Cracked

by Lisett Alonso

  “Thank you.” I get up and head to sit back down, before I can even sit a man comes out of an office.

  “Ms. Amos? Hello, I’m Mr. Cummins, I am your principle, welcome to New Hope high school, if you could please follow me.” I look up and follow. The guy is like no other principle I have seen before. He is tall maybe a good six feet, he towers over me by a good eight inches, he has the deepest brown eyes I have ever seen and If I dare to say it, I bet he was either in basketball or football in high school and maybe college because his built is huge. When I walk into his office my assumptions get confirmed, there is a picture of him in a football uniform holding a championship cup.

  “Please take a sit Ms. Amos.” I do as I am told quietly. “Hmm, I see you have amazing grades all A’s and a lot of AP classes. Very impressive Ms. Amos. With all the amount of classes you have taken and credit you have you only must take 5 classes this semester and 5 the next, here we run classes by semester, first semester starts on Monday, September 3 and runs till December 20th. After that you have a break and then second semester start son the third of January till end of May. Depending if there is a lot of snow days or not. The classes that you need to take are math, science and English, gymnasium, and an elective. You can stay here for lunch, or you can choose to go home, we offer that option for seniors, and then they come back to school, but because you don’t need to take more classes than you don’t have to come back. We have many electives to pick from here is the list of the ones who run before lunch. Look at it and let me know so I can set your schedule.” I grab the list he gives me, and I glanced down, they have the borings listed first then one catches my eye.

  “I would like to take the self-defense class.” I quickly make up my mind. He looks at me and nods.

  “Alright, give me a couple of minutes to get your schedule set up, do you want to take any AP class?”

  “Yea if you could put all of them in AP that would be great.” He looks at me, with a proud glint in his eyes, it reminded me of my dad before the- no do not think about it. I look away.

  “Alright, how does Gymnasium, AP Statistics, AP World literature, AP Sociology, and self-defense class sound?” He looks at me for confirmation

  “That’s great.” I give him a small smile and wait for him to finish my schedule. In awkward silence we stay for what feels like forever but were only minutes. The sound of the printer drags me back to reality.

  “Here you go, now Ms. Amos we do have a dress code, here is a paper for it. We also, have a zero policy for bullying and violence. I see that you do not have anything in your record that indicates that you would act out, but I just want to make you aware. It is a pleasure having you as a student at New Hope and again Welcome.” We both stand up and he extends his hands out and I shake it. With that I turn and leave the office. As soon as I am out of the office a girl walks up to me. The first thing I see is her beautiful chocolate eyes, she has a pointy nose and full lips, she is way taller than me and has this aura about her the screams gentleness but with power.

  “Hey, my name is Monica, ill be showing you around.” She extends her hand. I take it and shake it.

  “Hey I am Leah.” I give her a tight lip smile, she looks me up and down and smiles, then laces her arms with mine.

  “Come on, lets go.” We get out of the office, and as soon as we do, she steals my schedule. “We have 2 classes together, gym and self-defense. I can’t take an AP class it will kill me.” She suddenly takes a right, and I try hard not to stumble at the sudden change of direction. She notices. “Sorry, anyways this is the senior hallway, your locker is this way, all your classes will be here except for gym and self- defense.” She keeps walking till we get to my locker, 519. “Try to open it, they sometimes get stuck or the combo doesn’t work.” I did as she said, and It open of the first try, good because I did not feel like fighting with it. She smiles “I guess you got one of the good ones, come, one your classes are this way.” She smiles and closes my locker and starts guiding me again. “So where are you from?” She finally asks.

  “um from California, how about you?” She gasps and looks at me.

  “OMG, I have been dying to go to California for the longest, I want to see so many things, but my dad does not let me, and I am from here, born and raise.” She says proudly. “Why did you move all the way out here, you went from a fun town to well not that fun?” she asks confused.

  “I needed the change.” My tone left no room for questions or discussion, she just shakes her head. She keeps guiding me.

  “This is the Stats classroom; all the math rooms are in this part of the hallway. Then down the other hallway is the science department, your class is the last door right there.” She points to the halway that is intersecting with this one. I see the door she is pointing at; she then grabs my hand and leads me down the opposite corridor, up some stairs. “This is the second floor where you have English in, your class is literary this one.” She points to a door right in front of the stairs. I look at her and laugh. “What?” she questions

  “this is the easiest layout ever; I don’t think I can get lost.” I told her while I look around the floor. She laughs as well and leads me back down the stairs, instead of going through the doors we came though she went to a door on the other side.

  “The gym is this way; you have to go through this small hallway and all of the sport centers are out here. To your right is the pool, you are allowed to use it whenever, but that will be where you have your first class. Gym class the first half of the semester is in the pool, then the second half of the semester is in the gym.” We popped into the pool and it was huge. Full size Olympian pool.

  Reminds me of better times.

  She proceeds to cross the pool; we go inside the locker rooms. They are huge as well; the red and gold color of the school is noticeable in here more than any where else. We then proceeded to again go through a different door than were we came though.

