Chapter One
No one dared to made a sound. The classroom drew eerily quiet as a sudden wave of unease washed over the rowdy students. All eyes remained fixed on the two of them as the shock finally started to pass. But they wouldn't dare to speak, or move, or intervene in any way, because after all, what could they do? It was happening to Him.
The morning had started off the same as any other. Students of classroom A28 had filtered in from the hall with the ringing of the second period bell. There would be another five minutes before class truly started, so of course, most were still catching up with their friends, milling in from their first period classes, or lingering in small groups around the room waiting for class to start. Most of them talked briefly about the girl at the back of the room, but no one tried to speak to her because of the rather large, rose gold headphones adorning her head. The girl simply bobbed her head to the beat of whatever pop song was playing, eyes still shut as they had been when most of the students had walked in. "We'll talk to her later," was the consensus among the friendlier of the girl cliques, and they resumed talking about their weekend plans.
It wasn't until after the second bell rang that the rest of the classroom took note of her.
To no ones surprise, Mr. Halbrook was running late again and wasn't present when the second bell sounded. The girl opened her eyes, recognizing the beginning of class routine from every other school she'd been enrolled in. Her father had recently taken up a job that moved them from the countryside to the hustle and bustle of the big city. Being the new kid didn't bother her, even if it meant joining the class a full month and a half later than everyone else. She was more than two hours away from the farmlands and no mans land she'd lived in up til now, but she'd never been more excited. The countryside had long since lost its luster, and she was ready for a change of pace.
Looking around the room, the students showed every sign of being too engaged in their conversations to notice her giving them the once over, but she liked how they were laughing and joking around like they'd been together for years. Overall, she thought they might prove to be a fun bunch once she got to know them. The absence of a teacher was unexpected, but the ease with which the other students carried on suggested this was simply a much more relaxed environment than her previous school. Mrs. Warwick had been a mean old crone, and her students didn't dare engage in idle chatter once the final bell had rang. She was the old-school type that kept a ruler handy at all times. It was not used for measurement often.
As she took in all the small groups of friends, her eyes lingered briefly over one desk that didn't have a noisy circle around it, or anywhere near it for that matter, noting a boy that no one was talking to and the girl just a row beyond that was quietly watching the door for the missing teacher. She thought it was strange that no one was engaging with him, considering how close everyone else in the class seemed to be. His physical presence was somewhat lacking considering his smaller frame and thin limbs, but his demeanor was a sharp contrast. Something about it said that he was in control at all times, and everyone seemed to give him just a slightly wider birth than she deemed necessary. They seemed.. afraid of him. She couldn't guess for the life of her why.
Seconds rolled by, and then minutes, and still she sat there at the back of the room, studying him. The way they avoided him was curious to be sure, and it was what had initially drawn her attention, but there was something else. Something she couldn't quite put her finger on. It bothered her incessantly, like the face of an actor you know you've seen somewhere before, but can't quite pin down. She studied every feature as well as she could from her position at the back of the room, from the ash blonde low-cut fuzz atop his head, down to his meticulously polished flat white sneakers. His clothes, though befitting a school environment, spoke of dark tastes and family money.
Absently, she'd noticed one of the bigger, far more muscular boys to her left was fighting to escape a headlock. The jocks were predictably spending their free time horsing around, but she hadn't particularly cared what they were up to until suddenly, this one worked himself free. The burly brunette stumbled backward, loosing his footing, and caught himself again just before collapsing onto the blonde boy in his chair. His face became livid as he looked up at the jocks, chewing them out in an unexpectedly malicious and ruthless tone. His vocabulary was shocking to say the least, particularly when coming from such a small frame, but she reminded herself, she had been raised in a strict school system until now and the big city was sure to be a totally different environment. She mused over their quarrel a moment longer before noticing he had turned, giving her a better view. She could see his face now, clear as day, and all at once she knew why he felt so familiar.
The girl laid her headphones down on top of her bag as she stood and walked toward him. He was still hurling expletives at the boys while they shrank away from him apologetically. The fear that filled their eyes was somewhat comical, both because of their obvious size advantage over him, as well as the way his face seemed completely unfit for the violence flashing across it. He had such deceptively sweet and innocent features that she thought to herself, if he ever actually smiled, he might be mistaken for a middle schooler. Yet here they were, months into their senior year of high school. The jocks were still apologizing profusely when she stepped in between them. His glare shifted to her as he cued up a few good death threats, but it was of no importance. Every step closer had solidified her conviction.
