I walked into Language Arts class and saw her sitting in the back corner. I dropped my backpack on the floor and sat next to her.
She watched me suspiciously as I pulled a new notebook and a pencil from my book bag, “Hi.”
“Hey.”
“I’m Ebony,” she hesitated.
“Draven,” I looked her over but my gaze locked onto hers, her light grey eyes flecked with a rainbow of colors that left me skeptical they could all blended into one, leaving me hypnotized, “You’re new here, right?”
“Is it that obvious?” She ran her fingers through here jet black hair and gave a half smile.
I laughed, “Everybody knows.” She gave me a questioning look so I explained, “There aren’t many secrets you can keep at this school, especially if Cam and his friends know about it.”
“Really?”
“That’s Black Ridge High for you.”
“What is Cam like, anyway?”
I sighed, running my hand through my own jet black hair about to speak when Mr. Chad walked through the door and set his stack of literature books on his desk.
“Hello class,” Mr. Chad scratched his chin absent-mindedly while he organized the mess of papers and files strewn across his desk, the floor, and taped along the wall behind him. “I seriously need to clean out everything!” the class laughed with him. He finally found the class schedule, and then he started writing the lesson for today on the whiteboard.
Ebony and I glanced at each other, Ebony asking with her amazing eyes. I moved my chair closer to hers, leaned into her and whispered, “That’s Mr. Chad, obviously our language arts teacher, a distracted and unorganized one at that,” I gazed into her unnatural eyes, “but he’s great, he’ll let you do anything.”
She smiled a devious smile, an idea sparking in her eyes.
“So how was everybody’s summer?” Mr. Chad asked, still writing.
Everybody spoke at once, telling the lame and exciting stories of their summer, everybody wanting to share, everyone except Ebony and I.
“What, don’t have any amazing stories about your summer?” I joked.
“What about you? I don’t see you yelling at the top of your lungs to tell your own vacation,” she laughed.
“How was your summer?”
She looked down, wringing her hands in her lap, hesitating. I tried to see her face, to see the emotion in her magnificent eyes, but her face was hidden behind a black curtain of her hair, “Not good.”
“Do you want to talk about it?” I tried to comfort her.
She only shook her head, “No, and definitely not here,” she looked up and gave a half smile, “But, what about you? How was your summer?”
“I didn’t do anything; my summer was just a boring mess.”
“Okay, okay,” Mr. Chad spoke above the voices of the conversing class, holding up his hands in surrender, “I’m supposed to talk about the code of conduct—” the class sighed, “and we all know how boring, and, lets’ face it, stupid it is, and since everybody needs to get out their summer stories lets write them down for extra credit.”
Everybody gave a slight sigh but pulled out paper anyway and started writing.
“S***,” Ebony muttered. I glanced at her, “What am I supposed to write?”
“Uh, what you did over summer, that’s kinda the idea.” I waved my pencil around then tap the side of my head with it.
“I didn’t do anything.”
“Just write that you stayed home all day.”
She laughed, “I am great at fiction.”
“Aha, you did do something.”
She pressed her lips together, “Maybe.”
“Then write it down.”
“I-I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I can’t tell—” the bell rang, cutting her off.
We shoved our folders and pencils in our bags and started walking out the door when Mr. Chad called out to Ebony.
“Hey, hold on a sec,”
We both turned around to Mr. Chad.
“You’re Ebony, correct?”
“Yes,” Ebony fixed the strap of her messenger bag.
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” Mr. Chad asked.
She glanced at me, “I’ll wait outside,” I told her.
“You don’t have to,” she assured me.
“I’ll do it anyway,” I smiled.
I walked out and leaned against the wall when Cam came up to me, “Draven,” he nodded, leaning against the wall next to me.
“Cam.”
“I know what you’re doing Draven,” he looked at me, challenging me.
“Yea? And what’s that?” I pushed back.
“Stealing away my girl.”
“Your girl? What, did you buy her?”
“Face it, I got to her first. She’s my puppy now.”
I glared at him, “Puppy? She seems more like a kitten to me.”
Cam pushed off the wall and faced me, evil sparking in his dark eyes, “Stay away from her Draven, she’s not yours to keep.”
“Oh? But you can keep her?”
“If I turn her I can,” Cam gave a dark smile.
“You turn her and I swear you’ll be sorry.”
“Yea? And why is that?”
“You can’t just turn everyone you claim as your pet Cam, it’s dangerous!”
“How dangerous?” he smiled, enjoying my anger.
“You know how dangerous it is Cam; half of them don’t make it, especially young girls who have troubled minds.”
He took interest, “She has a troubled mind?”
“Yes,” I answered reluctantly.
“Well, I’ll just have to fix that, wont I?” he turned and started to walk away.
“Cam,” I yelled after him.
He turned but kept walking, “Stay away from my Kitten!”
I sighed, running my hand through my hair, sick of Cam and his immature ways.
I wasn’t going to back down, there was something about Ebony; something about the way she walks, how she talks—how pretty she is— I shook my head, clearing that thought away.
I slid down the wall to sit, placing my backpack next to me and waited for Ebony to emerge from the classroom.
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