Firestarter

So the next morning I go to school as usual (at least it’s Friday), and I head into homeroom and see a new seat has been added. More specifically, there’s someone sitting in this new seat that’s right in front of me. It’s…

…the girl from yesterday!

I immediately plan to run out the room yelling “Nope! Not gonna happen! Dropping out right now!”, but then the bell rings and the teacher orders everyone to sit down like this is Nazi Germany or something. Well, basically, it is; I made a compare-and-contrast chart about it for English class once, and let me say the English teacher had no sense of humor at all. However, I do as I’m told to avoid bringing any attention to myself.

“Well, as you can see, we have a new student in our homeroom.” The scary “always happy” homeroom teacher (seriously, that’s creepy) said. She was in her early 20s, fresh out of college, and did what she could to make learning “fun” – news flash, that’s never going to work with me. “Say hello to Ms. Ah-ah-ah…I don’t want to mispronounce your name, so could you do the rest, sweetheart?”

“Certainly.” The girl said, standing up. “Hello there, everyone. My name is Adeline Motawa. I’m 13 years old and just moved here from Canada. I hope to be friends with everyone here.”

She then shot a glare at me. Oh man, she did notice me. This is not good. Not good at all. I need to run. Hide. Change my name. Move to Mexico. Start a fireworks business with my half-cousin. Anything…anything but sit in this classroom.

But unfortunately, sit in this classroom is what I was forced to do, as I listened to the teacher drone on. I was more focused on figuring out how to get myself out of a long, awkward year. I peered at Adeline’s schedule in front of me. She had homeroom, 5th, and 7th hour with me. That’s three hours to worry about – truly too much stress for the average human being to handle. I would be dead by September. Or tomorrow, if she got ahold of me first.

But then something caught my eye. As I was peeking at my schedule, she then looked behind and saw what I was doing. I immediately looked down, but the next time I glared up again, she was…smiling at me.

This is weird. Maybe she doesn’t remember me? Remember me? The weirdo? The stalker? The voyeur from yesterday? Maybe she’s got short-term memory loss.

After homeroom, I went on with my boring classes until lunch. I was about to sit by myself as usual, when suddenly, Adeline sat down by me.

No. No, this is not okay. Somebody break me out of this prison.

“Hey.” Adeline said, picking her fork up.

“Oh, uh…uh…”

Adeline then repeated back, in a mocking deep voice, “Oh, uh, uh…”, then chuckled to herself. “I remember you.”

My muscles immediately tensed up as she said the words.

“Yeah, I was in your homeroom.” I said, hoping she didn’t remember me from you-know-what.

She laughed again. “No, that’s not what I remember you from.”
Anxiety attack now in process…

‘Listen, I guess I misunderstood your intentions last night, thinking about what you said.” Adeline said. “You probably just wanted to see who was in the house and peeked in the wrong window, right?”

I immediately felt relief after she said that. “Yeah, that’s what I was trying to do.”

“I don’t wanna be in this town either, so I guess we should stick together, right? Maybe we could even get together and form a rebellion. I apologize for overreacting last night. Do you accept my apology?”

She held her hand out. I was at first unsure of her sincerity, but it’s not good to bite the hand that feeds you. So I held my hand out and shook hers. That rebellion sounded pretty good thinking about it.

“I accept your apology.” I said. “But if you don’t mind me asking, why are you here?”

She sighed. “It’s a long story.”

“No, it’s okay if you don’t wanna talk about it-“

“No, no, no, it’s not like I’ve got anything better to do. I’ll tell you about it.”