Not sure about the title, so for now, it stays that way. As it goes further and deeper, it really shouldn't be named this, but then again...
I’m definitely not here to make a point. That’s for sure. Like listening to songs from musicals, for example We Go Together. What in the world does “ramma lamma lamma a kiddinkyedy dinky donk” tell you? Nothing, and that’s my point. You’re probably oblivious to this but, two sentences ago I said I’m not here to make a point. Huh, guess I lied. I’ve been told I’m a liar. Actually I haven’t… So I just lied about being called a liar. Irony, here we come.
I sit at a small desk. One of those weird ones where you can’t push yourself closer, or farther away, the one where you think, God it would suck to be fat and go here. Well, luckily, no extremely fat people come here. Just these people with money, and that’s not me. I’m just an average girl, who just happened to travel across the country to board during the week, and spend the weekends at my grandparents. Sometimes I went home with friends if my grandparents were out traveling. I didn’t blame them; my parents sort of forced me on them. Well, forced is the wrong word. More as though my parents left a will and my grandparents just happened to be the lucky winners of a brand new teenager! Mom used to promise me, if anything happened, Ma and Papa would move to where we were living. It was Maryland at the time, and I knew something would go wrong with the bay bridge in our backyard.
“Audrie?” I looked up slowly. Maria handed me a test from the stack of papers in her hand. She was such a kiss-up and acted as though she couldn’t be bothered to actually “know” your name. I’ve been here since the start of the year, it’s not a hard name to pronounce or remember… “Try harder next time,” She said as she walked past me. I looked at the red ink scribbled into the paper. 15 out of 40 questions that is what I got wrong. I looked at the percentage. I sighed, not bad for a girl who just lost her parents. I used to be straight A’s, but I just couldn’t keep it up with the loss of my parents. My GPA was still 4.0 because I’m an exception, I’ll pull it together next year, I think to myself.
The bell rang, and I sat in my seat for a second, and then began to pick up my already gathered things. I walked up to Miss Franklin’s desk. “Did I get any better?” She nodded her head. “I’m not a tattle tale, and this makes me one by doing this, but Maria needs to be a student, and not a teacher. She always leaves remarks like ‘do better next time,’… it’s rough Miss Franklin. I’ve been deprived of… things that are necessary to survival, and Maria, well, Maria isn’t helping.”
“Maria is doing what she thinks is right, Audrie,” I shook my head, was she that dimwitted?
“No, she is doing your job. What she is doing is not right because all my teachers know my situation, and Maria doesn’t because she is not a teacher, and she doesn’t need to know.” I turned and walked out of the room. I was late to my next class, but I still took my time.
“Thank you for joining us, Audrie,” Maria says as I enter the room. I shoot her a look that kills. She speaks without permission. “Mr. Tallik, Audrie is showing one of the seven signs of disrespect.”
“…And may I point out to you, Maria, that you showed two signs of disrespect right before that?” I snickered. This was Public Relations, but not like business, more as though everyday morals, but more in depth. We go into the phycology of it all, too. “Pass this worksheet back to Audrie,” I wait for the paper to reach my desk. I began to fill it out as Tallik talked.
“So, let’s do something to understand this relationship theory. It’s a project where you have to work in groups of three, which I will pick. You will each be responsible for creating your own way to collect your data, and I don’t want to see mimicry in your projects,” He began to pass out a packet with paragraphs of information. “I want you to become friends, to understand how each of you work and what your motives are. I want you to have a different relationship than your friends that you have now. The three of you must get along. There will be different situations that I will give you every week which you must perform and collect data for. I know it sounds confusing, but by the end of it, you might still hate each other, or you may have a new boyfriend.” I sighed. Then as the packets reached me and I handed the rest back, I wondered if this could be good for me.
“Here are the groups…” He began to read off names. I waited anxiously for my name. “Audrie, Alex… Falloch, and Maria.” Alex, someone I had dreamed of when I first came here. I never said hello though. Maria… that was expected.
“I didn’t get into a group Mr. Tallik,” Jason said from the back of the room.
“You can pick,” I wish I had been so lucky. Jason came up to my desk, as everyone got into their groups to start getting stuff done.
“Hey, Audrie, can I join your group?” Maria looked at him with anger.
“Sure, pull up a chair,” Jason dragged a desk up and sat next to me.
“Um, I think first things first, we should probably trade out cell phone numbers.” I wrote mine down on 3 sheets of paper with my name scribbled at the top. I read over the front page, the first assignment was to figure out all of the basic things about our new friends. Favorite color, middle name… I flipped the page. Jason handed me two sheets of paper with numbers and names. No Maria. “Maria, you have to. The point of this is to get to know each other and realize our relationships.”
“Well I can get to know you without giving you my phone number.”
“You’re already sabotaging my data,” Jason said. “Why don’t we look over it tonight and come back with fresh minds tomorrow?” We all nodded in agreement.
“Also, tonight, get a rough draft of how you’re going to collect data so we don’t copy each other,” Alex added in. The bell rang as he finished his last words and Jason stayed back as I got myself reorganized.
“You don’t mind that I joined your group?” Jason looked at me as we made our way out of the room into the outdoors.
“Why do you say that?” He kept in pace with me. Jason was cute, about the same as Alex, just in different ways. Jason was toned and slim, with tan skin and white teeth. His eyes were blue, and that was a total turn on. His brown hair topped it off for me.
“I thought it would be a funny way to get to know you, and not the back of your head, but I didn’t want it to get even more weird with smarty pants Maria hanging around.” I laughed, that was a silly way to look at it.
“Jason I’m glad you joined the group. Isn’t this an awkward way for you to introduce yourself though?” I looked up to him, oh double plus. He’s tall… I wonder if he’s walking here thinking about my looks too? It’s probably just me.
He flushed a bright red. “You think I’m a loser, I’m so stupid.” He was about to turn away, I stopped in place and grabbed his arm. “I’ll just tell Mr. Tallik I didn’t mean to choose your gro…”
“Are you always this worried when you realize a girl likes you?” He stopped his words as I talked over him. He smiled. I smiled back at him.
“I’ll text you tonight, maybe we can work on the project a little, or not,” He kept smiling and walked through the grass. I hurried to my dorm, for study hall, which I wasn’t lucky enough to have in my room. Carter ran into me on my way.
“Hi, Audrie,” Carter said. “Long day?”
“Long life,” I said shaking my head. “I’ve got to go I don’t want to lose any more slim chance of getting dorm room study hall.”
“Alright, I’ll see you at lunch maybe,” He started walking to his next class.
“Bye, Carter,” Carter is my best guy friend, he’s drama free, but can tell you it all. It’s sort of fun when nothing else is. I rushed to my common room, where I was luckily not late. I got permission to retrieve my laptop, and began to work on my project outline as I simultaneously read the packet.
