Little Blue Slips

Chapter 19

Monday came around again far too quickly. I really don’t know where the weekend went. But, they say time flies when you’re having fun, so we must have.

I had given up on my locker and put all my books in Jareth’s. I was sick of having all the blue scraps rain down upon me and having to clear them up before anyone noticed or started a rumour about it. I peeked through the vents of my old locker. It was very quickly filling up. I put it to the back of my mind and headed for English, Jareth grim faced beside me. He didn’t like the fact that I had classes with David. What he thought was going to happen when there was a room full of other students present, I don’t know, but it clearly played on his mind. He kissed me softly as he left me at the door of my classroom, looking relived that he didn’t have to see David himself as he hadn’t arrived yet.

            I took my seat at the back of the classroom next to Sophie and we chatted quietly about the weekend until David came in.

            “Good morning class, today we’re going to be going over the essays you had back last lesson and we’ll highlight what the question was looking for and the best ways of phrasing your answers. Bear in mind you’ll be getting questions like this in your exams…” He stopped as the door opened loudly, Yasmin clicking in with a flick of her bleached hair and a shake of her butt. Yuck. He ignored her and carried on as she took her seat and noisily took out her things.

She did not like being ignored, that was one of the first things I had learned about her. Yasmin was the centre of the universe and everything revolved around her.

            “David…I mean Mr. Milicevic?”

            “Yasmin can it wait until I’m finished?”

            “Not really.”

He nodded for her to go ahead.

            “It’s about that essay we did…”

What followed was an entirely too graphic reasoning for her not having done it, one that incorporated her distress at being raped and the ensuing nightmares she had been having that prevented her from being able to concentrate etc, etc ad infinitum. Essentially it boiled down to TMI.

Most of the class gaped in awe that she would speak of it in front of them. David simply quietly stated that he would speak to her after class. This was what she had been hoping for as her face lit up.

There is something very, very wrong with that girl.

            I simply tried to omit the whole exchange from my memory and focused on his voice, it was all I allowed myself now. I wouldn’t meet his eyes, or look above his mouth, though it was a wonderful mouth with full lips, the bottom one pouting slightly just asking to be…

I shook myself and blinked a lot to try to clear the very wrong imagery that had been filling my mind. This wasn’t good.

            “Ok, who would like to read lines?”

Yasmin’s hand shot up.

            “Very well, Yasmin you are Othello.”

She frowned.

            “And Jack, could you be Iago?”

The scene was read, Yasmin’s voice sullen and unenthused.

I couldn’t do it any longer, I’d denied myself long enough…and when I did look up to his eyes, they were staring right back at me. The rest of the class were following the text as it was being read so they did not notice the intensity of his stare, or the way I was unable to look away, a blush rising to my cheeks. I felt like crying, that he could leave me so weak from one look! It was infuriating and so very wrong.