Beacon High and what changed me

Chapter II

7:00am. Yawn. Stupid early school. I open my laptop and lo and behold, a new AIM message from my ex. Why didn't I block him? Ugh. I tell him that Band-Aids don't fix bullet-holes and just leave him. I get dressed, eat breakfast, do a Sailor Moon transformation (okay maybe not that last one) and rush to get to the bus stop. The next 33 is coming in two minutes. As I wait I text Chloe asking her if she's taking the bus. "Yeah," she texts back, "I'm waiting at the bus stop." I tell her I'll text her where I sit and with that, the bus arrives. I hop on and get a seat, and settle down between some jocks and a group of tech nerds making themselves comfortable among some laptops. I pull out my headphones and plug them into my phone and get a song by FallOutBoy going. Before I notice it, the bus goes past Herculaneum Street and Chloe sits herself down next to me. "Miss P, could you be a darling and unplug yourself from your phone?", she says mocking Clara from the cheerleaders' voice. I smile cheesily, mumble "yes" and stuff my phone in my pocket. "So me and the guys were thinking of making a band, you know, Panic! At The Disco style. Maybe with a bit of Marina amd the Diamonds. What do you think?" I nod. "Great idea. But what will it be called?" Chloe thinks. "How about Urban Tribus?" I smile. "Hmm, or how about the Silver Spoons?" Chloe waves her hand. "Never mind the name, Miss P, we'll think of that later. First, we've got English class to get through." English, oh god. My head's a jungle anyway and class hasn't even started. It'll just make me more confused and confuzzled. The bus arrives at the school, and Chloe leads me down the forsaken road - aka the road to the school main building. Here the dream of freedom and happiness and fun is given up on by hundreds of pupils every day. Truly, the american school system is the biggest manufacturer of boredom with a zesty hint of mild depression. As we hurry to Mr. Hedd's class, we run past signs begging people to vote the people on them for treasurer and so on. "Ah, a new fellow. Well, hello, my name is Richard Hedd, and I shall be your English teacher. Now, children, open your books on page nineteen." I glance over next to me at Chloe. "Never trust a guy whose name's short form is Dick Head." She chuckles. "Yeah, true. Hey, so, you know Marina and The Diamonds right?" I nod. "Well, we were thinking of doing a cover of one of her songs, Mowgli's Road. Wanna join in?" I nod. "Yeah, sounds cool." I open up my book onto the aforementioned page and a wall of text stares back at me. "They couldn't make school books interesting, huh. They couldn't break up the wall of text here and there, could they. Quality craftsmanship, I do say." Chloe stares at me. "Yeah. But you gotta be quiet now, Mr. Hedd gives you bad marks for talking in class." As I glance at the table next to me, I see a skinny girl who could do with a Snickers or two, and a short skirt so short it makes Sailor Moon look like she's wearing a long, flowing dress. As she pulls out her mirror to redo her mascara, Hedd shouts. "Lena! What are you doing there?" She hastily stuffs it back into her pencil bag and murmurs "nothing" while doing her best to hide mild embarrassment. She's not doing well, to say the least. The class passes by, uneventfully, and we eventually get let out. Chloe and I run through the corridors, past geeks with laptops and WiFi Routers, to get to the main entrance hall of Beacon High, where we meet Skyler and the gang. "Hey, Penelope! How's it going?" I smile. "Quite well, ya know, school and all... Hey, I wanted to take you up on that offer of going and having a bit of a makeover, would today suit you?" He kinda sorta nods. "Yeah, yeah. To be honest there's not much else school-wise today, just a few classes and then school's out. So at about, I don't know, 14:30, meet you at Chloe's place?"  I nod. "Yeah, I need to get my clothes savings anyway." Yes I keep a separate savings jar for clothes and the sort. "Okay, cool. Shouldn't cost too much, I mean, Chloe's mom is a hairdresser, and she probably has a few clothes and hair items lying around unused." I smile at Skyler and the bell rings. I see the boy that I saw at the first day rush past me and Chloe points me towards the art wing. We rush there and Mrs. Langine awaits us. "Chloe Andrews..." She holds up an inherently sad-looking painting of a severely thin, almost starved, young woman. "Your art has to get happier, you're starting to scare the other art teachers." We sit down and the teacher introduces us to our next art project. Pop Art. "Andy Warhol, Beacon Hill style, basically. Do anything you want, as long as it's Pop Art." She trotted off to her table and sat down, looking through pieces of paper. I whisper to Chloe. "You paint for a hobby?" She nods. "Yeah. It's sort of based all on events in my life..." So the plot thickens. If the painting is of a severely thin person then Chloe... must have starved herself once. I wonder why. I start thinking what I could do and, craving inspiration, I stare at my table. I know! I'll just do a kissing scene... As the class passes by in what seems like eleven seconds, I start finishing the rough draft. The bell rings and we run out of class. I meet up with Chloe and Skyler, who shows me a piece of paper. "I tried to apply for a job to get some money, but apparently Fox News doesn't like feedback." I read the paper, detailing how he was turned down. Then I get to the line at the bottom. "We're Fox News", I read, "we don't care about the news, we never have and we never will." Literally. I can't believe it. Skyler smiles weakly and I try to suppress my laughter. "I wasn't told that Fox News was now self-aware." Chloe nods. "Yeah, how else would they be able to turn every topic into Republican propaganda?" A guy at our table laughs. "Fox News: Watch us and be damned for all eternity!" I ask Chloe who this is. "That's Lyle, he rarely speaks." Silence comes from Lyle's direction. "Uh, well, anyways..." Chloe stared at the time table. "We have history next, how.incredibly exciting." The bell rings and we rush to class, tripping over some air-headed cheerleaders in the process. "Good Morning Class, I am Mr. Banks and shall teach you the ins and outs of what happened before you were born." Class passes by uneventfully as Mr. Banks shows us a film. The bell rings, alerting us to our need to escape the classroom for a while. Next up on the classes-to-stomach list: Geography. Ms. Florence introduces herself and makes us read up about the geographical regions of America. Riveting. After an hour the bell rings and school's out for another 18 or so hours. I make my way home with Chloe and fall onto my bed, exhausted. Being a student is an exhausting job and we don't even get minimum wage.