It's a Love Story

Juliette’s POV:

The first time I saw him was on the first day of school.

Senior year. That meant a lot of things. For one thing, it meant freshman would scurry out of the way when I walked down the hall in my school-appropriate Marc Jacobs heels and fitted uniform. But it also meant something more. My last year of high school. In one year, I could be finally free.

I was just so sick of my town. Everyone in Hewlett Bay Park, a town in the suburbs of New York City and officially the eighteenth wealthiest area in the US, was way too rich and equally spoiled. And okay, yes, I was one of those private school kids. But I wanted to experience the world. I wanted to do things. I did not want to find myself washed up in twenty years, exactly the same as my parents, clinging to my diamonds and botox jobs.

To say the least, I was bored.

Fashion and photography, those were the two things that mattered to me. And these interests were not exactly shared by the rest of my peers, most of whom, when we weren’t clad in our uniforms, were typically classy and sophisticated in their style choices as their old money breeding required, but still didn’t really care too much about real fashion. Like taking chances. Being daring. Most of those girls only cared about the latest gossip texts they had received on their Blackberrys about who had hooked up with whom at last weekend’s big party and who had broken up with whom. I’ve always prided myself on the fact that I’m different than that.

When I say “different”, I don’t mean, like, I’m the loner kid sitting in the corner with no friends. I went to those parties. I had plenty of friends. The truth was, I just didn’t like them too much.

Sophie was my only real friend. We had hit it off in kindergarten when she sat next to me in our drawing time and drew a crude sketch of the snobby little girl sitting next to me called Nicole who had refused to talk to me because my socks weren’t matched. Twelve years later, Nicole Berg was still a snob and Sophie was my best friend. It was with her that I first saw him.

Sophie and I had stepped into the newly painted cafeteria, recently done over in a soft lilac shade so students would feel less in a school cafeteria and more in a refined spa, to grab something to eat during our lunchtime. Standing on the incredible long line to get a custom-made pizza and listening to Sophie bitch about something or the other, I considered my uniform, which consisted of a navy blue skirt (or a plaid skirt—you could choose) and a seersucker white blouse. Boring, yes. The trick was to accessorize. My fingers were covered in my various rings, including one that when you twisted it open would reveal Chanel lipgloss, and I had on a pair of knee-high white socks, purple flats, and my blue skirt was sneakily hemmed shorter than it was actually supposed to be, an untold rule that freshman girls still had yet to learn. But should I roll my sleeves up or down? Decisions, decisions.

“My dad’s going to be seriously PO-ed when he found out that the school used his tax money to paint over the walls of the cafeteria,” Sophie announced as the line inched up. “And seriously? Those new TV screens plastered around everywhere? They could have totally used that money to build some AC.”

I laughed. Despite the fact that everyone in our school was wealthy and could easily afford it, Vanderbilt Prep Academy had yet to place central air conditioning in the school. Which, yes, meant that we basically melted in the summer. I was surprised some overbearing parents hadn’t sued the school yet. “Yeah, seriously,” I agreed. A couple minutes later, Sophie finally got her pizza and I grabbed a water bottle. And then there, in the crowded cafeteria, was where I first had contact with him.

I turned around and bumped straight into a boy, sending my water bottle flying to the ground along with his wrapped sandwich. “Oh! I’m so sorry,” I apologized, blushing. Of course I would bump into someone and knock their food over. Nice one, Juliette.

“No—it was all me,” he drawled out in a faint Southern accent I couldn't quite place. He bent over to pick up what had fallen to the floor. All I could see was the top of his head. He had beautiful golden blond curls in the perfect length, shaggy but not too long. As he stood up, I saw the rest of him. He had honey-colored eyes, sharp cheekbones, and an only slightly crooked nose and was dressed in the required dark pants, black blazer, and a white button-down shirt, through which the words David Bowie were bleeding through from his tee-shirt underneath. I noticed he wasn’t wearing a school tie. “Here you go.” He handed me my water bottle.

I realized I was gaping at him. I quickly looked down. “Um, thank you,” I mumbled, feeling embarrassed again.

He gave me a quick smile and moved away. When he was out of earshot, Sophie grabbed my arm and whispered, “Who was that?”

I shrugged. “No idea. Probably new student.” I put it out of my mind as Sophie and I paid for our food and left to go sit outside with friends.

Alex Wolff:

My third class of the day, and I was still freaking out.

This teacher thing was hard! I never thought it would be like this. From the freshman visual dynamics class who kept snickering at everything I said and rudely asking me how old I was, to the Photo 1 class where I almost spilled photo chemicals all over the darkroom floor in a demonstration, I was just a mess. What was it with rich kids being extremely obnoxious? And now the next class was the Photo Journalism class. Photo J. These kids were the real deal. They had taken a minimum of five photo classes and gone through a rigorous portfolio selection to get in when the last Photo J teacher, who had been teaching for fifteen years, suddenly retired. It was not going to be easy to take this class on, let me just say.

