didn't know you were cold ('til you felt my fire) // JENLISA AU

Chapter 2

That incident made the choice for her.

Yes, BMBYH High had the prestigious Progress Program that came with excellent university courses and high recommendations but it also had real people- locals, who didn't live behind fenced laneways or have personal maids. It had people with experiences.

More than good grades, prestigious degrees and university applications, Jennie craved to experience the real world.

She didn't give that explanation to her parents of course, just parroted that the Progress Program had an excellent track record with helping students into the Law program for University of her choice. Which was enough for her mother to agree.

"When I was your age it was always known that the prettiest girls all went to BMBYH." Was her dad's only contribution, said with a wink.

Jennie was never quite sure what he meant by that.

*

School was, as it always was, uneventful. She handed in papers, highlighted notes, ate her lunch alone by the windows looking over the sports field and counted the minutes through her Progress U-Level physics lesson until the last class of the day could begin. It was Jennie's favourite: automotive.

Despite, or in spite of, her upbringing in a house of politics and medicine there was nothing Jennie loved more than cars. Ever since she had caught a screening of Grease on television, her entire dream had been to just live a life of metal and gears. While it wasn't something she knew was possible, not for Jennie Kim, auto class at least gave her a chance to pretend it could be.

The shop teacher was a close friend of the family, and it was that luck that Jennie was allowed to take this class at all, getting her fingers dirty with grease and oil, scrubbing them furiously in the bathroom with a toothbrush before heading home, her lying that she was only helping with administrative work.

For her senior project she was working on something more personal, restoring a 1979 Porsche. It was a beautiful, ugly, absolute hunk of junk and if Jennie could get just the right parts she could make it purr again.

Unfortunately getting those parts wasn't always the easiest, especially parts for the odd shaped frame to replace the rust, and she was often stuck spending half as much time scouring eBay and car magazine sale ads as she was working.

The class shared it's space with metal shop, both mixed cohort classes of various grades just for the sake of numbers. Jennie was one of the few seniors, and didn't know many of the students very well but Ella always stood out. Faded blue hair, in haphazard braids, clothes that were always tattered but in a pop-punk way that looked like it was on purpose, a cheerful attitude despite her social outcast status, a notable gift for engineering and math.

A sister with a reputation.

Jennie had tried to befriend the lonely young girl at the beginning of the year and had been met worth a polite but firm 'yeah, my people don't really like your people,' and Jennie didn't press it. The rift between 'vandal' and 'pinksy' wasn't so extreme it couldn't be breached, but she and Ella were both from fairly opposite ends of their respective 'sides', despite Ella being in the Progress Program. Jennie certainly wasn't going to force someone to be her friend.

So she was shocked today, when halfway through free time at class the younger girl walked up to her, head low and shoulders up like a cat approaching a toy. She stopped just beside Jennie working on cleaning a piston cylinder, and stood there a minute until Jennie tilted her head, acknowledging her presence.

"Car's looking good." Ella said in a strangely clipped voice.

Jennie paused in her work to look over at the half-finished frame. "Thank you." She looked over at the younger girl, trying to keep her face impassive despite her curiosity. "We're having a hell of a time sourcing some parts but what we have to work with is going well."