Thε Spαrklε Tooƒus (ACT I: Fall Term) ✓

six

A Notorious Senior Class

Damien yapped on as we walked while I avoided replying to any of his comments. I had spent less than ten minutes with the guy and already felt like my head would explode. He tired me out, with his constant chatter and over the top laughter. That was why when we made a turn around another nook in the hallway, I was glad to see we had finally arrived at the destination. A plate on the door read: MUSIC ROOM

What a way to start the day. I loved listening to music but never enjoyed the participatory part involved in the subject.

Sounds of loud shouts and roars came from the other side of the door, all belonging to soon-to-meet classmates. Maybe this wasn't a strict class as I thought it would be. Or the teacher was absent. Either way, the idea of joining a group of noisy teenagers didn't bother me all that much. The idea of them involving me in their acts was what had my stomach twisting in knots inside of me.

This was my first, first-day in a new school. I didn't want to mess it up but I should have known running into Damien had already done the job.

"Ready to get it over with?" A voice popped me out of my thoughts and I looked up to see him, smiling gently. His eyes said it all, though. They were sparkling, as if witnessing my reaction to meeting the ruckus of a class that awaited would fulfill his life's wishes.

Slipping my hands into my pockets, I shrugged. "It's not like I have a choice."

Grinning, Damien's hand curled around the doorknob and he pushed it open.

Students were scattered around in a very unorganized manner around the room. Some were seated conveniently on top of their desks, having formed little clusters with their respective friend groups, talking and joking loudly. Right in front of me was a circle of about five to seven people, sat on the ground with a bottle spinning in the center. It landed, with both ends pointing to two girls who went bright red at the result.

"Kiss her, kiss her, kiss her!" They were chanting, pushing a short haired blonde girl to  kiss the other one, who resembled her a little too much. The guys' voices were the loudest, as if this is what they'd been looking forward to all weekend: Spin the Bottle in music class, with an extra dab of possible incest.

I noticed that a man, who looked no older than twenty five years old and who I assumed to be the teacher, was walking back and forth across the room, trying to calm the class down. But no one listened.

My jaw dropped open at the sight. What had I just walked into? Aren't senior classes supposed to be focused, hard-working and ? This one seemed to be quite the opposite.

Not one person seemed to notice my presence among the haywire of the situation, even after Damien cleared his throat a couple of times.

He shrugged to himself when it worked out to no avail and entered the room, turning to the left to pass through a door connecting the room to another. He cast me a sideways glance and a wicked grin before vanishing from view, closing the door behind him and leaving me to gape at the mess in front of me.

A pair of eyes landed on me and I tried to straighten up my posture. Closing my wide-open mouth, I regained a sense of formality as the teacher came closer. He forced a smile to his lips, tired grey eyes assessing me in the best way possible as he held out a hand.

"You must be Makayla Summers."

I nodded, glancing nervously around as I shook hands with him.

"I'm Mr. Stevenson. But you can call me Joshua. I hate it all the formalities with students."

"I can see that," I said, cocking my head towards the class. He laughed at what I was suggesting, looking a thousand times younger in the process. "Yeah, the senior class is quite a handful this year."

My smile faltered as I looked past Mr. Stevenson - whoops - Joshua's shoulder, noticing that a group of students had managed to find me in the spotlight.

What now?

I'm not scared. Seriously. I'm not.

I didn't have a reason to be and I'm not one to get frightened easily. But the way those three creeps from across the room were staring at me certainly caused goosebumps to break out across my skin.

"Makayla?"

Snapping my gaze away from the group and back to the teacher, I noticed him giving me a grim smile.

"I'll just warn you," he whispered, stepping in closer to me, "most of the students in this class are outright insane. And unless you want to get yourself influenced by their 'bad-ass'," he made air quotes with his fingers, "motives, I'd keep away from most of them."

My eyebrows arched up slightly at what I was hearing. Was 'Joshua' actually gossiping about the students to me? I didn't say anything in response but he must have been expecting a reaction. Instead, I settled with an unsure nod, watching him as he retreated back to his task of trying to get everyone in place after giving me a small smile.

I found myself rooted to the spot, trying to figure out what to do. By now, most of the students had noticed that the 'new girl' had showed up. Eyes fixed upon me in interest and I felt myself squirm uncomfortably under their gazes.

Casting a frantic glance around the room, I bit down on my lip as one extremely pathetic thought ran through my mind, one I knew I would regret later.

Where in the world is the stable boy?

Tearing my eyes away from the scrutinizing ones of my fellow classmates, I searched the room for Damien before landing on the door to my right. That's where I'd seen him go. He had to be inside that room.

Taking a step sideways, my hands curled around the door handle, pushing down on it with urgent force. I stepped inside the room, closing it behind me and leaned back against it - not even looking at the room's inhabitants. An audible sigh of relief escaped my lips.

My heart was pounding unevenly within my chest and I could still feel the eyes of the others imprinted on me.

I hated being the new girl. I'd never had to play that role before. Life had been so much easier in Florida. It was as simple as being born, then being placed into a school for nursery and finally growing up for the rest of my life in that same school. Seeing classmates I'd known ever since I'd learned to add and subtract numbers, walking past familiar classrooms that I had once been in during the sixth grade... that had been the routine of my life.

But now, I felt like an alien in this new environment. The worst part of it all was that I'd transferred senior year - the most important year for forming last memories and reminiscing over school life. Instead, I would be graduating from a school where I knew absolutely no one and had no attachment to. Wonderful.

Inhaling a deep breath, I dropped my hands to my side, relaxing my posture. Straightening up so that my bag was no longer bunched up against the door, I realized that my dramatic entrance had made quite an impact on an audience I hadn't been aware of.

Not only was Damien in the room but alongside him were two other boys. Three pairs of eyes fixed on me with interest, waiting for my first words.

Oh, what have I gotten myself into?

--------------------CHAPTER END---------------------

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