After picking up my skateboard from the dirty tiled floor, I held it by my side and sauntered into Redwood’s main building for lunch period. I walked alone in the chilly fall air. Nobody cared about anyone else in this shit town. And nobody gave a fuck about me.Except Vera now.Vera had barely spared me two glances over the past four years, but the way she had looked at me today when I dragged a chair over to her desk and told her to meet me later was the best fucking thing I had seen all week.With her staring up at me like she actually gave a fuck about what I needed to talk to her about, as if she really, truly feared me, fuck, it had done something to me. People in Redwood only cared about themselves, but Vera … well, she now cared about what I had to say to her.It was comical, laughable almost.And it brought me joy in this miserable place, so I wasn’t going to just scare Vera off. Tonight, I wanted to see what she had to say about the sex-filled story she had written in her notebook that I found by her locker.Vera might not have given me a second glance ever in her life, but after tonight, she would.Vera Rodriguez was about to care about every single thing that I did to her. I would make sure of it.