Don't Trip Up: Chapter One

Don’t Trip Up
By R.W. Zaire

{size:4I.Wan.na.Talk.A.bout.Me
My name's Drew Horn. Kind of on the short side, dirty-blond hair just past my shoulders, gray-blue eyes... The usual. I know, I sound so cliché — except for the being short part — but let me tell you... I'm not. Far from it, actually. One being: I'm crazy. I'm wild. And I'm shy.
Huh? Still cliché? Well, I can't help that, for, cliché or not, I'm real. I'm real, my friends are real, everyone in this is real. So don’t go and be sayin’, “Too many personality traits. Such a fake.” If you do, I swear I will hunt you down, tear you limb from limb, then discreetly push you into a boiling conundrum of stinging acid. Hm? Conundrum isn’t the right word? Oops. Well, I never said I was exactly smart… when it comes to vocabulary. I'm very intellectual, really; just not... clued in. Yeah, whatever. I'm ramblin' again, ain't I? Yeah? Oh, then, I'm just gonna keep rambling because you bug me. Yeah, I'm just mean like tha—
Wha'? I think my dog just planted a bomb on top of my television. Gim'me a few seconds, 'kay? Gotta disable it before it blows a hole in my wall — that'll let the birds in. Birds just seem to love me for some reason... Well, catch ya later, dude; adios; aloha. Whatever's your savvy, I'm out. Uh... wait. Yeah. Buh-bye. Or, not really. If you're not too creeped out, I guess you can keep on readin'. But eh. Now, I swear I'm going... Right.



She.Ain't.Right
“Miss Horn!” came the thunderous bellow. It was like a hundred hungry wolves giving chase to their prey, with impossible ferocity. It was like the infuriated roars of a terrible dragon, flames erupting from its maw to scorch an intruder. It was like… Mr. Washburn.
I jolted up in surprise, my back pressing against the plastic seat. My gray-blue eyes went wide, the fear Mr. Washburn coursing through me. Yeah, I was actually afraid of my teacher -- everyone was. Mr. B. was… terrifying. He was like an army sergeant, muscles ripping up his arms and bulging through his shirt. His hair was cropped in a buzz cut, gleaming eyes set on a plain surface for maximum glareage.
“Miss Horn, sit up straight and stop talking over there!” Mr. Washburn shouted, his muscular hands tightening around the ruler he gripped. If it wasn’t against the law, I almost would have been afraid that he was gon’na hit me with it — ooh, he looked so angry. The expression on his face: Priceless. I’m sorry to say, but it — was — freaking — hilarious, despite the horror bursting within me.
“Smooth one, Drew,” my ‘shoulder partner’ giggled through a cupped hand. “You sleep-talk loudly.” I glared at the speaker from the corner of my right eye, though keeping my other firmly locked on Mr. Washburn. When the large English teacher turned away to resume speaking, his knuckles white as he rapped the ruler against his desk for emphasis, I turned my head to address the young lady sitting beside me, elegance dripping from every word:
“Shut the heck up, Leah.”
Oh, yes, so elegant; so polite! I was just the model of perfection, a gorgeous little angel! Can you see my halo, my sparkling halo? No? It’s a little crooked? Uh… oops. Gim’me a sec to fix that. Yeah… Right — there! Huh? It went out? Drats. Eh, whatever.
“Someone’s perky today,” Leah giggled, flashing an innocent grin. And hell, she sure did look innocent. Her white-blond hair was tied up in a gorgeous ponytail, each strand of hair bound precisely in an ivory hair-scrunchy. It was like the kind that everyone in first grade just had to wear, or else they were out of the ring. Leah, though, managed to pull it off — she was a truly beautiful girl, just very… sarcastic. All the time, too.
“I didn’t sleep at all last night,” I grumbled in reply, slouching down in my seat and resting my chin on a clenched fist. And when I say that I hadn’t slept at all, then I meant it. I slept like a freaking Snow White after she’d been poisoned, not waking until the head phones stuffed in my ears fell out and let my blaring alarm clock fill my head with its senseless ringing. So if I woke up at all, then that means I never even went to sleep. Yeah, pretty bad, I know. But that’s me for ya!
“Mom and John fightin’ again?” Leah queried, her sarcasm ebbing away a bit. She mimicked my posture, stooping forward and supporting her pale face on the palm of her right hand. “Or was it your Granny June and Mom arguing this time?”
