Everybody noticed the new kid when he entered the room.
And by everybody, I meant everybody. Even the jocks stopped making fun of poor Isaac, the class nerd, just to turn and look at him. Even the cheerleaders, who were sitting in front of the class, looked up from their make-up mirrors and stared at him for a minute or two.
Heck, even I had to pull my earphones off to momentarily enjoy the sweet sound of silence inside the classroom, only to find myself looking at the direction everybody was and stared at him, too.
In complete honesty, he looked lost. Like a little boy who was suddenly forced to sit with the big kids for once. On the other hand, he also looked troubled, and had the same look of regret across his face as I would whenever I entered the classroom myself since the past term.
That was another thing that confused me, too. It was already halfway into the first semester of the school year, and while everybody was already well-adjusted to senior year at this point in time, this kid decided to face it head-on three months later than anybody else. Even though I hadn't officially met him yet, I already bid him 'Good Luck' for, well, at least the rest of this week.
I wasn't confused, though, as to why people just stopped doing whatever they were doing just to gawk at him. His hair was black and short, like it was bowl-shaped but slightly messier, like he'd just gotten out of bed. He wore an unzipped black hoodie with a grey t-shirt underneath with what looked like some band logo printed on it, dark jeans that were ripped around the knees and black sneakers.
In other words, he looked like a homeless guy who just happened to stumble into this school and decided to stay put for the next nine months. I could just imagine what new gossip the cheerleaders had come up with just by his overall and sudden appearance today.
The next thing occurred was more natural for the students in this class: the jocks began snickering and some even started tearing off paper from their notebooks to make spit balls, the cheerleaders—as expected—were already leaning toward and whispering furiously to one another like mothers at a Parent-Teacher Conference, while everyone else pretty much returned to whatever pre-class activity they were doing, be it doodling, chatting with their friends, or—such as the loners like me—plugging their earphones back in and pretending that the world never existed.
But even as the pleasant yelling and guitar riffs of my favorite rock bands blocked out any sound from my ears, I couldn't help but watched the new kid from the corner of my eye, as he stood by the doorway for a minute or two, his grey eyes seemingly scanning the entirety of the room for a place to sit, before they eventually landed on a spot—right next to me.
I cursed at myself. That's what you get for sitting in the back of the room, all by yourself, Hayley.
Well, I wasn't completely by myself, though, because sitting right in front of me was Melody Turner, the only best friend I had in this entire school. The two of us went way back before high-school, back since when we were in kindergarten where she used to be one of those kids who practically ran to the playground every single break, while I was the one who would stay back inside the class, busy with my crayons and the paper half-filled with colorful scribbles in front of me.
We would barely even talk to each other back then if I wasn't being picked by all the other kids who had growth spurts before me, and she somehow chose to defend me when she practically yelled to the rest of the playground that one of those big kids had the cooties. Nobody spoke to him or even dare themselves to sit next to him for the next two weeks, while she asked the teacher for her seat to be moved so that she could sit right beside me. And ever since, we were pretty much inseparable.
As time passed, she grew to have other friends as well and even tried to introduce me to some of them. I didn't mind that too much back then, and sometimes we would all hang out together and actually have fun. Lately, however, they all distanced themselves from me and it didn't take long for me to realize that I was distancing myself from them as well, and only Mel was left by my side once again. Mel, on the other hand, was still in decent terms with everybody, and whenever she wasn't butting into my own personal problems, she would keep herself busy with them instead.
Unfortunately, that's exactly what she was doing right at this moment, talking with her other friends in the row in front of me, while I was left to sulk in the back of the class, alone, with some dude sitting to my left, taking up one out of three spots in the back just so that he could sleep his way through the class, and one empty seat to my right—the one I sat in the first day of school until Mel urged me to sit right behind her so that she could pass notes to me a lot easier.
But it was empty now. And it was the only empty seat in the class, I'd noticed.
A moment of panic washed over me. The only thing I hated more than school was awkward situations, and the new kid sitting right next to me was bound to end up with at least few of them, if not all the time. The only solution to that was to ignore him completely, but that would make me seem rude and unfriendly, even though I wasn't. Well, maybe the 'unfriendly' part. Then again, talking to him didn't seem like an option, because judging by the scowl he wore on his lips, he didn't seem like the 'talkative' type either.
I tried staring down at the surface of my desk as he slowly made his way toward the empty seat. When I looked up for once, I noticed that he too was facing downwards, paying more attention at what he was stepping on rather than the atmosphere of the class, or probably just to avoid any eye contact with the pimple-faced, ginger-headed nerds who looked like they were about to feast on him or something. A few girls even winked at him as he passed by, and yet he still acted as though they were insignificant, no doubt pissing them off, especially those that belonged to the more popular crowd who thought that their powder-covered faces and shirts with necklines lower than necessary could let them have their way at any guy in school. Or any man in school, as a matter of fact.
