Eccedentesiast - CH. 4

"Soulmates catch each other with their eyes." - Ventum

__________________________________________________________

The crimson-coloured bus rocked from side to side as it travelled further down the familiar road I lived by. I hear chatter coming out of it, and determined after a short investigation with my ears as a helper that it were the chatty senior girls that usually sat in the front. One of the younger kids looked out of the window, and investigated the road outside as if it was a wonder each morning.

And just like that, I saw the bus passing by, as it left its own way and distanced the two of us even further.

I had missed it again. Like every morning.

Hastily, I began to run further up the streets, where most taxis drove by. I saw from the corner of my eye that one of the well-paid cars and waved. To my own luck he pulled over, and I quickly opened the door to enter my rescue, "Carolwood," I uttered and he nodded in response, while his car already wandered over the road.

The taxi stopped near the front gate of my school at 8:25AM. Thank god. Coming late to literature class was like signing your own death contract.

I ran out so fast that I forgot to take back my change after I had paid off the driver. I sighed deeply. So, no lunch for me. Great.

Blue skinny jeans weren't the most comfortable to run in, but at least they made it seem as if I looked like I cared. The light brown boots made squishy noises as the hallway had just been whipped, and the thin, long silver necklace that laid on my neck tangled itself, until the bottom part disappeared under my black top.

8:29AM. Derek was just about to close the door as I approached it. Judged by the way he looked at me, I probably looked like I just ran a mile. And though it were just a couple of meters it felt like one whole mile.

"You missed your bus again?" he asked as if he didn't know the answer, which was why he earned an eye roll from my side and a simple "you know how I am in the morning."

He smirked, "come on in."

I quickly squeezed myself through the space between him and the door, and earned a mad glance from the teacher, but then I sat down and his gaze wandered away from me.

"Today, we're going to start with the Scarlet letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne" the teacher commenced the start of the lesson, but a strong frown grew on my face. Hadn't we read that already?

The teacher noticed my confusion, "some of you may read it over the summer. You can start with Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen. The other half will continue with this book."

I turned around and saw Derek rolling his eyes. He hated reading. Or writing. Literature class in general.

"Tell me why I've chosen this class?" he asked me, and his face reflected the emotions behind the words he was saying.

I only grinned in response, but suddenly Derek stared at me for a moment, without saying words, and then looked down at my eye bags, "did you have that dream again?"

I nodded nervously. I didn't like anyone to know. I didn't like to seem weak. Or vulnerable. And in nights like these, I was.

Derek sighed suddenly, and I remembered that I was sitting in class and not in my bed during one of these nights of nightmares, "Melea, you know you can call me. Whenever you need to."

I smiled gratefully, but was interrupted in commencing an answer by a mad teacher, "Mrs. Aldridge, is there anything you want to tell the whole class or can we continue with the content?"

"I'm sorry that I wasn't paying enough attention," I mumbled and faked an apologetic look that grazed my face for a while, "I will focus more."

"Listen, instead of talking to your friend," he replied more calmly, but the mad look on his face only grew stronger. As if these books were his only joy in life.

I pretended to nod in agreement and forced a smile, "you're right. I wasn't trying to distract anyone. I'm sorry."

"Well, now that this is cleared up," he smiled satisfied and turned around to the board, "let's talk about the historical background of these books, shall we?"

"I hate that book. The entire story about love and infatuation is boring and way too unrealistic for the real world," I whispered to Derek and closed the book. The bell rang, announcing the end of this horrifying lesson.

"Please read until page 45 and take notes on the character's expressions and the figure of speech," the teacher shouted, as people were already walking out of the tiny room. I glanced at Derek and he followed me out of the room and into hallway.

"Have a little imagination, Melea," he took his phone out of his jeans and started texting someone.

"When you're in love, everything in that book makes sense," he said that while a slight smile appeared on his face, and I raised an eyebrow, "is that what Veronica just told you?" I asked, and gestured to his phone.

"No, we kind of broke up this morning,” Derek answered, but as he knew the kind of reaction I would have he increased his speed level, but it wasn't hard to follow him. Someone had forgotten I was quite a fighter at night.

"Again?" I groaned, as Derek further increased his speed level, "just admit that you need each other and move on."

Derek stopped letting me chase him, and instead walked in a calm and slow way, "but she can be so narcissistic. I mean it. I just need some space."

