THIRTY NINE

VERA

I quickly glanced away, looking down at the floor. But even though I wasn't looking at him directly now, I could feel his eyes burning into me.

My breath caught as I remembered all the time he's gone in full big bro mode. It never ended pleasantly for whatever boy I happened to be around then.

Not wanting to put Alex in trouble, I quickly lifted my head off his shoulders. He put out a hand to stop me, but my pleading eyes made him retract.

He sighed.

"Who's that?" he whispered. "He looks familiar, and everyone is suddenly silent,"

Almost as if on cue, hushed whispers erupted all around me in the room. However, it was that of the two guys behind me caught my attention.

"Damn! I told Michael this was a mistake," a guy's voice said. He was whispering, of course.

I tried to place the voice to a face among my classmates, but it was so low I couldn't recognize it.

"What was?" his friend responded. He too,