I resisted the urge to cuss loudly. Leah knew me too freaking well. I wanted to keep my troubles and stresses secret — which meant that I didn’t want this person to know about them. I hated it when people treated me different based on how I was feeling; it was just so much easier when my friends and acquaintances figured I had simply had a bad night and thought no more of it.
“Both. And my Nanny and Mom. Nanny threatened to move out if Mom didn’t stop drinking so much. So then Mom, all drunk and crap, practically cracked her skull open on the wall when she tried to grab Nanny,” I admitted, heaving a long sigh and sinking down into pity. Not self-pity, because I wasn’t all sorry for myself, but rather pity towards my screwed up family.
“I’m sorry, Drew,” Leah mumbled quickly, ducking over to me and grasping me in a quick hug. Before Mr. B. could spot us, she pulled back to her own desk, pretending to busily scrawl down some notes. I melted into the embrace, enjoying the fact that someone was comforting me instead of visa-versa.
I was a shrink to my friends, practically. Every time one of my galfriends had their dicky boyfriends break up with them or cheat on them, they came crying to me. Whenever one of them was having troubles at home, they confided in me. If one of them was pissed off at a certain girl — cough cough — they ranted off my ear. Yup, they all came to me for every—freaking—thing. Anyways…
Just as I was beginning to doze back off yet again, finding comfort in the abyss of the swirling vortex that made up my mind, Mr. Washburn turned on me, malice glimmering in his dark blue eyes. “Well, Miss Horn, since I see you have been paying close attention all bell, can you tell me if this—” he paused to scrawl an utterly confusing sentence on the olive chalkboard— “is a…” Mr. B. hesitated when he noticed a small, bouncy girl waving her arms about, trying to get his attention.
“Muh-iss-tuh-er Wuh-sah-Buh-urn!” the student practically shouted when he trained his narrowing eyes upon her. “Dashanté’s flicking you off!” When anger crept into Mr. Washburn’s glowering orbs and fury contorted his face into a mask of unadulterated rage, she smirked in satisfaction and shot me a look as soon as our professor turned away towards the door. ’You’re welcome,’ she mouthed with a gleeful grin.
’Thanks,’ I managed to form, my full lips sluggish in doing so as fatigue slowly began to overwhelm me. I then twisted my head a bit, craning my neck to peer over a surprisingly tall male’s head, and joined the rest of the class in observing with hungry eyes as Mr. Washburn flung open the door.
Mr. Washburn had to restrain himself physically from seizing up Dashanté and flinging him straight down the hall. Instead, he lunged forward, grabbed the dark-skinned boy by the arm rather… gently, and began marching him straight down the hall. One of the monitors — a fair-faced, blond-haired woman — quickly noted both of them and jogged into our room to supervise us.
“Happens every week,” she sighed as our questioning eyes probed her rather calm outlook. “Feel free to chat amongst yourselves, class. Washburn will be a while, as you all should know by now. What I cannot believe is that you students actually gave the guts to flip him the bird week after week and not be intimidated by his very powerful presence.”
A couple of us gave strained laughter to this lady that few of us knew, then shifted our desks and bodies about to wrangle some seats beside our friends. Even in the small residence, I could easily pick out the different cliques. We were a very diverse group of eighth graders in this class, so there was a little of everything.
The preps, of course, had gathered in the center of the room, forming a protective ring around their gorgeous “leader”, as my friends and I preferred to refer to the tall, graceful girl. They glared at any outsider who dared approach them, then proceeded to whisper betwixt their circle about that intruder.
I was one of those unfortunate enough to have to pass by the preps, crossing the room to get to my own clumping acquaintances. “Hey, Drew Horny,” a voice sounded at my back when I made to sit down with my friends. I heaved a long, exasperated — and annoyed — sigh. ’Don’t react… Don’t react… Don’t react…’
“I thought it was Drew Hore?” a second prep commented. I could feel their thirsty eyes boring deep rivulets into my skull, just waiting for me to twirl about and start cussing them out. I didn’t, though — and so the mocking continued.
“Oh, that’s a good one…,” the first mused, frowning in thought. She turned to consult with the Queen Prep, I heard, and a silence fell over the group.
“Drew Horny,” was the final decision. The single phrase pulsated with strength and control, that which was needed to keep all of her “minions” in check and push off those not pretty and blond — yeah, all of them were blondes. From where I sat, facing the opposite direction of them, it was obvious that she was Mary Hendrix. Even her name was pretty, gosh damn it! I envied her beautiful looks and her perfectly straight hair; her outgoing personality and look-on-the-bright-side attitude.
