I Just Wanna Know What Your Best Friend Knows

Kathleen had taken her seat in a matter of seconds, making it with about half a minute to spare. The teacher had begun to speak when Alex decided to show up. She rolled her eyes as he sauntered in as if he owned the place, watching as the teacher stopped and looked over at him. She internally rejoiced as soon as she noticed that he was most likely about to be scolded about his lack of punctuality. Sure enough, she had called it right on the dot.

“Mr. Gaskarth,” he sneered, looking over to the boy who had entered room, “you’re late. Again. What’s your excuse? And do you have a pass?”

Alex looked over at Kathleen, who was glaring daggers at him. “Don’t you dare try to put this all on me, Gaskarth,” she mouthed at him. She wasn’t in the mood for this, and she wasn’t about to be put into any sort of trouble. She certainly didn’t want to be forced to intervene to defend herself, though technically, she did nothing wrong. She got there on time—he didn’t. She couldn’t be held reliable for that.

Alex, meanwhile, didn’t seem to care as he grinned over at Mr. Hester, the chemistry teacher. “Nope, no pass and Kat and I were attending to…important matters.”

“Harassing me would be more like it,” she muttered under her breath, furious.

To say the look on her face was murderous was an understatement. Had it not been for the fact that there were other students and a faculty member in the room, she most likely would’ve lost it right then and there. Though as the case proved, this wasn’t what was going on. Mr. Hester only gave Kat a quick glance before returning his gaze to Alex.

“That may be the case, but Kathleen came in on time, whereas, you didn’t. Were you standing outside staring aimlessly at the door again, Mr. Gaskarth? And whatever important matters you two had to share with one another could probably wait until later.”

Kathleen was mentally panicking. She knew enough about Alex just from what Belle had told her to know that the wheels in his head were cranking and he would find some way to hint at something suggestive, despite the fact of it being a whole lot more different than he could make it sound. If he wanted to, he could make her sound like a complete tramp, and that wasn’t something she would let herself be thought of, especially if it was insinuated purposely by the likes of him. She wasn’t like that, and all that she could hope was that God have mercy on her soul and have Alex shut up like she was hoping he would.

“No, sir, there wasn’t a way to wait. It was very important. We couldn’t quite postpone what was happening for a later date. Right Kat?” Alex asked, and when Mr. Hester turned to look over at her, Alex sent her another wink.

For the third time that day.

“Miss. Hillard? Would you care to cut in?”

Biting her lip, she gripped the back of her desk, clawing at it irately, her teeth gritted together as her lips formed a tight smile. “Of course, Mr. Hester. You see, the story’s all wrong here. Alex was merely speaking to me about something completely unimportant, and, while I was trying to tell him to go so I could get to class, he proceeded to attempt to distract me, so when I finally did get my items, I rushed to class and he decided to take his sweet time. He and I aren’t in this whole thing together. That’s why I was here and he wasn’t.”

Mr. Hester looked back at Alex, who shrugged. “It seems your story is different from Miss. Hillard’s and I have reason to believe that hers is more accurate than yours is, Mr. Gaskarth. And we’ve wasted approximately five minutes on this topic, so take a seat and let’s get to workin’.”

Unknowingly, Kathleen had stumbled into a random seat, one that happened to have another empty one right beside hers at a lab table. As her luck have it, Alex happened to spot this particular seat, and took a seat there, causing her to roll her eyes and turn her seat as far away from his as humanly possible. Luckily, she was almost positive Mr. Hester had mentioned a new lab partner arrangement sometime this week, and hopefully, today was the day.

“I hate you so much right now, it’s not even funny, Gaskarth. Were you trying to hint at making me sound like some sort of whore or something? Because trust me, it’s not something I’m happy about as of right now. Don’t you know when you’re not wanted around here?” she hissed at him, her eyes reflecting the amount of loathing she felt for this boy.

“Calm down. I didn’t get in trouble. You didn’t get in trouble. We’re all happy here.”

“No, we most certainly aren’t. And for the record, there isn’t even a ‘we’ to begin with,” she mumbled, looking up at the teacher, who had shot her a brief look that was telling her to stop talking if she knew what was expected of her. She pressed her lips together in a thin line again, not bothering to listen to whatever Alex had to say, if he’d even said anything back in reply.

“Alright class, now that we’ve taken care of that…disruption,” the teacher made sure to send a pointed glare in Alex’s direction, while Kathleen’s eyes reverted to her desk, “don’t get too comfortable. You’re all getting new seats, and new lab partners.”

