CHAPTER EIGHT:
After class I found Ally in the hall. Sean made a small wave as he walked off.
“Oh that’s him isn’t it?” She asked excitedly.
Max came up to join us.
“Rach you are no fun! I was dying in there!” Max pulls on my arm, “We must chat - bring the smiley one!”
Ally laughs and we both follow Max to her locker. Max and Ally formally meet and Max catches Ally up on what happened in her point of view, with me adding mine.
“Whew, the vapors!” Ally says with a fake southern accent and fans her face with her hand. “You’ve barely been here one full day and have already made this way more interesting.” She laughs.
I stand there smiling, feeling really good. I think this could be really good for me. After coming from Piso, where all I had was this greasy guy literally cornering me in the halls, this already feels so different. There was a brief time I thought Jake could make it different, but the stoic guy never said or did anything after I confessed my feelings for him. But that was all a long time ago.
Max looked at her phone and noted the time - passing period was ending and we all needed to get to our Homerooms.
“Can I fill Marsh in? I promise we will be super low-key about it with your man like right there,” she pleaded.
I agreed as long as she was super serious about not making anything obvious. I trusted Max to calm Marsha if needed.
Ally led us to our Homeroom, which was back at Levi’s. Outside of the classroom, was a lanky guy waving at Ally. I was quickly introduced to Simon, who I recognized from Trigonometry yesterday. His voice was startlingly deeper than I would have guessed.
“Hey, nice to meet you,” Simon said with a kind smile.
That’s when I saw someone watching us from the hall door. Thin, medium height, shaggy dark hair, oversized windbreaker. Piercing eyes. God. Dark piercing eyes. Unsettling ones.
Simon followed my gaze and said, “Oh, do you know him? He’s kinda odd.”
Odd-unsettling-guy made a face of distaste and backed up further down the hall, further into the shadow.
“Uh no,” I say, clearing my throat, “Good lord, what was with the staring?” I ask no one.
Ally chimed in, “No clue, he keeps to himself. Sadly he’s in our homeroom. Never seen him look at me though, I’m shivering.” I notice that she actually is shivering. Squinting her eyes in focus, then looking off to the side, she looks like she is remembering something but changes the subject instead.
“Speaking of Homeroom, let’s get inside before we’re late.” She leads us all the way to Levi’s classroom.
We walk in, and the three of us sit at a table. We spend the time chatting, with Ally taking a few minutes here and there to work on some homework assignments. I learned that Simon is local, and lives just a few blocks from our school. He seems like an easy-going guy. I notice that when Ally isn’t actively participating in the conversation he glances at her more. I wonder if he notices that. It’s not hidden by any means.
Creepy guy sits in the room with his back to us thankfully. During attendance I learned that his name is Vance. He sits alone, even though there are two other people at his table, they keep their chairs, conversation, and body language far away from him. He sits almost totally still. Every time I registered his presence, I could swear he hadn’t moved at all.
At last Homeroom ends and we stand up, ready for Break, the nice actual recess we have. Most everyone is standing, walking towards the door, and pulling out their cells. I start to do the same and realize something unsettling. The glass cabinet door across from Vance is working like a mirror. He is looking right at me. Through me. Simon accidentally bumps into my elbow, and our mutual gaze is broken. I need to get the hell out of here. There’s something feral in that look. It reminds me of Paul, the creep who would corner me in the halls of P.H. and I notice I’m breathing really quickly. I am rushing through the door and away, away.
“Rach!” I hear Ally call behind me. I hear her footsteps getting louder, she is probably running after me.
But I don’t look back, I can’t. Can’t stop until I am clear out of there.
CHAPTER NINE: Break ends with me again in the bathroom splashing some water on my face. Ally had tracked me down after my full freak out. “Are you sure you’re okay?” She asks me, one hand on my shoulder as I look at my face in the mirror. I glance around and notice there is another person in here with us. I don’t want to talk about all this with a random stranger as a witness, so I shrug her off. She looks concerned. I use a paper towel to dab my face fully dry and walk back out to the hall. We should be rushing to class. “Yeah, I’ll be okay. I’ll explain later, okay? We’ve got to get going.” Ally didn’t look quite satisfied, “Okaaay.., but I’ll at least show you where you’re going. Ally led the way to my next class, Humanities. The class was two doors down from Mr. Chu’s Homeroom, where I had started part of my day yesterday. A student opened the door from inside and turned around to face those of us gathered by the door. Ally nudged my arm, “That’s Ms. Del Rios. Our Human
CHAPTER TEN: By the end of class, I don’t think I could’ve told anyone what we had done the whole time. I felt cold after so much discomfort and as soon as class wound down, I frantically started packing things away. I had some handouts in front of me, I noted to myself to look at them later. A few times during class Bella had tried to talk to me but I could barely speak, feeling like there was a huge weight on my chest, and like my throat was squeezed shut. I made small “mhmm” sounds but couldn’t do much beyond that. People started standing up and gathering by the door, waiting for the few seconds before the bell. I forced myself up by the door all the way to the left of the crowd. I still felt eyes on me and needed air.The bell rang, the door was opened, and I walked as fast as I could back towards the courtyard, taking in big breaths of the fresh air. Other students started filing out nearby doors, and several gathered at benches along the courtyard walls. I was so determined to