"Okay, that's your call then," I looked down at my phone screen as it had just been vibrating, but looked at the time instead of the actual message; the break was too short to keep on discussing with Derek about his and Veronica's non-ending feuds, "I have math, I'll see you later."

"Wait, did you pick up the documents from the secretary office?" Derek interrupted my attempt to come at least to my math class on time. I groaned and buried my face in my hands, "Ugh right. No, I didn't."

"You should go now then. You know how your mum freaks out when she doesn't have every single thing together," he said with a slight smile, and I grinned in response, "you're right. Thanks for reminding me."

"Someone has to look out for you," he responded as I already turned around, when he added something, "you don't do it yourself."

I ran past the students, all of whom were too loud for me, and above all, too many. The school hallway seemed to have been designed by one obsessed with grey and white. Well, that were most people in this town anyway. No other color seemed to graze the walls. Some of the teachers and students had done their part by hanging up colourful posters, of events, art pieces or other beautiful work.

Keeping the focus on this rather than on the crowd around me calmed me, and as I squeezed past some more near the teacher's wing, the shouting and general rambling stopped as I reached the reception. Silence.

I looked around. In front of the reception, which laid directly in front of the principal's office, were some white chairs set up for students to wait. I shall sit down there and wait, shall I? Or should I approach her directly?

"What can I do for you, sweetheart?" the slightly chubby secretary looked at me questioningly when I reached her desk as I had chosen Option 2. I smiled and took a few steps forward, facing her directly, "I'm here to pick up the forms for my parents. We haven't gotten them yet."

"Oh yes. Melea Aldridge, is it?" she asked and pushed up her leopard-patterned glasses, "yes," I answered, and empathised it by a short nod.

"Just let me see where I put them," she flipped through the big pile of paper lying around her desk, and after a while, they seemed to be even more disorganized as she rummaged through, put some of them apart and some others together, and in general, made the chaos worse. After a while, she seemed confused as she was staring down at the big mess she had made, but it seemed as if she had an epiphany – she rummaged through one of the Piles and took some documents out.

"Here you go, these are your forms. I'm sorry that you didn't get them earlier, we've had problems with the printer for ages. The old thing just doesn't really work anymore."

I responded with a nod, took the forms out of her hands and was about to leave the office, when the door opened with a creak noise and someone else entered the room. My eyes moved from his seemingly new-polished shoes to his dark jeans and up to a white shirt, with the first two buttons left open, that led my eyes wander off to his face. His hair was in a darker brown tone and completely dishevelled. The eyes dark, as if they hid unusual darkness inside of them, with a spark of life. He studied me for a moment, then walked past me and looked at the secretary, who threw one piece of chocolate after another in her mouth.

"Margot, you look great today," he greeted her. Margot?

If I wouldn't have been so perplexed, I could have prevented my frown, which was followed by his quiet remark. The secretary, visibly happy, smiled, "oh, Taylor. Here's your card. Please try not to lose it a second time in your first week, " she grabbed a student card from a folder she apparently just had right in front of her and handed it to him.

"It just slips out of my hand again and again," he winked and my frown grew stronger.

I tried to turn away and instead go through the forms, which I had gotten after a long search through piles of documents. Apparently, I hadn't had my own folder like some other students.

"Sorry, but I'm missing Form 4," I interrupted the conversation between the two, and the secretary's head shelled in my direction, "oh," she replied with a desperate look on her face. She ran her hands through her hair and added, "I'm sorry, dear. I'll try to print it out this afternoon, but I cannot promise anything. You know, the printer. "

Yes, the 'printer'.

I just nodded in response and noticed that "Taylor" gave me a quick gaze, and then a smile grew on his face. Oh, someone really knew about his good looks.

I looked away from his dark eyes, smiled reassuringly at the secretary and left the room to run to class. At the other end of the hall, I opened the door, where about twenty-two students greeted me with their loud bawls.

I sat next to Sofia and threw my bag next to the chair, "are you coming to the Charity Gala?", she asked me, right when I sat myself down, "yes," I responded shortly, as she already went on saying, "it was beautiful last year, wasn't it?"

I was pulling out my book and notebook as we talked, and therefore only nodded quickly, "why didn't you go though?" I asked when I finished unpacking, "I don't know, didn't feel like going after the whole thing with Kyle and Hannah," she mumbled and looked down.