Yes! she mentally cheered. Her thin-lipped smile turned into a full out wide grin. Kat was about ready to jump out of her seat and continue to cheer that she didn’t have to sit with Alex any longer. There was only so much of him anyone—especially she—could take. The ironic thing was that she didn’t even have to spend one day, let alone fifteen minutes to feel as infuriated around him as she was. And she was more than ecstatic to have a different seat.

Alex couldn’t help but silently snicker at the girl beside him. Her reaction, which he supposed he should’ve found offensive, was actually quite comical in his opinion. Then again, this was only just beginning, so he presumed that despite what she was thinking, they were probably going to be seeing a lot more of each other. It was also a little puzzling as to why he was trying so much to get her to speak to him. Maybe it was because she was putting up a fight and that he never really had to work as hard as he did now to get a girl to react in a positive manner towards him.

In other words, he was almost positive it was just the chase that he found remotely intriguing.

“Bianca Lewis and Travis Baker; station one,” Mr. Hester called out, pointing to the lab stations.

“Jeanette Mercer and Wesley Reynolds; station two.”

One by one, people were plucked out of their current seats to be put in different ones, and the list seemed to go on and on.

“Lia Thompson and Dana Quincy; station nine. Mike Greene and Tyler Morris; station ten.”

Oh, get on with it already! Kathleen thought with impatience, drumming her fingers edgily on the lab table. She cast a glance at Alex, who seemed to be enjoying her anxiousness, and in fact, he seemed to be more than amused by it. Her expression grew darker as she looked away, her fingers pounding on the table harder and faster, her knee now bouncing anxiously. Finally, there were about three stations left, and six students to still be partnered up. Right now, Kat had it narrowed down to Marissa Tunnel and Giana Cooper as to who she wanted to work with. Hopefully, luck would be on her side.

“Kathleen Hillard and Alex Gaskarth, since you two seem to be having some issues, you two can stay right where you are and hopefully throughout this class, you’ll learn to be a little more tolerant with each other.” Kathleen’s eyes widened as she looked at Mr. Hester’s stern expression, before sinking a little into her seat. Her face, which had now fallen dramatically, reflected exactly how she felt about the situation and more.

“Uh, with all due respect, sir, but, are you serious?!” she exclaimed, attempting to be as polite as possible, though with the situation at hand, she found it was nearly impossible to do just that. She would do anything, absolutely anything at all whatsoever to negotiate with him and have him change his mind. There was no way she could stand having to sit by this nuisance without going completely and utterly insane. Apparently, some people were surprised. Normally, she sucked things up and didn’t complain, unlike now. Especially considering the fact that her negotiation skills were generally better than this.

WHY?! What the hell?! Lord, whatever I did, please, please,please forgive me. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, what am I going to do?! Kat thought frantically, burying her head into her hands. She was panicking big-time. She had no idea how to react to this. It seemed as if he was having a huge ball with this one. A class period where he was required to sit beside her, and quite possibly get away with torturing her. As soon as this thought registered in her mind, she felt her face drain entirely of blood.

Lord, just kill me now.

This was hell on earth, she realized, and that unless some sort of miracle was to strike, she’d be stuck here for what would seem like all eternity and beyond. Sure that sounded melodramatic, but she could only imagine what he had under his sleeves. She shuddered in response to the thought; this couldn’t possibly get any worse, could it?

Then again, we rarely have to work with our partners. I’ll be fine. Nothing could possibly go wrong.

“Furthermore, you all will be working with your partners nearly every day for the rest of this semester, unless otherwise told.”

Apparently, it could.

Kathleen sunk into her seat, her shoulders slumped with anticipation of what the rest of this class period would hold, which would no doubt be displeasing, to say the least. On the outside, she was annoyed, on the inside, she was screaming as loud as she possibly could. If she could scream that way at that moment, every single glass item would’ve cracked until it hit the ground.

Shoot me. Shoot me. Shoot me. Shoot me. Shoot me. Shoot me. Shoot me. Shoot me. Shoot me. Over and over again, this thought was stuck on repeat, because everything else in her body seemed to have shut down. These thoughts didn’t cease, even when Mr. Hester passed by with a sheet that contained the basic lab instructions.

