Second lesson soon comes: Science.
The bell rings, so Rachel and I walk to science together. We soon discover we have a real quirky teacher.
"Hi class! I'm Mrs Wilde, and I'm gonna be your teacher for the rest of the year!" she explains enthusiastically.
Something tells me she's gonna be my favourite teacher.
"Okay, class. Today – and I know this sounds mean – I need to get an idea of your starting grades. So, you're going to be doing a school project."
Okay a school project. She's a little less my favourite now.
"You'll be working in partners."
Great! I can work with Rachel! Yes!
"Which I will allocate."
Damn ... Thanks, Miss.
Without thinking, I sight out loud, regretting it instantly after.
"Something wrong, Miss Costello?" Mrs Wilde turns on me.
My head shakes frantically. "No, nothing wrong at all," I smile sweetly. I'm unsure about how convincing that sounded.
"Okay!" she smiles, once again a little too enthusiastically.
"Okay, so, the partners are: Elliott Sikes with Kat Banks, Samantha Sullivan with Andrew Matthews. Rachel Scarlettson with Abbi Walters. Michael Jackson with Becky Costello."
It's almost laughable that I knew this would happen. Why does this keep happening to me? This is absolutely ridiculous!
"No Miss! You've got that wrong, please!" I cry, already knowing – once again – that it's not wrong at all.
Looking behind me at Michael, I notice he also looks angry at it. He doesn't want to work with me just as much as I don't want to work with him.
Miss walks over to me. "Calm down, Miss Costello," she says with a smile. "What's wrong with your partner?" she asks.
Now I'm wishing I hadn't spoken; I don't wanna answer this.
"Becky?" she repeats.
Not wanting to give in, I sigh, trying to think of an excuse. "Uh ... personal reasons."
Miss smiles, as if trying to change my mind of convince me, somehow. "Give it one chance, okay? And if you don't like it, just come to me, okay?" she suggests. Her tone is really sweet; enough to shut me up.
"One chance," I say with a sigh.
She smiles and addresses the class. "Okay, that's sorted then. You can start your projects now if you wish," she says.
Ha, no! I'm not spending more time with Michael than I need to.
I glance angrily behind me at Michael, finding that he's glaring at me rather menacingly. But his eyes lessen my anger, somehow.
How? I don't know.
Everyone in the class moves to their partner, leaving Michael and myself. I'm sitting at the front of the class; Michael at the back.
Looking around the room, I take note of everything around me. Posters about chemicals; the periodic table; biology; physics. All that stuff.
I turn to Mrs Wilde. "What should I do?"
She looks at me, pausing a moment to think of some ideas herself. "You could start your project alone. Or you could look at what other people are doing; get some inspiration."
"I don't like talking to people I don't know," I admit.
Mrs Wilde smiles at me, as if empathising with me. "Oh, I understand. The whole first-day-nerves thing, where you don't wanna talk to anyone," she says.
I'll go with that. It's more a case of "I can't be bothered".
"Yeah ... " I eventually respond.
Then, she looks up at the clock. "Well, there's still a long time until the lesson ends. Maybe you should do something," she suggests politely.
I look at the clock to find that there's still half an hour to go until the lesson ends. When she walks away, I decide to draw the solar system. It starts with the sun; I draw little rays of light for no apparent reason. Then, I move on to Earth. The blue planet with green splodges.
For some reason I decide to skip out most of the other planets, going right ahead to Saturn. The rings are drawn first, and because they're oval-shaped, I draw an oval on my page.
Ten minutes later, it's an eye. A deep one, at that. Mentally slapping myself for not focusing on the work, I glance behind me, at Michael. He's working on his own drawing. However, he must see me out of the corner of his eye, as he looks up at me.
Look away, Becky. Don't make eye contact with him. Turn away before he can look at you for too long
My head whips back around, and I looks down my paper, examining the drawing of the eye that I've made.
Oh, damn ... Now I get it.
I've drawn Michael's eye.
-Edited December 10, 2016-
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You Ain't Bad || Michael Jackson
Fanfiction[Michael Jackson Fanfiction Awards winner 2016.] Bad Era - 1987. Becky Costello is a young adult in college. At this college is a ruthless gang known as The Jax. Breathe on them and you're in their debt - that's how much they mean business. When a n...
