The Pros and Cons of Romantic Dynamics (SIDDHARNAV)

Chapter 1

Steve Pie

Five years later

          I trudge up the stairs to my new eighth grade class. Hopefully this year is filled with new opportunity and knowledge. Hopefully the people here actually like me. As I walk in the classroom, I see almost all of the previous classical kids. They're so smart. I'll probably make an embarrassment of myself in here. Well, considering Surina and Bethany are here, perhaps I'll have a chance at popularity from smarts. But with intimidating figures like Ryan or *shudder* Daniel in this class, I'm a little afraid of what's to come. If only my old debate friend from all those years ago were here, I wouldn't feel so alone. I wonder how Skinner North is for him. He's probably so popular and cool and that kid there, he won't remember me at all.

          It's 8:53. The door opens. A late-comer on the first day of school? How unbelievably rude. "You're late-" I begin to say, but break off as my eyes meet a familiar pair of honey brown eyes. "Peter?" "Steve!" We both exclaim at the same time. Well, THAT was not on my bingo card for today. No, really, I actually have a bingo card for the first day of school. But that's beside the point. "I can't believe you're-" "-in classical this year!" He finishes my sentence with ease. I chuckle a little before standing up to him face-to-face.

          God, he's short. I easily tower over him, and I'm not even that tall myself. I guess he isn't as short as Ben, for example, but he's gotta be smaller than 5 foot, that's for sure. He could play Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit.

          I digress. "Why'd you switch schools?" I ask curiously. "I was too cool for Skinner North. decided to return to my roots here. And I missed you a little, I guess." I rolled my eyes at the last statement. He has no clue how many countless nights I've lain awake, imaging all the possibilities of if he had stayed with me here at Skinner. All but one possibility had crossed my mind.

          I sigh, a small smile pricking the ends of my lips. "You should sit with me for every class," I muse out loud. "I guess. If you really want me to," he replies, "What's our schedule like?" I point to the board in response. "Ancillary first. Next, math. Then civics. Lunch. WIN. Science. Language arts. Dismissal," I conclude. "Hmm, seems we'll be quite busy then." I don't notice his double entendre until he's out of the room. Once again, I spot too late that the rest of the class has left me to be the last person in the room. I race to grab my supplies and catch up with the rest of the group to my foreign language ancillary.

--

          "That math class was so fun!" Peter says. I can't help but nod in agreement. Judging by my classmates' unenthusiastic expressions, I can tell they don't feel as strong of a love for math as we do. All the more reason for Peter and I to keep to ourselves. We don't need another classmate interfering with our best-friends-forevership.

          Peter stares at me expectantly. "What?" I remark, not hearing what he said but still getting defensive anyway. "Nothing. I asked you how you thought Ms. Zamiar will be this year." He quickly calms me down, my ruffled feathers smoothed over by his flowing tone. "She seems a bit eccentric. Perhaps our other classmates would like her better. I at least hope her curriculum will be advanced enough where I won't be bored out of my mind..." I continue to drone on about possible complaints for our civics educator that I didn't notice the rest of the class quieted down already. Peter nudges me to shut up, so I quickly do so and stare at the curly-headed teacher.

          "Well, I can already tell who our chit-chatters are going to be." Her sing-song voice flutters throughout the classroom, gentle, yet scolding at the same time. "Yeah, Steve, shut up." Peter blurts out. Ms. Zamiar imitates a gasp. "Swear jar!" She exclaims. "Thank you for allowing me to use this as a teaching moment. So, whenever one of you cusses, you go up to that little jar over there and stick a piece of paper with your name on it inside the jar." She demonstrates before beckoning for Peter to do the same.

          When he returns to his seat, I look at him with an "I told you so" expression. He feigns annoyance, so I egg him on by teasing and poking fun at him a little more before the teacher begins her instructions once again. Today is just a syllabus day, a getting-to-know-you day, so I easily drift off to her lullaby-like voice.

--

          "Steve. Steve. Steve. Ste-" A voice jolts me out of my dreaming state. "Alright, I'm up." I reprimand, groggily collecting my things. "Sorry, I guess," he mutters, quickly walking out the door and into the hallway for lunch. I immediately regret my words and tone, meandering out to meet him and apologize. How could I have been that careless with my words? Now he'll probably just go hang out with the other kids. Stupid, stupid, stupid Steve.

          I find him by his locker, lining up for lunch. He opens his mouth to say something, but I interject. "Sorry. I didn't mean to come off so harsh. My bad." He seems taken aback by my apparent sorrow for his feelings. "It's fine. I get it." He responds, with a confirming nod of his head. I blow out a breath. I thought I'd lost my best-friend-forever. I suppose it'll take more than that to break our bond. After all, we're best platonic bros. Nothing will change that. Mark my words, I'll make sure of it.

        Instead of going directly into the lunchroom, our homeroom teacher, Mr. Barkley, tells us to go outside. We have recess first, I guess. Peter and I try to join in with the soccer kids, and they let us in with them, albeit hesitantly. We're not very good, but it's worth getting embarrassed by my poor playing so I can see my friend play. I'm so lucky to have him as my friend. Before we know it, the sirens are already blaring for us to go back inside so that the horde of sixth- and seventh-graders don't stampede us.

          We arrive in the lunchroom and I find a seat next to some girl knitting... spaghetti? Nope, it's just yarn, I conclude looking closer at it. I inspect the other people at my table. The majority of them are boys, apart from two girls, one who seems awfully close with Ryan and the other seeming like more of a third wheel. Peter find a seat next to me before it's almost taken by some random short kid wearing a Shrek T-Shirt. The people in this class are certainly interesting indeed.

          "Eugh, this is exactly why I left for Skinner North." Peter grumbles after regretfully swallowing a piece of cafeteria pizza. "Yeah, I don't trust the school food either. Half of the time it's cold, and the other half it's expired." I say. Peter bursts out laughing and my line, although I don't understand how it holds any comedic value, to be honest. "It's true!" I defend myself, thinking he's mocking me for not being able to handle the school food.

          "The only thing I'll eat on the school menu is the chocolate milk." Peter states as he takes a giant slurp from the expired chocolate milk carton. It's almost comical, his reaction of realization when he finds that the milk is no good. He imitates vomiting. "That is horrible, why didn't you tell me it was expired?" He sounds exasperated. "So I could see that reaction just now.  You should've seen your face!" I comment while snickering about the image forever tattooed in my mind of Peter sipping from the straw.

          "Ughh, I'm leaving." He begins to get up. "Wait!" I exclaim, latching onto the bottom of his shirt like a leech. "Please, stay." I plead, giving him my best puppy-dog eyes. He gives in after about a half of a minute. "Fine," he sighs as he sits back down. However, lunch is already over and our teachers have come to bring us back upstairs for our next classes. I suddenly realize I'm still holding onto Peter's shirt. The blood rushes to my cheeks and I quickly let go of the hem, thinking of the nature of my actions. What came over me? Why am I so embarrassed? Why do I wish I hadn't let go of his shirt?

          Shoot, this class is getting to me. I can't wait to just go home and do my favorite AP Calculus IXLs. I can't wait to leave this hellhole of Skinner West. Although the day isn't over yet, I can't wait until I see Peter again tomorrow.

**

Word count: exactly 1500