The weekend flew by faster than I had liked. After that Saturday with Shaun and the others, I had spent Saturday with my mother watching Harry Potter movies and eating Ramen noodles for lunch and dinner. Monday crept up on us too soon, and I found myself walking down the corridors to my locker, my hair hanging in messy waves down my back, clad in ripped jeans and a grey "Clearly I have made some bad decisions" shirt, courtesy of Simon Lewis from The Mortal Instruments. Reagan rolled her eyes when she saw it, and said, "You should show it to Ron, though he won't know what it means." I chuckled and replied, "Trust me, I will."
The bell rang, so I hurried over to my locker, surprised at myself that I found it. The hallway was crowded, and there were people crammed on either side of me at their lockers. I hurriedly turned the dial to the combination and opened it. I had just grabbed my books when someones arm stretched across, right next to my face, resting their knuckles next to my locker, so I was trapped. I turned to glare at whoever it was, and saw it was Bruce. "Hello there," he said in a mockingly low voice, and my lips turned up at the corners. He had a mischievous grin on his face, and I quirked an eyebrow. "Let me guess. Your next line is 'Do you come here often?'"
Bruce shook his head, smiling in a confused way as he pushed away from my locker and let me loose. "Let's go to class," he sighed, and turned and walked down the hall, glancing back to make sure I was following. "What's wrong?" I asked him, quickening my pace so that I was shoulder to shoulder with him. Bruce chuckled, turning his head slightly to connect his gaze with me, my blueish grey eyes meeting his own hazel ones. It was then that I realized how tall he really was- my head barely came to his shoulder as he looked down at me. "If it had been any other girl- any other girl- they would've flipped if I'd done that."
"Done what?" I asked in confusion. "Cornered them like that. Girls usually get all nervous when you corner them- they start stuttering and messing with their hair. You weren't even fazed," he said, his voice almost incredulous. "You really are different, Cassie. I mean, no wonder you've got at least two guys watching your every move." I blinked at him, shaking my head slightly. "Wait, what? What do you mean, two guys watching my every-" Bruce stopped my sentence short with a hand gesture. "Nah ah. Don't bother, I'm not answering that question."
I rolled my eyes, chuckling as we entered the classroom. We were late, but the teacher wasn't in the classroom yet, so I hurriedly took my seat as she entered. We were about twenty minutes through class when someone else entered. And it definitely wasn't someone I was hoping to see. Actually, I was hoping I wouldn't ever have to see him again. But of course, I wasn't so lucky, and Alex hadn't moved while I was gone.
He was just as arrogantly handsome as always, his blonde hair cut and styled in the front with hair gel. At least five of the girls in the class smiled at him, some batting their eyelashes, making me smother a laugh with my hand. It's funny how the person he was meanest to seemed to know him better than his own friends. Alex handed his pass to the teacher before taking a seat next to a pretty redhead, who scowled at him before turning back to the front of the class. I raised my eyebrows at this; there were other people at this school who didn't like him?
I focused more on Alex after that. He had lost some of the baby fat in his face so that his jaw was chiseled to perfection. His skin was a lot tanner, and he had gained a whole lot more muscle to add to the appearance of a typical football player. His cocky smirk remained, a smirk that ruined the whole look for me, and his eyes glinted with something like lust as he kept glancing over at the girl next to him, who would continue to scoot farther away as he practically raped her with his eyes. I leaned back in my chair, just a little too pleased that the girl wasn't falling for it.
When the bell rang, I collected my stuff and stood up. "It's okay, I know where my next class is," I said to Bruce, and he shrugged before saying "See you at lunch then," and walking off. I picked up my books and walked casually out of the room when I realized that Alex was behind me, talking to the girl. "Aw, c'mon, Tins. Just a coffee; I know a place." The girl groaned in frustration before saying "No! And don't call me Tins, it's Tinsley!" Alex chuckled in what he must've thought was a charming way before saying, "Aw, you know you like my nickname for you. And it's just one coffee! It won't hurt anything."
"It'll hurt my ego, and my IQ," she replied, and I heard her storm off in the other direction. Alex sighed in defeat, and I resisted the urge to laugh as I walked towards my next class. I heard Alex's pace quicken and soon he was right next to me, his smile charming. "And where have you been all my life?" he said huskily. I stared at him blankly for a moment. Then, I burst into a fit of laughter. Alex stared at me in bewilderment, and then the laughter stopped. "Sorry, that was really cheesy," I said, slightly breathless from my laughing fit. "You mean for the past four years? Avoiding you." Alex shook his head, glaring playfully. "There's another one who's playing hard to get? And what do you mean, four years?"
