You and Me... (BWWM)

5

The next day during English class, Alex, Lucas, and I got to work. We had to do a presentation on a famous author or poet, and teach a lesson based on it. Currently, we were trying to figure out who to do our project on.

"Edgar Allan Poe, that makes the most sense," Lucas commented.

I shook my head vigorously. "No. No, anyone but him. Considering we live in Richmond, we literally do something related to Poe every single year. So, let's think outside of the box."

"Langston Hughes?" Alex suggested.

My eyebrows raised in excitement. "There we go. He's a phenomenal poet with a great story. I'm going to nominate Zora Neale Hurston as well."

"Oh my gosh, she's a goddess," Lucas smiled. "Her book, Their Eyes were Watching God was so good."

"You've read it?"

"Of course. It's actually one of my favorite novels. Back home, the books that we read in class weren't really doing it for me, so I decided to read some novels by Americans. I happened to come across her novel when I was looking at the Great American reads, and it interested me. So, I think I've read it a total of five times."

"Wow," Alex raised his eyebrows. "I think you're the only teenager I know other than Jazz who actually likes that book."

"That's because we know true literature," Lucas and I said together, and we laughed.

"Anyway...so are we going to do Zora Neale Hurston?" Alex suggested.

"I think we should. She's a choice that no one's going to do, because they don't know true talent and are going to choose the easiest option."

"Question," Lucas asked. "Aren't we supposed to be thinking outside the box considering we're all taking IB classes, which are the most vigorous classes ever? That's how it was in Ireland."

"You are right, Lucas. However, the kids in this grade who take IB courses are lazy as heck. It's sad but very true."

Alex nodded. "Jazz is right."

"Damn," Lucas said. "So, how about we make a schedule for what exactly we're going to do each day? The rubric says that the project is due two weeks from today, meaning we have about five classes prior to presenting. And we already said that we're going to work on it together this weekend."

"Right. This is just a thought, you guys can vote against it. Today, we come up with the schedule and start outlining what we're going to do for the project. On Thursday and over the weekend, we can focus on research, then next week, we can put our presentation together, and finally on the last class day we have, we rehearse so everything goes smoothly," I said without taking a breath.

"It's like you already had this planned up in that Einstein brain of yours, mate," Lucas smiled. "Sounds good to me."

"Yeah, I like that plan. Do you guys want me to write that up so we can refer back to it?" Alex got his notebook out of his backpack.

"You can, if you want," Lucas and I said in unison, then laughed considering that was the second time we had something in unison.

"It's like we have this weird telepathy link, kind of like Thomas and Teresa in Maze Runner," I told him.

Lucas laughed again. "Seems like it, doesn't it?"

Alex scoffed. "Oh my gosh, you two are disturbing."

"Why, mate? Just bonding. That's what you do when you become mates with others, right?"

I simply shook my head and told the others that we should get to work. For a few minutes, we actually made some serious progress until our teacher called me up to her desk after receiving a call from the office. I came quickly as she had a certain tone in her voice. "Yes, Ms. Spencer?"