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Me
Y’all, she has a bruise on her wrist. It looked like a handprint from what I could tell, in the few seconds I saw it.
My phone vibrates almost immediately; a few responses from my brothers have already come back.
Atlas
Is she okay?
Mateo
What the fuck happened?
Kade
How big is the bruise?
I look over at him, and he is staring at Paisley.
Me
I don’t know. I haven’t talked to her, but I plan on it. Give me time. I’m also upset about it. I’ll let you know when I know.
Gritting my teeth while responding to the group chat, I look over at our girl, and I get a pain in my chest thinking about what or who caused the bruise and if she has more.
When I finally put my phone away, I look up and the teacher has already started class. Mrs. Embers is explaining that she wants us to fingerspell objects at home today. The objective of the activity is to get faster at fingerspelling. Which makes sense for everyone but Kade, me, and maybe Paisley. She seems like she knows what she is doing.
Angling my body toward Paisley, I start signing random things at my house: TV, couch, washer, dryer, stove. Giving her time to catch up, I look around to check out the other students to see how they are all doing. Most of them are still struggling with remembering the proper way to fingerspell.
Looking back at Paisley, I finally just bite the bullet and ask her about the bruise.
“What’s with the bruise on your wrist? Don’t try to lie, either. I saw it while you were fiddling around with your sleeve,” I sign, nodding toward her wrist.
“I just fell down the stairs at home. I hit the support beam wrong trying to grab it to catch myself. It’s really nothing to worry about,”Paisley signs while looking down.
“Okay, what’s the real story? Because I can tell you are lying. Avoiding eye contact, fidgeting, ragged breaths…they are all signs of lies, Paisley,”I sign to her.
“I swear, Luca, it was just the stairs. I slipped going downstairs to do the laundry in the basement. There were clothes on the stairs that I didn’t see. Hence, I slipped.”
“Okay, so say I were to believe that. Why is the bruise in the shape of fingers, Paisley? There really isn’t a way you can explain that away. What is going on? You can trust me. You can trust my brothers. We want to help you,”I sign to her with hope in my eyes.
“It was just a fall. Leave it alone, Luca. Please leave it alone,” Paisley signs while sneering at me. “Besides, you can’t help me. No one can protect me from her.”
I glance up to make sure everyone is still minding their own business. When I catch Kade’s eyes, the look he gives me tells me he was watching some of the conversation and is so furious he needs to punch something. Lifting my hands slightly, I silently tell him to calm down. Kade wouldn’t want Paisley to see him upset, and we don’t want Paisley to be afraid of him either.
I don’t want to ignore the bruise because I need to know what is going on, but I’m afraid to push Paisley and have her run away scared of us. So I continue with the random fingerspelling until the light flashes that class is over.
I quickly stop Paisley before she can try to sneak away. “Can you stay after school next week sometime and work on our English assignment?”
She nods her head before slowly leaving the room.
CHAPTER11
ATLAS
“She told you what?!”Kade yells from across the room.
I really wish he would remember that we are all in this little room with him and he needs to use his inside voice. It’s not like we are trying to tell the whole world our business.
