Girl Meets Closet

Chapter 6: Jason Meets True Maya Pt.1

—---Jason’s POV—---

I watched in amusement as the Drama Squad came into class. Farkle and Smackle had their heads together, bent over a textbook while discussing the intricacies of the human nervous system. Zay was busy tossing a pencil in the air, trying to get it as close to the ceiling as he could without it getting stuck. Lucas seemed confused by Maya and Riley, who weren’t paying attention to him for once. Maya was ignoring Riley who was trying to talk to her.

Finally, Mr. Matthews started class. “Pompeii. Lucas!”

“You mean Farkle?”

Mr. Matthews shook his head. “I mean Lucas.”

“Oh.”

I snorted, causing him to turn back at me with a pouting look, before turning back to Mr. Matthews, who said, “I wanna see what you know.”

“Okay. Here’s what I know.” He hit Farkle in the chest. “Farkle!”

“Why thank you!” Farkle said. “Pompeii was an ancient village in Italy located near the beauty and culture of Naples. It was a resort town where the wealthy would go to soak up the sun.”

“It was like the Hawaii of Italy,” Lucas added, helpfully nodding his head.

I snorted again, rolling my eyes. I knew Lucas was smarter than he let on, but it was still funny to see him play the game.

“Pompeii sounds so beautiful, Maya. We should go there. We should go there and be calm,” Riley said, seemingly pleading with her. I still wasn’t sure what was going on, I’d just heard them arguing a little this morning.

“Let me tell you about a whole city that became very calm, very quick. Now, who here knows about Mount Vesuvius?” Mr. Matthews asked.

“Mount Vesuvius was a pent-up, boiling cauldron of ‘I wanna do something,’” Maya said. This made me worried, because this was beginning to sound like the old Maya, the one who broke the rules and didn’t care about anyone but Riley.

“Vesuvius stayed quiet for a long time. But then, it did what volcanoes in time must do. It ‘sploded!”

“Why do volcanoes have to ‘splode?” Riley asked.

“That’s a good question, Riley. Jason? What do you think?”
Why me?

“Well, I think it’s because if it doesn’t it’ll just blow up worse later. Vesuvius wiped out the entire population of Pompeii. It was one of the greatest natural disasters the world has ever known," I said.

After a moment of thinking more, I shared, "People are kind of like that too. Some tend to hold themselves in, but sooner or later, we all reach a breaking point."

The class was quiet for a moment, before Riley turned to Maya and yelled, "Okay, then do it right now! Do what you need to do to be Maya. But please don't wipe us all out, Peaches."

Suddenly, the fire alarm went off. The class began screaming and grabbing their things. Evan and I quickly grabbed our bags and our books and ran out of the back of the class.

After making it out of the building with the rest of the class and taking roll, Riley said," That's it! Oh, a fire alarm! Ooh, you sassy troublemaker! Fire alarm, everybody! Yeah! This is bananas." She began to dance around, a big smile on her face as we all made room.

"Your blood pumping?" Maya asked, watching her dance.

"Oh, it is so pumping!" Riley screamed, waving her arms around and spinning.

"You sure it isn't just the exercising?" I muttered, looking towards Evan. I heard a laugh on my right and quickly whirled to see Lucas standing right next to me. We were close, really close. Kind of have to be when your entire high-school is packed on the sidewalk, but that was beside the point.