The Life and Lies of Jodie B. Clarke

Two.

True to my word, I arrived to first period -a Ms. Fischer's Honors English 101- two minutes late and tired out of my wits. Already feeling done with the day before it's even began, is, needless to say, not a particularly appealing start to a already dreaded day.

Ms. Fischer, the woman herself, smacks her lips (cherry red, colored in outside the lines) as she stares at me over her tiny, tip-of-the-nose glasses that look a second away from falling right off, with a carefully placed glance that makes me want to throw myself straight into a black hole and a "Let's not make this a habit, shall we?", that makes the rest of the class titter like it's the funniest thing since Sunday cartoons.

I slip into my Assigned Seat and wish, more than I ever have, to become invisible. To be Sue Storm and disappear within my sweater, two sizes too big, with chewed up sleeves and holes so big I can slip my thumbs into, to fade away into nothingness, just for a single moment and be anywhere but here. But I count to ten and open my eyes and I'm still me, and I'm still here, and it's all too loud, and Ms. Fischer is rambling on and on about summer reading I didn't even know we had, and soon her words, too loud and too sharp, mix and jumbled up with the carefully whispered words of a girl two seats away, all smooth and sickening sweet like chewed up bubblegum stuck to concrete, seemingly never-ending stories of a family vacation to hollywood and hawaii and who knows where else, that just as quickly slips into gossip -who kissed who and who didn't, who slept with who and who didn't, and just how Rebecca lost thirty two pounds over the summer, and how Lizzy isn't coming back this year because she's pregnant and her mother kicked her out of the house for three whole days after she found out. It's all too confusing and too loud, and too much, then it all fades out.

But then, all at once, the startlingly familiar bell rings, rings, rings, and I'm pushed outside, by a wave of varsity jackets and worn-out converse, out the door before I even know what's happening, a half-torn copy of Catcher-in-the-rye in my hand, held together by duct tape and prayers.

One period out of seven, Done. Only six more to go, and then repeat like a broken record for the next 180 days.

Lots to look forward to.

I slip into the gymnasium a second before the second bell chimes, being thoroughly ignored by a heavy-set man, red-faced like a over-ripe tomato covered by a mop of straw-colored spaghetti, who was thoroughly engulfed in a dog-eared over of Stephen King's The Shining.

The whole room smelt of sweat and rubber, underarms and too much cologne. My sneakers squeaks against the cracked linoleum floors, as my eyes drop to my feet, cheeks redden as eyes flicker towards the newcomer.

It's only five minutes later, when the conversations of twenty-three fourteen-year-old cuts through the awkwardly building silence before him, does the man finally look up, something close to embarrassment flashing through his features for just second, before they once more into a annoyed, twisted expression that seemed natural. And then, without a warning-

"FwEeeeeeet!"

-went his whistle, making the whole room jump at once, and then, just as quickly, scatter into uncomfortable laughter, silenced once more by the man's voice, high and strange, a voice that did not in any way go with his soft, abnormally large features. 

"Listen, kiddos. I'm Mr. Richards. That's Richards with an R and and  a I and a C and I figure ya'll can spell the rest. If not, then I can't help you with that. You can call me Mr. Richards or Mr. R or better yet, Sir. Even better yet, you can not call me anything, and I know you and me both would be perfectly content to leave it at that."

He said that all without taking a single breath, his face growing increasingly, impossibly, redder by the second, before taking a huge gulp of air like one breaking through the surface after a few seconds  too long at the bottom of the swimming pool, just to prove to your self that you could do it.

"Now, our next task is very simple. Idiotically simple. I figure even you -ahem- dimmer minded folks can figure it out. I'm going to say your name, and if you're here, say, 'here'. If you're not, then, well, goddamnit, don't say anything. It's that simple."

He takes another long, gasping breath, spittle flying all around, before clicking his clipboard open with a -plaaaaak, clearing his throat.

The room stays deathly silent.

"Carter? Carter Ableman?"

"Here" A tall, gawky boy, long, overgrown curls pulled back behind a baseball cap.

"Thalia Ambrose? THalia?"

-Nothing.

"-here. Jeez, " Second row-red sweatshirt, dirty converse. Dark skin a half shade lighter than her curls, twisted back into two braids thinning down the arc of her back. "It's Thalia," She said, making the "H" silent. There was a hint of an accent in her tone, definitely not west-coastal, but it was hard to pick out exactly.

Having been a constant mover myself, my own dialect was a muddled mess of general bad English. A childhood stutter had been somewhat corrected if not for an ever-lasting, though mild inability to say "s's"

Her sweatshirt was obviously new, fresh pressed and branded, adidas stripes running down both arms, but her sneakers were about as worn out as my own. Her long legs stretched out from faded cut-off shorts- the kind of easy skinniness and easy confidence you only noticed if you were neither of those things.

Figuring out the social hierarchy of a place like Willow Hills High was becoming increasingly difficult by the minute, I realized, in that blurry gray space where stereotypes, social-economical status, and general popularity intertwined.

And so it went.

"Barnard? Josh Barnard?"

"Right here."

Blond, sun tanned, ridiculously so, for (or more so, the lack of) San Francisco summers.

And then.

"Josephine Clarke?" Whistle-man asks, in a voice that is obviously too used to being obnoxiously loud. "Josephine! Are. You. There?"

"Here." I say finally. "It's Jodie."

"Josie. Okay." Whistle-man, and makes a single mark on his click board, before continuing. "Riley? Riley Holmes, anyone?"

I stuck my arms inside the sleeves of my sweater, feeling goosebumps rise up.

"Riley? Riley?"

"Here."

Mousy brown hair, matching pink sweatsuit her mom defiantly picked out for her, looking- if it was even possible- even less comfortable than I felt.

A split second each for me to glance over these people who I would spend the next four years with, trying my hardest, with minimal success, to conjure up any sense of who they were. Sure there were the obvious, physical descriptions. Hair color. Height. race. Stereotypes. Yet with every fleeting glance these previously hard cut lines became blurred, and very such so was the complex microcosm that was Willow Hills High.