All I could see was white. I was running, running away from someone. I didn't know who or why. All I could here was them calling my name over and over again.
"Halley...Halley...HALLEY!!!"
I shot up awake and alert.
"I'm up, I'm up. Geez mom, no need to yell so loud."
"Of course I have to yell loudly, my daughter sleeps like a log."
"Wow. Thanks mom."
"You're welcome sweetie. Now get up, it's Monday and time for school."
I slowly got out of bed and headed to my window to let more light into my room. Of course with my luck the first thing I see is stupid Tyler Pierson shirtless. Yeah, I know, how lucky am I. Trust me not that lucky. Of course out of all the rooms my window could be facing it had to be his. That just shows how lucky I am. Ignoring him and closing my curtains I start getting ready for school. It's always so hard to dress for school...Yup joggers and a hoodie sound great. As I'm grabbing my bag I can hear the front door opening.
"Sup Mrs. Carter, hi Nathan, what's for breakfast."
I can only roll my eyes at how at home Hayden is making himself. As he has for the last 5 years. I can imagine him walking into the kitchen, like he does every morning, greeting my mom and patting my little brother Nathan on the head. Nathan worships Hayden, but even worse Tyler too. I try to keep him away as much as possible.
"Hayden you better not eat my breakfast like you did last time. I'll kill you if you do."
I say as I walk down the stairs. I walk up to my mom and kiss her on the cheek. I then ruffle my brother's, despite his protest and kiss his cheek. I then turn to Hayden and hug him, like I do every morning.
"Of course not, besides, you're gonna need all the food possible to keep you happy this morning."
"Hayden...what did you do."
"Well...you know how I'm kinda crazy in the morning when I drive."
"Yeah...? What did you do?"
"I may or may not have hit Tyler's car this morning so I have to drive him to school today."
"Dude! Seriously!"
"Yeah, and it gets worse. You have to sit next to him in the backseat, Lexi's already set up front."
"You're kidding me right, there's no way I'm sitting next to him."
"Well we're already late so you have no choice. Grab your breakie and lets go."
"Gosh Hayden, one of these days I really am gonna hurt you for being an idiot."
"Yeah yeah, plot my death later lets go."
Reluctantly I followed my so called best friend out to his car only to see my other bestie gloating from the passenger seat. Of course she would happy about this. She doesn't understand my hatred towards Tyler. She thinks he's really hot and that I'm wasting my chance of being with him. If only I could tell them what happened all those years ago. As I walk up to the car, I hear someone call me from behind.
"Well well well, look who it is."
I turned and glared at Tyler.
"What's the matter toes? Didn't get enough sleep last night or are you always like this in the mornings?"
I'm about to answer with a comeback when Lexi opens her window and answers for me. Not the answer I was going to say obviously.
"Oh, she's always like this in the mornings. I think it's because she wakes up lonely."
I just glare at her and get in the car. Tyler smirks and gets in the car after me. Once we start heading to school I started to think that he was going to drop the subject of me being grumpy, but of course that's not like Tyler.
"Oh by the way toes, you don't have to worry about being lonely in the mornings now. Until my car is fixed I'm gonna be carpooling with you guys. Plus my mom is making me drive you to school after my car is fixed. She says its too far for Hayden to drive."
I could only stare at him in disbelief. there was no way I was gonna let him drive me to school for the rest of the year. It's only been a week of school, there was no way I'd survive an entire school year with him driving. Before I could try to protest we arrived at school, so naturally I jumped out of the car and booked it to my locker. I couldn't believe this was happening. It definitely made more sense, but that didn't mean I had to like the idea. Sighing to myself I pulled out my history and calculus textbooks. Of course I would have my two least favourite classes first today.Sighing again about my terrible luck I started my trek to history. Immediately my best friends joined me in walking to our doom, and of course Lexi started talking about my Tyler predicament.
"I think this'll be great for you Hales. Maybe he'll help you get out of your comfort zone or something."
"Yeah right, more like he'll just torture me endlessly."
"You might be surprised Hales."
I could only stare at her in confusion, but thought no more about it as we entered class. Heading to our usual seats we sat down and started getting ready for class. As I was pulling to notebooks and pencils out of my bag I heard a few gasps then felt someone sit next to me. Looking up I was so confused. Tyler was sitting next to me. Near the front of the class. Not in the back with his football buddies. Somethings not right and I'm gonna find out what.
"What are you doing sitting..."
"Hellooooo Pleasant Hill High. If you are a Freshman, Sophomore or Junior please feel free to zone out and not listen to the following announcement"
All thoughts of Tyler flew out the window as soon as our principal started talking. I never understood our new principal Mrs. Matheson. She was oddly cool and casual, very different than our old principal.
"Ok Seniors, I'm hear to talk about our first senior event and to tell you about our vision with this improvement. The administration has noticed that Pleasant Hill High has become much like the school we do not want to be, where there are cliques and groups and no interaction between them. So, for your final year here we are going to make you all interact with people you would not normally talk to. Every event that we have this year will have a masquerade theme, that way no one will know who anyone is. At these event I ask that you try really hard to meet someone new. You never know, maybe it will change your life in a positive way. Anyways, our first event will be a masquerade back to school barbecue. Attendance to all events is mandatory unless you have a valid excuse, so I suggest you start planning your disguises. The barbecue will take place this Saturday at school. I hope you guys are ready. That will be all, have a nice day."
As soon as Mrs. Matheson finished talking Lexi yanked me from my seat and closer to her.
"Oh my gosh!!!! Halley this is totally meant for you"
"What are you talking about Lex?"
"Are you kidding me, this is a chance for you to meet your next boyfriend."
