Unmasked Heroes (Book 1)

Chapter 12

"Do or do not, there is no try" -Yoda

"Alright, you can spend the rest of the period working on your project with your teammate," Mr Lawrence addresses the class. "And I'll be coming around to see if you need help and how far you've progressed."

Predictably, there's a shuffling of furniture, chairs scrape against the tiles and tables shift out of place as seats are swapped. I clear up my desk, ignoring how quickly my seating partner, Jeremy, sprints out of his chair to sit next to his team member. I didn't like him anyway – his face is too freckly. I don't know if I should be glad or not that working on the project means less worry about physics. This class stinks like a chemical reaction gone wrong.

My gaze catches Skye as he laughs with one of his friends, slapping his shoulder before making eye contact with me. He gives me a heads up and I just stare at him silently debating whether it's wise to flip the finger. Letting it go, I watch as two girls interrupt his stride to flirt with him, their giggles so loud, I can hear them amidst the ruptures of the classroom's chaos. Twirling their hair, I witness them openly flirt with him. Skye smiles and nods, and then after a quick conversation, he leaves them with a wink.

"Hey, Woods," Skye sits next to me without an invite, his smile in full gear. It's a good thing he thinks I'm immune to his charm because a grin like that sends my heart thumping too fast for my liking. "About time we started with this crap."

I don't make any mention of what just occurred there within a span of five seconds. It's none of my business.

I scratch the back of my neck guilty. "Sorry, I couldn't make it for Saturday."

Someone (ahem, Dex), made me sit through an interview on television, posing as a saviour of Skylight City. A bit of a stretch if you ask me. And for that, I ended up missing my meet-up with Skye leaving a message with a feeble excuse.

"No stress," he waves it off good-naturedly, eyes twinkling.

Which only makes me feel infinitely more guilty. Why does Skye have to be so patient and attentive? So damn nice? I mean at least if he was a cruel guy I wouldn't feel half as bad. No, Skye Stingworth is the very epitome of all the good in this world and then some. He makes me want to talk to him, smile with him. It's bad for my health is what it is.

"So, what do we have to do?" He asks, flipping to a blank page in his notebook and pressing the spine down. I do the same, lining my basic stationery items next to the spiral binding of my physics book.

"See this experiment," I tap the back of my pencil on the printed assignment worksheet, reading over the instructions. "We have to research and investigate Coulomb's laws by means of experimentation. Then we need to present a model showcasing our findings alongside a write-up and report that Harry and Penelope will design."

"And-do-a-write-up," Skye mutters to himself, repeating the words slowly as he joys them down before looking back at me. "What was that last part?"

"Didn't you listen to anything Mr Lawrence said?"

I glance at the teacher, just in case, but he seems to be preoccupied with another group at the front of the class. Roughly by my calculations, he'll only get through the first third of the class before the bell rings and my table isn't one of them. The two girls who were talking to Skye earlier glare at me and I roll my eyes.

"Uh ... no?"

"Oh God, we're failing, aren't we?" I hit my forehead with my book, groaning.

"Yeah, pretty much," Skye shrugs, accepting it in his stride.

"Penelope is going to kill you, you know that, right?"

Skye points his pencil, leaning his body towards me, so close, that I can see the gold flecks in his eyes. I angle back, heat burning my ears.