Homeroom

24: Oh No

[A/N] Hiii guys :) Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Song for this chapter is Wonderland by Taylor Swift... I have a small obsession with her new album, can you tell? Lol :)

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"Aaron and Callie, sitting in tree. K.I.S.S.I.N.G.," Jillian yells from the sidewalk.

I peek around Aaron, my arms still wrapped around his neck. Jillian leans against the fence next to Luke, who's looking anywhere but at me. I force myself to release Aaron and approach Jillian.

"I ship it," she smirks, flicking her blonde hair behind her shoulder. Confidence practically radiates off every inch of her body.

I roll my eyes. "Gosh, please just stop."

She wiggles her eyebrows, nudging me in the ribs as she giggles. "Okay, fine."

"Okay, well, see you both later, I guess," I awkwardly say goodbye, "and thanks again, Luke."

His crystal blue eyes reach mine at once, widening in surprise. This is the moment where I'm fairly certain that an unsaid truce is being made. "Yeah, sure," he says after a moment, nodding at me as he coughs into his arm.

I surprised but also elated that things are finally calming down. It seems as though I can let go a bit and trust the people around me instead of continuing to push them away. Maybe, just maybe, things will be okay for once.

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"Hey, Shay," I greet her as I walk into math class on Monday morning.

She looks up from her notes and smiles. "Someone looks unusually happy."

I nod, setting my backpack down on the floor and sitting down in my seat. "You could say that."

"Care to explain why?"

I launch into a shortened version of what happened over the weekend. She eagerly gobbles up the information, gasping and awing at all the right places.

Somehow, I manage to squeeze the entire story into the two short minutes before class starts. Luckily, Luke seems to be absent, so he won't overhear any of our gossip.

"See, I told you Luke is a nice guy," she points out.

I roll my eyes. I seriously still think that he has a lot of flaws, but maybe he isn't 100 percent evil.

"You still can't date him. He's still with Karissa." I almost choke saying that name. I seriously cannot stand that girl.

"He dumped her a couple weeks ago, he's on the market now," she giggles.

I shoot her an odd look. "And how would you know that?"

She shrugs. "He doesn't sit with her at lunch anymore."

Only she would notice that.

The teacher passes out a worksheet for us to do, not really caring that we're talking about everything other than math.

"So what's your game plan? Are you going to ask him out?" I ask, writing my name at the top of the paper.

Shay rolls her eyes. "Yeah right. I know he has no interest in me."

"Then maybe I can get Aaron to talk you up to him."

She shakes her head. "That's just weird. I can't have your boyfriend telling him what a great person I am."

"Aaron is not my boyfriend."

"Sure, whatever you say," she sarcastically replies.

I huff, turning my attention to the work I was given. At least my math homework won't talk back to me.

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I sit down on the plastic chair next to Charlie at lunch, opening up the paper bag and pulling out my lunch. "Hi," I greet him, taking a bite of my sandwich.

"Hey," he replies, eyeing my food. "Hungry?"

I nod my head, my mouth filled with bread, ham, and cheese. I skipped breakfast this morning, which wasn't the wisest choice I ever made.

Charlie asks, "Why do you seem so cheerful? Did you win more insult battles?"

I shrug, sipping my water. "No, I'm just really happy with life, that's all."

"Happy," he repeats, raising an eyebrow. "That's a new one."

"Is it illegal for me to be happy or something?" I ask, playfully narrowing my eyes at him.

"No," Charlie quickly replies. "It's just... different. A good different, though."

"Well, good then."

We continue to talk about school stuff, which somehow leads back to Charlie talking about his bass. I end up nodding as he drones on and on about tuning it.

A sudden loud bang on our table makes me jump out of my seat. I turn to see an angry Zander hunched over our table, his palms pressed on the surface. His face has a giant, purplish-blue bruise on his jaw. I look at him with widen eyes, shocked by his anger.

"Don't start thinking that you won this one, Russe. I've never been one to back down from a challenge."

My heart drops to the pit of my stomach as he pushes himself off the table and turns to walk away. He stops in his tracks as he looks over his shoulder before turning all the way around. "Tell Aaron that I want a rematch. I'm coming for him, too."

And with that comment, he marches out the cafeteria doors. No one even bats in eye in his direction; it was as if he was never here.

"What the hell was that about?" Charlie asks, eyes wide with fear and curiosity.

"It's a long story, one that I don't want to get into right now," I say. "But I think I could use your help on this one."

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[A/N] Like I said, I'm ending this for the Wattys 2014, and I'm going to reopen it when the Wattys end! :) For the next couple months, this is the end but don't worry, I'm going to pick it back up really soon! Until then, peace out :)