It's currently eight o'clock pm on Thursday and I was writing an English essay due for tomorrow last minute as I decided to hold it off until now.

I took one glance at my blank screen and just sat back, deciding to think about what a bad decision it was to leave this to last minute. My English teacher is not only strict, but she has a lot of power in the school, so I'd have to come up with a pretty believable excuse for me to not get a detention.

That's when I remembered.

I grabbed my phone and texted Elijah, asking him if we had detention today. In under a minute he replied, confirming my fears.

"Argh!" I shouted louder than I was supposed to. I paused for a second, expecting to hear my mum's footsteps stamping towards my room to see what had happened, but there was only silence.

"You know what?" I said to Hugo, my sister Amber's dog, who she'd dropped off for the weekend. "I don't really care anymore. I already have an hour detention tomorrow; I can endure through another one."

I paused and leaned in. "But, in movies, the main character always somehow gets away with not doing her work when the cute boy saves her during class." I whispered, and he just nodded lazily.

So, I decided to get eight hours of sleep that night and went to bed earlier than I usually did, shutting down my laptop and packing away after accepting the fact that I was seriously screwed.

*****

I woke up to my alarm at 6:30 am the next morning and sighed, forcing myself out of bed. On my way to the bathroom a ruffled Hugo's head and started my hygiene routine. When I'd finished brushing my teeth and showering it was 7:21, so I had to speed up.

I'd decided to wash my hair so I wouldn't have to tomorrow so I quickly combed through the curls, applied some hair cream and blow dried it until it was soft. I then tied half of it up and half down, brushing out my hair so it could be more voluminous.

"Why's it so quiet in here?" I asked Hugo loudly, trying to fill in the silence in the house. I shrugged and brought out my phone, connecting it to a speaker. I pressed shuffle and grinned when Don't by Bryson Tiller came on.

"Don't play with it, don't be dishonest!" I sang, dancing towards my wardrobe. I'd checked the weather on my phone earlier and it said there was a high chance of rain, so I picked out my black and white Supply and Demand hoodie with a comfortable pair of light blue jeans and my black Nike Air Forces.

I curiously walked to my mum's room to check if she was still sleeping, as usually she would be awake and ready for work. There was no sign of her there but there was a piece of paper on her bed. After further inspection I noticed it was a note which read:

Chloe, I have a very important appointment with a lawyer that will take the whole day. It's about what happened in Australia. Call this number if you need anything, ******* ****** and I've transferred money into your bank account so you can buy food. If anyone asks where I am, you don't know. Don't open the door for anyone before or after school. Love you.

My heart thumped harder in my chest after reading that, unwanted memories of the past two years in Australia coming back to me. I took in deep breaths, unconsciously clutching the paper harder in my sweaty palms as I tried to avoid having a panic attack.

"You're a very beautiful girl do you know that?" He whispered, his breath fanning my face and I could immediately smell the wine in it. He continued stroking my cheek delicately with his finger and I gave him shaky smile, cautiously moving away from him and reaching for the phone behind me.

His face that I had once found comforting and friendly was now filled with lust as he moved closer to me, his hand now roughly cupping my cheek-

It was only when Hugo brushed against my leg I remembered to breath. I ripped up the note and put the shreds into the bin, fighting back tears and forcing a smile on my face.

I had once read on the internet that a good way of stopping yourself from crying was to smile, which was exactly what I had been doing ever since we'd returned.

Anyway, I headed downstairs with Hugo and after a small bowl of cereal and an episode of Once Upon A time, I got ready to leave the house. Joe, my brother in law, was going to come later on to pick Hugo up because he couldn't be left alone.

I patted Hugo's head before exiting the house and locking the door behind me, keeping it under the mat so Joe would be able to get inside. I sighed to myself, rubbing my hand together to try and warm them as I walked down my road and started on my ten minute walk to school.

*****

"Bring out your essay please." My English teacher said loudly at the front of the classroom, looking at each one of us. I gulped and exchanged looks with Elijah behind me, who looked like he was going to cry.

Our teacher started moving around the class to collect the essays individually, thankfully starting at the opposite side of the class so I had enough time to think of a good excuse.

I accidently left my USB in my jeans and my jeans were washed....

I was running for a bus and I dropped my bag, when I picked it up my USB disappeared...

