I answered Ryder, not trying to hide the despair choking the life out of me. He wouldn’t care anyway. Actually, he’d probably ignore it completely. Thank God. “Sure about that?” He asked with a sarcastic edge to his voice that grated across the space between us. Today Ryder was wearing a long sleeved gray thermal shirt and dark washed jeans over leather flip flops. His hair was layered carelessly at least a good inch off his forehead, pushed out of the way by an obsessive need to run his hand through it. His gray eyes were gunmetal with concern and he was holding a stack of papers divided up with yellow sticky notes labeling them. “Yes, I’m sure.” I snapped. “That’s why you’re at war with your locker instead of in class?” he assessed me judgmentally from where he leaned against the opposite wall. I wanted to think he was joking, but there was nothing light or teasing in his eyes.
