The Story of Us

Ch. 13 Another One Bites the Dust

Ch. 13 Another One Bites the Dust

“It’s finals! You hear me, Keegan, finals!  I’m totally panicking!” Ellie said frantically, pacing back and forth in front of our usual spot for lunch.

“You’ll be fine. Just memorize the study guides and you’ll be fine. Besides, shouldn’t we be worried more about the PSAT and the SAT tests more? We have them this month.” I said, raising an eyebrow and taking a bite of my sandwich. I made a face as I tasted the tuna. Gosh, my mom packed me tuna? She knew I hated it.

                The weekend has passed after I had driven home without Liam, with my mother returning from the camping trip early afternoon yesterday. Now I was back at school, with finals nearing in the next three months. I wondered if Liam would ever be going back to school. I wondered if we would ever call or contact me again. Then again, I’d been wondering about a lot of things that concerned Liam these past two days. No, that didn’t mean I was in love with Liam. It was just friendly and platonic based thoughts.

                Right. I shook my head and snapped my attention back to Ellie, who was still ranting off.

                “I know that we should be worried about those tests, but this is finals! These affect our high school grades and the chance of getting into a good college, too! We have such little time!”

                “Three months is only ‘little time’?” I asked.

                “Yes!” Ellie said.

                I shook my head and gave a low chuckle. There was a sudden vibration, and I slid my cell phone out of my jeans’ pocket and got to my feet. “Hold on and let me take this call. I’ll be right back.” I said, walking behind a wall as I answered the phone.

                “Hello?”

                “Honey,” my mother’s voice said.

                “Oh, hey Mom. Why are you calling during school hours? Did something happen?” I asked.

                “Oh, no, nothing bad happened. I’m really sorry to interrupt but I was wondering if we could talk when you come home. You don’t have any plans after, right?” my mother said.

                I frowned. Something seemed off. Yet nevertheless I answered her. “Um, no. I’ll come home right after. What do you need to talk about with me?”

                A hesitant pause. “Um…your father.”

                “What?” I asked in surprise, but my mother had already hung up. Growling in frustration, I pocketed my cell phone. My mother was so elusive and secretive sometimes.

                “Who called?” Ellie asked as soon as I returned. Her eyes suddenly brightened. “Was it Liam?”

                I shook my head. “No, my mom. Anyway, let’s get back to class.”

~~~~~~~~~~

                “I am handing out the guide lines for your project, which will be counted as sort of your final grade.” Mr. Sur said, handing out the papers to everyone. Everybody as unison groaned and continued to read what we had to do for the project, which was writing a short story and creating a huge fifteen slide power point. It was only Creative Writing class, for goodness sake.   

                “You’ll be writing a short story about anything. It can be any genre, such as romance or action. And then you must create a power point that transforms your story into reality. Almost like a movie almost, except with pictures and an explanation of what is happening in each slide. I know finals are still a long way off, but this might take you quite some time. I expect this project to be the best from all of you, so take your time and create something inspiring over these next three months.”