  “This is the Gymnasium; you will be taking your self defense classes in here.” I look around, this gym is bigger than the one back home, is twice the size. There is even a second floor that surrounds the gym, and it looks like people can run in a track up there, in some corners there are punching bags. For a school with no violence tolerance, they sure have a lot of encouragement of it. “Come on I want to show you the field and introduce you to a couple of my friends that are there.” I follow her. Still amazed of how huge the school really is. “So, are you liking it so far? I am really bad at giving tours, well you’re the first person I have given one to, I’m sorry.” She nervously laughs. I shake my head.

  “No, its fine, the layout is pretty easy, and I will catch up fast. Thank you, you will save me a lot of time when school start, I am the one that should be sorry for making them drag you out of practice. What sport are you doing?” I asked, she looks at me from the side and smirks.

  “I play soccer but its ok, I’m in the team, were just doing pre-season and it was done, some of us just hang back to play a game for fun.” She grinds and her eyes light up when she talks about the sport.

  “That’s really cool, what position do you play?” I did not have a lot of knowledge over soccer beside the positions because my ex explained it to me, but other than that the sport did not interest me. Everything was too dramatic for my liking.

  “I play forward, most of the time, sometimes I play right ringer depends. How about you, are you into sports?” She probes.

  “I was actually in swimming; rugby and I did boxing.” I say once we get to the field, I am even more shock, there is a baseball field, soccer, and football.

  “Oh wow, are you going to join our swimming team and boxing club? We don’t have rugby though so that sucks.” I look at her and shake my head.

  “As of right now I am not, I just want to focus on school this year.” She looks disappointed when I say it. Then shrugs.

  “Makes sense if I were taking 3 AP classes I would be taking time off too. Anyways come on my friends are in the
football field waiting for their boyfriends.” She walks ahead of me a bit and I keep looking around. Everything is so different form California, here everything is quiet and surrounded by nature. I loved it, its peaceful. We quickly get to the field and everyone is looking at me. I get a bit nervous, everyone eyes are on me some are welcoming, and others are of pure hate.

  “Hey guys this is Leah.” Monica introduces me and I smile.

  “Hey.” That was my lame introduction, they all say hey back.

  “So where are you from?” Some one asked.

  “California” I say

  “That is so cool. I am Mary by the way.” A girl with blonde hair says, she has freckles all around her face and just like everyone here, she is taller than me.

  “Alright, so the group is as follow, from the right to the left, we have Mackenzie, Brianna, Krista, Monica, and Oliva.” The one giving me the stink eye was Mackenzie. The other smile.

  “You are so short, it so cute!” Brianna, I think is her name says, it makes me blush and all the girls laugh.

  “I am 5‘4, I am average size. You guys are the ones who are huge like, what are you guys like 5’9?” I laugh and they laugh. They start to talk with their group again and I see out to the field where they are playing football. The Quarterback makes a pass, and dam he has a hand. I see how he passes the ball a bit more and I am very surprise of how good he is.

  “Careful, he is beautiful but deadly.” Monica whispers in my ear. I turn towards her and shake my head.

  “I wasn’t admiring him, I was admiring his arm, is really good, he could definitely go pro if he wanted to.” I finish saying before Monica can opens her mouth someone beets her to it.

  “Well thank you I will definitely consider going pro just based on that comment.” I turn around and come face to faced with a chest. A vary defined, very hard chest. My eyes make their way up to his and I catch my breath, Monica was right he is beautiful. But I know that the beautiful ones are the ones who bring all the pain and heartaches.

  “You are welcome, just don’t let it get to your head.” I smiled back up at him. He looks surprise, as if no one has ever talked to him like that before. The aura around him definitely radiates power, and makes a lot of people uncomfortable, but I was used to it.

  “You are very rude. What is your name anyways?” He asks kind of annoyed. I smirk.

  “Leah.” I say but I do not ask for his I just turn around. “Hey Monica, I have to go I have to stuff to handle, but I’ll see you Monday?” I ask Monica while completely ignoring the green eye monster behind me.

  “Yea, I was thinking, my friend is throwing a back-to-school party tomorrow and was wondering if you wanted to come? I’ll send you the address?” I thought about it, I was not really in party mood but what is a better way to get to know this town then to know its people.

  “Yea sure here is my phone.” I Unlock my iPhone and handed it to her so she could put her number in. She takes it and start to put in her number, she hands it back to me and I press dial.

  “I’m calling you so you could have my number save too.” I tell her. “Anyways, it was nice meeting all of you, see you guys tomorrow.” I smile and start to walk away. From the side of my vision, I see a ball coming my way. I catch it and turn around; I see green eye monster with his mouth open. I chuckle, and toss the ball back, in a perfect spiral. That throws him even more off. I wave and walk away laughing.

