True Love

New Friends

When I got to school, after all the stares I got while walking through the crowded hallway, I finally arrived at Gifted Zoology III. It was in the same dilapidated class from that I had for Zoology I, during my freshman year. I sat down in the desk in the back corner next to the window, Derek and I sat here when we had this class together. He always told me that it was his favorite class because it was the only class we had together.

I picked up the book that was on the floor by my desk and set it on my desk, it fell open to a page that had Introduction to Flatworms written in spiky blue ink. Below were some pictures labeled Class Turbellania and Class Trematoda. The worms were beautifully drawn, with their nervous systems and reproductive organs shaded in different colors of ink, but the artist had also given them a big goofy smiling faces. Grotesques but lovable in a cross-eyed way. I turned the page and saw another drawing The Life Cycle of a Pork Tapeworm.

At first the room was empty, I was the only one in the bland classroom. The students started to come in one by one, when they stopped there was only ten kids in the room. They were all spread out, evenly among the twenty desks. Typical first day of school. Out of the ten students, there was only two guys.

The tardy bell rang when the teacher finally walked in. She set her stack of papers down on the big mahogany desk that was set up in the front of the class room. “Hello. I’m Ms. LeMaire but since we are all seniors slash adults y’all can call me Ashley.” No one spoke when she stopped, there was a silence I felt I could cut with a knife. “Welcome to Gifted Zoology III. I, um, I’ll try to make this class as fun as possible, but I’ll be honest, even as a teacher I know this subject can get a little dreary--”

“But it is interesting, too.” A girl said next to me. I didn’t even realize that someone was sitting in Derek’s spot. She had curly red hair and brown eyes that were as cold as ice but still compassionate. Everyone turned to look at her, even the teacher had a look of surprise. The girl looked around the room, then finally look at me, her eyes go wide and she quickly turned her head.

I hadn’t seen her around before, I turned my head slowly away from her, really confused. She leaned closer to me, “Hey, um, you’re uh Mia Syracuse, right?” I looked at her and nodded. “I have, erm, heard about you. You’re like the most popular girl hear. Top of the food chain, or well social ladder.” She suddenly stopped talking

I didn’t know what to say at first, “What have you heard?” I finally asked. There was so many rumors going around about me, I wanted to know which ones she had heard.

“Well--uh--I don’t know just--um--different stuff.” The girl was timid.

“Yea, but like what?” I was determined to know what she had heard. I wonder if their was a new rumor going around about me. It would have been a perfect way to start the year off. Not.

She showed a certain reluctance before she spoke. “Nothing really important or worth worrying about. I have mostly just heard about that thing that happened with your friends or well--um--ex-friends. But I have heard different things, I was wondering if--uh--”

“You were wondering if I would tell you what really happened.” I snapped. “Sorry. Well, last year I had met this guy, he wasn’t really popular or anything but he was sweet, funny, and understanding. Now this guy he wasn’t all that cute but I think looks don’t matter, it’s the personality that matters. All of my friends thought he wasn’t good enough for me, kinda like that song Skater Boy by Avril Lavigne, except I didn’t tell him see ya later. Anyway, it was getting close to the end of the school year and we had been dating for about a year. Then my friends decided that I wasn’t popular enough anymore, but I wasn’t going to let them just dump me. Hell, I was the leader of the group, I was the reason they were so popular. So I did a few things that I’m may or not be proud of, but it made them social outcasts. Anyone, who would talk to them, was considered to be just as low on the social ladder.” The bell rang just as I finished. The girl was already packed and was walking out of the door. “Hey, wait, what’s your name?” I asked her, as I stumbled to get my books put up, but she didn’t hear me.