Counting Raindrops

Chapter 3 of Counting Raindrops

Sitting down at my usual spot next to Jayce I kept my eyes forward, my mood was too good to be ruined by Jayce Wyatt. The unsupervised class was growing louder and louder as the time passed but I stayed silent as did Jayce, his best friends weren't in this class and I guess no one else here is worth his words or energy. That made me mad, he was too good for everyone else.




Mr. Goodman walked in with his mug of coffee in his hands and as usual, he didn't look pleased about the class' immaturity so he spoke, his voice was loud and strong, "all right! Settle down!" The class shifted into a pin-dropping-silence. Mr. Goodman smiled, "much better. Now, I have decided to give you all a project to do. Your partners have been decided for you so no looking around thinking you'll be partnered with your best friend. The project will be two and a half weeks long and it'll be about your chosen time frame and your chosen location." Making sure everyone was processing everything he continued, "you must make a model and write a paper about the significance of your event and how that impacted the rest of their history." "Any questions?" He finished with raised eyebrows, looking around the class for any hands to shoot up into the air.




"Who are the partners?" I recognized the boy as Johnny Smith, he was a cool kid, one of the popular kids. He had a lot of friends who adored him, athletic, pretty good looking, and smart too, but even he envied Jayce Wyatt. Compared to Johnny, Jayce was ten times better. Being broad-shouldered helped Jayce have extra strength and muscles where as Johnny was the slender type of strong. Jayce was very smart and knew what was right from wrong which is quite shocking to people like me who despise him. Jayce . . . Even I must say has better looks than Johnny . . . By a long shot to be honest. Everyone wants to be Jayce's friend, but he just doesn't acknowledge them making them try all the more harder. Jayce Wyatt was thee cool kid.




Mr. Goodman looked around, being sure that everyone was paying close attention to his next words, with trepidation in his tone he spoke, "the person whom you are sitting beside is going to be your partner and no Jayce, and Kat, there is no switching partners . . . Understood?" Some people groaned, including me, other people quietly cheered; quite happy with their partners. One was glaring at the teacher, that one was looking with icy cold eyes at Mr. Goodman for the choice of partners. That one was Jayce Wyatt.




I noticed that his hands were clenched on his thighs; his knuckles turning white with the pressure, "you expect me to work with her? Anyone in here for that matter. I work with my friends, or myself, that's it." He spoke through his teeth, it didn't take a scientist to notice the acid that was being sent through his words as he had so calmly said them. So calm, yet so ominous. I studied his posture as he sat there, he was leant forward slightly over the lab table as he didn't break his hard glare towards Mr. Goodman.




Mr. Goodman shrugged, "I'm sorry, Jayce, but it's a partnering assignment and you must work with whom you are sitting next to. No excuses and if I hear that you are not working with Kat over here, I will not hesitate to fail you. Understood?" Jayce stayed quiet, his jaw muscle clenched tight with irritation. I couldn't really read his eyes, they were guarded like they were at Cammy's, but I could tell that they were as cold and hard as icy steel. He hated giving into other people; their orders. He liked to do things his way.




For the rest of the hour we talked about the assignment some more, what it must have included and what the limitations were. The rules to the project were: if you do not work with your partner like expected to, you will fail. If you force your partner to do most or all of the work and refuse to do any of the work, you will fail. If someone other than the partners work on the project, family members for example, you will fail. If you attempt to swap partners, you will fail. So technically if you slip up once, you will fail.