CHAPTER ELEVEN: “Oh my god!” Marsha’s hands flailed about as she and Maxine approached my spot on the bench. “Tell me, tell me, tell me!” Marsha chanted excitedly like a little kid being told we were going to Disneyland. I chuckled, looking at her, and back at Sean’s retreating frame. Even his walking swagger attracted me, this all felt unreal. I still had my phone in my hand when I turned to them and said, “Well, he gave me his number.” I grinned, feeling warm and blushed in my face, “and I think we may be going on a date?” “You think?” Maxine asked me teasingly. I laughed. “Well he sort of arranged the whole thing while pretending to be me, and he made plans for us to go to the beach tomorrow after school - and I don’t think I can go” I added sadly, realizing that while realizing I still needed to tell him that wouldn’t work for me. “Well why the hell not?” Marsha asked. “There is only one bus that takes us home after school and I didn’t live in this town. My mom works
CHAPTER TWELVE: Ally and I walked to our next class, which we actually had together, Spanish. We waited by the door with the little crowd of other students while she caught me up on how ridiculous our Spanish teacher apparently was. Mr. Hall was supposedly a horrible teacher in that he waved his master’s degree around and demanded that the class respect him for it. He also supposedly had terrible class management skills but most of the class’ nonsense faded away on its own already because the class was just totally over him. Fun. “Oh crap! I almost forgot!” Ally exclaimed, a huge grin on her face. She whispered, “Sean is in this class.” She wiggled her eyebrows and I laughed so hard I nearly snorted when none other than Sean himself showed up. “Ladies,” he greeted. He just stood there next to us, like he has been our friend for years. He leaned over to me, “You didn’t say you were in this class. Might make it actually worth going to.” “I, uh, didn’t realize. Still getting my fi
CHAPTER THIRTEEN: We caught up on our way out to the exit. Me, sharing Sean’s message and how we still decided to go forward with hanging out tomorrow, and Ally/ Maxine/ Marsha sharing their points of view on the whole class period. They had me laughing so hard with Ally’s reenactments of Marsha trying to rein herself in. At the front Simon waved us over by this tree near our bus pickup, and we waved goodbye to Marsha and Maxine who made their way down the hill. They took the regular public bus down at the very bottom. After chatting with Simon a bit about weekend plans he wished us a good evening and walked to his older brother’s car who came around to pick him up. It was cute watching Simon really come into the personality Ally talked about. He seemed to be becoming more at ease around me. “Oh hey,” Ally turned to me as we sat down on the grass, “I forgot to ask you. Did you ever figure out what the deal with the redhead goth dude was? I don’t think I’ve seen him around?” I th
CHAPTER FOURTEEN: I watched from a safe distance as she crossed the next street. Something had made her smile. I wanted it to be me, who made her smile. I felt anger rising. It better not have been that giant clumsy fool she was just speaking to. She couldn’t be interested in him. Could she? Why couldn’t she just know it was me. I’m the one she has to be with. I need her. I continue to follow from across the street, using the cars along the way to block her view of me. I wouldn’t want to startle her. I need to know her. I need to study her without her knowing before I reveal myself. The real me. She looks up again from her phone to cross the next street. Smart girl. For a normal human she seems to be pretty aware of her surroundings. Almost at the elementary school now. I should be able to blend in with the crowd. I did that on our last walk. I have to stay calm though, if I get too comfortable she might sense me like yesterday. She nearly looked right at me from the bottom of the st
CHAPTER FIFTEEN Today marked my last ‘first’ day. I began today with Humanities, Ally’s Humanities class, which I hadn’t been in before. This morning after exiting the bus, successfully avoiding any eye contact situations, I sat in the cafeteria with Angela, Melanie and June again until Ally came by. We had decided to walk and talk a bit and came across the school librarian, Mr. Waller, who taught my film class too. He was surprised to see students on campus so early, at 7:35am and was surprised when we told him I got there at 7:20. Empathizing with us a bit, he invited us into the library to wait until school started. The library had been delightfully warm compared to the dense cold fog surrounding the school. A few minutes before the first bell Simon joined us, having texted Ally prior asking where we were. We all chatted a bit and then walked together to Ms. Del Rios’ class. Class went by fairly well. This group of people felt like such a break compared to my other Humanities
CHAPTER SIXTEEN: “Hey, um, Rachel?” I slowed down my charge and turned to see Kyle looking at me with… hope or something close to it in his eyes. “Oh hey” I said back. “Were you still up for the grand tour at some point? I figure you’ve already been around pretty much the whole place - but maybe?” He asked as we kept walking. We approached the courtyard and were hit with direct sunlight. “Yeah, sure, I’m still up for it. When were you thinking?” I asked back. I was very curious about this very odd guy. We slowed our walk to a crawling pace. “Great!” He exclaimed. “Maybe, after school today? Can we meet right back here?” “Rachel,” Sean said from a few paces away, beckoning me over. I turned back to Kyle, “Sorry, I’ve got some plans off campus after school. Maybe tomorrow, like Break?” Kyle seemed to just notice Sean’s approach and quickly said, “Okay, see yeah,” before retreating back the way we came. Sean walked up to me, uneasy. “That’s not him right? The guy who was givin