The Spanish teacher was nice, though. Her name was Mrs. Willis. She kind of reminded me of Mom because she wore these kind of ugly looking cardigans that I was sure someone once told her looked nice and she ran with the compliment. Mom had some sweaters like that too, and I always wanted to ask her, first, what decade it was when she bought or was given the sweaters and, second, why she still had and wore them. Mrs. Willis had curly dark brown, almost black, hair that fell to her shoulders. Personally, I thought her hairstyle looked a little too young for her, but then who was I to judge? I’d guess that she was probably in her forties. She looked like she could’ve had some Spanish in her blood just because of her dark hair and eyes, and I didn’t think it seemed like too much of a jump with her being a Spanish teacher and all.
When she started speaking in Spanish to the class, I was a little taken aback because the only part I understood was “hola,” but then she went back to speaking English and it was okay. My first choice for a foreign language was French, but that class was full. Tegan and I decided that Spanish was more practical anyway. It wasn’t like we were likely to happen upon any French-speaking people in town, aside from maybe a foreign exchange student. Spanish, on the other hand, might come in useful.
She made it sound like the class would be pretty easy, though, and I knew that Luke took Spanish too, and he said that she didn’t give a lot of homework, so I was happy about that. She spent the majority of class teaching us the alphabet in Spanish, but I could only remember up to the letter H by the end of class.
After Spanish, it was lunchtime because I had Lunch A, and I was ready for it because my stomach started growling toward the end of class. The boy sitting in front of me turned around once to look at me and kind of smiled before he turned back around. It was still kind of embarrassing, but because I could tell her anything, I said to Tegan, “I think I scared Todd Marcum when my stomach began to eat itself out of hunger,”
“My stomach was growling too,” she confessed. “I was too nervous to eat breakfast this morning.”
“My mom made all of us eat,” I replied. “Skylar, of course, complained and looked morose the whole time.”
“Still on a diet then?” Tegan surmised.
“Yep, only a couple of months away from turning into Skeletor,” I grinned.
We made our way to the cafeteria after Tegan showed me where to find her locker. I made a map of it in my mind just so I wouldn’t forget and end up lost later. When we got to the cafeteria, I saw Skylar sitting with her best friend, Stevie—known to her parents as Stephanie. She and Skylar had been best friends for three years. They met their freshman year and had been hogging the phone lines ever since.
I started to wave, but then I remembered my vow not to embarrass Skylar or tell anyone I was her sister, so I just followed Tegan to the end of the very long lunch line. On the bright side, though, the high school had an a la carte line with pizza and soft pretzels, which sounded a million times better than what usually came on a tray. I wouldn’t consider myself a picky eater, but Government food freaked me out. Well, except for the pizza. It was the one thing I could actually get excited about eating at school. Aside from pizza days, I used to always take my lunch to school, but I thought I’d give high school food a try. Or at least the a la carte line, anyway.
After we got our food (pizza for Tegan and a pretzel with cheese for me and juice for both of us from the vending machine), we went to sit with some of Tegan’s friends. To tell the truth, I really didn’t have very many friends. There were people I’d talk to in my classes, but I didn’t really hang out with any of them outside of school. Sometimes I’d tag along with Tegan when she’d go out with her other friends, and while they were nice and would talk to me, I knew they thought I was weird. It was as if I’d been deemed a freak in kindergarten and had been unable to shake the label ever since.
Sometimes Mom would tell me she thought I needed to make more friends to spend my time with. I knew she thought that Tegan was the only person I ever talked to, which wasn’t the case at all. I talked to people at school. I knew most of my classmate’s names, but I wasn’t sure if all of them knew mine. Still, it wasn’t like I was completely anti-social or made the decision alone to have so few friends. I just didn’t see those other people I talked to outside of a school setting most of the time, but I was mostly okay with that. Besides, I’d rather have one really great friend like Tegan than have ten that weren’t so great.
Lunch ended way too soon, but then it was time to go to my elective class: Journalism. I had to coax Tegan into taking it with me, but it was Journalism or Sociology, and Tegan had no interest in Sociology. I thought it sounded like it could have been cool because it’s the study of human social behavior, which I found thoroughly fascinating, but Tierney told us that the teacher, Mrs. Fortright, was a complete bitch. Since Tierney hardly ever cursed or thought badly of people, we knew it had to be true. So Journalism it was.
Our class was in the computer lab, and our teacher was Mr. Hensley. He was tall and thin with thinning reddish brown hair and big glasses. He was really nice and told us all about what we’d be doing in class, which was, essentially, making a newspaper for the school.
Tegan groaned, and I grinned as I wondered what I could possibly write about, but instead of picking topics right away, he taught us about different laws and rules of good journalism. Then we had to pick a name for our newspaper. He made us all write down a suggestion, and he wrote the names on the board. Then we voted and narrowed it down to three before we voted again and picked the official name, which turned out to be the oh-so-exciting title of The Scoop. I didn’t like the name. I liked my suggestion—The Juggernaut—better, but not many people knew what it meant, so I guess they didn’t vote for it. Or at least that was the story I told myself.