I lingered at the back of the room as the class drifted in. Talking excitedly about their summer escapades, they quickly filled up the studio until there were about fifteen people. Most of the class was female, though there were three or four boys, mingling with the groups of girls. I spotted the blonde girl I had bumped into in the cafeteria, chatting with a red-haired friend. They all looked like a bunch of rich, spoiled kids, just like everyone else in the school.

The chatter eventually faded away and the class members looked around at each other, clearly puzzled at their lack of a teacher. I took that as my cue to step forward and shut the door, then cleared my throat.

All eyes turned to me.

“Are you a sub or something?” the red-haired girl asked.

“Uh, no, I believe I’m your new Photo J teacher,” I announced. Their expressions looked doubtful. “Have a seat around.”

I saw them all exchange bemused expressions before doing as I asked. I fidgeted a little as I waited for them to settle. It felt weirder giving orders to a class only a couple of years younger than me, but even weirder yet to see them followed. “Alright.” I cleared my throat and leaned against a table, looking at them as I began. “My name’s Alex Wolff. You may or may not know, but Mr. Ables retired. So I’m his…replacement.” I shrugged a little bit. “I’m a graduate from Rhode Island School of Design with a double major in photography and drawing. If you’re doubting my credentials, I worked as an assistant curator for the Guggenheim Museum for a year after I graduated.”

One of the boys gave a low wolf-whistle. “Sir, if you worked at the Guggenheim, why the hell would you leave to work here?”

I gave a weak smile. “They pay me more here,” I responded with, which wasn’t exactly a lie, but not entirely the whole truth. Hey, good idea, how about I spill my guts to a class of completely unfamiliar seventeen-year-old students? Yeah, how bout not.

The kids laughed, thankfully unaware of how I was having a mini conversation with myself inside my head. “So, I’ll just take attendance, or whatever…” My voice trailed off as I tried to find the attendance sheet. “It was right here, fuck,” I muttered to myself.

The class giggled again. I could feel my cheeks flaring up. “Uh, I mean, shoot.” Nice cover up, I thought sarcastically to myself. I found the paper and pulled it out from under my now-cold mug of coffee. Great. It had coffee stains on it. I wrinkled my nose and tried to ignore the stains as I started reading off the names. “Alexis Bridd?”

“Here.”

“Jake Calhoun?”

“Yup.”

I went through the rest of the list quickly. It was a small class—looked like rich people weren’t really that into creative stuff—and hopefully easy to teach. That was good, at least. “Juliette Lewis?”

“Here.” The petite blonde girl I’d knocked into earlier raised her hand, then pushed a strand of sun-drenched hair behind her ear.

“Hi,” I told her, looking up at her.

She looked puzzled. “Um, hi.”

It’s hard to explain, but when I looked at her I felt something weird inside me. It was those sparkling hazel eyes; eyes that were almost green, but not quite. She looked like she’d seen way more in the world than she should have, and she was laughing at it all. I dragged my eyes away from her and looked down at my attendance sheet again. “Lewis,” I mused out loud. “That sounds familiar…”

She raised her eyebrow at me. “It’s a common last name.”

“No, I know, but…” I frowned, thinking hard to remember. Then it came to me. About a year ago, back when I still worked at the Guggenheim, someone had donated a fuck load of money to the museum in the Lewis name. We’d used it to build a new hall for the photography display. I wondered if it was the same Lewis. “Well, anyway.” I finished up the attendance. Everyone was present. Looked like I had no skippers on the first day. “So, uh,” I stalled. All the upturned faces waiting for me to say something made it hard to think. I picked up the coffee to take a sip, not because I was thirsty but rather just to have something to do with my hands. I almost immediately spat it out. “Holy fuck, this is fucking terrib—” I stopped myself suddenly. The class giggled again at my incompetence. I took a deep breath and started over. “I’m sorry. I’m not too used to this teaching thing,” I admitted awkwardly.

“How old are you?” the red-haired girl, Catherine, asked. The girl next to her elbowed her. “I mean, not to be rude…”

“I’m twenty-four,” I responded irritably. “And now that we’ve gone over my personal information, let’s talk about the class. So, I will give you a class syllabus—uh—once I make it, but right now I’d like to see what kind of standards you’re up too. If you have your portfolios from last year or any work you did over the summer, I’d like to check that out…now, I guess…”

The class all stood up to collect their work. Chattering resumed. I closed my eyes briefly, hoping for this awkwardly uncomfortable day to be over.