Long-Distance Calls

9

I met Andrew at the bus stop.

"Hey," I muttered.

He greeted me with a plain movement of the head.

"Did you get any sleep?" I asked him.

"I slept like a baby. Why ask?" He sounded a little rough.

"'Cause I didn't. I slept for like two hours," I quavered.

"And why so?" He kicked some rocks with his foot.

"I don't know. Anxiety, I guess." I tried to sound vague.

"Anxiety? C'mon, this is an exciting moment!" he exclaimed.

"Don't talk to me about excitement right now," I yawned, "I don't even know if I'm awake or not."

The bus arrived right on time. During the trip, we barely exchanged a word.

I forgot my headphones, so I had to listen to the music on the radio. We Are Young was on.

That song, though I liked it, didn't exactly reflect my mood in that moment, but I would take it any day over Flo Rida or Pitbull.

After more than twenty minutes, we got there. Andrew got out of the bus all excited. I, on the other hand, almost wished the bus doors would close before I could get out and take me away.

In front of us, Flushing High School.

The building was tall. Really tall. Frightening tall. New York City buildings tall. But this time the dizziness wasn't pleasant.

It almost looked like a castle, but I wasn't the king. I felt like a slave getting deported in it. I felt like, once I entered it, I would have never seen the sunlight again.

Though on the outside the situation was pretty calm, on the inside it was a mess. There was a great amount of young people, all over the rooms.

"Oh man! Agoraphobia kicking in!" I almost shouted so Andrew could hear me.

"C'mon," he said, clearly more relaxed than I was, "Let's find our class."

And apparently our first class was English. We found the room and we entered it. There were some twenty people. I didn't understand how Andrew was doing that.

How could he not feel even the slight bit of anxiety in that moment? He was acting all confident and straight to the point.

We entered the class and the teacher, a slim woman on her thirties with long golden brown hair, pitch black eyes and glasses, asked for our names.

"Hook. Andrew," he said with a deep, steady voice.

"Uh, Charming. P-Peter," My voice was the exact opposite of his. I heard some laughter in the room when I said this, as usual.

"Please, take a seat," she said, adjusting her small, transparent glasses.

I walked right behind Andrew, until he sat in the first row, next to a curly-headed girl.

I stopped and looked at him with eyes wide opened. He didn't even give me a look, as he introduced himself to the lady.

Why would he do something like that? Why would he get me in that situation? Why would he lie about us sitting together all summer, only to sit next to the first pretty girl he sees?

I looked away from him, to the rest of the class. They were all staring at me. I took a quick glance of all their faces, without resting my eyes on any one of them. I saw some pretty girls and some scary-looking individuals, but then again, I couldn't see them very well, they were all blurred out in my eyes.

I realized that there was an empty desk in the last row, so I bounced there, not before glaring at Andrew.

But it was useless, as he was too busy talking with that girl to care about his freaking friend.

I sat next to an Asian kid that I didn't even see from where I stood before.

"Hi," I whispered, constantly averting my eyes from his, "I'm Peter."

"Hey," he said. His voice wasn't really deep, but, to my surprise, the accent was very American, "I'm Erasmus. Nice to meet you."

Erasmus?! What the hell kind of name is that?

"Woah!" I raised my eyebrows at him, still whispering,  "And I was worried about my last name being Charming!"

He looked at me with an expressionless face for a few seconds, then he looked away.

Off to a great start. Off to a great. fucking. start.

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Thanks for reading, please VOTE and COMMENT if you liked!

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See you on FRIDAY as the first day of school continues in the next chapter!

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