A Kiss Makes All The Difference

Chapter 1

     I arrive five minutes early to my Junior level English class.  Technically I'm a high school frosh, but I am in no Freshman classes this year. I take Sophomore History; Junior  English and Biology; and Senior Mathematics and Photography. I attend West Montford Academy; I have been since grade six, and like the other students and teachers, I live on campus.  In every class I sit in the back corner, farthest away from the door.  It is not that I am a bad seed that I sit in the back; I dit in the back farthest from the door so I can watch the people around me.  I don't do this in a creepy stalker way, but in a way a little kid is glued to a television watching their Sunday morning cartoons.  People fascinate me.

    Enough about me, back to class.  I arrived early so I can be the first in the room (also, I must admit, so no one can take my spot).  Mr. Hare had just walked in before I did.  His hair was a mess and his tie was tied wrong.  Mr. Hare is a new teacher at the academy, and this was his first teaching job.  He was 23 yet still acted like he was 13.  I sighed and decided to help him out.

    "Mr. Hare-" I started.

    "Tyler," Mr. Hare tried to correct myself.

    "Uh, right.  Mr. Hare do you need any help?" I offer as he attempts to fix his tie.

    "Please call me Tyler, Ellizabeth, it's my name," Mr. Hare insisted.

    "Okay Tyler Ellizabeth, do you need help with your tie?" I ask like the smart-ass I am.

   "Ha ha very funny Miss Ryan and yes I could use some help," he said defeated and walked over to me.

    "Also, you know what happens when someone calls me Ellizabeth," I yanked hard on the tie, nearly choking him.  "It's Elli!"

    "Easy there, Elli," Mr. Hare choked out, loosening the tie a bit.  "Thanks," he mumbled out, walking back to his desk.

    As soon as Mr. Hare sat down, the rest of my classmates began to file into the class.  Here the seating arrangement is very stereotypical.  Nerds in the front, jocks in the second row to the back, cheerleaders next to their boyfriends, social outcasts in the back, unclassified kids in the middle, and me in the corner.  Timothy and Zeke were the last to show up.  Timothy ran to his seat, right in front of Mr. Hare's desk while Zeke strutted his bad boy strut to his seat (which happens to be the seat next to the empty seat beside mine).  Everyone was terrified of Zeke.  He came to this boarding school as a last resort after he cut up a kid in his old school.  No one wanted to be on his bad side.

    Once everyone got seated, Mr. Hare turned to the chalkboard and wrote something down in his nearly illegible handwriting that resembled 'What is love? Is it real?' and then went back to his black leather swivle chair. 

    "Now Zeke, what is love?" Mr. Hare asked.

    "Baby don't hurt me, don't hurt me, no more," Zeke sang in a velvety smooth voice that shocked everyone.  Zeke seldom speaks.

    "Wasn't that great?  Bridgette, what is love all about?"

    "Whistles," she replied simply.

    "What was that?" Mr Hare pursed his lips and looked utterly confused.  Obviously he has never heard of Bo Burnham.

    "You know... 'love is all about...whistles'... the end of the song 'Love is...'?  Go youtube it," Bridgette said looking at her reflection in Mr. Hare's sunglasses, adjusting a loose strand of hair.

    "Mhmm," he said, ignoring her suggestion, "Tammy, what about you?"

    "Love is Daddy Dearest giving me his credit card to max out.  Love is real.  Duh!  How else do you think I got this awesome mani/pedi," Tammy answered showing off her nails.  It's quite funny how she left out the part about the nose job she got in grade six, a boob job she got in grade eight, and the two abortions last year that the whole school knows about.  I raise my hand gracefully in the air.