Meet Teddy (Teardrop), a nonverbal girl starting high school. Despite her introverted nature, she's going to find herself connected to the centers of drama in the new high school. Between her two childhood friends (one of which has an evil twin), a...
Almost immediately, both Dora and the other student got out of their chairs and glared at each other. The other student yelled out, "Aw seriously?" while Dora started protesting in Spanish. Teddy couldn't understand much of what Dora was saying, but she could at least make out the word "no" and the name "David".
However, the teacher didn't seem to care. "Great, you two can be on team 'hates-each-other'. Moving on!"
Teddy felt bad for Dora for having to be partnered with someone she clearly couldn't stand, but was relieved to find that, although she hadn't been partner with Dora or Sawyer, she at least had been partnered with Ellie, on what the teacher had rudely dubbed team "honestly-I-doubt-I'll-even-remember-you-exist". Though, what Teddy actually doubted was that the teacher would even remember these partner names the next day. Still, that didn't seem to stop Ellie from being offended by the name the teacher assigned their pairing.
"How rude," Ellie muttered under her breath.
"What was that?" the teacher snapped, glaring at Ellie, who immediately paled upon realizing she was heard.
"N-nothing," Ellie stammered.
"Good," Mrs. Chrysanthe Hanasaki said smugly. Since Ellie and Teddy happened to be the last people who she partnered up with each other, she also clapped her hands and yelled for everyone to sit next to their partner for the main part of the class.
As Ellie moved over towards the back where Teddy was sitting, and Sawyer similarly moved over to where her partner was, Teddy shot Dora a sympathetic look. Dora's partner, who Teddy figured was named David, had begrudgingly moved over to a seat next to the Mexican girl. However, both of them were glaring at each other and were trying to scoot as far away from the other as possible while still staying within their seats.
"What's with them?" Ellie asked, after following Teddy's gaze.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Image: Teddy and Ellie are sitting in chairs and looking to the side (at Dora and David, who are not in view of the picture). Teddy has the tote bag mentioned in Chapter 3. (Don't check Chapter 1's image for the tote bag. Let's just retcon it into being there all along.) Ellie is wearing an off-white sweater/jacket on top of a yellow shirt. Her prosthetic arms are placed on her chest. Ellie has an eyebrow raised.
Teddy shrugged and began typing into her AAC app. "I don't know."
It was the truth. All Teddy knew was that Dora and David seemed to hate each other, but everyone who was paying attention would know that by now. What Teddy didn't know was what kind of history was between the two to make them hate each other that much.
"Okay, now that you're all with your partners, let's learn about biology," Mrs. Chrysanthe Hanasaki said.
While a lot of the other kids seemed to have an expression on their face that clearly said, "Then why do we also have health class?", Teddy's main thoughts were of surprise. They were actually going to learn science. Normally, that wouldn't be a surprise, considering the subject name, but so far, Teddy didn't see Mrs. Chrysanthe Hanasaki as a capable teacher. She was too self absorbed and Teddy knew that what she was famous for was actually her fashion lines, and not anything science related. Although, Teddy now realized that she wrong. Maybe she shouldn't be too quick to judge, after all.
