Stars are what you see when you open your eyes in a dizzy spell, what you see when the dark comes, what you see when you are viewing passion in one's eyes.
And apparently, it's also what you see when you turn off Tars lights.
The room was supposed to be a simple astronomy themed room but it had somehow taken a completely different point from that aspect of science and now donned on a particularly creepy-pasta scenario as Tars closed her eyes and slept.
The blue lights of the glow in the dark paint showed the room as a soft glowing enigma. However, it was only enigmatic because there were no such things as blue, glow-in-the-dark-paint in Kiribati. It would have made a lot of natives in the country scratch their heads had there not been a table full of chemicals in the corner, along with a bookcase. The bookcase was filled with books that ranged from theoretical to real, not a very specific detail you must notice and so there was also a book of paints and a kit on how to make paints.
The glow in the dark issue would also be resolved by the fact that there were a dozen pairs of empty tubes, most formerly known as glow in the dark bracelets, currently without their glow in the dark contents.
However, one must not forget that along with enigma, there was also a possibility of death lingering in the air like a bad taste.
That was because the contents inside the glow in the dark bracelets were harmful chemicals.
Which really brings back your mind to the fact that glow in the dark bracelets was mostly sold off to kids.
Possibly harmful to human's chemicals…. Sold to kids… Quite the mysterious issue of glow in the dark bracelet company's level of stupidity there.
And yet… Tars slept like a bear, with a few flecks of green on her face.
Jason was walking by himself when Olive spotted him. She smiled widely and ran to him, heart beating, face flushing, breath quickening.
'Jason!' she called out.
Jason looked back and sighed at the sight of the girl who was basically skipping to him.
This was now their unofficial routine for the past two weeks. Every morning at precisely 7:30, Jason would arrive in the school and Olive having found out that that was his routine (via stalking and asking) two days after she met him decided to take a bet and arrive every morning at 7:15. She would hide nearby the gates every morning since she had won in her bet and when Jason arrived, she would be the first to tell him good morning.
It was a routine no matter how Jason seemed to be steadily growing irritated by it as seen by the sideline view. Perhaps the correct term for it would be a temporary routine, but even if it was, it didn't seem to help the fact that Olive wasn't noticing the irritation on Jason's face ad continued to smile and say good morning.
This day however, seemed to be the day that Jason had lost his patience virtue and he scowled before turning away.
Olive faltered in mid step but then regained her cheerful attitude and walked forward to him.
'Good morning.' She smiled when she caught up to him.
Jason looked to the side in surprise that there was an annoying bug next to him and made a tired noise. He walked faster leaving Olive behind.
Tars saw this and sighed. Regina looked upon Olive next to her and frowned at Tars lack of action.
'Useless.' She muttered.
'You aren't doing anything either.' Tars replied in a matter of fact tone and walked fast towards the direction of her class before Regina could do anything to her.
She passed by Olive and froze a bit when she realized that Olive wasn't that thick as she looked at Jason with red eyes.
'He is a jerk.' Tars said as she looked at Olive with her usual lazy expression.
Olive looked beside her and found her sister, she dried her tears and smiled weakly, 'You don't know him Tars, don't be so judging.'
'You can't say that you know him either Olive.' There was no change in Tars expression as she said this. Olive was used to this; this… was, well, how Tars expressed sympathy.
By even saying anything showed that she cared, despite how scathing the words were, they were true. True because Tars was showing sympathy and wanted Olive to let go of a hopeless puppy love, it might have been coarse in form but it was rather effective and Tars knew it.
So the only expression Olive showed was a hopeless light in her eyes that flashed before she stomped away.
She might understand what Tars was doing but it didn't help the fact that it hurt. The best she could do was confronting it and not put the blame on Tars because it was the truth and Olive had always been a good person.
'You could have been gentler you know.' Zeal said as he walked close to her.
'Were you nearby?' Tars asked.
'I was not five feet away, how could you not notice me?' Zeal said in mock hurt. By the fact that Tars glanced at him meant that yes, she hadn't noticed him but she didn't say so when she spoke again.
'I meant when we were young, were you nearby to watch us grow?'
'You and Olive?'
Tars nodded.
'You gonna elaborate on that?' Zeal asked, 'Or am I just going to assume that you think I was a childhood stalker of yours and that your sanity must be questioned?'
Their relationship was rather… strange to say the least. Zeal had come back to apologize but Tars couldn't have cared, leading to another misunderstanding that Tars didn't bother to clear up, leading to Zeal to connect the puzzle pieces together out of confusion and curiosity, leading to another apology which again, Tars didn't even acknowledge.
It had been a few days after that first day in school and it was at least safe to say that Tars had an acquaintance, one that Tars opened up to slowly, in her own way that is.
Realizing a few days ago that Zeal was persistent (an explanation on the constant misunderstandings), Tars had begun to pay more attention to the point where she could actually answer his questions.
And thus;
'Olive understands me, I understand her, and you'll get it soon.' And then when Zeal slowed down his pace due to confusion, Tars was gone.
