“I’d say my teacher forcing me to attend this assembly counts as bullying. What about you?”
Guinevere Daniels rolled her eyes. “Yeah. I’ve got an in-class nap to catch up on.”
The random seating by grades at school assemblies had brought us together for the first time since middle school. Otherwise, hot thin blondes like Guinevere didn’t talk to guys like me.
“Oh, late night?”
She smiled mischievously. “Late, but uneventful.”
There were two prominent rumors about Guinevere- the first was that her sister worked as a stripper, which added to her sex appeal. The second was that she broke up with her boyfriend so she could sleep with him and his best friend. This added to her slut appeal.
The loud, reverberating noise from a handheld microphone ruined my chance for an innuendo. I cursed our school’s frugality.
“Good morning students,” greeted Mr. Johnston, our assistant principal.
He repeated himself, as he wasn’t satisfied with the initial level of feedback from the crowd.
I leaned closer to Guinevere to whisper, my dark brown arm grazing her white one.
“I’m Lester.”
“Gwynn. I’m expecting this to get really exciting, so try not to talk my head off.”
I accepted her sarcasm as an invitation. While I doubted the rumor as fact, Gwynn’s ex-boyfriend, Brent, and his best friend, Roman, were the only people she hung out with. Most of us switched crowds throughout our first year and blended into a new one sophomore year. Gwynn hadn’t. I didn’t consider their group intentionally exclusive, but anyone who tried to enter later complained they just didn’t fit.
“Everyone, please give a warm welcome to Dr. Camellia Rosario.”
Gwynn stopped being the object of my eye for a few moments as a posh Hispanic woman in a pant suit walked from the double doors. Mr. Johnston must have made a mistake when he called her a doctor. She couldn’t possibly be out of her early twenties.
Dr. Rosario reintroduced herself and went through her credentials, but I was lost in other details, like her full lips and athletic yet curvy body. Her shoulder-length, wavy, nearly frizzy hair bounced as she paraded around the gym, her amber eyes winnowing the crowd.
She demonstrated presence like the power-executive types, which made me think of my dad, and which likely meant her display was just an attempt to smother the evidence of a depreciating life.
“You may not believe this by my success now, but I used to be bullied, too.”
“She’s right. I don’t believe her.”
Gwynn shot me a smile.
Dr. Rosario went on talking and I went on not listening. Until I heard the word “volunteer.”
Her eyes fell right on me. I’m sure my physical features screamed victim: tall with lanky arms, horn-rimmed glasses, and an unkempt afro. But it would cost a lot more than her outfit to get me to open up to my peers.
Dr. Rosario spun around in a circle, still searching.
“Anybody?”
A hand shot up in the air over where the juniors sat. “I’ll go.”
“Excellent. Come on down.”
The volunteer’s short dreadlocks bobbed as he stepped down the bleachers. The grin plastered on his face was as dark as his complexion. A few students snickered when they saw who it was.
YOU ARE READING
Communion
Teen Fiction"Lester Fuller knows isolation well. It has been his only friend since Jadarius Singleton humiliated him last year. But one night after Jadarius's taunts go too far, Lester stumbles upon Gwynn's body. He's sure she's dead. Until she bites him. V...
