The Bad Ass And The Geek

Chapter 1

Quickly stuffing my science booklet in my bag, I glanced around the room to see everyone gawping at me, as I had just raised my hand for the first time since.. well forever I think. It wasn't a particularly hard question, part of me just thought it was time for a change. Well that part of me has completely disappeared now, I can't be doing with everyone staring at me like this. I feel my cheeks heating up ferociously and blushing a bright tomato red. Throwing my bag over my shoulder, I speed walked out of the room, trying not to make it obvious that I was embarrassed and wanted to get out the room as quickly as possible, without anyone questioning me. I jumped as I felt someone nudge me in the ribs, turning around to see who it was, I realized it was just my best friend, Rachel.

"Has the tortoise finally come out of her shell?" she asked, looking like she was on the edge of breaking into tears of laughter.

"Hey! It's not funny! It was humiliating, you know, with everyone staring at me like that!" I looked down at my feet and shook my head.

"Come on Megs, cheer up! It wasn't that bad, I promise! Anyway all the boys were looking at you for once. At least you got something out of it." She nudged me again and winked at me and laughed softly to herself.

"You know I'm not interested in boys Rach!" I laughed and pulled tongues at her. She raised her eyebrow at me, and shook her head gently,

"Do you know who didn't take his eyes of you the whole time though?"

I gave her a weird look and questioned myself if I should even ask, but I did anyway.

"James. James was staring at you non-stop all the way through that lesson." She wiggled her eyebrows at me and nudged me again.

I thought about this for a while. He wasn't particularly popular, more popular than me but still. Plus, he wasn't exactly a fitty, if that's what you would call a good looking person, I'm still not sure about the whole thing about boys. Then again, I'm not a fitty either, so I'm not one to talk. He is obviously taller than me, it's not exactly hard to be taller than me, but he isn't too tall either. He even has basically the same colour hair as me just a bit darker, which is shaped perfectly over his face and carefully covered one eye, which he brushes out the way occasionally when he can't see and...

"MEGAN!"

I jump out of my skin, almost literally.

I focus my eyes to see Rachel staring at me right in the face , carefully scanning my eyes as if to try and figure me out.

"Fuck Rachel, you scared me half to death! No need to shout!"

"I said your name 5 times Megan! You were completely in a world of you own... Wait... You were thinking about James weren't you?" A smirk emerged on her face.

"Yes... Wait, no I mean no. I wasn't." I felt my face go red. I looked down at my watch only too try and hide my beetroot red cheeks. 10:15am. My brain clicked. I was late! 10 minutes late to be precise! I couldn't get in trouble!

"Shit Rachel! I'm late! Why didn't you tell me! I can't be humiliated again and get told off for being late!" She stared at me blankly and shrugged her shoulders.

"Okay, whatever. Catch you later chick. Day dream about James some more!" I stared at her annoyingly, told her to shut up and said I'd see her later.

Speed walking down the corridors, as I wasn't going to break the rule of No Running In The Corridors, I passed a few teachers who gave me weird looks probably because i was late. After another 5 minutes, I reached

the door of my next lesson. English. My favourite lesson by far, mainly because of the reading and Shakespeare books we looked at. I looked down at my watch again. Gawping at it, I saw that it read 10:21am. I was most definitely going to get told off, 16 minutes late! Standing on my tip-toes I peered through the window on the door. My class was already reading Romeo And Juliet without me. I felt my heart sink inside. I loved that book. Taking a deep breath, I opened the door. Great. More people staring at me. That made it twice within the space of 20 minutes. The worst part was to come though. Now I was going have to explain to the teacher, in front of the whole class, including James why I am late to the lesson. Wait, why am I scared of speaking in front of James? Mr. Harlington looked at me once and must have seen how traumatized I looked, because he just nodded at me and pointed to my seat with saying a word. I swear I'm going to have to make this up to him someday.

30 minutes into the lesson and we were reading out parts of the Shakespeare book, Romeo And Juliet. Perfect, I absolutely love reading out loud in front of everyone. Not. Mr. Harrington was going around the tables asking people to read out a section at a time. I glanced down at my book and counted how many sections there were. 32. Looking around the room, trying to make it discreet, I counted people in the class to see what section number i was. 18. Right, okay. Better practice in my head. I wasn't even into my second practice of the section when I felt as if somebody was watching me from across the class room. I looked out the corner of my eye, but I couldn't see anything, so I turned around. You would never guess who was looking right at me, right into my eyes as if he was looking right through me. Yep, James. I tried to hold eye contact with him, as if to say starting is rude you know, but he wouldn't drop his gaze. He had his arm dropped over his chair and was slouched, but not too much, and he has his other hand resting on the book which wasn't even open. I glanced back up to him again. His blue eyes piercing my blue eyes. His eyes were like the ocean , as if within one look at them and you could be swept away, lost at sea. Lost in his eyes...

"Megan?" Mr. Harlington asked me. "Are you okay? You look quite flushed."

My hand reached up to my cheek immediately, and sure enough, it was as hot as the sun. Well not literally but very hot. I stole a quick look at James, only to seem him smirking at me. He raised his eyebrow at me. I felt my cheeks burn even more. I nodded at Mr. Harlington quickly and buried my face in the book. This day couldn't get any worse.

3:20pm. The bell had just gone and I was running through the corridors this time, not worrying if I got caught. I couldn't risk bumping into James and him asking me why I had gone red when he was looking at me. I just couldn't. I wouldn't know how to answer, because to be honest, I don't even know why I went red myself.

Clambering onto the bus, I threw my bus fare into the little dish and squashed down onto the seat next to Rachel.

"What's up? You look flustered." Rachel looked into my eyes and she actually looked concerned.

"It's James." I said. 2 words. Just those 2 words made Rachel become fully concerned and her eyes widened.

"Shit. What happened?" I explained to her about how I was late for my English lesson, and how he kept staring at me and how he made me got bright red, the way he raised his eyebrows and me and smirked. I left out the bit about his eyes being like the ocean though, she would think I had a crush on him. Do I?

My phone buzzed and vibrated in my pocket. I pulled out my BlackBerry Curve carefully. Who could it be, nobody ever texted me other than Rachel, and she doesn't need to because she's right next to me. Typing in my password to unlock it, my heart was racing faster than normal for some unknown reason, I clicked the BBM icon. I could feel Rachel's breath on my neck as she watched me over my shoulder. It said "Contact Request From James". I looked at Rachel and she was looking at me already, my eyes widened and I could feel the panic rising inside me. My hands started shaking. How did he get my pin? What's he going to ask me? What does he want? Do I like him? As In crush? Does he have a crush on me? My mind started swirling with many questions. Without thinking, I accepted the request. Rachel opened her mouth and stared at me,

"Oh. My. God."