But that’s not the point. The point is that this last slap at my surname lit my extremely short fuse. It freaking pissed me off, in simpler terms for y’all that ain’t really too smart. So, saying that, you can probably get what was slowly stirring inside of me when I stood up with careful precision. I slid my desk away a couple inches, shoving it against Leah’s. I picked up my feet, black-with-skulls shoes gliding nimbly across the room until I was facing one of the shorter, more delicate preps. As I probably mentioned before, I wasn’t too tall, and the more highly-standing girls freaked me out… just a bit, though.
“Look’s like Horny’s finally sticking up for herself,” the girl before me cooed, flicking my forehead with a long, red fingernail. And that was when the fuse completely wore down and ignited the smoky black bomb…
Wham. I pulled back my fist, knuckles going pale as I curled my fingers to my palm. And then I lunged forward, my palm facing up, and made a direct path right for Prep Numero Uno’s face. I grinned in satisfaction at her terrified shriek as she reeled back, but I had already stopped, my arm not even fully extended. “Don’t call me ‘Drew Horny‘. Or ‘Hore’ for that matter. Actually, on third thought, don’t call me anything. Just back off,” I said, choking out these words between held-back giggles. Letting my arm fall back to my side, I pivoted on my heel and strolled back to my dearest friends.
“Nice one, Drew,” Leah giggled, glancing at the preps from the corner of her eyes. She slapped me a quick, ritual high-five as I sat down, but didn’t dare pursue the topic any further in fear that Queen Prep would hear her. “Where’s Sam?”
“Wheee!” a sudden voice practically shouted as she endeavored to scoot her desk towards us, devouring the floor little by little beneath the metallic legs of the chair. I smirked a bit, recognizing this immature girl as my earlier savior from Mr. Washburn’s wrath. This was Sam for those of you who fail to understand the chronology of it all.
“Hey, Clay-Clay,” I greeted. Sam was a very small, petite teenager. Her legs were of fair length, but her torso was quite short. She had lanky arms, also. Oh, and some short, recently cut blond hair to top it off. My little friend here never wore black… gray… or anything remotely dark. She showed off retro-colored striped shirts, sporting bright pink blouses and tangerine-hued shirts. Sometimes she was drabbed in horrendous clothing, like that blue poncho-thingy, but she had her own style for sure. Ah, did I mention her giant head, too? No? Well, she does. And I mean a freaking huge head, at that!
“Drewy, who’s that?” Sam asked with a childish smirk as she raised the smallest hand I had ever seen. Sam’s finger protruded awkwardly and sliced through the air as she jabbed in the direction of a stoic young man. A handsome, stoic, young man at that. And, like Sam’s finger, he stood tryingly. Unutterably so, as I failed to mention in that last sentence. But still… his face was a mask, his whole trim figure a porcelain statue.
“I don’t know,” said I as my fingers grappled the perpetual presence of my perfunctory pencil. It was always there, sitting right beside my books and eternally at ready. Okay, it was kind of silly for me to find comfort in a freaking pencil, but that was just me. It was my buddy. Hell, I even named this specific utensil… Phillip. Then again, I named everything Phil. Well, not everything. But you get the picture. Or do you?
“He’s cuh-yute!” Leah whispered into my ear. Sam, overhearing the two words, nodded vigorously in agreement. The two girls continued to converse for a few minutes, discussing whether the guy was new, had been promoted from the seventh grade, or was just changing classes and everything. I, though, excluded myself from the discussion and took to staring at him with such intensity that I, myself, was confused by whatever I wanted to see. Another heartbeat, I dashed my eyes down and gave my bit of opinion into the conversation:
“He’s new. He’s carrying around his backpack and everything. If he jumped up a grade, he’d still have a locker, and if he was switching classes… same thing. Therefore he is new.”
The two femmes stared at me in aghast horror. “No! We’ve lost her!” Sam shouted with the most embarrassing air of drama. She sprang to her feet suddenly, and then crumpled to the ground as if what I had said burned her physically. “We’ve lost her, Tray-y! We’ve lost her — lost her to…” She paused to add horrid suspense to her whole play. “The intellectuals!”
“Good, Lord,” I sighed, sinking down as laughter broke from the surrounding teenagers. I whipped my notebook off of my desk, cracked it open, and buried my nose in it, pretending to busy myself with the peculiar words I seemed to be always scrawling down. I wasn’t, though; rather, I was struggling to tune out the show that Sam was further putting on.
