On my way to the bus stop, I noticed Mason Jones walking in step beside me.
“Finally decided to go to school today, Mase?”
I heard him chuckle beside me as he unplugged the ear phones from his ears. “It hasn’t started yet. Don’t make me change my mind.”
Our conversations never really lasted, so I focused on getting to the horrible place that kept me for eight hours and five days out of the week.
The October air was a bit chilly as I made my way into the old school. The school district tried their best to “reinvent” it, but it always ended up looking the way it did before, so what was the use. The used-to-be white floors held yellowish stains from many years of being walked on. The oh so “trusty” lockers looked bent and were oddly shaped, but we had no other choice but to use them.
People crowded the places with their little groups, most of them trying to talk over each other. I was friends with most of the girls in Mai’s grade, so after they graduated I started to focus on my grades rather than make new friends.
I was never popular – even before Mai and her friends graduated – but it wasn’t as if I really wanted to. Our school didn’t have the major cliques like they did in the movies, however, it had “gangs”. Those “cool kids” who usually skipped school in my neighborhood were involved, but as I mentioned before, they were harmless.
I wasn’t one to pay attention to the drama that went on, but from the pieces that I did hear about, I concluded that the gangs in the school were similar to the two in West Side Story. Two groups – or gangs, for that matter – that disliked each other for some reason. It wasn’t too fond of the musical, so I ignored the gang-related drama that happened in the school.
As I made my way to the library to finish up some homework, my phone began to vibrate in my pocket. Ignoring it, I continued to my destination – homework was my top priority today. If I wasn’t going to get to the Stanford University with money, I had to with high grades.
The library was dingy, but to tell the truth, it was the cleanest place in this school. It probably held the oldest books – I mean, the school was nearly thirty years old, and since the town didn’t have very much funding for the education system, building a new school wasn’t in anyone’s plan. Don’t even get me started on the bathrooms. If I had the choice to hold it until I went home, that’s exactly what I’d do…but not everyone is blessed with such a bladder.
As I sat down in one of the tables, I thanked God for the quiet. My phone began to vibrate again, but I ignored it for the second time.
In about twenty minutes, I’d completed my homework, looked over a few class notes, and noted that my phone rang about four times in that time... I still had about ten minutes until I had to be in my first class, so I whipped out my phone to see who the pesky caller was. It couldn’t have been Mom – she had to be at the diner extra early this morning for the breakfast rush. She probably didn’t have time to even think about her little flip phone. And it couldn’t have been Dad. He…was not here.
I stared at the unknown number: 812-7280. They called about six times, but left no voice message. Who in the heck could it be?
Before I could snap the phone shut, the number popped back up on my phone. I lifted myself from the table and made my way to the back of the library.
“Hello?”
“Oh, so you finally answer the phone!” The husky voice wasn’t one that I’d heard recently, yet he sounded so familiar.
“Who is this?”
“Oh, so you’ve forgotten already? I should’ve known.” He mumbled to himself.
That rude and straight-forward voice…
“Who is this?” I asked again.
“Are you – uh, busy at the moment? I need to speak to you about something…something rather important. You wouldn’t want to miss it.”
For the third time, I repeated my question.
I stared at the number to make sure that I didn’t recognize the number. Was this some kind of joke?
“Tell me who you are!” I lost my patience and forgot where I was for a second until I heard the librarian tell me shut up.
He was quiet for a long while. “Oh…I don’t think I properly introduced myself.”
“No, duh, Idiot,” I mumbled away from the phone.
“I am Christopher Livingston. We…met this weekend at that very elegant country club. I am sure that you remember me, but if not…then I guess something is very wrong with your brain.”
Of course it was him. His nearly annoying voice was as arrogant and cruel as before. I wasn’t surprised that he had called me, but I was surprised that he called me two days later. I should have expected that he’d call me for his money for that damaged car…
Dang, rich people and their money.
“So, are you busy?” He added, sounding like one of those pesky credit card callers who never stopped calling the house about the overdue bills.
“As a matter of fact, I am,” I felt so stupid for not thinking about how to get the money to pay this guy. How did I let it slip my mind?
“Yeah, right,” He snapped back, all of a sudden turning bi-polar. “You don’t have a job, remember, so I can tell that you’re lying to me. You’re probably at home lazing around.”
Reality slapped me in the face, then. No job, no money. That meant that I wasn’t getting Mom and me out of East Chicago at all.
He spoke again. “I can’t believe I felt sorry for you…”
My breathing hastened, as my anger rose. “You don’t know me, so don’t feel sorry for me!”
“You didn’t even listen to what I had to say…and you’re acting like a fraidy-cat.”
“Wow, for a rich boy, you sure do have a rich vocabulary.” I snapped back. He was making me get riled up like he did when we first met. “Look, I have no time for your stupidity, I have class in less than five minutes. I’ll pay you your darn money when it magically appears in my hands.” With that, I slapped my phone shut, grabbed my stuff, and headed toward my first class.
***
By time I arrived at seventh period – the last class for the day – I was just about ready to drop on the floor and take a rest. This was the class that I hated the most, because I managed to get straight Ds in it. It wasn’t Mathematics or Physics…nor was it Chemistry, History, or English class. It was Culinary Arts…
Remember when neither Mom nor I could cook to save our lives? Well, the Culinary Arts class wasn’t helping at all. I was assigned to this class when I told my trusty counselor that I only ordered take-out every night for dinner. That was the biggest mistake of my life! The cruel teacher, Ms. White hardly even taught. The instructions she gave us every week was the same: Read the chapter, do the assessments at the end, and there would be a kitchen lab on Friday.
We were practically teaching ourselves, but not everyone could do that – including me. I was more of a hands-on learner, and Ms. White was very hard at understanding that.
The only way I managed to get straight Ds and not straight Fs in the class was that Ms. White would take many “participation grades” whereas if you were in the class and did the work, you got an A for the assessment. But when it came time for the actual kitchen lab that everyone seem to pass with flying colors, I always failed, and that grade counted as three test grades! Crazy, right?
So today, Ms. White, the old evil witch sat at her desk reading some novel that wasn’t even close to the curriculum. I sat at my usual desk and took out the book to read this week’s chapter: Knife Skills…
Well, it looked like I wouldn’t have my fingers by next week.
YOU ARE READING
Mr. Stupid Rich
Teen Fiction"He was made of money, and I knew anything but that. How was I supposed to trust him when people like him cared about nothing but themselves? If they did care, the poor wouldn’t be poor, right?" Meet Ashleigh Wills, your typical high school senior t...
