Enigmatic

Chapter 2

Mornings are just not my thing and especially not after what I went through yesterday night . Every muscle in my body ached and screamed at me to stay put in the bed but I had promised myself that I won't let my nights affect my days , so I get up . My reflection looked worse today as I had expected . The bluish mark on my stomach was complete bang on purple . But the top of my worries was the wound on my face . It looked grotesque and I had no idea how to cover it up . It would sure raise some eyebrows in school .

My mom was sipping a cup of coffee when I enter the kitchen . She flinches at the look of my face but knows better than to ask anything . I never told her the details of my nightly chores . She just knows the very basic facts and I preferred it that way. I grab a bowl and cereal and much on them , every bite hurting my sore jaw muscles. We don't talk much . That's just how we are . We are more comfortable with the silence than we are with the small talk because my life is way more complicated than school and detention .

"I won't be back after school today , got some stuff to be done in school," I inform my mom .

She just gives me a nod and continues staring at the table top .

I walk out the house and feel the cold air nip my skin . It felt good , the air. My hair blew around slightly as I had left it open as a pathetic attempt to cover my face . Once inside the school , I quietly walked to my first class ,keeping my head down the entire time . There was a lot of noise in the corridors as people shared their normal lives with their friends and as usual no one bothered me . I got a few stares but not a single greeting or question . I like to think that everyone is just scared of me at some level to come and talk to me . But I know that's not what it is . I don't belong with these people , the people for whom the most important thing in life is sales in the stores or soccer games . They probably just don't know how to approach me and even if they did they probably wouldn't because I am not exactly the appealing inviting person.

I had math first and I sat at the last seat in the corner and waited for the teacher . People were slowly filling up their seats and finally the teacher arrived . She was a woman of standard and generally took no rubbish from anyone hence the noise in the classroom suddenly subsided. We started with the lecture and it was just as uneventful as it could be from most of the time . Just when there was 10 minutes left for the bell to ring , there was a timid knock on the door . Everyone looks up and so do I .

A guy stood at the door , his hand clutching the bag straps .

"I am Sean ," he says in a low and deep voice , " my schedule says I have math now ."

"Oh yes you must be the transfer who I was told about , please come in and take a seat ," Ms Marin says .

He gives a nod and walks into the class. There were only two seats empty , one in front of me and the other beside me . He walks through the rows and takes the one beside me . I spare him a look from the corner of my eye and judge his frame .

He was a decent looking guy . Tall athletic build with dark brown hair cut short . His skin way very pale which was a obvious sign that he didn't prefer the outdoors much . He wasn't bothered with checking out his new classmates and just silently stared at his book , twirling the pencil in his hand , a nervous habit I guess. I think he felt my eyes on him and he turned around to look at me . I didn't back down like most people would but just continued to survey him like he was a science experiment . He got an amused look on his face at my stubbornness but turned back to his book without a word and so did I .