School Will Never Be the Same

Wednesday came around fast. Faster than I thought it would. I didn’t see Gerard, Mr. Way, whatever, at the restaurant but Kevin assures me he was there. That he was at some other girls table just at the end of my shift. I don’t know whether he was just trying to make me feel good about myself or if it was true. I'm glad I didn’t see him it may have confused me more as to his motives and my feelings and his feelings.

I got dressed extra nice on Wednesday. I have to wear business wear but I dressed myself up a little more than usual. I dressed this way to impress him I guess, or to make myself feel better about myself. I picked Annie up, Wednesday is one of the days I drive to school. Friday is the only days I use the bus.

When I arrived at school I sat with my friends until it was time for form. Form time is one of my preferred parts of the day. It’s one of the times I get to see Mr. Way and there's the added bonus that I get to do a little art work before my first lessons of the day.

“Morning guys,” Mr. Way said walking into form, he was carrying his coffee mug and a few text books. He placed them on his cluttered desk. It’s a wonder he gets any work done. He’s the most disorganised teachers I know. Makes him unique and I like that about him. I like the things which make him unique. And the surprises his personality suddenly reveal to you. For example the fact that he was dork, geek, loser whatever when he was a teen. He took the register and read out some of the notices of the day. “You guys aren’t allowed to go out to the garden area at second lunch, there was too much mess yesterday. And don’t forget BTEC deadlines are right around the corner after Christmas. And UCAS applications need to be done soon. Speak to Mr. Jacobson.” We were then left to our own devices.

“So, Nat, how you been?” I turned to find that for some reason on the empty seat to my left, Max one of James friends, had decided to fill the normally empty space. I turned away, to Becky who sat on the other side of me. “Don’t ignore me Natalie, I just want to talk.” I continued to ignore him. I was not going to engage this guy in conversation. He was most likely working on behalf of James, who had cooked up some elaborate scheme to torture me. He would do that. Things with us didn’t end well.

I sat through an entire form time of him trying to get my attention and since a teacher was in the room he couldn’t use force to get his way. Instead he had to sit frustrated by my silence. And I'm glad to say I did not give in.

“Natalie can I talk to you for a minute please?” Mr. Way called as I was about to leave the room. Déjà vu. Although this time he wanted to speak to me at the beginning of the day rather than the end. I turned around and walked to stand in front of his desk.

“Yes, sir?” I said fiddling with the strap on my bag. All of a sudden we were a lone again. And he wanted to talk to me again.

“Mr. Way. Sir is my father. Anyway. About our session this after noon, is it ok if we meet in here and if we need a computer we’ll you my laptop?” Mr. Way asked standing up to walk around and talk to me properly. I nodded and went to leave. But he stopped me again. “Was Max bothering you today.”

I turned around, put on a nice big smile and flipped the hair away from my shoulder. “Nothing I can’t handle.” I walked away before he could respond and made my way to the first lesson of the day.

At break time, I found myself at my locker alone. I was getting ready to go and find a quiet room during one of my frees in order to get some of my written course work done. I had finished swapping books to and from my bag. My locker door slammed, I thought it could just be the wind. Or someone knocked my locker door accidently in their hurry. But I looked round and there stood Max. He was leaning against the block of lockers, resting one foot up as well.

This was not going to end very well.