However, a single word broke through the walls I was slowly constructing: “Hey.” But who said it with such confidence, in such a tone that seemed to make flowers wilt and my gray clothes turn vibrant pink? Queen Preppy.
I raised my head as the laughter that overtook the room halted in an abrupt second. Sam had even paused her little skit to stare at the beautiful girl that uttered words to anyone but her little minions. The… freaking… apocalypse… was coming.
But then we all realized just who she had spoken to. Queen Preppy had her sapphire blue eyes trained on the new kid, of course; who else would she even cast a glance at?
“My name’s Mary. There we have Emily and Kansas and Alee,” Queen Preppy, or Mary if that’s your savvy, continued. “Why don’t you sit with us?”
Ugh! No! She had him! And he was so cute, too! But no, soon his heart would be devoured by Queen Preppy and his mind taken over by Preppy Minions…
The boy made no effort to move from where his legs were planted. He regarded Queen Preppy with critical eyes, then quickly flicked over the rest of the Preppy Minions. As he observed the rest of the room and their wide eyes, he shook his head. Snapping his eyes back to Mary, he said coolly, “I don’t associate with bitches.” Then, shifting his bag around a bit, he showed her his back and paced over to the female teacher that had already stuffed her face into a book and was unaware of the insults exchanged during the span of time.
“Who? Huh? What?” the teacher exclaimed, dropping her book in surprise when the new guy tapped her shoulder. “Oh? Are you new? Give me one second—” She cut herself off with a hearty laugh. “Here we are! Nick Theodore, correct?”
“Nicholas,” this ‘Nick’ — or ‘Not-Nick’ — fellow corrected. “Nicholas Thoedore.” He stood there stiffly, not a single expression mauling his stony face. Not the twinge of a curving smile, nor the flick of an annoyed frown. Just… nothing.
“Nicholas Thoedore. Interesting name,” Ms. Teacher Lady commented, smiling warmly to the cold male. “Anyways, you may take a seat anywhere. Well, not exactly anywhere… There’s a seat beside Drew and another beside Mary — Wait, where did Shelby go?”
“Huh? Who said my name?” I exclaimed suddenly, head jerking up and orbs flashing to attention. “Wha’?” I glanced around, only to find my surprised gaze rousing chuckles from the room. God, what was with us today? Making everyone laugh! God.
“No one, Drew,” Leah sighed and gave me a playful shove. “But Mr, Sexy is heading this way,” she added in a whisper, her warm breath hissing into my ear.
“Mr. Sexy?” I replied back, dumbfounded. “That’s what you’re calling him? No way, hun! Mr. Handsome, maybe, but not Mr. Sexy. Mr. Dreamy? Mister…” I trailed off in thought, only to be shocked into alert yet again when I heard the scraping of a desk to my left.
“Mr. Dreamy, huh?” came a cold voice, startling me into letting my guard fall and blush creep around my cheeks. “Is that what you are calling me already?” I let my eyes slowly peel over to the speaker, my face a fierce shade of red.
“Uh…,” was all I could managed to splutter. Then, just like that, I dropped all dignity and scooted myself away from him and into the dark corner that sported Mr. Wash-himself-Washburn’s file cabinets. I shifted all of my thoughts over to my notebook and busily scratched down the whole conversation for later purposes; such as… writing a story, hm?
But it was only moments before I heard two desks edging back towards me. I dared a glance up and trained my eyes on Sam and Leah, thanking the Lord for sending me such saviors.
“Smo-o-ooth!” Sam giggled as she came to a stop in front of my desk. Leah was right beside her, though looking ticked at being forced to ebb across the whole freaking room. Not my fault, hum de dum.
“My God, Drew!” Leah exclaimed, in obvious horror at what had just taken place before Mr. Dreamy. Yes, I was sticking with Mr. Dreamy. So suck it up, losers. “What was that? You totally blew it! I could have so totally worked my charm on him…”
“Come on, Drewy,” Sam urged me, snatching my notebook in her underdeveloped hands. “That guy’s all freaked out; you love freaking guys out!” She flashed me a smile and flipped her blond hair, grappling at my arms and pretending to be, like, melting or something. I couldn’t tell; you can never tell with Sam.
“Fine,” I grumbled and obliged to Sam’s nudging voice, heaving myself up and roughly shoving my desk back over to Nicholas. The cute young man was just sitting there, his being void of all emotion. Well, I already established that, but whatever.