The moment his gaze fully met hers, she grabbed his head between her hands and pulled herself down towards him. "what the-?!" he exclaimed, his face paling, but it was too late. She held his head steady, leaned down over him, and took a long, calculated, whiff of his head.
The room was silent in a matter of seconds. All eyes were on them, and even if only for that one brief and fleeting moment, he was completely and utterly stunned. The room hardly dared to breath as she held him there. And then, just as quickly as they'd left him, he regained his senses.
"What. The ACTUAL, FU-"
Despite his boiling rage, the boy was once again silenced, not by the slamming open of the classroom door, or even the fluttering of papers as the teacher fumbled his way into the room with a stack too large to control, but by the sudden presence of a switchblade at the new girl's throat.
She stopped, feeling the stinging tip against her pulse, and carefully considered her options. Someone uninvolved was not pleased by her actions. Careful not to shift her body in a way that could be perceived as threatening, she slowly looked up to see who held the knife. The quiet girl that had been sitting one seat up and over had somehow risen and put a knife to her throat before she had even thought to release the boy's head. Naturally, that was the very next thing she did.
The new girl pondered in the following beats many things about the situation, but above all else, why this boy, who had such a foul mouth and an even uglier temper, was sitting there quietly staring daggers into her skull. It didn't seem to fit with his image. Surely the teacher, meek and scattered as he was, couldn't impose such a threat that the boy would hold his tongue just because there was now one present. A classic Bad Boy could hardly scare the ever loving schnitzel out of his classmates if he rolled over that easily. The teacher hadn't seemed to notice the heavy tension in the room, or even the weapon currently being held to a students throat- but in all fairness, her body was likely blocking his view of the item in question, as he was stooped over collecting everything he had dropped. No one seemed particularly inclined to point it out either.
By the time the teacher had gathered all of his papers and stacked them neatly across his desk, the girl who had brought a weapon to school had put it away and was sitting quietly in her seat again. Her stare dared the new girl to try anything further, but the message had been received. Not that it really mattered; she had gotten what she needed. With the teacher none the wiser, the students found their seats again, and amidst an uproar of whispers, class finally began.
"Class, we have a new student," Mr. Halbrook began, flipping through the papers on his desk, unable to pull from the tall stacks whatever it was he was looking for. Instead, he looked around the classroom and found her immediately. She was hard to miss, as the vibrant colors of her hair and clothing were positively bursting with life.
Most of her exceedingly wavy hair was kept layered, with a wash of aqua on top and kelpy green undertones below, stopping at the nape of her neck. But the right side of her hair had a large circular section that was instead buzzed on a high guard setting, resulting in a mess of small, dark blue whirlpools left to curl as they saw fit. The shorter hair highlighted the shining silver piercings adorning her right ear, from the Celtic cuff near the top, down to the line of sterling studs that grew in size with every orb.
"Would you mind introducing yourself?" Mr. Halbrook sighed as he surrendered to the stacks of papers. "Absolutely," the girl said with a small smile and stood to look around the room, determinedly not looking at either of the classmates she had already managed to offend.
"My name is California Darby. But please, call me Cali. My dad moved here for work, so we'll be staying here for a while. At least until graduation." Embarrassed by the spotlight, Cali bashfully looked around for an empty seat to escape to. She took the only open one she could find, behind a girl clad entirely in black who seemed to be growing more shadows around herself beneath the broken florescent light. She didn't turn to look at Cali as all her attention was directed towards an open book.
"Right, well. Welcome Cali. Now, let's turn to page 492 and continue where we left off."
The classroom felt oddly small as Cali pulled out one of the books she had spent first period acquiring from the administrative office. She felt the eyes of most of the classroom on her, and she shrunk beneath her text to escape. Her headphones called to her, offering sweet release from this social prison, but she didn't risk them being taken away while class was still in session. The minutes felt heavy as the clock ticked away with all the speed of molasses.