Part 2

I smile as my best friend notices that I am walking towards her. "Hey, Michelle," I say as I give her a hug, "sorry I'm late again." She rolls her eyes at me then says, "Jai, come on now, you're always late." I shake my head at her while we both laugh and I put my things in my locker, get what I need then we head off to our first-period, Biology.

We walk in one minute before the bell rings and take our seats at the middle table in the middle row. "Good Morning everyone and welcome back to the biology bonanza!" Yeah, that's my Bio teacher Mr.Cartel, this is his second year teaching and he is very passionate about his work, he may be a pain sometimes but he is the best Bio teacher I have ever had. "We will be continuing our study of communications from organism to organism, there will be a worksheet which I will be passing out and everything you need will be in the book, work with a partner if you want." He finishes his sentence with a smile as usual and everyone gets to work.

"So are you ready for the competition in March?" says Michelle. Michelle and I are on the academic decathlon team along with some more of our friends. "um yeah, it's pretty far away as of now but, I think with you being our leader we will be perfect by then." I'm sure about our team winning but I'm not so sure about us being a team to do it.

In August, the team went to Washington DC for a competition. We were all so excited and our whole team was there, Liz, Ned, Peter, Michelle, Jason, Flash, and me. We were going on a 2 day trip in total so we thought it was going to be fun. The day of the competition, Peter disappeared, as usual, he was the best on our team but we didn't let that bother us, we did the competition and we won. To celebrate the rest of us decided to take a tour of the Washington Monument, that was a mistake. We were all in the elevator going up the monument when Ned's bookbag mysteriously explodes causing the elevator to be broken, I thought we were going to die. Just before the elevator fell, however, Spiderman saves us, he saved us all that day. A month after that our team captain Liz had to move because her dad went to prison, thus dubbing our new leader Michelle.

I will never forget that day, that was the first time that I met Spiderman, and most of all I will never forget what he did for me that day, what he did for all of us. It actually hurt me that day thinking back on it because I have my abilities but none of them would have saved us.

"I do make a pretty good leader don't I?" Michelle says with a smirk on her face.

***

Three classes later and it is time for my final class of the day, Spanish. I walk in the room and take my seat next to none other than Peter Parker. My fellow decathlon mate, friend, and advanced Spanish taker. "Peter, you showing up today?" I ask in the most polite voice that I can manage, I am referring to our after school academic meeting, which he almost always fails to show up to or ends up leaving early. He looks up at me from staring at his phone and says, "y- yeah of course!" I will believe it when I see it. Peter is not the best at keeping track of time about things, however, he is very kind and a great friend to have, I just hope that whatever is keeping him occupied all the time is worth it. "Hola clase, vamos a aprender sobre el pasado hoy." Great, Mr. Sateano wants to teach us a thing or two about the past, how lovely. "um Peter, next Saturday a group is having a Halloween party, all the decathlon team will be there and some other people," he is barely listening to me at this point, "so anyways I was hoping that you would be there? Will you?" He is staring at his phone again typing something in, then he looks up at me, "party? yeah I will be there... we can hang out." he says with that charming Peter Parker smile. I nod then return back to paying attention to my work, I hope he keeps his word this time.

***

Class finishes and I make my way to the designated room in the library to start the academic meeting. As usual, Michelle and I are there first. Michelle takes her leader seat at the head of the table, and I sit on the right side of her. A few minutes later and almost everyone is here, that includes my brother. The academic meetings only last about half an hour so Jack usually just sits in the corner, or goes out to the library and does his homework, except he's not really doing his homework he watches YouTube videos which he claims are "completely educational." The meeting starts and guess who's not here, Pet-, just as I'm about to finish my thought in he saunters through the door.

"Sorry I'm late guys, what's the plan for today?" He takes a seat right next to me and Michelle catches him up on what has been said. We then go over a few terms and questions that may be asked to us in March, Peter answers each one absolutely correct and without hesitation.

Peter talks to Ned, his best friend, they're whispering about something. I turn my attention to my notebook and write down some things that I have trouble remembering. I have learned to do this recently, it helps me differ what is important and what is not, what is a priority and what can wait. This time I write down the words, "strength" under the important column and, "Spanish" under what can wait.

***

MJ closes off the meeting and everyone leaves, I give MJ a hug and off she goes. I then get up to go find Jack who has wandered off into the library. Before I leave the meeting room, Peter, Ned and I are the only ones who are left in there so I go talk to them.

"Hey guys," I say while adjusting my bookbag on my shoulder then direct my attention to Ned, "I already spoke to Peter about this but um, there's going to be a party on Halloween, the whole team will be there and some other people so, it would be great if you could come." Peter slaps Ned on the shoulder, "yeah man, be there." "Okay, alright, I will be there." I clap my hands excitedly then nod towards them and walk away. Just before I exit the room Peter stops me, "Jai, I'll text you tonight about something.. it's not important or anything but uh... yeah." he says while scratching the back of his head. "ok, I'll keep a lookout." I then turn and leave, I find Jack in his usual spot in the back of the library, and as predicted he is watching YouTube. I grab him and we head out to the parking lot, get in the car and drive home.

***

We make it home and settle in, do our homework and just take a breather for a second. Once it is dinner time we sit down at the table and eat our food and talk as a family. It's not often that all four of us have dinners like these. My mom and my dad are both doctors and they get called randomly to report to the hospital, sometimes they're only gone for a few hours but when they are it's always at an inconvenient time. I've learned to cook dinners for both myself and Jack, make sure Jack gets to school meetings and appointments, I am basically his second mom.

Dinner is finished and I put the dishes in the dishwasher to be cleaned then head to my room. I'm sitting on my bed just scrolling through my apps when I get a text from Peter.

pete :)- "hey, can we talk now?"