Panels (A Teen Fiction)

Chapter 1

"And in order to calculate the square root of this equation, we must use the formula we learned about last week. It should..." Oh my god. He never stops! Mr. Edison, our math teacher, has me doodling comic book panels in my notebook about the unimportant-ness of math. That is how outstandingly boring his class is. It seems the clock is ticking so slowly, as if it never wants us to get out of this torture. It is 2:27, which means I have 3 more minuets of this crap lesson before I can leave this hell-hole known as school.

"Miss Johnston," The professor shouts. Literally, shouts. "I asked you a question!"

"What, what was the- I mean, what did you ask me?" A few of my classmates snicker. I especially notice the smirk on Alison's face. I hate her so much. The feeling is mutual.

"I asked you why don't you save the drawing for art class and actually pay attention for once?" The bell rings and he sighs. "For homework, please complete page 104-105 in your textbooks." I grab my binder, shove it in my bag and sling the bag over my shoulder. I rush out, remembering I am supposed to meet Emily at my locker.

Once I get there she is leaning against the wall texting. When she spots me she grins, waves and types a few final letters into her phone.

"Hey!" She says as I'm opening up my locker. "Anything new since biology?" We are lab partners, and we also have art and history together. I sigh, remembering the events that happened a few minuets ago in math class.

"Nothing much," I say, grabbing my pencil case and notebook. "Mr. Edison is being a jerk again, probably for his enjoyment. He loves to torture me." She chuckles and I manage a grin. "You are just plain mean." I say, laughing.

"Oh come on, Rae. You know you love me!" She says in a sing song voice. She called me Rae instead of Rachel because, and I am directly quoting her here, 'Rachel is such a lame name. Rae is more my style'.

"And also," She adds. "Want to head down to Juicy Crew and chat about our history project? I still don't know what I'm going to do for mine." And I smile, because I know that there will be no talk about history, just about Nathan Hutson, popular school geek. Not the actual nerdy type of geek, the geek who is into good grades and Call of Duty.

"Yeah, sure. Drinks are on you?"

"Nice try," She says. "No way am I spending my money on your $6 juice." We both grin and head towards the front doors.

"It was worth a try," I say, laughing. I text my mom telling her I'm going to Starbucks with Emily.

*

Me: going 2 starbucks with Em. will be home by 4. love ya, xoxo

Mom: Okay. Have fun.

*

Emily and I are out in the hot, sunny weather of California and we are almost at her car when I hear someone shout my name.

"Rachel! Rae! Hey, wait up!" We turn around and find none other than my ex-boyfriend, Taylor. I never really liked his name, anyways. It's really a girls name. Emily and I both groan, because if I hate him, she hates him.

"What do you want?" I shout, walking more towards the car. He dumped me for Alison, I guess maybe because she's super popular and all.

"I was just wondering, um," he reached up to the back of his head and rubbed it. "Would you maybe want to go out with me again?" I see. Now that Alison has dumped him he comes crawling back to me. I roll my eyes, Emily does too, and we swing open the car doors.

I get in, and before closing my door I say, "Forget it." Emily starts the ignition, cranks the AC and drives off to Juicy Crew.

"I literally cannot believe him." I say to her. When I look over at her, she looks just as pissed as I am. "Alison dumps him so he decides on me as his plan-B."

"I know! He's unbelievable." She says, checking her rear-view mirror. I feel as though she's plotting his demise, so I change the subject.

"How's your photography coming along?" I ask her, hoping she will forget about the Taylor thing. Her face lights up as she pulls into the Juicy Crew parking lot.

"I got some great shots of the beach last weekend, and I also updated my fansite." Emily is the kind of girl who seems like she should be into cheer, and, like, shopping and stuff. But in reality, she has this huge obsession over this TV show called 'New Light'. Also photography. Everyone has a passion. Mine is drawing. Hers is photography and binge watching TV. In fact, for someone who spends a lot of her time on the couch watching TV eating chips, she is in surprisingly good shape.

After we order our drinks and are sitting at a table with them, we start talking about my new comic I'm working on.

"How is it coming along?" She asks. I take a break from my spinach-pineapple-banana smoothie and give her a thumbs up.

"Good," I say. "The main character is a girl named Emily. I named her after you." She beams.

"Really?" She says, grinning.

"No, her name's Tori. You're so gullible!" I say, laughing. She laughs with me, smiling.

"Oh my god, Rae! You got my hopes up!" I could tell it was a genuine smile, because the corners of her eyes crinkled.

"Eh, you never know, maybe I will name another main character after you in my next comic." I hear the door chime, but pay no attention to it.

"Rae, omygosh." She says in a hushed voice.

"What?" I say, my voice at normal volume.

"Don't look now, but Nathan Hutson just walked in." Of course, since she added 'don't look', it is my natural instinct to turn my head and look. And then I make eye contact and turn away. Now I know why they call it eye 'contact'.

"Rae! What part of 'don't look' don't you understand?" I shrug.

"That's like saying 'don't look now, but there's a dinosaur behind you.' A really hot dinosaur." She laughs, and I slurp the last of my drink through my straw and, since Emily is already done, we throw out our cups and leave.

After getting one last look at Nathan, of course.