From the corner of her eye, she noticed his hand moving in a particular direction, so out of instinct, her head shot up and she sent him the nastiest glare she could begin to muster. “Don’t even think about it,” she growled threateningly. Kathleen wasn’t in the mood to be felt up by him in class, or felt up by him in general.

“Feisty, again, I see,” Alex commented snidely, and Kathleen rolled her eyes.

“Let’s just get this blasted lab done as quickly as we can so I don’t have to spend as much time with you. Plus, I’ll do most of the work and you can even look off of my sheet,” she offered, shooting him a sarcastic smile to match the cynical tone in her voice.

“So you assume I’m going to take that offer because I get free answers?”

Kathleen let a bitter laugh escape her lips, glancing over at him with an “are you serious?” look painted on her face. “Hmmmm, let me see,” she drawled dramatically, making a theatrical appearing expression that looked as if she was deeply in thought. “You’re obviously a pervert, you don’t show up to class on time, you don’t seem to care whether a girl says no to you or not, and quite frankly, you don’t look as if schoolwork is your kind of thing. Therefore, I conclude that yes, you’ll take it because you get free answers,” she finished, flashing him a smirk.

“You concluded wrong.”

“Impossible. We all know you, Gaskarth. Now, if I were you, I’d do the wise thing and take the offer before I really do stay true to my promise of having my foot meet your balls. I’m being serious here; I want a good grade, because unlike you, education is important to me because I don’t want to have a terrible job with almost no profit and become a failure in life and struggle to make money and end up having to sell my house and live out on the streets and wear ragged clothing, eat out of trash cans, and hope and pray for a job. In order to get a good job, you need a good education. And I’m not about to have you hold me back. It might do you some good to listen to me,” she informed him.

“Well. Now I know it doesn’t take much to get you all riled up. All I have to do is slack off.”

“Excuse me?!” she sputtered. The textbook that she’d been thumbing through absently while she was talking to him was slammed down onto the table. People stared. Mr. Hester stared. Kathleen didn’t care. Neither did Alex. He continued to smirk at her enraged expression with no regards to anything else. Alex hadn’t ever known that having a girl react this way could be as entertaining as it was. He was sure he couldn’t possibly become more amused than he was at this moment.

“Miss. Hillard, Mr. Gaskarth, is there a problem?” Mr. Hester asked them, cocking an eyebrow in their direction.

Kathleen held her tongue as a smile as fake as a plastic Barbie doll’s appeared on her face. “No, sir. No problems here. Alex here, for once, is quite eager to start on this project and it took me by surprise is all,” she lied, shooting Alex a look that said “you owe me big time”. “Isn’t that right, Alex?” Figuring that he’d be better off agreeing with her, he nodded his head.

“Good. I’m glad everything is going well then, because this lab is only the beginning. After that, you’ll be doing a project with your partners and it will require doing work outside of class as well.” Kathleen’s face nearly fell yet again with this news. Alex, on the other hand, had a smile on his face as he looked over at her head, which had slumped down so no one could see how furious she was with this news.

“Let’s get started,” she stated in a bored manner. Of course, Alex being Alex, he just had to try to sidetrack them, but after the look she gave him, he shut his mouth and they began to work on the lab, finishing it right before they were dismissed. She flew out of that classroom like her life depended on it, desperately attempting to avoid any more confrontation with Alex. It was bad enough that he wouldn’t stop chasing after her whenever he had the chance. The last thing she needed was to see him after sitting next to him in class. That was a gruesome experience she wished she wouldn’t have to repeat.

Kathleen spotted Belle meandering in the hallways, bidding farewell to a girl nearby, and she charged over towards her. “Belle! You have no idea how happy I am to see you!” she exclaimed. The blonde curiously glanced over at her best friend, clearly surprised at the outburst that had left her mouth.

“Well, it’s not everyday that I get that, even from you. What the hell happened?”

“I had to sit next to Alex in class. He’s my new lab partner.”

“Oooh, that sucks,” Belle remarked with a careless shrug, causing Kat to glare at her.

“You know, I have no idea how you ever dated that nuisance.”

Belle’s face turned to one of disgust, shaking her head once. “Don’t remind me,” she replied in agreement.

“We have next period with him. I’m just glad you’re with me instead of me being alone. Lord knows that’s a disaster waiting to happen. I can’t shake him off.”

“What happened between you guys earlier, anyways?” questioned Belle, now suddenly remembering how Kat had refused to tell her about what she guessed was a previous encounter with the messy haired boy.

