Fawkes

Rubber Bands and Sweaty Hands

The week went on, and at school I got closer with Dick. We didn't even discuss it, we just were friends now. I realized that he wasn't playing a trick on me, and I no longer had to eat lunch under the staircase with Finley. Speaking of, the girl had missed a few days of school, but I learned not to be worried, because that was just how she rolled.

Classes were mostly boring, except instead of tormenting Dick in math, we joked around. I mean, I still challenged him, but it was like friends do. It was odd how easily we switched from enemies to what we were now. In Spanish we no longer glowered at each other, and even in Digital Media he'd roll his chair over to my group to tell me some stupid thing that Tony Doffer, a greasy boy with an IQ in the negatives, said or did.

In all honesty, I didn't have the energy to be cautious of him, as I was sleeping even less than usual due to paranoia. I could not stop thinking about Cobblepot in the alley and Batman being suspicious about the Joker. Every time I closed my eyes I dreamed of him breaking out of Arkham and snatching me. I hadn't even got a wink of sleep for an entire week, and I was beginning to malfunction.

"You look like hell." Artemis watched as I plunked myself in the seat next to her in Math class, rubbing my swollen eyes and trying to keep my haywire hair from my face.

"You sure know how to flatter," I said dryly, slamming my books onto my desk a little dramatically as the blonde chuckled.

It was Wednesday morning, exactly a week from when Robin and I won the scavenger hunt. We did get to run training on Friday, but considering Wally was being an extra big turd that day, all we did was try to hit him with different rotten fruits as he ran around the training room. Note to Self: Artemis has a really good arm.

We hadn't gotten very far in terms of the whole Bot situation, but we did have another mission last Saturday, which turned out to be another false lead. We were wondering if the Bots just went off the grid, but if I'm being perfectly candid, we knew better. They were up to something.

The first bell had only just rung, so Artemis and I were two of the only ones in class at that moment. The others that were seated around were the eager ones who were already doing work. I leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes as Artemis rambled on about some girl named Bette Kane who was in a lot of her classes. I spaced out after awhile, but opened my eyes again when the second bell sounded.

More people had filled up the class, and Artemis was just finishing a story on how this Bette girl stole her project idea for History class.

"She's the devil's spawn, I swear."

"She doesn't seem all that bad." I yawned, "I mean, considering you never really said that you wanted to do that for your project, I don't really know if that's actually stealing—"

"Shut up, yes it is." Artemis crossed her arms and I laughed, sitting up properly and peering around the classroom.

"Ever shot an apple off someone's head?" I turned to Artemis, sudden excitement in my eyes.

"What?" She narrowed her eyes as if she knew I was up to something. "No . . ."

A grin broke out onto my face and I fished into my back for the Granny Smith that was to be my lunch for that day.

"Think you can shoot elastic bands like you shoot arrows?"

Thirty seconds later and I was stood up in front of the class, an apple on my head as the class gathered around me and Artemis. Dick was standing on a desk and held his hand up to silence the class. I caught the eye contact of Barbara Gordon and winked at her as she shook her head at me with an amused look on her face.