"Hey, Aurelia!"
"Hi, Julie!"
"What's up, Aurelia?"
"Hi, Jack!"
"Hi, Aurelia!"
"Hey, Brianna."
This was how Aurelia's school mornings normally went. People greeting her, and her greeting them. It was simple, she had no friends, but that didn't mean that nobody liked her. In fact, most of the kids in her school admired her even though she had just started high school. They thought she was pretty, smart, and talented as far as they knew. There was no one they would rather represent their gifted community.
She never invested in friendships, though. She was invited to many events, but never attended any. The closest she got to hanging out with people outside of school were events for the school. Even then she wouldn't spend time with her classmates.
The truth was, she was afraid of getting hurt. She didn't want to damage her mind, so the best way for her to do that was to focus on her work, not her relationships. She firmly believed that any friends of hers would dump her eventually for her loud mouth and basic inability to stop talking once set on a topic.
"Good morning, Aurelia."
"Hi, Ms. Baker."
...
"Aurelia, can you demonstrate with the hurdles? I don't think anyone was paying attention except for you." The old gym teacher said, clearly exhausted with her job.
"Yes, of course. Yeah, yeah. Do you... uh... want me to do of them?" She asked, looking at her teacher with her arms crossed.
"If you want to."
"Alright, okay. Thanks." Aurelia replied, everyone falling silent as she lined up behind the hurdles. Carefully, she positioned one foot behind the other, twisting the back foot a little as she tried to root it. She placed her hands on the warm, red surface of the track, preparing to run. She put her head down for a second before picking it back up and starting to run.
One by one, she cleared the hurdles. One jump after another, she seemed to fly over them with her athletic abilities.
Once they were all cleared, Aurelia stopped to catch her breath. Her classmates clapped and cheered from behind her, even though most had seen her do the same exact thing practically millions of times.
She started the trek back to the team, staring at the buildings that bordered the field. The teacher started to lecture them again, most likely criticizing Aurelia's front leg: it never seemed to be straight enough for her.
When she got back into the circle, one of her teammates, approximately a year or two older than her, put his arm around her shoulders. He nudged her a bit before releasing her. Aurelia had no clue why he had done it, but she was interested. Liam, or whatever his name was, wasn't necessarily bad looking. She had always preferred the guys from track over the guys from football, after all. Actually, she preferred no guys, for that matter.
That wasn't true and she knew it, though. She had a soft spot for cute nerds. The shy ones that don't speak unless spoken to. She remembered her first and only crush in seventh grade. It was minor, and she got over it, but it was quite a monumental time for her. He had freckles and wispy blond hair. He was attractive, but a huge history nerd.
Liam's gesture was appreciated. A little bit of social interaction never hurt anyone, especially Aurelia.
...
At lunch, Aurelia worked on hanging up a banner that read "Upland High School" across the cafeteria. It was one that she had helped the graphic design students make, and it had the new school logo on it.