“Long story. Like I said, lunch time.” Kathleen received a groan in reply to her final answer. For once, she followed Belle to her locker, who quickly disposed of her things into her locker and picked out only what she needed.

“That’s probably the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“What, waiting?” Kathleen asked, tilting her head to the side a little. “It wouldn’t kill you to have some patience, you know. It’s a really long story, and it’s also one that I would choose not to share, but since you’re my best friend and his ex-girlfriend, I might as well. I still think he’s the biggest jerk ever to walk the planet.”

“You and me both.”

They laughed at their comments for almost no apparent reason at all. It wasn’t particularly funny, but it was clear that they could both use a good laugh or two before they start their next class. “You know what we really need, Elle? Do you know what we all really need?” Kathleen asked, a cloud of wonder in her eyes that could easily mystify anyone. Fortunately, Belle was used to it and kept a neutral expression, not at all fazed.

“A coffee machine for students?” she suggested in almost an uninterested manner.

“Hell yes! But no, that wasn’t what I was referring to.”

“A large mallet to smash the chemistry room?” she tried again. Kathleen sighed.

“As much as that’s true, no. That’s not it again.”

“What is it, then?” Belle asked, sounding almost frustrated.

“An escape. Some sort of wild getaway from this place. My luck sucks today, and all I want to do is get out of here. I don’t want to waste my time here. Honestly, I feel like getting into a car and never looking back here,” she told her, and watched her friend’s reaction, which so far, had stayed almost exactly the same.

“I thought you were the sensible one. You know, the whole “Education is important…blah blah blah, good career…blah blah blah, stay in school…blah blah blah” crap you’re always trying to shovel down my throat? Remember that?”

Kathleen rolled her eyes at Belle. “Who gives a shit? How about one day? Just one day of freedom. I say we should ditch the rest of the day,” she suggested, now arriving to her locker and pulling out her textbook for her next class anyways. Belle froze in her spot, looking over at Kat like she was insane.

“Uh, how about no? As much as I want to do that, I don’t think we can do that right now.”

“I’ll tell you what happened between Alex and me,” Kathleen bribed, flashing the infamous overly-cheery smile of hers at Belle.

“What the hell are we doing here?!” Belle shoved her books into the brunette’s locker, throwing them wherever, not caring at all about how the books turn out. “Let’s ditch this mad house,” she replied, pulling Kathleen’s books out of her own hands and chucking them into the locker as well, slamming the locker door shut. Luckily, she kept her keys right in her pocket at all times. She pulled them out and flashed them at Kat. They shared similar grins before dashing down the hallways, slowing down near the doors.

“Miss. Donovan, Miss. Hillard, what do you two think you’re doing? And where do you two think you’re going?” The principal’s voice rang behind them, and they looked over at each other with wide eyes. They were caught like a deer in headlights. They slowly turned around, fake smiles etched on their face, though deep down, they didn’t know what they were going to say.

“Well, sir, Belle and I were heading out to the parking lot. I ride with Belle every morning to school and back in the afternoon, and I was studying in her car when she was driving, and I think I forgot my textbook in her car. I bet it fell out of my bag when I was putting it in. My foot was catching on to the bottom of the seat and I guess it just must’ve fallen out then. I’m terribly sorry and I do hope you can excuse us and let us search for my book,” Kathleen lied, the words tumbling out of her mouth steadily.

The person responsible for catching them considered this for a moment; those two hadn’t gotten into any trouble as far as the principal’s memory could recollect. “Very well. Let me write you a pass since you two will be late. You’re in the same class, I presume?”

“Yes, sir, we are.” Belle had finally found her voice, and while she should’ve expected something this believable from Kathleen, she still couldn’t help but be stunned that Kat figured out an excuse that quickly. She also figured she shouldn’t have been surprised when the principal dug in his pocket for a brief moment and pulled out a pad of late passes, all of which weren’t filled out. When he had them written out, he handed the slips to them both and headed back down the hallway.

“Phew. Well, that was a bust. Let’s get back to class instead of pushing our luck. If we go now, he’ll realize we lied,” Kathleen said, and Belle nodded unenthusiastically as they headed to Kat’s locker and carefully pried their books out, walking down the otherwise empty corridors towards their next class, not at all looking forward to it. They had been so close to finally getting out, but they just had to be caught. One thought entered Kathleen’s mind.

Luck obviously hates me today.