I really liked Journalism, and Tegan seemed to like it too despite her groans and initial misgivings. That class went by way too fast, and before long it was time to go to our last class of the day: English Composition.
Our teacher’s name was Miss Barkley. I had heard many stories about her from my siblings. Luke was convinced that she was a lesbian, and I had to admit that she was rather butch, which lent itself to Luke’s theory. She had super short hair and had almost a rugged look to her face. She wore wire rim glasses, and the way she stood reminded me of a drill sergeant. Skylar never really mentioned her thoughts on Miss Barkley’s sexual orientation—not that it mattered anyway; Skylar usually just complained about how hard her class was. The one thing Luke and Skylar really agreed on was that Miss Barkley was really strict.
To tell the truth, she kind of scared me, and from the reaction of the rest of the class, I wasn’t the only one. Everyone sat up straight and listened as she spoke and went over the class curriculum. Then she started handing out assignments. A lot of them. I’d officially died and gone to Hell. She was the only one who gave us any homework on the first day. She’d also assigned all freshmen to write a paper about themselves when we registered for school. I’d been shocked when Mom handed me the assignment along with my class schedule. I’d slaved away writing several drafts during the two weeks before school began, and after meeting Miss Barkley, I felt like I should have worked even harder to make my paper presentable. From the looks of the syllabus, the class would only get harder. According to her outline, we would have homework almost every night and an essay a week. Oh, how I loathed essays.
When the bell finally rang, the whole class scurried out of the classroom. It was as if we couldn’t get away from Miss Barkley fast enough. I waited for Tegan outside of the class, though, and we walked to my locker.
The only book I had to take home was my English Composition book, but I had to get my trusty olive green messenger bag. I didn’t like purses much, so I kept my wallet and all of that stuff in my messenger bag. I also kept notebooks in there too. As of last night, my newest notebook had apparently become something of a journal. It also housed my poetry and some short stories I’d start
ed. I usually didn’t tell anyone that was what I was writing, though.
I hadn’t started off with the intention of making a secret of it, but I hadn’t really intended to try my hand at writing either. I’d always told myself stories in my head, sure, but the notebooks were just part of a weird fetish I had when it came to notebooks. I’d started collecting them by accident, usually picking up one or two when there was a sale of some sort. Then I realized it was stupid to have a bunch of blank notebooks, especially when they weren’t the typical spiral bound notebooks like Mom bought us for school. No, these were heavier bounds books, likely made for journaling.
One night I’d picked up a pen and just started writing some of the stories I’d told myself. I’d been doing it off and on ever since. Tegan was really the only other person who knew about my writing, and sometimes I’d let her read it even though it made me nervous to share something so personal.
After my locker, we went to Tegan’s locker. She threw her books into her bag and draped her fake Louis Vuitton bag over her shoulder. It was like one Oprah had talked about on her show, and Tegan had been insanely excited to get it. She’d told me more than once what it was called, but it never seemed to resonate because, as I said, I wasn’t a fan of purses. Tegan loved them, though, and I was pretty certain that if she had the money, she’d spend copious amounts of money on getting the real name brand bags. And somehow I’m considered the weird one?
As Tegan turned toward me, Tierney appeared around the corner and walked over to us. “So how was your first day of high school?” she asked with a smile.
It was eerie just how much she and Tegan looked alike. They were both so insanely and unfairly pretty with the same long, wavy melted caramel colored hair and gray eyes. The only difference was Tierney was slightly taller and had a ton of freckles, and her hair was shorter, falling just above her shoulders in a stylish layered hairdo I could only wish my hair would comply with.
In short, they were both gorgeous, inside and out. And, over the years, Tierney had become like the big sister I wish I had and Skylar refused to be.
“It was okay,” Tegan replied.
“We have homework in English Comp,” I complained.
“Sorry, I guess I forgot to warn you about that,” Tierney said, scrunching up her straight, freckled nose. “Do you need a ride home?”
I knew without a doubt that Skylar and Luke would have already left without me, so I smiled sweetly and nodded. “That would be wonderful.”
“Okay, let’s go,” Tierney said easily.
We followed her down the hallways, which were thinning out quickly, and out to the student body parking lot. When we reached Tierney’s car, a black 2002 Sunfire, she unlocked the door and I climbed into the backseat while the other two got in the front. Tierney’s car was so clean. I was slightly worried she had an obsession with it. If she were about twenty years older, I figured she and Mom would’ve been great friends. I could totally see them sharing tricks for getting stains out of the carpet or discussing the best way to keep the windows from getting streaks when they washed them.
I mused over the idea of Tierney as a middle-aged woman as she drove to my house. We listened to one of the popular radio stations, which only played a total of twenty songs a day at strategic intervals so as if to cover the fact that they had nothing new to offer. Tegan told Tierney about all of her classes, and she had a pretty good grasp on explaining the day, so I only added my input when I thought of something particularly interesting, and in no time we were in front of my house.
Tegan hopped out of the car and pulled the seat forward so I could get out. I thanked Tierney, and Tegan said she’d call me later as she climbed back into the car. I walked up the walkway that led to the oak front door of the two-story off white middle class house that I called home.
