The Project

Chapter 3

                                                               "First Day"

           I walked into my first class and took my usual seat at the front of the class between Amber and Sidney. We got all of our classes together this year. That should have been my first clue that something awful was going to happen. Nothing could be completely perfect.

            I looked around the room to see who I was with. There were only a few people in the class so far and I knew everyone. So far everything was good. I turned to talk to Amber before Mr. Rivers called the class to order.

            “So when are you going to talk to Chad,” I asked.

            “I don’t know. I guess at lunch unless I have any classes with him before then,” she said when she turned to look at me.

            “Well, at least I know your happy with your partner,” I said with a laugh.

            “Yeah, not everyone was as lucky as me,” she said blushing.

            “Yeah. That’s true. So who did you get Sidney? I kind of zoned out after I found out I was with Aidan.”

            “I got Adam LeRue,” she said with a frown.

            “Who is that,” I asked confused. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of him.

            “Some emo kid. He keeps to himself. I’ve seen him a couple of times around but no one ever talks to him.”

            “What does he look like?”

            “He’s really tall and skinny. He has short, spiked, black hair and he has his eyebrow and lip pierced.”

            “That’s kinda weird. Do we have any classes with him?”

            “I don’t know. I guess we’ll find out.”

            “Are you ok with being paired with him?”

            “Yeah. I mean it could have been way worse,” she said with a small smile.

            Before I could say anything else, the bell rang and Mr. Rivers called the class to order. He started talking about the lesson but I wasn’t really paying much attention. I was thinking about this new class. It was completely stupid. Why did they think that we would need a marriage ed. class?

            I tuned myself back in so that I could pay attention to the class. I really needed to stop zoning out. There was no telling what I missed. I just started to listen to Mr. Rivers when the door opened. I looked over to see none other than Aidan Riley sauntering into the class.

            “Sorry I’m late Mr. Rivers,” he said in a low voice.

            “It’s fine Mr. Riley. Take your seat,” Mr. Rivers said in an exasperated voice.

            Aidan looked at me and smiled before walking to the very back seat in the classroom. I knew I had my mouth hanging open and hurried to close it. I looked over at Amber and she had a weird smirk on her face. It almost as though she was enjoying this. I turned back to look at the board but I couldn’t focus. Why was he in class? Why had he not skipped? When did he get into any of my classes?

            “You all need to read the first five chapters of The Scarlett Letter before the end of the week. On Wednesday I will be handing out an assignment on it that must be turned in on Friday,” Mr. Rivers said as I tuned back in.  The first day of school and we already have homework. Great.