Once we had all returned to our previous positions, framing around Nicholas’s own desk, Leah immediately stepped forth and apologized, “Sorry, man. That’s kind of our thing: CJ is Mr. Egotistic, Dave’s Mr. Cute-But-Stuck-Up… And you’re Mr. Dreamy, apparently.”
Ignoring Leah’s words, Nicholas shrugged and pulled forth a book — a book written in… German! Whoa, German. He knew German! How sexy. Uh… wait. Am I actually typing these nonsense thoughts? God, what a horrible author I am. Ehehe. “Whatever,” he muttered.
Just as Nicholas resigned to silence and cracked open the binding of his peculiar, foreign novel, a second lithe figure had filled up the doorframe and blocked out the ever-present murmurs that arose from the outside corridors. Just as Mr. Dreamy before her, she stood there awkwardly and with an expression of mixed feelings — terror as many eyes focused upon her, nerves as she pressed further into the class, and finally… mourn. The sorrow was vivid in her very odd eyes. What was so odd about her almond eyes?
Well… At first glance, they appeared to be brown with irises hue of beer — “whiskey eyes” — but as she stepped into the light that spontaneously flickered in and out of the room, a purple eye was finally illuminated; an orb the color of mud and another that of violets in the warming spring. Us nosy, gossip-lusting teen-agers stared and whispered amongst each other, trying to figure out the probability of getting two new students in one day.
“Are y’all siblings or something?” I inquired, though the words were forced. I turned to Nicholas, the blush still lingering upon my cheeks like pink paint. And right after I vocalized the sentence, I soon came to regret it as the two couldn’t have looked more different.
Where Nicholas had honey blond hair that stuck up in downy tufts, this new arrival was drabbed in a long mane of black that had been hoisted into a high pony-tail. He was muscular, she was slender and wiry. He was completely white, like ivory; her skin was darker but not quite black; more of the tan of a Spanish settler, but still close to his white. The chap walked with the distinct stride of a loner that had no wish to make acquaintances with anyone other than himself, eyes looking right past and through anyone in his path and chin held high. The maiden, though, staggered listlessly along with the legs of a seaman; stepping hard and standing firm with knees locked, always expecting the ground to be torn away from beneath her. As it was, she had probably been bullied or something, I judged quickly, due to her caged appearance.
“Oh, another one of you?” Ms. Teacher Lady exclaimed joyously. Her happiness seemed to sicken New Girl, as her features darkened just a bit when the unfamiliar woman’s smile just soaked right into her. “What’s your name? Wait… Let’s see right he—” Ms. Teacher Lady wasn’t given a chance to finish, as New Girl immediately muttered her whole name to uncomplicated matters:
“Jesse El’Dorado Tobias.”
“Jess Elkorato Todis?” Ms. Teacher Lady repeated, frowning at the jumble she had echoed. Jesse was slow to correct her, as if she couldn’t understand what had gone wrong so quickly.
“Jes-ee El-Dohr-ä-doh Toh-bee-ass,” mumbled Jesse after a few long ticks of the clock just above her head. She enunciated each syllable very carefully, like some screwed-up English teacher — like Mr. Washburn, ack! But it was obvious that this was not her normal tone of speech, and she was only speaking such to make short of the conversing words betwixt Teacher Lady and her.
“Oh,” Ms. Teacher Lady chuckled, then nodded. She lifted Mr. Washburn’s clipboard and flicked a checkmark onto the roll chart. She nodded to Jesse and pointed towards the Preppy Queen and the Preppy Minions, saying, “That’s the only available seat.”
Jesse just didn’t seem to care. Even before Ms. Teacher Lady had finished her yakking, she was already sashaying silently over to the preppies and was sliding her svelte shaft into the empty desk, almost protectively lowering her small turquoise bag into her lap. Practically mimicking Nicholas’s earlier actions, she brought up a book and drifted off into the tale rather than even so much as glance at the Preppy Minions or Preppy Queen.
“Okay, seriously, are y’all related?” I repeated, eying Nicholas sharply when he didn’t answer. I waited patiently as he set down his novel, purposely placing a random slip of paper between the pages before closing it.
“No, we’re not siblings,” Nicholas replied coolly. “We’re cousins.” He returned my gaze with his own, steely eyes locking mine for dragging moments. Then I relented and dashed my globes down, blocking out his critical looks.
“Cool,” was all I voiced, Nicholas’s fierce gaze unnerving me. I hated when people look-looked at me; made me jittery and antsy.