As soon as I stepped inside, I thought I had stepped into a war zone. I could hear Mom yelling, which was really unusual because she was normally so quiet. I had no idea who she was yelling at, but I knew it was either Skylar or Luke because both of their cars were in the driveway. I took off my shoes by the door walked into the kitchen and saw Mom staring both of my siblings down.
I sat my bag down with a frown and asked, “What’s going on?”
“Cecilia! Oh thank heaven’s you’re all right,” Mom exclaimed with a look of relief. “How’d you get home?”
“Tierney drove me.”
“See, Mom. I knew she was fine,” Luke said and walked off before she could say another word.
Mom turned back to Skylar and scowled. “You got lucky this time,” she said before she marched off. Most likely to go clean something.
Then Skylar turned to me and glared. “If you want a ride home with me, be outside by the car by the time I get there. And if you’re getting a ride from someone else, leave me a note in my locker,” she said before she stomped off looking pissed.
I looked around the kitchen and sighed. “My first day of high school was fine,” I said to no one as I walked over to refrigerator. “I found all of my classes fine. I really like Journalism. I do have homework, though,” I said as I grabbed a Coke. “I guess I’ll go get started on that now.”
Silence answered me as I made my way upstairs to my bedroom.
CHAPTER TWO
While, on the first day of school, it was obvious that Miss Barkley was a very strict English Composition teacher and I knew I’d probably struggle with her class more than any of the others, by the end of the first month of school, I was convinced that she hated me. Or, at the very least, disliked me very much.
“Why would Miss Barkley hate you?” Mom asked when I complained about the teacher on one occasion.
I had no answer, but the evidence of Miss Barkley’s hatred seemed pretty cut and dry to me. I tried to explain to Mom that while I never talked in class and never wrote notes or zoned out the way I sometimes did in my other classes (Mom was not enthused by this confession), Miss Barkley always called on me to answer questions when I didn’t know the answer. If I raised my hand to answer, she’d skip over me. It was as if she waited to see the look of terror or blankness on my face when she’d ask something I didn’t have the answer to, and she’d pounce. Sometimes I’d guess, rarely ever right, or mumble that I didn’t know, and she’d snap, “Wrong! Anyone else?”
It was mortifying, and if Miss Barkley didn’t hate me, then she had to be sadist.
The only other possible explanation, aside from sadism, was that Miss Barkley disliked me because she disliked my brother. I’d overheard Luke telling one of his friends that he’d called Miss Barkley a dyke last year, which was totally rude and uncalled for in my opinion, and he was pretty sure she’d heard him as she walked by.
“I’m sure she was too embarrassed to actually say anything,” he’d chuckled. “I mean, denying it would just be lying, I’m sure.”
But he’d gone on to say that the next time he took one of her classes, she’d always put him on the spot, probably in much the same way she was doing with me now, and he’d just scraped by with a C- in her class.
It was disheartening that Miss Barkley couldn’t have associated me with Skylar instead of Luke. While my sister wasn’t the best student, she’d never done anything, as far as I knew, to piss off Miss Barkley, and she’d passed with a B in the class.
I couldn’t exactly explain this theory to Mom without ratting out Luke, so I was stuck with a weak, “I don’t know why she hates me,” which Mom refused to believe due to her biased belief that no one could possibly dislike her children.
Tegan, at least, believed in my theory. After all, she was there to witness my daily torture. Thankfully, Tierney was nice enough to help me with my essays. She had infinite patience as I stumbled my way through various papers.
Tegan also pointed out that it was weird that I enjoyed writing short stories and poetry, but I struggled so much with writing essays. I tried to explain that it wasn’t the same. “I write stories and poems because I enjoy it, and they’
re mostly just for me,” I said. “I’m not getting graded on them like I am with essays.”
Tegan had smiled sympathetically, but I could tell that she didn’t fully understand what I meant since she never wrote for fun. Also, she was a good student and didn’t struggle like I did with improper grammar and run on sentences.
When Miss Barkley handed back our first essay, my paper looked like it was bleeding from all of her comments and corrections. I’d been so upset after class, and when Tierney met us at Tegan’s locker, she’d offered to start editing my papers for me after Tegan had explained why I looked like someone had killed my non-existent puppy.
Sometimes I felt jealous of Tegan’s relationship with Tierney. They got along so well and were actually, honest to God, friends. Sure, they’d fight occasionally, but Tierney had never denied being related to Tegan. Sometimes I’d try to imagine having that kind of relationship with Skylar, but the idea seemed so foreign to me. Besides, I figured I probably wouldn’t spend as much time at Tegan’s house if Skylar and I were friendlier, and that would be a major loss because I loved staying over at Tegan’s, which is what I had done pretty much every weekend since school started.
When I’d ask if I could stay at Tegan’s, Mom would always ask, “Are you sure it’s okay with Tegan’s parents?”
Probably because Mom couldn’t fathom the idea of having one of Skylar, Luke or my friends over every weekend, I don’t think she actually believed me when I’d always reply, “Yes, I’m sure they don’t mind.”
Infinite (Strange and Beautiful, Book 1) Page 3