The Ripple Effect

Day Two

Acacia Taylor woke on the morning of December 2nd to the sound of her mother waking her up and instructing her to begin her morning routines. In response to her mother, the young girl slugged out of bed, yawned, and officially began the day. Today was the second day of the semester at her school. Life seemed to begin to go uphill for the poor girl after constantly dishing out terrible slices of news. Her father recently found a new job after being fired from his previous one just days before and thanks to the new seating chart for her biology class, she was now put right next to her high school crush, Daniel Wright.

Daniel was an attractive young man with short brown hair, freckled white skin, and a personality that was hard to hate. The boy had a somewhat good set of morals and was almost never one to do something out of spite or hatred. As far as Acacia was concerned, Daniel Wright was the definition of perfect. No matter how she looked at him she was incapable of finding a flaw of any kind in her image of the boy. Shocked with excitement that she would soon be able to be by his side for an entire class period, Acacia stood up and began her morning routines.

She first picked out an outfit for the day, consisting of jeans and a long sleeved shirt along with a cotton overshirt to keep her warm in the cold weather, then went to go make breakfast. Breakfast today, as was almost every day, was a self-made bowl of cereal which Acacia finished quickly before brushing her teeth and getting her backpack. After she grabbed her bag, Acacia sat in the car, and waited for her mother to be woken up by her second alarm so that she would drive her to school.

When she got to school, Acacia reminded her mother the time that she wanted to be picked up at then left the vehicle and began eagerly walking to her first class. Acacia was normally dropped off at school exactly when school was to begin, but she didn't mind this as her one friend was normally late to school to begin with; leaving her with no one to "hang out" with before school started. Today, however, she had arrived a tad earlier than usual and being driven by excitement and natural tendency, she ended up sitting in her spot in biology minutes before the bell for first period even rung. The classroom was cold and quiet with Acacia being the only person in the room. Her spot in class was in the far back corner of the room. The room was divided into three columns of tables, making up the five rows. Each table had a black top much like every science room throughout the school.

"What brings you to class so early, Miss Taylor?" Acacia's biology teacher, Mr. Scott, asked upon seeing her already sitting in her place when he arrived.

"What do you mean?" Acacia asked, cluelessly, taking a second to realize that the class had yet to begin for the day.

"Acacia," Mr. Scott began, "There's still five minutes until the bell rings."

"Five..." Acacia started to herself before looking up at the clock in the room and realizing the time. "Oh my. My apologies, sir, I wasn't paying attention to my surroundings. I'm used to my mother always dropping me off at the last possible moment so I instinctually came to class," Acacia said, slightly embarrassed.

"It's no trouble," Mr. Scott said, chuckling to himself, "I was just surprised to see you here early is all."

With the leftover time that she had from being early for once in her life, Acacia took out a small paperback book and resumed reading from where she had last left off while she waited for the bell to ring. The five minutes left before class began flew by relatively quickly, as before Acacia knew it the bell rung. When she heard the bell ring over the intercom, Acacia casually put away her book and got out her supplies for class. It didn't take long for students to begin walking in and, most importantly, for Daniel to arrive and take his place next to Acacia