Dissonance | ✓

21 | Sisters

     When the worst of winter had arrived, it set itself into the rifts of my bones and tinted my lips gray-blue. That also happened to be when Mr. Walker decided to drag the school out onto the field for a fire drill. Although he could not have chosen a worse season, I had to thank him for sweeping me from a particularly tedious Geography lesson.

     Stepping out of the building was like stepping into a blast chiller. The throng of students before me were in no rush to reach the field and, obviously, not concerned about others who may have been on their way to hypothermia.

     Everybody split into their dormitory groups, then further into grades. I made my way to a group of familiar girls from my dormitory and met Miranda fixing the scarf snaked around her neck.

     "Hey," I greeted, my breath clouding in front of me.

     "Oh, look! It's Judy Moody!" she jested. Her, Carter and Joey had set that as my nickname, in response to my apparent mood swings. I was not moody, or so I believed. "Better get comfortable and quiet because we'll be here for a while."

     I planted myself next to Miranda on the damp grass. Above, the sullen sky foretokened rain, but the child in me hoped for the first flakes of winter to come swaying down. 'With the length of time it seems we'll be here,' I thought time to myself, 'surely find out which it will be.'

     After role call was taken, Mr. Walker demanded everyone's attention from where he stood in the center of the bleachers. A series of hushes then followed. He held a megaphone to his mouth in one hand and a clipboard in another.

     "As expected, you did not perform as well as I had hoped. Six minutes," Mr Walker spoke through his teeth. "During a real fire, you have to be faster. There's no reason for it to take six minutes..."

     Mr. Walker's tirade continued well into lunch, stirring a lot of negativity from the crowd—teachers inclusive. A few students began to leave, even though Mr. Walker was not done, and others followed suit. My toes were beginning to lose feeling, but I remained on the field until we were officially dismissed, out of pity for the principal.

     What remained of the student body was finally dismissed for lunch. A warm hand landed on my shoulder as I hurried to the nearest heated building. "Colleen," Mason's voice called. I jerked my shoulder forward, his hand falling limp. "c'mon, listen to me."

     I snorted, "I'd rather listen to another boring rant from your step-dad than hear you out." "My what?" I titled my head to one side. "He's not even your step-dad, is he, Mas? God, I feel like I'm constantly wasting my time with you."

     "You're not wasting your time. We really got something going on," Mason spoke half-heartedly, making me wonder why he was trying—with minimal effort—for something he did not fully believe in.

     "There's nothing between us," I clarified, "I think it's better if we just called it quits."

     "But I never quit. Have you met me?" Mason's arrogance was shining through.

     "Yes, I have, and it's the Mason that I've met that I can't stand. Get it through your thick head that we are over." Without waiting for a response, I rushed into the student center and up to the eleventh grade common room.

     The heat was more than satisfying. I sank into the one sofa of the room, brought my knees to my chest, and stayed that way for the warmth to settle in. Nothing but the soft thrum of the heater could be heard, humming a tune that soothed my mind; allowed me to, slowly, unwind...

     "I can't believe you," a voice whispered. I jolted up to see Ximena right before me. Just the person I wanted to see while I tried to relax.