While I looked ahead to focus on Jesse once more, I noticed one of the Jocks making a move on her. The teen-ager had regained her calm and was just sitting there, leafing through the pages of her novel one by one. She was really pretty, I realized after a few moments; but it was a subtle pretty, not an all-around pretty. At first glance, like with her eyes, she was just ordinary. But when you took the time to really looked at her…
Her face was flawless, a seamless golden-brown that was both a mix of her heritage and brushes with the sun. Two strands of black hair hung in her face, the rest bundled up and held as a high ponytail — much different from the one that I sported, pulled down low and towards my neck. Her mane was perfectly brushed, each hair held in place, and it smelled faintly of apples — it was a strong smell, scented from way over where I was seated, but it was sweet.
It was slender, not wiry, Jesse’s figure was. She had a trim waist and a slim torso; she wasn’t exactly a rail, though. More of that hourglass shape that we all lusted to replace our lumpy, disproportioned bodies with. Her arms were long, as were her legs, but they were no longer than her torso. She was average height, if a tad tall — now that I think about it, she was pretty tall, actually; not Preppy Minion tall, but still tall. Still, she was pretty —beautiful, even, if you asked a guy. I, though, have no interest in the female gender that way, so I’ll only go as far as “pretty”.
Jesse had a certain look to her; she didn’t have the carefree eyes of a teen-ager, but instead her face was a mask of maturity. Her voice, even, carried that twanging rumble of an adult-ish being. It wasn’t high-pitched like a child’s or the crackle of an adolescent’s; it was the deep, cautious tone of an adult’s.
“Hey,” one of the Jock’s greeted, and to my aghast it was the MVP of the football team — not the quarter back, but he was still the best player. CJ was his name; Mr. Egotistic, if you were actually paying attention to the dialogue earlier. “I’m CJ; star player of the football team. That means that it is my fortunate obligation to, let’s say, take you out for coffee after school.” He stated the demand of a date, rather than a question. See, what’d I tell you? Mr. Egotistic!
“No,” was Jesse’s monosyllable answer. She didn’t so much as glance up at him, and instead continued contemplating the words that filled the pages of her novel.
Mr. Egotistic ogled at Jesse, perplexed beyond meaning. “That wasn’t a question,” he growled in that low, sexy voice of his. “I’m not just anyone! I’m the sta—”
“Yes, I know. You are CJ, star — and most valued — player of the football team. You currently endeavor to pursue a relationship with five girls at the same time, and you even so much as took them all to the movie in one day,” Jesse recited, finally lifting her whiskey eyes to Mr. Egotistic. As the light swerved away from them, her one violet orb flashed back to brown and her iris gleamed gold in the dim.
At these words, an entourage of raging shrieks filled the room. Five girls, two of which were Preppy Minions, heaved themselves up and glowered at CJ. Preppy Minion Kansas stomped towards the football player, her short but dainty figure growing large as she loomed over him. Preppy Minion Emily, though, simply hung back and allowed her associate to do the dirt work. However, just as Kansas was about to bring her very effectual fist down upon CJ, a third girl hurtled across the room and hurled herself at the Preppy Minion.
“Order, order!” Ms. Teacher Lady shouted in frustration as Preppy Minion Emily and Michelle also engaged into a cat fight. The only of the five girls not doing anything at the moment was Melanie, surprising, but she was soon barreling right towards CJ. She turned sharply past him, though, and threw herself unto Jesse in a wild rage.
“Order, I say, ORDER!” repeated Ms. Teacher Lady, but her words made little difference. Instead, it was the rest of the Preppy Minions who pulled the girls from Kansas and Emily, while a cluster of egotistic jocks — though not comparable to Mr. Egotistic himself — unlocked Melanie from Jesse.
Even in the short amount of time that passed, all of the girls — Jesse, too — were in bad shape, except for Melanie. Melanie was perfectly fine, whereas her little sparring partner had a black eye. Kansas’s lip was bleeding, but her attacker’s, Bailey, nose was gushing maroon liquid. Emily had a swollen cheek, and three of Michelle’s nails had broken and she was already sulking over them.
“All of you, down to Guidance! NOW!” At Ms. Teacher Lady’s screeching commands, the five girls were scurrying down the corridor with such fury that the room was left with heavy air and snapping static. Jesse, however, lingered just long enough to lift her novel and tuck it protectively under her arm. She also grabbed her bag, but this she carelessly slung over a shoulder. Then she followed suit.