I stopped keeping track of his every movement when he was about halfway down and instead tried something else distracting: sketching. Without a moment of hesitation, I immediately pulled out my trusty old sketchbook from my pale cream messenger bag and flipped it open to the page I last was, before grabbing a pencil and started to continue where I left off. It took over my attention for a good while, actually, as I was practically allowing myself to be absorbed into the paper and the way the pencil slid across it with great ease, all the while losing myself to the beautiful rock ballad playing in my ears.
That was, until I heard a loud thump beside me and a loud, almost exaggerated sigh, and for the love of me, I couldn't resist glancing sideways, only for my eyes to immediately lock with his.
It was bound to happen, I'd thought. I didn't think it would happen right away.
My hand instantly stopped moving. His grey eyes looked a lot more different up close, as I could see blue flecks dancing inside of them, and a little hint of green, too. His features were sharp and soft all at the same time, with high cheekbones and full cheeks. He had black snakebites on either sides of his bottom lip, too, which balanced out his rather boyish looks to make him seem more like a badass.
And then I realized that I was staring.
I felt the blood rush into my cheeks before I could even think of any way to respond to this awkward moment, and while I flushed for a second, trying to regain my composure, I had to bit on my lower lip to stop myself from doing anything else stupid. Instead, I managed a smile, and turned back to him—he was still staring at me, god—and waved.
Just once. It looked more like a captain's salute than a friendly wave.
Then the unexpected happened. His lips curled back to form half a smile, and waved back.
Nodding, I went back to sketching. One awkward moment averted.
Just one. Who knows how many more would happen over the course of this day alone.
***
Our Homeroom teacher was absent that morning, and it didn't even register to us until the bell for first period rang, and everybody just stormed out of the room as though an earthquake had broken out.
Once outside, Mel and I went our separate ways after she promised to save me a seat and a strawberry cupcake during our first break period later, and she practically sprinted all the way to her next class afterwards—she had Algebra for her next period, and the teacher gave no sh*ts to anybody who's even a fraction of a minute late for her class. I, on the other hand, chose to take my sweet sweet time in walking to my next class, which was Arts, the only class in school I could tolerate since all I needed to do was doodle the entire period and I'd get an A+ for my final grade.
I didn't encounter the new kid again until the second period, which I also happened to share with Mel, too. By the time I got to the chemistry lab, though, he'd already sat down, also in the back of the class, and he had his head down the entire time until I entered, and he looked up just as I forced myself to look away from him. I didn't know why I was staring at him in the first place, but every time I did, it was as if he had something to say to me—something that needed to be expressed in a way more than just a friendly wave—but held himself back just because we were barely even acquainted with one another.
I quickly made my way over to where Mel was sitting at and settled down right next to her, just as I always did in laboratories, but when I turned to look at her, there was an unsettling, mischievous grin plastered across her freckled face that looked as though she was a cannibal and I was her next prey.
"What?"
"You like him, don't you?"
I nearly gagged. "No, I don't."
"You're in denial," she concluded, turning her face back to the front of the class while trying to keep a straight face. "That means you're so into him. Is it because of the snakebites?"
I rolled my eyes. I didn't want to give her the pleasure of winning just because I had to admit to myself that the snakebites were, indeed, cool. "You're ridiculous."
"And you are still in denial." She nudged me. "He's into you, too, if you haven't noticed already."
"How can you even tell? You've only seen him for, like, half an hour. I've only met him for half an hour."
"But look at him. He's practically the guy-version of you. He even has the same pair of sneakers you do."
I scoffed and rolled my eyes again. "And about three thousand other people on this planet. They were ten per cent off last week, by the way, so more or less, twenty other people in this town alone wear the same pair, too."
I expected for her to protest against me again when instead, she pressed her lips to a flat line and said, "He's gone, Hayley. There's no way he can get to you again. Maybe it's time for you to move on, too."
I shook my head, partly denying her words but also trying to push that nagging thought in my brain—more like a memory than a thought—back to the deepest corners of my head where nobody could pull it out, even if it tempted me to. I suddenly felt self-conscious and vulnerable all over again, shrinking whereas everyone else around me seemed to loom over me.
"And you're not the slightest bit worried that he had the appearance of a serial killer, at all?"
