Dancing with Fire (John Pearce/Justice Crew Fanfic)

Chapter 12

If you think having John as a teacher would make English class more interesting, then you’re wrong.  Maybe it did lighten up some people’s day having a teacher as hot as him to get distracted a little, although it doesn’t mean that we could get rid of the boring lectures, book reports, oral presentations, exams, and essays. Perhaps Lenny’s offer to skip English class did sound good right now, but too bad, I’m already in the middle of class, listening to John’s discussion over our next book report, Romeo and Juliet.

Mr. Pearce instructed that we would watch the movie in class today, so we’ll get to compare both the book and the movie. As much as I love watching movies, I’d still go for the book, if ever it has one. I love imagining things that were written, having my own movie playing in my mind, with the set of characters I picked, possibly one of the leading ladies would be me, and the guy being a famous celebrity I was crushing on for that moment.

The movie went on for 130 minutes. Mr. Pearce inserted the DiCaprio one, good choice. At least it was the newer version and not some old one, although I have seen this, I wasn’t keen on participating and watching it again, for the nth time. Okay, maybe just the second one, I know the story already.

So Romeo and Juliet’s families were mortal enemies, and yet they fell in love with each other. Though it was illegal, and knowing how each of the families would react, they still loved each other. Their connection was so strong and different, in terms of, being in love and fighting for the one you love, knowing your heart only beats for a certain person. I know some people do fight their love for the other person, it does happen in real life, but the thing is they become in good terms with the other people surrounding them after a certain time.

Love is truly magical. It doesn’t matter if you fall in love with someone you’re not supposed to, it just do and you can’t do anything about it, unless you want to explode into a million pieces just because you want to divest yourself of certain feelings towards a person. If you love someone so much, it would be hard to keep away from him, it would be hard to move away and focus yourself to another person because you know for sure that your heart would only beat for him. Only him.

My attention landed on Mr. Pearce in front of the room. He was, I think, grading some papers while everyone was watching the movie, except me who was lost in thoughts. Lost in my own world.

He was looking straight at me, wondering what I was doing, furrowing his eyebrows at me. He caught me looking out the window, daydreaming yet again. I have this thing of daydreaming whenever I was near Mr. John Pearce and he always catches me. I was beginning to think he was my daydream catcher, someone who also catches me daydreaming.

He signaled his hand to the projector on the right side corner of the room, telling me to watch it, more like demanding me to watch instead of losing my mind somewhere else. ‘I’ve watched it’ I mouthed back to him which he seemed to understand. ‘Watch it again’ he replied back. I shook my head, and said ‘no’, he chuckled silently, but I knew in his mind he was saying I was a stubborn girl. I looked away and smiled, not wanting him to see my reaction.

“What was that?” Amy whispered and snickered. She must be referring to that ‘conversation’ I had with Mr. Pearce earlier. She moved in closer to me, now more interested on my life, than what’s on the TV. If it were me, I would be more interested in my life too. I’ve been happy lately, and John was a part of it. I have dedicated my afternoon attending their workshop even though I wasn’t dancing with them. Well I did yesterday when I surprised the other boys, including John, at my dance routine with Lenny, and then today after school, I have promised John to dance for him.

Dancing for John makes me feel giddy. It was different from what I felt yesterday. I feel shy right now considering I know that people would be watching me. I had this feeling that all eyes would be on me like it was my dance recital and I was on spotlight. I don’t even know how it feels different. I mean, I danced for Lenny yesterday, so then maybe I should know what I would feel today. But nervous in my veins were showing. I did not want to embarrass myself in front of everyone in the workshop. Can’t Lenny excuse me in the workshop instead?

Looking up, I met John’s eyes once again. He was eyeing me. He had this ‘What are you thinking about?’ look, and his natural smirk was seen on his face. I would surely get in trouble right now if anyone sees us conversing with our eyes. He is our teacher in school, meaning, being friends with him inside school wasn’t allowed. I’m not even sure if we’re friends outside or I was a normal girl who doesn’t have anything to do but watch their workshop and annoy them by being there. Though I don’t think I annoy them or anything. Am I annoying?

“What’s up with you two? You seem to have a connection.” Amy uttered lowly. I saw Jason frowned when he had heard Amy, and then looked away. Jason. I miss Jason. I haven’t talked to him since he walked out on me. Feeling sad, I lowered my head and rested it on the makeshift pillows a.k.a my folded arms on my desk.

Unpredictably, the empty chair in front of me was now occupied by Mr. Pearce, turning it sideways, pretending he was watching the movie with us. I looked up at him and he was intently watching the movie, eyeing each one in the class if they were participating or not. Then he met my eyes, and Amy’s.

Amy giggled looking at him. Her eyes were shining brightly even if the lights in the room were turned off so we would feel like we were in the movie theater. The whole room was quiet and the only sound in the room came was from the movie. No one else spoke or done anything else. They were intently looking at what’s in front of them. Some may have looked around when they saw the empty seat that John had left in front when he decided to sit with us. Some of the girls’ eyes searched for him, and smiled when they saw him at the back watching around.

‘Are you okay?’ he mouthed when Amy wasn’t looking. ‘I’m bored and sleepy’ I said back. His gaze started moving around again when we saw Amy looking at us. Luckily, the bell sounded off and he stood up. He asked one of the girls in the corner to open the lights as he stopped the player.

“Okay guys, we will continue our movie next meeting.” He uttered, standing in front of the room as the other returned their seats like how it was when we came in. “But make sure you understand the whole movie and the book as I will be handing out the questions for your essay tomorrow.”

Some people groaned, while the others nodded in agreement. Most of us didn’t like writing essays, but John was making it enjoyable for some as they want to get his attention. It drives them to be better in class which is a good thing.

Students started going out of the room. As I was about to head out with Amy and our friends, he called my attention. “Kayla, please stay for a moment.”

Amy stopped and looked between us. Her face showed that something was up, but let it go when someone had called her, leaving John and I alone in the room.