A New Beginning

The next morning, I woke up to Santana standing in my doorway, giving me a look of complete hatred. “Um, hi?” I greeted, too tired to put any sting into my voice.

“What the fuck did you do to him?” she snapped, stepping forward to slam my door closed. “Why didn’t he come in last night? It’s not like you gave it up to him.”

“No, I didn’t. Why the hell are you giving me an interrogation session when I’m not even awake?” I threw the covers off me and yawned widely, not even bothering to cover my mouth. She could see down my throat and friggin’ LOVE it.

“I just want to know what you said to him that made him-“

“Oh my God,” I interrupted. “I didn’t say anything! Just get over it, Santana; you’re not that great. In fact, I asked if he was going to go screw around with you, and he said he wasn’t in the mood.”

She glared at me, clearly not sure whether she wanted to believe me or not. Instead of asking, I just gestured toward the door. “Are you going to leave, or do you want to watch me change for school?”

Once the door closed behind Santana, I turned to the closet and actually put in the slightest effort into what I wore. For earrings, I found my awesome purple feathers and quickly put them through my ears.

“You have five seconds to get your ass into the car or I’m going to make you walk to school!” Santana yelled at me.

Grumbling, I threw open my door. “Wait five minutes, for God’s sake!”

“BYE! I’M LEAVING.” The front door slammed shut behind her, and I rolled my eyes, figuring that she was being a total drama queen.

After going to the bathroom and brushing my teeth, I grabbed some flats and put them on as I looked out the window. The driveway was empty.

It took a second for me to realize that the driveway being empty meant that the entire household had left me behind. I…had no fucking idea where the school was.

“Great,” I muttered, running a hand through my hair. “Wonderful. Well, this ought to be fun.”

I locked the door behind me before embarking on my journey. For a while, I kind of remembered where I was going, but once I got to the center of town, I was completely lost.

“Syndey?” a familiar voice called.

Startled, I jumped about a foot in the air before turning toward the car to see Finn raising an eyebrow at me out the driver’s side window.

“What are you doing?”

“Walking,” I responded, going closer to the car.

“To school?”

“Oh, no. I was planning on going all the way back to Texas.” I gave him a look to show him that I was being very sarcastic.

“Want a ride?”

“That would be wonderful.” I climbed in the passenger’s seat, throwing his backpack on the floor so I could climb in.

“Sorry about that.” He reached over to grab his bag, tossing it in between the two seats to the back. “So, why were you walking the wrong way to school?”

“Damn, was I going the wrong way?” Finn nodded at me, stifling a laugh. “Santana ditched me this morning. She said I had five seconds, I figured she was kidding, and when I finished getting ready, she was gone.”

“That sucks.”

“You’re telling me.” I let out a sigh and leaned back in my seat. “I really hate living with her.”

“Well, when do you turn eighteen? You can live on your own by then.”

“Finn, I’m a sophomore with you. I’m not even sixteen yet.”

He winced. “That’s rough.”

“Kind of a lot.” I twisted up my face and cracked a couple of my knuckles. “Just to think that this whole thing could have been avoided if I could have brought my car from Texas.”

Finn hesitated for a second. “Didn’t you just say that you weren’t sixteen yet?”

“Yeah. In Texas, we get our licenses earlier.”

“Oh, okay.”

We were quiet for the rest of the way to school, mostly. A couple of times, I vented a little bit about Santana, but there was only so much I could say. My major complaints about her were a little too personal to spill to Finn. Although he was nice, I did barely know him.

He did earn a few points for showing up with very good timing, though, I had to say.

When we walked into school, Santana walked past me. “Oh, Sydney! I see you found a way to school. How sweet, you two together. Just warning you, Syd,” she leaned closer to my ear, “he’s not that good, if you know what I mean.” Then, she straightened back up and let out a loud laugh. “But, of course, that’s not really a problem for you, is it?”

“Do you realize the extent of how much I hate you? How am I big joke to you? Do you have any sense of conscience at all?” I screamed at her. People in the hallways were turning to stare. A lot of them looked slightly scared, as if Santana was going to murder me for standing up to her.

Finally, she pulled me by my upper arm and hissed in my ear. “You know how you keep from being a pathetic victim like you? Don’t say no, bitch.” Shoving me away, she turned to look at Brittany before storming away.

My face was completely red with embarrassment and rage at the fact that she could have just told everyone my biggest secret. As slowly and carefully as I could, I turned to look at Finn, who looked sorry for me.

Instead of asking him what he heard, I just turned and hurried down the hallway to my first class.

Once I was in my seat, I just worked on controlling my breathing, closing and opening my fist. Soon enough, Finn was sitting next to me, and he looked genuinely concerned.

“Are you okay?”

Something inside of me just snapped, so I turned to him and said, “I’m fine. God! Why does everyone always ask me if I’m okay?! I’m not a baby that needs protection and nurturing all the time! Why can’t you just leave me the fuck alone?”

“I’m sorry, I was just making sure-”

“Yeah, well whatever you heard, Santana makes it her business to ruin everyone’s lives. So just shut up and mind your own business.”

While my whole freak out was done quietly, the people around us could still hear me. So, without saying another word, I scooped my stuff into my arms and left the classroom.

At first, I had absolutely no idea where I was going. And even though I had just started at the school a few days before, I was ready to leave. I didn’t want to go back to my old life, exactly, but anything was better than subjecting myself to Santana every day.

Well, almost anything.

I continued down the hallway for a while longer before I finally just walked right out the doors. Nobody stopped and questioned me. Nobody seemed to notice.

Eerily enough, just as I was cutting through the parking lot, a truck pulled in quickly, skidding into a random parking spot crookedly before the driver’s side opened. Out fell Puck, with his backpack in his hand, darting toward the school.

It seemed like he saw me, but he must have not comprehended it because he kept on moving. That was what I thought, anyway, until he turned around and called, “Australia?”

Letting as much attitude show as I could muster, I turned to face him. “And what do you want?”

“What are you doing?”

“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m leaving.”

Puck paused for a second before taking a couple steps closer. “Want someone to tag along?”