Goodbye School (GMW)

chapter one; perfect

Riley POV
Hour and half before the shooting

"Last call for quizes, please!" My teacher calls.

I stand and hand in my quiz, glancing at Farkle as I sit back next to him. "What'd you get on number five?" I ask him, crossing my ankles.

"Jeresulm." He responds without hesitation, flipping the page of his book without looking at me.

I think about it for a minute and frown. "Crumbcakes. I think I said Mecca."

Farkle shakes his head, and I can practically feel him radiating disbelief. "Riley, the West Wall is in Jeresulm. That's the holy city for Jews."

"Yeah, yeah. I get that now." I grumbled, leaning back in my chair.

Farkle looks up and pushes my chair back on to all fours. "When you break your neck, I won't hesitate to say I told you so as they load you in the ambulance."

I pout at him, but I know he's right, so I stop. Humanities class, which was an advanced english slash geography class, would be boring without Farkle, but I sometimes find myself wishing Maya or Lucas was in here with us. Maya had on level English, and Lucas was in a PAP class.

"Cheer up Riles. We get out for Chritsmas tomorrow." Farkle points out, smiling slightly when he brings a beam to my face. I love the Christmas season. Hot cocoa, warm blankets, and good vibes.

Maya had always been more of a summer person. "Hot days, fun times, and no school. What's not to love?" She'd said to me once.

That never diminished my mood. I loved digging through my closet to grab my winter clothes.

"That's true. Hey, do you guys want to come over tonight? Dad said I could have you, Maya, and Lucas over for a movie and some popcorn to celebrate our two weeks of freedom for break." I say to him.

He nods. "Yeah, definitely." He responds.

"Awesome." I beam as my teacher starts up on a lesson about migration, but I'm barely listening. Lunch can't come soon enough.

An hour passes, and the bell rings. I dash to lunch, setting my stuff down at our table. Our table was Farkle, Lucas, Maya, Smackle, and my own table. It was in the back of the lunch room, near the Chinese line. I wait patiently, and about thirty seconds later, Maya shows up. She grins at me heartily and puts her backpack on the back of the chair. We wordlessly head to the lunch line. 

Maya starts as we moved up the line. "Healy cracked today. Ben stood up in the middle of class and declared he and Daniel were gay for each other-"

"Wait, what?" I ask her.

She laughs. "It was a dare. So anyway, Ben stands up and says this, and Healy just stood up and made him come out in the hall. They were out there for, like, seven hours-"

"Maya-"

"Or ten minutes, what's the difference? Anyway, Healy comes back in with no Ben, so Daniel raised his hand and asked where Ben was. You'll never believe what he said."

"What?"

She pauses. "He goes, 'Daniel, your gay counterpart is currently explaining to his mom how he's interrupting my class with his homosexual remarks, so if you'd like to add, you can join him in the office.' The class lost it."

"Dang. Healy must not be to happy then." I mutter. "At least I have him coming back after two weeks."

"At least we get to end the day with your dad." Maya giggles.

I smiled slightly. "Yeah, true."

We make our way back to our seats to see Lucas, Farkle, and Smackle are already there. Farkle and Smackle had struck up in some light banter, and Maya and I closed in on the conversation. I was only half listening. Something about how Smackle was brighter than the sun by some percentage. I only had eyes on Lucas.

His head was bent down, and he was hard at work making an mRNA sequence into an amino acid sequence. He looked so cute, with his brow furrowed.

"Hey Ranger Rick. What's that?" Maya asks, stealing the paper from under his nose.

"Biology." He swipes it back without a glance and keeps working.

Maya makes a humph noise to herself and looks at Farkle and Smackle, tuning into their conversation.

"Hey Lucas." I hear a voice say, and Lucas turns to look at me, making me realize I said that. Oops.

"Hey Princess." He greets me.

I let out a weird sounding giggle, making Maya turn and glower at me. Just act normal. The look reads, but she knows good and well, with Lucas, I can't relax.

Lucas has already returned to homework when I look back at him, and I wonder if this should make me relieved or disappointed.

When lunch ends, we all head up to the second floor together. Our classes are all right next to each other.

Farkle and Smackle, vanishing into the room together. My classroom is next, and then Maya and Lucas'.

"See you guys next period?" I ask them. They both nod, and I go in my class.

Everyone is at their seats, listening to Ben tell his story about the events Maya had updated me on. I sat down and listened anyway.

"-and he made me call my mom, but I just lied so I wouldn't get in trouble." Ben is saying.

"That's so funny!" One girl named Faith says in a flirtatious way. I can't help but roll my eyes.

"Tha-" Ben starts to say, but is interrupted by the speaker turning on.

"Attention, this is a code blue." Said the voice calmly. I recognize the principal. I've never really talked to him, but I recognize his voice. "I repeat, this is a code blue."

My classmates all look at the front, confused, as my teacher, Mr. Bailey stands up. His face has gone ashen. "What does code blue mean?" One girl named Gianna whispers. None of us seem to know.

Mr. Bailey rushedly locks the door and ushers us into a corner as the voice continues to repeat. "Code blue. Code blue. Code blue."

All of us press against the wall, confused. "Mr. Bailey-" Someone starts to say, but Mr. Bailey quickly shushes them. We all fall silent, listening to the principal repeating, "code blue," over and over.

Then it stops. There's no noise for a moment. Then a gunshot comes loudly over the intercom, and there's a soft groan.

My classmates all look at each other in horror. I feel my blood run cold, and everything clicks.

Code blue means there's a shooter in the school.

((A/N: Hey guys. Thanks for reading. I'm really excited  for this book. I've got this book thought out, and I can't wait for you guys to step through this journey with me. Chapter Question; Maya and Lucas or Riley and Lucas? Lots of love!))