I shook my head, my face mocking disappointment. "You really didn't recognize me? The girl who you constantly teased to make yourself feel better, even though I never really took anything you said to heart, much to your displeasure? The girl who had enough teasing in her life, the girl who you thought needed more? The one girl who never really liked you, never fell for your charms? I'm disappointed, Alex. I thought that you, of all people, would recognize Cassie Grey when they saw her." Alex's lips parted in surprise, his eyes widened. Then, he started laughing.
I glared at him until he finished. "Wait, you're Cassie Grey? What happened to the geeky girl with the comic books and the frizzy hair?" I touched my hair protectively for a moment while saying, "Yeah, it's me. Well, sort of." Alex raised his eyebrows, smirking. "Wow. Hello, Cassie Grey." I rolled my eyes, turning away from him. "You just made 'hello' sound like the world's most unfriendly greeting," I said, rolling my eyes at him. Alex continued to smirk, looking me up and down. "Well, you sure have changed."
I shot Alex one last glare- which he returned playfully- and walked into Chemistry. Trent was already there, his headphones in his ears. The chord was tucked into the neck of his hoodie, and I noticed that he had his ipod barely visible in the pocket of his jeans. Trent didn't look up when I sat down, staring off in the distance as he listened to his music. I smirked and said loudly, "Hey, Trent!" The boy in question didn't seem to hear me. I sighed loudly before reaching and taking out one of his earphones. Trent made a noise of protest, sending me a glare as I held the earbud to my ear. "Lost in You by Three Days Grace," I decided after a moment before handing the earbud back to its owner.
"You listen to Three Days Grace?" said Trent, his voice laced with surprise. I nodded slowly, frowning. "You sound surprised." Trent gave me a blunt look as he said, "That's because I am. Girls don't listen to rock, they listen to Justin Bieber and One Direction." I glared playfully at him. "Don't generalize. I don't like pop music, I'm more of a rock fan," I decided. Trent sighed and put the earbud back in his ear, leaning back in his seat and closing his eyes. "You know we have to get started on that project," I said, but Trent ignored me. I sighed. "Oh, so invisible now, am I? That's cool," I said, nodding. "I've always wanted a superpower."
Trent made a choking sound in the back of his throat, and I realized he was forcing back a laugh, since his lips continued to twitch. He twisted them down into a scowl that was pretty easy to see through; He couldn't hide the amusement that lit up his eyes. I blinked at this reaction in confusion- who knew someone would work so hard to prevent themselves from laughing? The bell rang, blasting me out of my thoughts as I winced at how loud it'd gotten. "Sorry about that," the teacher said, walking into the classroom. "The new bell was just put in, and... well, we haven't gotten the hang of it yet."
A few students chuckled, but most just opened their binders and shuffled through their papers. "Alright, we're going to get started on the new project. If you need a rubric, please let me know. This is one of the only days that you will get to work on the project in class, so I suggest you use this time wisely." With that, the class broke into chatter as people began to 'work', though most were just gossiping. I pulled out the rubric and two blank sheets of paper before turning back to Trent. He still had one headphone in, and had begun to draw a pretty decent looking dragon- though I wouldn't tell him it was good. "What do you think you're doing?" I said incredulously.
"Procrastinating," replied Trent smoothly. I glared at him, letting out a huff of annoyance before turning to my paper. "Alright," I began, focusing on the paper. "We are supposed to choose two from this list of experiments, and do a bunch of research before we actually make the procedure and perform it in front of the class. I think that we should do the candy chromatography and the hydrogen penny project. Those seem like they'd be easier," I decided, and then glanced over at my very bored partner. "What do you think?" Trent rolled his eyes and answered with an "I don't care." I blew out the air in my cheeks before circling the two from the list of experiments.
"I'm not doing this project on my own, you know. I'm forcing you to help," I warned Trent, and his charcoal eyes lit with something I couldn't place. "I can try, but I'm not very good at Chemistry. It seems I make things worse," said Trent finally, his voice coated with humor. One of my eyebrows lifted but I turned away. "This is going to be a fun project," I said sarcastically.