Lunch Time

"Hi, it's Aliam, right?" Ali was staring at a very pretty girl. She was tall, normal tall, not the kind that guys would be intimidated by, especially not Ali, who was also a normal kind of tall. She also had brown hair, and from a slight glance, Ali noticed her brown eyes.

What was such a pretty girl doing talking to him, Ali?

"It's, uh, it's Alian, not Aliam," he corrected in the most polite tone he could muster.

"Oh! I'm so sorry; that's my bad, she said.

"It's OK, a lot of people get my name wrong on the first try." He was looking at her face. She looked nervous and nervous was an awkward way to feel in a hallway with a lot of people walking around.

"It's not okay; I should have paid more attention when you introduced yourself in Math."

Ali was surprised.

"You were in math today?" Ali asked. It was a very silly question because he hadn't been to any other math classes except for the one with the red-faced teacher.

"Yeah, I was," she smiled, "that was one hell of an introduction."

"Sorry about the weird introduction," Ali sighed. "That was a very bad first impression. I just didn't think introducing myself as a middle schooler was necessary."

"No, honestly, Ali, I get it," said Millie. "I probably would have done the same thing. Oakwood can be weird sometimes." Her smile was enchanting and if Ali didn't control himself, he would have been smiling with her too.

"So, are you going to the cafeteria?" she continued. "I know it's a different school, but I promise you the lunch lady serves us food that tastes 50% OK."

Ali laughed. "Yeah, sure, I was just heading there before you, you know, approached me."

They went to the cafeteria. Ali was thankful Millie walked up to him before he followed the wrong group of people. But when they got to the cafeteria, she sort of ditched him for her group. It was normal that those kinds of pretty girls didn't just exist in secret; they had to be part of a mean girl group.

She wasn't mean to him though; at least she talked to him and wasn't ashamed to do it in the open, and he was happy she politely told him she had to eat with her friends; he understood.

After getting his chicken nuggets that looked like they were as hard as a rock, he went to a corner where he could sit alone and watch Millie laugh with her friends. But just when he thought he would be by himself, he spotted Jeremiah, who was already waving at him.

"Hey, my dude!" Jeremiah yelled and ran towards him. Ali wondered how he ended up with someone as loud as Jeremiah.

"Hey, Jeremiah, where did you go? I didn't see you after class," Ali had to ask. The lunch bell had just rung, and before he could clear the chemicals out of his side of the desk, Jeremiah had disappeared. It didn't bother him much anymore because he got to talk to a pretty girl, which he never did at his old school.

"I had a few things he wanted to settle," Jeremiah said, smiling, which made Ali roll his eyes because he had no idea why Jeremiah was smiling and if he wasn't going to tell him what exactly he was going to do, he wasn't going to pry.

"So, what are you doing eating here all by yourself?" Jeremiah asked, taking a seat next to Ali. "I saw someone sitting in the corner and I knew it had to be you, dude."

"How could you have known it was me? It's not like I'm the only one sitting by myself," Ali said.

"I think you need to look around, my dude," said Jeremiah. "You are the only person who doesn't have an eating group."

Looking around, Ali saw that what Jeremiah said was true. And another truth was that the two of them didn't have any eating groups.

"You know what I just realized, Jeremiah," stated Ali. "You don't have an eating group either, which means you would have been by yourself if I hadn't shown up today."

"I have an eating group," Jeremiah said, and Ali froze halfway to feeling happy over his triumphant discovery that he wasn't the only loser.

"What?" Ali said.

"Dude, did you think I wouldn't have a group that I hang out with? My group just has some issues they're handling, and it's taking most of our lunchtime." He was now taking some of Ali's stone nuggets. "Did you think I was a loser or something?"

Ali did think he was a loser. His baggy clothes said a lot of things, but Ali knew not to answer the question or talk about his fashion sense.

"Look dude," Jeremiah continued when he saw Ali wasn't ready to give him any answers. "I know you're a shy type and I get it, bro, chicks dig shy guys, but if you're going to be like this, people are going to think you're a lone freak."

"Jeremiah, you realize this is my first day, right?" Ali said" with renewed energy.

"Expecting me to have a truckload of friends already is asking too much of me, and that's so not cool. Also, why do you keep taking my food?" Jeremiah had eaten half of Ali's lunch already.

"Forget the nuggets, I'll give you a sandwich later…" said Jeremiah, "…and I know it's not cool of me to say people could think you're a lone freak, but I'll tell you what's cool though, the fact that you remember my name."

Ali frowned. "Of course, I remember your name," Ali frowned, "because you screamed it in my ears in Chemistry class, and then I told you mine."

"You told me yours, didn't you?" Jeremiah said, staring at nothing and making a thinking face. Ali guessed that he didn't remember his name, which wasn't the first time something like that had happened. Sometimes his father forgets his name. "It's Martin, isn't it?"

"It's Alian," Ali replied bitterly and turned his attention back to what he was doing before Jeremiah showed up, looking at the brown-haired girl that had helped him get to the cafeteria, Millie.

He had almost forgotten he had been looking at her. She was pretty enough to entertain his eyeballs while he ate his almost finished lunch. Besides, he had to try to take his mind off the burnt grass stench coming from Jeremiah, who was still rattling on about something.

"Alian?" Ali heard Jeremiah say. "What type of name is that? No wonder I couldn't remember it; it's so hard to remember."

"It's not that hard to remember, Jeremiah, but you can shorten it if you want. My Pa doesn't say it in full unless he's like terribly upset with me," Ali had no idea why he mentioned his father, but it was done and he would be careful not to do it again.

"Ok, Lian, then I'll call you Lian," Jeremiah said.

"Lian? You think Lian isn't hard to remember?" Ali asked.

"I don't think it is," replied Jeremiah nonchalantly.

"It is Jeremiah, plus its kind of weird to answer Lian. Ali sounds a lot better." He said this and continued with his Millie staring.

"Ali sort of sounds Indian though," Jeremiah said, taking the last of Ali's stone nuggets.

"Yeah, that's the point," Ali said, not taking his eyes off the giggling Millie. He wondered what she was always giggling about.

"What point? and who the hell do you keep looking at, Ali?" He had noticed Ali's attention wasn't on what they were saying.

"No one," Ali lied, but it wasn't necessary because Jeremiah had already seen whom he was looking at.

"Millie Oaks? You're staring at Millie Oaks?" He snapped.

"Yeah, I guess, don't make it a big deal. Seriously, please don't make this a big deal," Ali pleaded.

"It's no big deal. It's just that you're staring at the daughter of the owner of this here school, Oakwood High, and over a hundred guys, even from other well-known schools outside Paver Town, stare at her pictures on her Instagram and other socials."

"Her father owns the school?"

"Oh, yes he does…" Jeremiah gushed. "…which makes her a very big deal in school and around town, so, I'd advise you to take your stares somewhere else."

"Nothing's wrong with her, Jeremiah; she's a human being too, you know," Ali supplied. "She was nice to me when we spoke too."

"You spoke to her?"

"Yes, I did."

"You and Millie Oak had a conversation?"

"Yeah Jeremiah, I just said we did."

"Well, I mean, it almost makes sense. You're good-looking, and of course, she'll know that..."

Just then, when Jeremiah was going on about Millie, Ali saw her, the jet black-haired girl.