  Chapter 3

  Once I get home, I start setting my inflatable bed up, when I am finish, I start to unpack the two duffle bags. Its funny how my whole life fits in these bags. I went from having too much to just two duffle bags. I breath out, everything feels like ages ago, like it was another life. Like if I saw that life through a glass ball and then by accident, I let the glass ball fall and it shatter to a million pieces.

  An hour later and everything inside my closet. I was happy when I found out the closet was made with built in drawers and cupboards, it really solved the problem as to where I was going to put by underwear. I hear the bell going off. I walk towards the door confused. When I open is Elia standing there with a plate of food and drink. I smile and open the door wider.

  “Come on in, thank you so much, you didn’t have to bring me food.” I say shyly.

  “Nonsense, you must be tired and hungry, you can do groceries tomorrow if you want.” She says walking up the stairs. She places the food in the kitchen countertop. She turns around and looks at my makeshift bed. “You are sleeping in that?” She shrinks out.

  “Yea is actually really comfortable. I been sleeping on it since I was 16. I only hate that I have to inflate it once in a while.” She looks at me like if I was crazy. I laugh. “I promise I like it.” I say and smile up at her.

  “Okay if you say so.” She still looks doubtful.

  “I’m glad you’re here I was about to go down to tell you my schedule. I do not start school till 8, and I get out at 1:15 I can start working at 1:45, or before that every day. I don’t know at what time you open.” I tell her. She looks like she is thinking.

  “Hmm okay, on Mondays and Tuesday I would appreciate if you would open up the shop at 5:30 till 7:30, and then when you get out of school you can start at 3 – 8. Then the others day you can come in at 3-8 and Saturdays all day, and Sunday off. How does that sound? If its to much we can change it.” I do not even think about it.

  “That is perfect actually. Thank you.” I said gratefully. Something in my life was going well for ones.

  “Perfect, the reason I need you Mondays and Tuesday mornings are because I take care of my grandson till the babysitter gets there at 7 and Theodore doesn’t like being here alone. Can you start tomorrow? So, we can show you all the ropes, I was thinking we can leave everything set on Saturday so that when you opened Monday is just putting everything to bake and take out.” She response going around the apartment.

  “Yes, that perfect. I’ll be there at 2 then or do you want me earlier.” I asked her.

  “2 is fine, like that you can get settle a bit. The dress code is black pants or jeans, leggings whatever you want, and I will give you a couple of shirts. Sounds good?” She askes me. I nodded. “Alright now go eat before it gets cold, I didn’t know what you like so there’s a bit of everything okay.” I nod again.

  “Thank you so much for everything I really appreciate it.”

  “No problem, I will see you tomorrow, have a good night, call if you need anything.” She smiles then head to the door. I walk with her so I can close downstairs. Once I go back up, I go straight to the food and demolish it

  August 31

  After I ate and showered last night I went to bed, I tried to sleep, but again the nightmares kept me up.

  The demons that come out at night when the world is at its most sensitive state visited last night, and they lingered. When the clock hit 4, I could not take it anymore, I decided to go for run, it was pouring out, but I could not care less, I had to get out of here. I put shorts on and my running shoes and a really light rain jacket, grabbed my headphones keys and phone and left. I did not have a destination in mind. But that is the best run. No direction whatsoever just letting your legs guide you.

  An hour later I come to halt, there was a small park to my right and the boxing bag the was under a gazebo caught my eye. I ran towards it. It has been so long since I took out my anger out in one of these, it uses to be able to numb my pain, numb my anger, after a while, it did not work anymore. Knowing this I decided to give a try again.

  First punch shook me whole. I felt the vibrations all the way from my hand up my arm then all around my body. So, I threw another one, and another one. Suddenly a memory flashes in my eyes.

  Our first lesson together flashes in my eyes. I hit the bag harder, another memory flashes, him smiling because he landed the punch just like I taught him. The punches after that are harder, disoriented, unprecise, nastier.

  When I cannot feel the pain anymore, I stop. I stare at the bag, a couple of minutes pass
of just pure numbness, I absorb it all. Then just like it began it ended. My heart goes back to feeling like its on fire, like its being burn little by little the only thing left is ash and nothingness.

  Something trickles down my hand, I glance down I would say I was shocked to see blood, but I am not. Getting to this point is the only way everything freezes, everything just deadens.

  I look at the time and decide to go back to the apartment, there is a lot I need to do today. I turn around and head home.

  When I get home is almost 8:30, I take a shower put my favorite jeans on with a black t-shirt, I put mascara on and eyeliner. I let my hair down because is wet, I gather my things and put my shoes on by the door. I decided to go and get a coffee in the bakery because I need the caffeine. Wake and bake has around 10 people inside. I walk in and get in line. I am looking at the menu to see what I will get when someone behind me touches my shoulder. I turn around and could not believe my eyes.

  “Hello Leah.” Said green eye monster. He just looks at my eyes. Moves from one to the other. I haven’t put in my contact because I left the bag in my car.

  “Hey, have you never seen eyes like mine?” I asked him, he snapped out of what ever trained of thought he was having. I get this reaction from people a lot, not a lot of people have two different color eyes.