Just as she opened her mouth to answer me, all of a sudden the lab door was banged shut as the teacher, Mrs. Lynch—or 'Mrs. Lich' as some of the other kids would say—already in a lab coat, marched toward the front of the class, setting her books and supplies down on the teacher's desk before turning around to face the chalkboard. The entire class simultaneously plugged fingers into their earholes as the chalk scratched itself across the board, forming two words that instantly spread fear throughout the student body.
LAB PARTNERS
As expected, a chorus of groans and mumbles of complaints erupted from everybody, including Mel, who whispered to me, "God, I hope she finally decides that we're quiet enough in the back to not disrupt the class too much."
I shook my head again. The likeliness of the two of us being paired to be lab partners or any group projects, as a matter of fact, was undeniably low considering how close we were as friends, and how much the teachers just loved putting two people who hated each other with a passion in one group, just to spite them and to see exactly how much chaos could they brew. Either that, or they just wanted to pair a couple of students up just so that their 'Teacher's Lounge' gossip-fantasies would come true.
'You'll get to meet new friends,' they would say. If anything, they'd be our new enemies than our friends.
It's like they're really begging to be loathed by us.
"As you might've known for today, I will finally be assigning you your lab partners for this school year," Mrs. Lynch barked. Her raucous voice could spread fear across the student body that not a single student would dare themselves to do so much as to even blink. "This means that for the rest of the year, whenever you enter my class, you will immediately go to your assigned seats and sit down with your lab partner—not your little group of friends in the corner of the room, and not with your lovely little girlfriends or boyfriends either.
She grabbed a piece of paper right beside the chalkboard, and I noticed it to be the attendance list.
"I will assign you according to alphabetical order, understood? Table One will be Ann James and Beverly Robertson..."
We didn't need to be asked twice to stand up, some people cowering in fear of whoever would be assigned to be their partners, others holding their heads up high in confidence due to the knowledge that their partners would either be one of the brightest kids in the room, or the hottest. As always, I was indifferent—I didn't really care about whom I would be assigned with, as long as they'd leave me alone to get my own work done. In most cases, that would be the situation.
Unfortunately, Luck was definitely not in my favor today, as I found my name being called out loud, along with another name that I had yet to recognize.
"Hayley Rose Montgomery... you will be partnered with Jacob Parsons."
Walking toward the table Mrs. Lynch assigned me to, I looked to the corner of my eye to see someone else heading toward the same table as well, and my face instantly went pale when I realized it was none other than the new kid.
We arrived at the table almost at the same time—and almost too coincidental that it was terrifying—but I immediately sat down and dropped my bag by my side in a quick rush, probably too quick to remain unsuspicious. He only reacted by giving me a strange look before taking his place by my side, his actions a lot quieter than mine.
I didn't recall myself begging for another unwanted situation, but it seemed that today was just not my day at all.
As much as I tried to keep my gaze straight ahead at the chalkboard while waiting for Mrs. Lynch to finish, my focus was distracted once more when this time, it was him who decided to be friendly for once.
"You don't look like a rock fan," he muttered faintly, his deep voice barely audible.
I instantly glanced over to him, locking eyes with his once more. They didn't seem as hostile as they seemed from afar anymore.
"And you don't look like a 'Jacob,'" I retorted back, keeping my voice as silent as his.
The corner of his mouth twitched, forming a half smirk this time. "Touché, mademoiselle. Although, I prefer to be called 'Jake,' actually. 'Jacob' was my father's name, so I'm really 'Jacob Parsons, Jr.'"
I nodded and found myself smiling as well. "I'm Hayley, by the way, but I guess you knew from when Mrs. Lynch yelled both of our names out to the clouds and heavens above."
He chuckled, once, but it was a throaty, warm chuckle. "By the way, I knew that you were a rock fan from the loud music blaring, despite your earphones, and how you were sketching a familiar somebody in that sketchbook of yours."
I almost blushed again, shrugging. "I just happen to find circa 2002 Pete Wentz rather intriguing... and interesting to draw. I can show you the rest of my sketchbook sometime, perhaps."
His expression had brightened a bit at my words, but I myself felt somewhat proud that I got to be the first person here to make the new kid—or Jake, as he mentioned before—smile and even laugh despite the dreary atmosphere of the school.
God, what was wrong with me?
I made one guy smile. One guy. I mean, that was definitely a first or something, but maybe it was just because of my depressing and sarcastic self. Then again, I definitely didn't expect that he would be among the very few people who actually noticed my presence. I was practically invisible enough that some of the teachers still forgot my name even when it was already halfway through freshman year.
"Now that that's over," Mrs. Lynch's shrill voice brought me away from my thoughts and I immediately turned my attention back to the board after realizing that I still was, in fact, staring toward Jake's direction, "where did we last leave off in our last discussion again?"
ns 172.70.100.166da2
and then Add to home screen.