Short Stories by Me

Codes

Let me tell ya, middle school is weird.

I'm Blake, and I go to Tera Middle School. It's cool, but as I said, weird. I'm on the soccer team, and some of my friends tease me by calling me a try-hard. And I guess they're not that wrong, in a way. My favorite subject is History, probably because our teacher makes it so easy. I suck at spelling and reading, but I'm okay at math on a good day. My best friend, Mitch, is the football quarterback. Another of our friends, nick-named String, has the record for most home-runs in P.E. And another of my buddies is student president Parker. We hold our heads high, along with our reputations.

This all might sound like a dream, and most of school is (I tend to fall asleep a lot), but the weird part is, sadly, at my used-to-be-favorite part of the day. Lunch.

Our table consists of me, Mitch, String, Parker, Ben (the school spelling champ) and Ben's twin sister, Tina the singing queen and one of her friends, Bella the math whizz. My usual table. You could call us popular, sure.

But right behind us is the table of weird girls. There are four of them, all nice and spaced out (unlike my table, we're all crammed), and whispering amongst themselves, every once in a while bursting out about simulations or carrots. I've never understood the connection. Conspiracy theorists are weird.

I was just sitting back in my chair, pretending to doze off and trying to decide if I should actually fall asleep, when I heard it.

"...Top secret..."

It had come from the table of weird girls. It sounded like Lulu, the most chill of them all, I'd say.

"Shh!" Hissed another girl, Natalie. "People will hear you. T.S."

T.S.?

My eyes fluttered a little, but I kept them closed, tuning out String and Mitch's chat about which sport was best and listened carefully to Amy and Lulu's conversation.

"Here," Lulu said, probably passing something over to... someone. I peeked just enough to see Amy, the quietest girl, stuffing something in her backpack. "Do you guys have anything?"

Natalie and another girl, who's name always escaped me, said no.

"It's okay," Amy whispered, so quiet I almost didn't catch what she had said. "I think this is enough. But we can get more tomorrow. I just won't be able to do a lot tonight."

"You should save it for when we have a lot." Lulu. "Then we can do more."

"She's right," Natalie hissed. "Wait a little longer, Amy. We almost have ten gallons, don't we?"

Ten gallons?

"Okay, that's reasonable." Amy.

"Now that that's done," Lulu started, and I could hear the smirk in her voice. "Can you remind me why you think this is a simulation, Amy?"

Amy groaned, but I had heard enough. I withdrew from listening to them and stretched, pretending to just be waking up.

"He lives!" Mitch joked. "You would think that our world-class try-hard would have more energy."

"Where do you think I get the energy?" I teased back. "I save it up in my gut, deep in the mushy insides of my stomach-" Tina and Bella mimed puking. "-and when it's time, I throw it all up and win the soccer match for you guys."

"Hm," Mitch said. "Maybe I should try that." He leaned his head back and started fake-snoring very loudly. He looked back up. "My throat hurts already. I don't think it worked very well."