"Lexi, I am not gonna use school sanctioned events to try and find a boyfriend. Plus there's no one at this school that I would date, they're all stupid or jerks or both."
"Maybe to you they seem that way, but I'm sure there's a guy out there who's more than you think."
"Ok, what is up with you today. So many cryptic messages is unlike you."
"Nothing's wrong with me Hales, I just really want you to have a great year and you can't do that if you're not open to change."
"Fine, you have a point. I'll be more open to new things. Happy?"
Lexi squealed and jumped up to hug me. Once again I had forgotten that Tyler was sitting with us. Hayden, however, didn't and saw Tyler not so secretly listen to our conversation, but what he didn't was when Lexi hugged me she looked over my shoulder at Tyler and gave him a smile. All he did in return was smile back then start writing something in his notebook. Now you may be wondering what my best friend was doing having secret conversations with my nemesis and honestly at that moment I had no idea either. It didn't matter really because at that moment Mr. Wheilem walked in with a stack of papers that just filled everyone with dread. Everyone scrambled back to their seats. After writing the dreaded words, "Pop Quiz" on the board Mr. Wheilem turned to address the class.
"Good morning everyone, as you can probably see we are having a pop quiz."
Immediately groans filled the classroom.
"Settle down class, this is not necessarily for marks, it's so I can see what basic knowledge of history you've accumulated over the years."
With that said the complains quieted down and everyone started preparing to write the quiz. As Mr, Wheilem walked around the class handing out the quiz my nerves started skyrocketing. I wasn't bad at history it just wasn't my best or favourite class. Looking to my left I saw that both Lexi and Hayden felt the same as me. What surprised me is when I looked to my right Tyler look really relaxed and confident, but maybe that's just his cool guy resting face. Suddenly, my quiz sheet was placed on my desk and I started looking at the questions. Ten minutes later, I was half way through the quiz when I here a chair scraping on the floor. Looking up, I see that everyone else is trying to see who the heck finished the quiz so quickly. To my surprise, the seat on my right was empty and Tyler was handing in his quiz the Mr. Wheilem. Shock was written all over my face and I won't deny that I was impressed. Who knew that Tyler Pierson of all people would be finished first. Being the rational person I was, my reasoning was that he just didn't care enough to do well so he most likely handed in a half finished quiz.
Twenty minutes later I finally finished the quiz. It wasn't extremely hard, but there were definitely a few questions I probably got wrong. After I handed in my quiz more people started to hand in their copies. After getting all of the quizzes Mr. Wheilem gave us the rest of the block free while he corrected the quizzes. I turned and huddled close with my friends.
"Ok, was anyone else really surprised that Tyler finished first."
"Come on Halley, It's not that weird that he finished a quiz a least twenty minutes faster than anyone else..."
I gave Hayden a pointed look. Before he could answer again Lexi jumped in the conversation and changed the topic. Again I probably should've wondered why, but let's be honest, I'm pretty oblivious.
"Have you guys thought about how you're gonna disguise yourselves at the barbecue?"
Hayden and I both rolled our eyes. Of course that's what she asks even though we've only know about the barbecue for like one hour and in that hour we were writing a quiz. Being the amazing friends we are, we both don't comment and shake our heads, but share a knowing look. With that, Lexi dives into a full discussion of possible ways to conceal our identities. While she blabbers on, I lean closer to Hayden and whisper to him.
"Don't you think she's a little too excited about the whole masquerade concept."
He only looks at me shrugs.
"I don't know, but if anyone was going to be the most excited about this it definitely would be Lexi."
I could only agree with him. Tuning back into what Lexi was ranting about. The number of ideas she has could probably disguise at least half our grade for all the events. She was about to make me write down specific ideas for me when she was interrupted by out teacher.
"Well students, I am actually rather pleased with your knowledge of history. If anyone has any questions about the quiz before I hand them back please ask now."
One kid in the back raised their hand. It was Kyle Portman, Tyler's best friend and running back on the football team.
"Yes Kyle, what's your question?"
"Well Mr. Wheilem, I think you, along with everyone else in the class, were surprised when my good buddy Tyler handed in his quiz first. So, I was wondering what score he got on the quiz."
"Mr. Portman. You have no right to ask about the mark of another student."
Before Mr. Wheilem could continue scolding Kyle he was interrupted.
"It's okay Mr. Wheilem. I don't mind if the class knows my score."
"Are you certain Mr.Pierson."
"Yeah, it's no sweat sir."
Mr. Wheilem only shook his head in disbelief, but then seemed to have a moment of realization as he picked up Tyler quiz.
"Very well Mr. Pierson. Now class, I think that Mr. Pierson here is a prime example of what can happen when you put your mind to it and don't care about keeping up your reputation."
What Mr. Wheilem just said sent everyone into a state of confusion. What the heck does that mean and why would he say that. Now if I wasn't so confused I might have seen Lexi smiling instead of being confused and sharing a smile with Tyler, but I didn't so carry on.
"Just tell us that he failed."
Of course Tyler's friends would say that. I don't understand football friendships.
"Now now Mr. Portman, I believe that you will be very surprised with what I'm about to say now. As I was going to say, Mr. Pierson here scored ninety seven percent on this quiz."
Yeah, you can guess the reaction of the class. Everyone was shell shocked. We all turned to look at Tyler who was just sitting in his seat casually as if he didn't just blow everyone's mind. Tyler getting an amazing grade on a pop quiz wasn't even what shocked me the most. It was that as I was staring at him in shock he turned and looked me in the eye and smiled. Let's just say that even though that's shocking, it's not the most shocking thing to happen this year.