Kyle Ewell. As his name already stated, he wasn't the kind of guy you wanted to be involved with. Even though he was a pretty decent guy - polite, pretty wealthy and good locking with his blonde hair and the blue-green eyes, I could never think of him the way every other one saw him. The way Sofia still saw him. She never had luck with guys – she chose the wrong one's. Well, he was quite the wrong one for sure. As they were dating during the beginning of the year and moved further into deepening their relationship, he cheated on Sofia with Hannah, his now-new girlfriend.

Wouldn't be as much of a problem if we would just be from different places. But he was not only in our grade and therefore we were forced to seem him nearly every day, his parents also had quite a good reputation, causing him to be invited to most of the events we were going to.

"It's fine Melea," she murmured as I had hugged her. She shook me off, but I knew that she was still hurt. But as always, she was too nice to admit it.

Sofia was actually everybody's darling. With the bright blonde hair and the brown eyes that reminded me of all the good in the world, she was a sparkle of hope for so many people. She had, by definition, a genuine, kind soul.

My math teacher commenced the lesson with an introduction that made us students groan, "Math Exam next week. Please open your books at page 167, we'll need to do the exercises on that page at least."

The school hallway looked different than this morning. Not only were there more posters helping these halls to shine in their best possible way, but there was art work hung up all around the halls. Was there an art exhibition I did not know about? What were their works about?

These were the questions I was asking myself as I squeezed past even more students than this morning. To focus on something. There were still too many of them, and not enough space. Narrowing scared me.

As I arrived near the reception it got less and less. Relief streamed through my veins, until I realized I probably would have to wait for the secretary to get the form for me. I groaned. I hated to stand while I was waiting; it was exhausting and boring. But there were chairs there, weren't they? I could sit down and tipple with my feet on the ground to get over the waiting time.

As I turned around the last corner, I realized that someone has had the same thought - a brown-haired guy, not much older than me, with a white Shirt and new-looking shoes already sat there, flipping through a magazine. I stopped walking for a moment, as I was trying to figure out what kind of magazine he was reading, but I could not identify the name.

He must've realized that I had gazed at the magazine, because now he looked up and straight into my eyes. The Margot-guy.

"Ah, Melea!" the secretary turned her face into my direction, as she had felt my presence somehow. Maybe due to Taylor's scrutinizing gaze – they seemed to have quite a close relationship to one another.

"Wait a bit, I'll print it right away," she went on, interrupting my sudden thoughts and I chuckled, followed by a nod as I sat down on one of the chairs next to him. Taylor closed the magazine with the colourful cover and put it back onto the table on which more of them were laying on.

"Seems like the printer is really bothering you," were the first words he was saying to me, "mm, yes. The printer," I replied, and my words were filled with sarcasm.

He chuckled, "I'm Taylor," I didn't look him in the eyes, I only replied with "I know." I didn't know what to think about this guy.

"Don't worry Taylor, you don't have to wait much longer," the secretary interrupted our conversation, but he just smiled brightly, "don't stress yourself Margot, I don't mind."

"Wow you can call her by her first name. I didn't even know she had one until you called her that this morning," I added and his eyes went back to me.

A non-genuine smile graced the corners of his mouth, "if teachers don't like you very much, you at least must be the staff's favourite."

"Problems with teachers in the first week. So, you're planning on getting suspended? " I assumed, and he winked, "no, but there is a slight possibility that I make a few remarks teachers do not really appreciate."

"Why did you transfer then?", I asked further and he leaned forward, "to broaden my horizons," he replied, but I raised an eyebrow, "and why here?"

"Maybe I like the atmosphere of interrogation," he whispered and I leaned my head to the side for a moment, "do you ever answer a question honestly?"

"If I ever learn to trust you," he winked, and I lost myself in his eyes. Weird. Eyes were the mirroring the soul of one. So, what did his eyes show me?

"Taylor, the principle wants to talk to you. Don't worry, it'll just take a couple minutes," the secretary interjected, and all of a sudden, another forced smile graced his face.

"Another interrogation. Maybe she'll be luckier than you, "with these words, he got up and left his seat.

"Melea, I have your missing form," the secretary shouted, but I barely heard what she said. I was lost in my thoughts.

I had never seen such a fake smile.

_______________________________________________________

Eccedentesiast - someone who hides pain behind a smile.