Broken Strings

Chapter 1

Kendall, upon hearing James and Carlos's grunts of disapproval among the other students', sighed thickly. The fact that the class would have partners assignedto them rather than choosing for themselves held absolutely no significance for the fair-haired teenager; at least, not in times such as this, when his two closest friends were bothin the class with him and would undoubtedly cling to each others' sides at the mere mention of free-reign on two-person projects. Turning just slightly in each direction to glance at his frustrated friends, Kendall raised an eyebrow.

"Sad to know what I feel like every once in a while, huh?" he smirked, chuckling lightly and shielding himself as Carlos wadded up a piece of paper torn from his spiral notebook and hurled it at his head.

"Yeah, whatever Kendork." James muttered, shaking his head. His expression was none-too-satisfied as he proceeded to doodle upon the surface of his desk with his pen. Moments later, his pen ceased its incessant scribbling and he shifted in his seat to glance up at Kendall. "Besides, you need to stop being such a little girl about the fact that you're always paired with some stranger. Make some new friends and maybe you wouldn't be so lonely all of the time."

Sneering in the direction of his cocky friend, Kendall snorted. "And what are you, pretty boy? My mother?" he laughed quietly as his playful sneer reformed and instead took on the profile of a crooked grin; the irony of his statement was that the things that James had said actually sounded like something that Mrs. Knight might have said.

Choosing to ignore whatever witty comment James might have shot back at him, Kendall turned in his seat once again, sighing softly as he caught sight of Mrs. Jones striding up and down the aisles created by the arrangement of the desks. She appeared to be pausing at each of his fellow classmates' desks to give them the name of their partner for the review project that she seemed so dead-set upon.

As the nearly-burnt-out-for-the-day blonde boy observed his classmates' reactions he sighed audibly, pursing his lips for a moment… very few of the students appeared genuinely happy for the partner that they had been given. A few looked to be simply indifferent, but the majority of the teenagers in the room appeared extremely disappointed, and some, even slightly appalled. Well, Kendall thought to himself, this is high school… where the brains are small, and the sense of acceptance is smaller.

In any case, as he proceeded to scan each student's expression, gauging reactions, he came across one in particular that he found quite odd. At the opposite end of the room, Kendall spotted a head of dark hair attached to a jittery pair of shoulders. He bit down upon his lower lip tentatively at the sight of the kid, his brow furrowing just slightly. He really only had a profile view of the boy, but he could see that the brunette was equipped with a pair of dark, glasses-framed eyes; eyes which, after a moment or two, coincidentally found their way upward to gaze toward Kendall. The expression garnishing the two chocolate-colored orbs, as Kendall could now see them clearly, appeared to be slightly fearful. Tilting his head to the side a bit as he observed the boy, the blonde began to nibble thoughtfully at his chapped lower lip. After only a moment's worth of analyzing the boy's odd expression, though, it seemed that the petite young man noticed that he had been caught staring, as his eyes snapped downward as soon as he caught Kendall's eyes.

Breathing a somewhat heavy sigh, Kendall lowered his gaze as well, shaking his head slowly. The boy had looked only slightly familiar – like someone that he had passed by at the supermarket while helping his mother and younger sister with the grocery shopping, perhaps. Be that as it may, however, something about those strange eyes had caught the quick-witted teenager by the throat. Whatever that something may have been, it had rendered his mind completely blank for a moment, and had stolen whatever snide remark he had been about to spew about the kid's staring right off of his tongue.