The week before school started felt incredibly bitter sweet. Part of me was already stressing about upcoming assignments and tests, and the other half was excited to finally graduate. After having to take a year off after my sophomore year due to financial problems, I was finally back on track to graduate unfortunately being the oldest in the class.
I heard cursing through the thin walls and the sound of something dropping outside my door. I stood confused, nobody had lived in the apartment across from me in years. I looked through the foggy peephole and partially made out a woman's figure. The figure turned revealing her face and my hand froze at the doorknob, she looked young.
I pushed the door open and she came into view, a shorter brunette woman with a lot of grocery bags. Her head snapped around to me quickly in surprise,
"Oh god I'm sorry, was I being loud?" She apologized frantically scrambling for the bags she dropped avoiding eye contact. She sighed eventually giving up and finally looked up at me. Her expression was worried as she fiddled with the key in her hand, scanning my face for annoyance.
"No dont worry," I immediately tried to calm the woman down, I felt embarrassed for her. "Do you need help?" Her expression melted into gratitude as she winced,
"Is there an easier way to use this shit?" She held up her key. I laughed, the locks at the apartments were pretty annoying to figure out.
"Here let me try," she dropped the key into my hand and I stepped towards her door, pushing the key in and twisting her doorknob while pushing it up to the right. The door swung open easily and I looked back to her shaking her head.
"Unbelievable. I've been fighting with this thing for like a week, how did you do that?" I smiled,
"I've been here for about two years now so I've had some practice." Her eyebrows shot up and her blue eyes worked curiously, probably wondering why I looked so young.
"Well thanks for your help, I'm Love." She stuck her hand out her hand politely and I took it gently,
"I'm Devin."
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I pulled into the familiar parking lot and felt my blood pumping faster than usual. I was not excited for today. I've already had 4 'first days' of high school, and you'd think I'd have the hang of it already. Still I found myself chewing my bottom lip nervously, wiping my palms against my pants.
I stepped out of my car grabbing my bag, my stomach buzzing with nerves. I had four classes this year, but the small schedule didn't give me hope. Each class seemed particularly heavy.
"Devin!" I heard a familiar voice from across the parking lot. I smiled as the younger girl waved at me,
"Hey Katlyn." She was my bosses daughter who I used to babysit when she was younger, she was starting her freshman year at school. She had long dark eyelashes and lots of freckles and was a ball of energy.
"Dude do you always dress like that for school?" I smiled at her bluntness,
"Trust me, when you're this far in you'll do the same thing."
"Oh. Okay!" She turned away quickly unconvinced and ran to her first class as the tardy bell rung. I didn't mind being late to AP History, this would be my second time taking it and I'm sure Mrs.Hartwick would be thrilled to see my name on the roster again.
My first couple of classes went by just fine, I really loved my ceramics class. I could be left alone to express myself with art, what more could I ask for? I was looking forward to my writing class aswell. I had always loved writing, and it seemed like a super easy English credit.
I took the seat nearest to the back of the class, hoping we would just be given a syllabus and then dismissed. I heard the heavy door pulled shut closed but didn't bother looking up. I was too busy thinking about my lunch break in my car, maybe take a nap-
"Alright everyone, let's get started."
There's no way. The familiar young sounding voice caught my attention and my head snapped up. She wore a classily looking white blouse and black trousers, a professional looking version of who I had been introduced to.
It was Love.
She turned to face the class and smiled,
"My name is Ms.Quinn." Since our first encounter we hadn't really run into each other much beyond seeing each other at laundry or sometimes in the morning. I wouldn't have guessed her to be old enough to teach high school, I rolled my eyes already imagining the comments from the male students. She began calling attendance and hesitated before my name, "Devin Carter?" Her eyes scanned the classroom until they landed on me, a strange expression plastered on her face.
"Here." She switched her eyes back to the roster quickly and I groaned, slumping my head against my desk. There's no way my teacher was my neighbor, didn't this violate some type of moral law? This was going to make the remainder of the year extremely awkward, what if I didn't turn in an assignment and she came kicking my door down?
"I'm going to pass out the syllabus, your assignment for today is to write a poem about something you have never experienced. Go ahead and turn them into me and as soon as you have finished you are free to leave." She handed out pink sheets of paper, I rolled my eyes seeing our first unit was unfortunately poetry.
At least we could leave early, I snatched a piece of paper from my bag and started to think, something I've never experienced? Based on the syllabus how about a class more boring than this. I scribbled some nonsense about living on the moon and hesitantly made my way up to the front of the room. Was she going to pretend she didn't know me? Or worse was she going to ask me how to use the laundry service.
She caught my eye and raised an eyebrow suspiciously,
"Master of locks and a quick writer?" It was weird to see her in this setting and even weirder to be turning in a poem to her.
"I like to think I'm pretty creative." My stomach dropped as she took my paper and began to read it.
"The moon is so cool, I love my big pool?" She looked back up at me and I couldn't tell if she was concerned or amused. I winced feeling extremely embarrassed, trying for a smile. She sucked her teeth sarcastically, "Devin if this is the creativity you have an abundance of..."
I tapped my finger on my chin, feigning deep thought, "No, no, see I was thinking more abstract." I prayed she would take the joke and still be my chill neighbor, not some uptight teacher. She played along humming dramatically and nodding,
"Well I am looking forward to your thoughtful explanation of this piece tomorrow when we share our work with the class." My face dropped I swallowed,
"You're kidding." She shook her head pointing to the pink paper in my hands,
"Look at the first page of the syllabus." She was right, poetry presentation was the very first assignment. I groaned outloud,
"Can we just call this conversation my presentation?" She shook her head smiling,
"I'll see you in class tomorrow." It was an odd sentence to hear in her familiar voice.
"Right." We looked at each other then with nothing else to say, trying to figure out how each of us would go about this new position.
