Page 3 of Shattered Silence Duet

This man is breathtaking. I’ve never seen someone so attractive before. He has short wavy brown hair that looks soft to the touch, a strong jaw and beautiful hazel eyes. He’s wearing a light purple dress shirt with a dark purple tie and looks like the quintessential professor. His gaze feels heavy, and I drop my eyes to his desk, biting my lip nervously.

His desk is meticulously tidy. Everything is lined up parallel to each other, not an item out of place. I watch as he picks up a tall silver thermos and takes a drink from it before dropping my eyes again.

“Ahem. Right,” he says, clearing his throat. “Well, as I was saying, I’m your guidance counselor, and you can come talk to me about anything, okay, Mina? It could be about your classes, or problems with your peers, or even problems at home. You come to me, and I will help you. Do you understand?”

I nod, just once, a small movement that takes more effort than it should.

“Good girl,” he says, with a strange warmth in his voice. If the sound of his British accent isn’t already enough to make me swoon, hearing him say that does the job. I try not to show any outward emotion. It’s all I need for it to get back to my mother that I’m having any sort of reaction to my guidance counselor. If she knew, she may never let me leave the house again.

He clears his throat before speaking. “Alright, why don’t I show you to your first class?” He stands and passes me to open the door. I stand up and follow him through, shuffling my feet as I go in my giant shoes.

“Mina, I have a couple questions I need to ask you,” he says as he strides down the hall with precise, measured steps, his back straight and shoulders squared, exuding a quiet authority. “Please forgive me if my questions offend you in any way, but I need to make sure you are safe here. Do you know what a fire alarm sounds like?” I nod my head once. “Good, good, and you know what to do if you hear one? You get out of the building. Just follow the other students out,” he tells me as I nod.

“This is your math class. Mrs. Pinkins is your teacher.” He gestures in the classroom door. I look in and notice rows of desks, half full of students. A handful of them turn to look at me with curiosity. I shoot my gaze to the ground.

Dammit, dammit, dammit!Don’t make eye contact!I chastise myself as my breathing picks up.

God, there are so many students in there, I would have to walk past them to an empty desk and they would all be staring at me. My breath stutters and I start to gasp for air, placing my hand on my chest as I feel the beginning of a panic attack threatening to overtake me.

Mr. Hargrove leads me a few steps away, so I’m not standing in the classroom doorway anymore.

“Mina, you need to calm down, just take a deep breath for me. Come on now.” He tries to encourage me, but it doesn’t work. Darkness starts to cloud the corner of my vision. I suffer from panic attacks on a regular basis, living the way I do will do that to aperson, but this one is particularly bad, and it’s been a while since I’ve passed out from one.

“Mina, look at me. Come on, honey…”

“Is she okay… shit!” a voice I don’t recognize says, and it’s the last thing I hear before everything goes black.

Chapter 2

Mina

As I come into consciousness, the first thing I notice is a throbbing pain in my head. The second thing I notice is that something firm is wrapped around me. My eyelashes flutter as I try to open my eyes. When I’m finally able to keep them open long enough to focus, a pair of bright green eyes look back at me with concern.

“Hi there, Angel,” the gorgeous man says as he smiles down at me.Am I in heaven?Did my mother take it too far this time?

My eyes flick around, trying to figure out where I am and what’s going on. I appear to be in an empty classroom. Well, empty except for Mr. Hargrove and this new man. The new man whoselapI was currently curled up in. My body freezes, realizing I’m being held by a strange man with no idea how I got here.

“How do you feel, Love?” Hearing Mr. Hargrove’s British accent helps to calm me, which seems like a contradiction to how I should feel in the arms of a stranger. More importantly, why was he asking me that? And why am I in this stranger’s lap? I notice the worry in his face, and that’s when I remember what happened in the hall, I had a panic attack.

“You feel a bit better?” he asks, realizing I can’t answer. I give a little nod.

“You know a lot of girls try to get his attention, but that’s the first time a girl has actually swooned for him,” the stranger chuckles while he looks at me. My cheeks grow warm as I stare at him. His dark brown hair almost reaches his eyes and my fingers twitch to push it back. He is just as handsome as Mr. Hargrove, but in a different way. Mr. Hargrove has charming, classical good looks while this new man looks like the hot jock that all the girls would fight over.

As we stare at one another, I see something there that I’ve never seen before and I don’t know how to name it. I’m used to hate, anger, fury, loathing, disgust. But never this. It’s soft and… something else.Caring?I’m unsure, but all I can do is stare into his gorgeous green eyes as he stares back at me. It’s like he can see into my soul, and the longer he looks, the more he sees.

Please see me!My heart pleads, beating faster, as if it can beat itself right out of my chest to get closer to him.

“Can you stand up?” Mr. Hargrove asks, breaking the spell that this stranger has cast upon me. I want to know his name, so I know what to call him in my head. He called me Angel, but it’s more like he’smyguardian angel, the way he’s holding me together right now with his arms wrapped around me. He was keeping me safe while I laid unconscious in an unfamiliar environment, something I will be eternally grateful for. Nobody’s ever made me feel safe before.

I nod and start to sit up, my guardian angel helping me to stand.

“Mina, I’m going to take you to the library. I can set you up in a quiet room there where nobody will bother you, does that sound okay?” Mr. Hargrove asks. I nod my head with relief. That sounds way better than sitting in a classroom. As much as I want to be normal, I’m not. And apart from these two men, nobody has ever been kind to me before and I’ve probably reached the limit of nice people at this school.

“Alright, Jasper, you get to class. Thanks for your help out there.”Jasper.What a perfect name for this man. Wait - is he astudent? He seems a bit old to be a student, I mean I’m one to talk, but he doesn’t look like any seventeen-year old I’ve ever seen. But he is wearing the school issued uniform consisting of a white dress shirt and black pants. Not that I’ve seen any outside of tv shows and movies.

“My pleasure.” He smiles at me as he heads for the door. “See you later, Mina.” He waves before disappearing out the door.

“Alright, Love, let’s get you settled, yeah?” He holds out his hand towards me, and I frown at it with confusion. Does he want me to hold his hand? He quickly pulls it away and gives a quick laugh.