During the night, the FBI broke into my room without me knowing with the intention to take my essay as it has the key information on it.

I completed it but my printer vomited ink all over it-

"Chloe, where's your essay?" Startled, I looked up at my teacher who was staring at me impatiently.

"Umm..." I had the whole class's attention now.

Think, Chloe!

"My dog ate it." I blurted out. Out of all things...

She stared at me in disbelief, and for a moment there was silence. Then someone behind me, (most likely Elijah, sneaky asshole) let out a snort and the whole class erupted into laughter.

My teacher started laughing as well, so I joined in, not sure why I was laughing. Once everyone had sobered up, she turned to look at me again.

"That was funny and all, Miss Woods, but where is your essay?" She asked again, her smile now gone.

I gave her my best innocent smile, twisting my hands together. "Well, you see..."

She rolled her eyes and slammed a detention slip on to my desk, swiftly moving to her next victim. My smile was immediately replaced with a scowl, and I slumped in my seat with crossed arms. Teresa, who was at the desk next to mine, gave me a smug smile and I reached over to slap it off her face.

"Uh nuh, no way-" Teresa blocked my hands. "I spent an extra twenty minutes so I could look like this." She gestured at her makeup. I rolled my eyes.

"I don't need details about your morning routine, you vain child." I replied, leaning over even more in my seat to get a good punch in. "Just let me hit you!"

"Chloe Woods!" My teacher's shrill voice cut through the noise in the room and almost immediately it was silent, with twenty six pairs of eyes on me. I leaned back into my seat, my head hung in embarrassment.

"First you don't do the essay I assigned the class two weeks ago-" She shouted, emphasising on the time period. "And now you try to harass a student-"

"Ai Miss, it wasn't even like that-" Teresa interrupted and the teacher turned on her.

"Quiet, and learn how to address your elders." She snapped, and then looked at me once again, probably to say a speech I would forget in two minutes.

But the bell cut her off, and everyone stood up, scraping chairs and loud chatter not allowing me to hear her voice. I was one of the first people out that door, purposely leaving my detention slip behind.

"Now I know the true meaning of 'saved by the bell'." I told Teresa, giggling as we walked to our next class.

*****

The day went buy surprisingly quickly, and soon enough it was time for the detention I was dreading. Because me, Cody and Elijah had missed it yesterday, it was extended by fifteen minutes today, making it forty five minutes in total. I could be doing something productive in that time, like eating food, getting upset about how much food I ate then proceeding to comfort myself with more food.

Did I say productive? I meant profooductive!

I chuckled quietly to myself from my joke that made no sense as I made my way down the deserted hallway to where the detention was.

I opened the door to see a teacher I didn't recognize sitting at the front of the room at his desk, and Cory with two other unfamiliar faces inside. Cory seemed to perk up slightly when he saw me, gesturing for me to sit at the desk next to him. I gave the teacher a smile and sat down.

"Okay, I'll take the register." The teacher said, looking and sounding utterly bored as he turned to his computer.I glanced at Cory with a confused look on my face. He gestured for me to wait then brought out a scrunched up tissue from his pocket, (which I hoped was clean) and started to write on it.

"Chloe Woods." I heard my name being called and waved at teacher when he looked around the room. He responded with a small scowl and carried on.

"John-"

My interest was piqued at his name, and as inconspicuously as I could I moved to the seat next to Coy, who gave me an amused glance when it scraped against the floor noisily.

The unknown teacher looked up at the sound and glared at me, glancing at my previous seat then back at me. "Move back." He commanded. I did so, muttering under my breath and making a big show of not tucking in my chair when I left it. I hope he has OCD so he can lose sleep over that.

But judging by the amount of messy looking paper work on his desk, I was guessing that's far from the case.

"Okay,. Bring out some work to do. I'm going to go and look for the other kids who decided it's funny to skip detention." He told us, leaving the classroom.

"Yeah, because you have no life!" I shouted at the door he closed behind him, emitting a laugh from Cory who I'd moved back next to.

I sighed, slouching in my seat. This is going to be a long detention...

*****

WASS GOOOOODDDD?

So in this chapter, we get more details on Chloe's past? Who do you think the guy is? Is he connected to the Dave mentioned in Australia?