king and queen

twenty-one

Alexa's POV

Dallas got me a room key and we walked in the room. It wasn't too great. He was right. It was more like a studio. Except it was really tiny and it smelled pretty bad. But if I was gonna be staying here for free then I wasn't too upset.

I unpacked a bit and I knocked on Dally's door. "Hey, Dal?"

He opened it. "What's up?"

"You busy?"

"Not really."

"Oh. Well, I-I was just wondering if you could take me to the school? I was gonna see if there's an admissions person I could talk to as soon as possible."

"Yeah. I'm gonna shower real quick. Then we can go."

He walked past me down the hall to the bathroom. I took this chance to get ready. Do my makeup, fix my hair, and find a nice outfit to put on.

Dallas knocked on my door. "Lex, let's go."

"Coming!"

I threw my shoes on and walked out the door.

"I see you're tryna make a good impression."

"I am. I hope this goes well. I'm not a hundred percent sure how this is gonna work. I thought maybe about calling before but I figured an in-person meet would be better."

"It's public school and your address is at Bucks. You'll be fine."

I asked him to write the address down on a piece of paper for me and we walked over there.

"Well, here we are. Good ol' Will Rogers. I hate it here."

I giggled. "Everyone hates school. But thanks for walking me over here."

"No problem. Need me to wait?"

"That's alright. It seemed easy enough to get here."

"Alright. See ya, Lex."

"Bye, Dally."

I took a breath as I walked inside.

"Hello." Someone said immediately. The office was right there. "Can I help you?"

"Yes, actually! I just moved here like a few hours ago and I'm trying to enroll in school." I said with a polite smile.

"Well, it's your lucky day. Mrs. Roland is still here doing some work. Her and Mr. Harmon, the principal, might be able to help you out. If you wanna take a seat I can go get them for you."

"Oh, wonderful! Thank you so much!"

"Of course. What's your name?"

"Alexa DeVos."

"Alright, Alexa. Give me one moment."

I sat down and played with my fingers as I waited for the office lady to get the two people.

"Alexa?" Someone asked. It was a woman. It must have been Mrs. Roland that the lady was talking about.

"Hi!" I said politely.

I shook her hand. "I'm Mrs. Roland, the admissions counselor. I heard you're new to the area?"

We walked back into an office. "Yeah. I just finished moving in today." I said with a grin.

"Do you have a parent with you by any chance?"

Fuck.

"Umm..."

Think, think, think!

"My mom actually passed away a while ago and I don't live with my dad? I have permission by the state to live on my own."

"Oh, okay. Do you have an emergency contact just in case?"

"Umm... yeah. I do."

She handed me a bunch of papers to fill out. When it came to parent and guardian, I put dad anyway. I'm only here for a year and I don't plan on needing that number anyway. I put Buck's number that Dallas wrote on the paper for primary number.

I finished the stacks of paperwork and she looked them over. "Do you have your transcript from your previous school?"

"Umm... I'm afraid I do not..."

"That's alright. What school was it?"

"New York City High School."

"New York. Wow. What are you doin' all the way down here." She asked with a laugh.

"My cousins are down south. Figured it was right, I guess." I laughed to try and play it off. It wasn't a lie, I guess.

"Awesome. Well, it'll probably take a little bit to get the transcript. How about you check back in tomorrow with me around 4:00 and we can go over scheduling and class enrollment?"

"Wonderful. Thank you so so much. I appreciate it."

"Of course. And if you have any questions you can call me right at this number." She said handing me a card.

"Wonderful. It was so great to meet you."

"You too. Have a good day."

I walked out of the school with some copies of the paperwork I signed. Goodness, that was difficult.

I started walking home and I think I made the wrong turn somewhere. I must have turned too soon.

Shoot!

I walked around for a bit and for some odd reason I kinda recognized this place.

Oh! I know where this is! It's the park close to Dally's friend's house.

Well, shoot. Maybe they'll know how to get to Bucks.

I walked up the hill and I believe it was the first house of the corner. With the beige walls and big fence covering the grass.

I walked through the gate and knocked on the door. Someone I didn't recognize answered the door. "Hi, can I help ya?" He asked. He had a real cute face. And a nice smile.

"Yeah. I don't think I've met ya yet. I'm Alexa. I came down here with Dallas and Johnny from New York."

"Alexa DeVos?"

"The one and only." I said with a laugh.

"Yeah, Johnny was telling us about ya. Come inside."

"Oh, thank you." I said.

I took my shoes off and another guy came around the corner. He was the one who was talking to Dallas. "Hi, Alexa. I don't think I formally introduced myself. I'm Ponyboy."

"Well, it's a pleasure to meet you. That must make you Sodapop. Dallas was telling me about you guys on the way here."

"Yeah. We've heard some stuff about you too." Darrel said from the kitchen.

"Really?" I asked in shock.

"Yeah." Darrel stood up. "Were you... uh... on that homecoming court?"

I smiled and walked up to him so he could hear me better. "Yeah! Dallas and I actually won homecoming king and queen." I said with a grin. "It was hard to kinda get through to him at first but we warmed up to each other after a little bit. We won the dances too! We were partners." I said with excitement.

The three all looked at each other with confusion.

I laughed a bit. "I feel like you all know something I don't."