Caught In The Middle of the Road

Prolouge

Hey guys, this is my new story, hope you like it!!!

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"Jenna, get your lazy ass out of bed!!! You're gonna be late for school!!!"

I groaned. My stupid foster mother woke me up from an incredible dream. It was a dream I'd been having for the past four years. In it I was living with a loving family, and I wasn't moving to another family. I had been adopted.

I'd had this dream ever since I was taken away from my mother and put into foster care four years ago.

I rolled out of bed and stumbled downstairs to the kitchen.

My foster dad was already gone for work. He was a construction worker in Boston, Mass. We lived in Salem, so he didn't have to drive that far. My foster mom though, was unemployed, and an alcoholic.

George and Ruth Barton was their names. Mine was Jenna Martin.

"It's about time you hauled your good-for-nothing body out of bed. Now eat something and get out." Ruth slurred at me. I looked at the clock and sighed. 7:30 in the morning and she was already drunk.

I grabbed a bagel and slathered it with cream cheese. As I ran upstairs with half the bagel in my mouth, I crashed into my foster brother Dylan.

"Woah," he exclaimed. "Slow down speedy gonzallas. You don't need to hurry to catch the bus. I'll drive you."

I swallowed and gave him a grateful smile. "Thanks Dylan. You're a lifesaver. I'll be ten minutes at most."

He laughed at my retreating figure.

I simultaneously finished my bagel and got dressed. Exactly eight minutes and fourty three seconds later, I was running down the stairs and into the kitchen again to get coffee.

When I looked at the clock again, I yelped. I was way late! I threw myself out the door and into Dylan's car.

"Took you long enough. I thought you weren't going to be more then ten minutes?" he questioned me with an eyebrow quirked and a smirk on his face.

I huffed. "If you're gonna be like that, then I guess I won't give you you're coffee."

"Alright, alright, I'm sorry. You know I'm just messin' with you."

I laughed dryly at him. We had this sortta love hate relationship. We made fun of each other, but in the end we always stuck together.

We pulled into our school parking lot; St. Thomas' High School. And yes, it was a Catholic school, but it was the only school that Dylan and I's social workers could get us into. It sucked because we had to go to Mass, but at least we didn't have to wear uniforms.

We walked up to the front steps and entered the hell hole called high school.

I turned to Dylan and bid him farewell. "See ya hombre."

I walked off to Advanced Chem. I didn't have many friends in this class because it was usually a seniors only class, and I was 16 and a sophmore. But I was a science whiz, so I was placed here.

The ancient oak door creaked when I opened it. Every head in the room turned towards me. I was late, so it was understandable.

The teacher, Mr. Quince, cleared his throat. "Late, Miss Martin? That won't look good on your permanant record."

I blushed. "Sorry Mr. Quince. I woke up late this morning. My alarm-"

He interuped me. "I don't want to hear your excueses. Just take a seat so I can continue with my lesson."

I slinked to my seat with my head bowed in shame. Normally I wouldn't let any teacher talk to me like that, but Mr. Quince acutally held some respect with me. He was a sucessful sciencetist, had a PhD from Harvard, and was only 27. But he gave up being in the science spotlight to become his lifelong dream, a teacher.

I sat down at the back of the room and took out my book.

After about 15 minutes of being told what to do, we all got started working. Before my pen even hit the paper, someone came strolling into the classroom.

Everybody, including Mr. Quince, looked at the very late stranger.

"Ah, I assume you're our new transfer student from England, Mr. Smith?"

The stranger nodded.  "That would be correct." My mouth fell open. He had possibly the most beautiful voice ever. Soft, musical, but a bit hoarse, which caused him to sound like he was always hungover. But in a good way.

Mr. Quince sniffed in an annoyed way. "Care to explain why you're almost 20 minutes late Mr. Smith?"

He smiled. "Easy sir, I didn't feel like coming. I'm only here because the principal found me wandering the halls and escorted me to class. By the way, I prefer to be called by my acutal name, not my last name."

Mr. Quince sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Class, this is Peyton Smith. He's an new transfer student from England. Please, try to make him feel welcome. And Mr. Smith, have a seat."

Peyton looked slowly around the room, looking for an open seat. I looked around too. When I realized that the only open seat was next to me, I grimaced. I soo wasn't looking foward to sitting next to a whiny, spoiled British boy all year. No matter how hot he was. And Peyton was hot. He was tall, about 6'3", with caramel brown hair that flopped into his electric blue eyes.

We were complete oppisites, lookswise. I was small, only 5'4", with brownish-black hair and dark brown eyes.

When Peyton sat down, I didn't look at him. I just kept taking notes. So I didn't see when he wrote a note to me and threw it on my desk.