Old Flames Die Hard

Chapter One

"Is trigonometry too easy for you, Miss Mercer?" Miss Roberts asks impatiently. My head shoots up from my desk and I try to focus on the board.

No, trig is not easy for me. In fact, I'm not sure how it's legal to be teaching it at a High School.

"No ma'am." I reply.

I've learned that when it comes to Miss Roberts, short and concise replies are best.

"Then would you mind lifting your head off the desk and paying attention?" she asks, eyebrow raised.

"I would not mind at all."

"Good. Now as I was saying before, the sine of a triangle can be found by using the cosine..."

My mind blurs her out again as I continue to compete with my eyes. It's becoming harder and harder to stay awake as the school year goes on. I'm just so glad Christmas Break is 1 week away. Yes! Today's Friday too, I get a whole weekend!

I don't get much sleep at night. On top of cheer which takes up time before and after school every day, games on weekends, and away games which take me away from school, I'm also trying to pass high school without pulling out every single strand of hair on my head. Not only this, I'm also trying to keep boys OUT of my high school experience.

With my mind on this subject, one name rings itself in my ears. Thomas. Thomas. Over and over again. I try not to think about him, but it's like asking myself not to think about a pink zebra. I think about a pink zebra. Not that Thomas is like a pink zebra, in fact, he's much taller than a zebra. And his hair is brown, not black. His eyes are a beautiful hazel green, not black. His face isn't horizontal, its perfect. Did I mention his face is literally perfect?

Stop! You did it again!

I pull out my notebook, pencil, and begin to attempt to draw what Mrs. Roberts has written on the whiteboard. My mind keeps wandering to the constant buzzing and vibrating that is coming from my phone. The football players and the cheerleaders have a group chat, which literally never stops.

I lift my phone and see Hailey Johannes texted, "Sure, when?". Below her message, my phone reads "107 other messages". From the same chat. I unlock my phone, go into the chat, and turn my alerts from that chat off.

Finally, I can focus on trig.

The school bell rings for class to be over.

"Don't forget you have 2 pages of your trigonometry homework due the next time I see you next week on Monday! Use the student's resources page on canvas!" Miss Roberts yells over the chaos of 28 kids leaving their desks.

2 pages? I can't even do a single problem. I'll just have to copy the answer key. Again.

I shove my books into my backpack and hurry out of class. One more second in there and I'm going to explode.

"Hey Tay!" Abby calls after me. I look and see all my friends standing in a circle. I wave and join them.

My friend group is huge. The cliché group of Senior football, basketball, and wrestling boys combined with senior cheerleaders, drill team, and student body officers, basically sums it up. It's nice to have lots of friends in all of my classes, but it also makes me feel like I have to fight to even be seen.

Who knew the more friends I had, the more invisible I'd feel.

"Are you dead? You didn't text at all last class period." Davis asks as he folds his arms, making his huge football biceps bulge out of his skin. Davis is like a brother to me, since my real one is such a pain. We've gone through all of Junior High and High School together. I guess you could say the world couldn't break our relationship.