."

"I hope that's not too much trouble, I know its out of your way." She apologized.

"Its no problem." He said. "I was headed there anyway."

"To where?." She asked almost immediately, he almost wheezed out of his nose.

"The library." He lied through his teeth.

"Then what are you doing on the highway?, cos the library is the other way." She pointed over her shoulders.

"Hm?."

"Why are you all the way here?." She repeated, carefully.

"I, um, came to get gas, I was going to take a U-turn up ahead."

"Oh, okay, I just wanted to be sure I wasn't imposing, professor Caines." She muttered.

"I already said its fine, now its about to pour, lets get going." He glanced to the sky and led them to his car. Remembering her injury, he went to get the door for her.

"Thank you Professor Caines." She said, holding unto his arm as she climbed in just like the other night.

"Thank you again." She said after a few minutes. 

There were a lot of things he found annoying, one which was repeating himself. She had said 'Thank you' since they started the journey a total of six times, he managed to reply the standard 'You're welcome'  but he could only bring himself to reply her three times.

"If you say thank you one more time, I might get mad." He blurted before he could help it.

"Oh, sorry." She scratched her eyebrow.

"No, I'm sorry, I just hate hearing the same things over and over……" He apologized quickly, feeling somewhat bad for snapping at her, she was a kid, she was hurting and he was being unusually nice.

"Right." She bit her lip, drumming her fingers on her leg.

"So, how have you been?." He asked, slowly, not wanting to sound like he was prying, but he really did want to how she was. Especially after the nightmare episode at his place.

"Well, you know…….processing, some part of me still thinks that I'll wake up one day and he'd be back in our apartment, throwing his laundry in my face." She said in a breath and let out a single strained laugh.

"I know you don't want to hear it, but I'm sorry for your loss." He told her, sincerely, because he was indeed sorry.

She leaned in the car seat with a loud sigh, as another tear fell down her cheeks, she brushed it away quickly, but another replaced it, and another, and another, till her shoulders were shaking.

"I didn't mean to make you cry," He grimaced, his chest squeezing at the sight. "Shit!." He cursed, biting his lip and mentally face palmed himself, tightening his hold on the wheel.

She forced a laugh, wiping her face, "No, its just been like this all day, I haven't been able to make myself stop."

He looked over at her for a while, noticing the large bags under her red blood shot eyes and wet lashes. "Have you had any sleep since you left my house?." He asked her. She didn't reply.

"Have you eaten?."

"I had a protein shake earlier?." Her answer sounded more like a question to herself. "Its really hard." She added.

"I didn't know it would hurt this much, I don't want it to hurt this much, I just want my brother back." She glanced at him as her eyes began to water again.