But even though Zeal was persistent, even though Tars was opening up to him in her own fashion, it was still pretty much no difference than at the first day of school.
But like Tars said, Zeal was getting it and soon after, he shook his head and smiled.
The smile graced upon the females in the courtyard, lightening up the stormy days and though Zeal wasn't as handsome as Jason, it was enough to bring in a new, light atmosphere.
The teacher watched Tars through much narrowed eyes.
She was female and in her mid thirties and had a personal rule that she enforced in all of her science classes.
The rule was all attention on the board.
Simple as that and as shortly phrased as that and yet, the class she had taken up for her second period Thursdays couldn't get it through a magnifying class.
Especially Tars.
The teacher was new however and never particularly paid attention to the fact that although Tars never lost a single step in the cruel world of final scores but never cared for paying attention to the class she was in when she had something on her mind, it didn't mean that Tars was a pompous prodigy. Tars was always listening, always reading, always searching for second opinions, always researching. Tars had an inescapable fortress of compulsion for learning everything about the things she was giving and the internet was her relief.
But it was only because of events like what would be happening in three, two, o-
'Tars could you tell me what we were talking about on the board?'
Of course she would ask that, a prodigy might be a prodigy but one couldn't ignore the fact that their subject on the board was new and complicated and Tars hadn't looked up once during the start of class from her Terry Pratchett book.
Some of the students scoffed, some of them scowled, some of them smiled and brought out their phones, ready to record the event in case it was going to be interesting.
When Tars looked up with a weirdly sadistic glint on her face-
Oh, it was, it was very much interesting.
'What in the world earned you a detention slip that early in the morning?' asked Zeal as he noticed Tars name on the announcement board along with its time of entry.
'A red faced teacher.' Tars responded and walked to get her salad.
Monday morning, a week later there they were, Tars with a salad in her left hand on a fork on the other and Zeal with a can of coke and a phone on his.
'Whatever.' Zeal sighed and nudged Tars after a few minutes of drinking from his can.
'You want some?' he asked.
'No.'
'What are there too many germs on it or something?' Zeal mocked and continued to drink.
'If you knew, why did you ask?'
Zeal coughed and after a few seconds smiled and pulled Tars in a hug from behind.
When Tars stiffened he smiled wider and put his face near her ear. 'Do you mind the germs now honey?'
'You smell like you didn't bathe last night.' Tars coughed out through a grimacing face.
Zeal let her go and sighed, 'Do pheromones even affect you?'
'I'm going to pretend you didn't say that.'
'Why not, they are attractive to think about.' Zeal winked as he walked to her side, 'They are supposed to make girls swoon and blush despite having a… stiff, a rather stiff name.'
'Not when you imagine it as green smoke pouring out of someone like I do.'
'And that is wrong because?'
'Animations usually put out green smoke as farts.' Tars walked away, leaving a rather conflicted Zeal behind her.
He didn't know whether to feel surprised or repelled at how Tars thought, she was so random sometimes and he felt very lucky to be able to experience something as rare as Tars being random as she only spoke to make a point but still, it was sometimes over the line.
But he laughed a few seconds later as the bigger picture came into his head.
So, Tars did have a sense of humour then.
Olive was trying out a last attempt at Jason, her eyes were glazed over as she thought of him before she cleared her head, breathed in and flashed another small smile at Regina.
Hopefully, she was thinking, hopefully this would go right.
She walked to Jason and was instantly depressed when two girls showed up by his side, giggling and laughing as they batted their near nonexistent eyelashes. They were young and not of the class Olive was in, seemingly on twelve year old juniors. Most of the girls in the class seeing the daring pair in their classroom had one thought on their minds.
Those little! They even continued on standing there undaunted even though the students told them that the teacher was only going to be gone for a few minutes!
She fumed--being human she had a right to be angry no matter how kind a heart was and so-- she fumed before she realized that Jason had a particular look that was similar to the one this morning.
She regained her smile as a new idea popped into her head and walked over there with a gentle look on her face.
'Hi honey.' She smiled at him.
At this point, Jason was about to tell the girls off without a filter on his mouth but he quickly caught on when Olive winked mischievously at him.
'Honey?' asked one of the girls in confusion.
'Hello dear.' Jason flashed a smile.
Jealousy, thick and permeating in the room, many of the girls were now glaring.
'Is she your girlfriend?' one of the twelve years old said.
Jason looked at Olive with an amused expression before smiling, 'Yes.'
The girls turned that orange shade of Kiribati shame and smiled tightly, 'We'll be going then.' One of the girls said.
And like that, they were gone.
A laugh sounded out and Olive was stunned to see that it was Jason who was laughing. She hadn't been the only on rejected during the week he had been here, it had gotten to the point where lower and upper forms were now being miffed at the sight of blond hair. The reason for the miffing would be the rejection technique, cold and harsh, brutal and inexcusably ugly to look at.
Jason had never shown anything aside from that cool, collected façade he had and Olive had never heard him laugh.
Until now.
She found herself caught by the laugh and began to laugh along. Jason smiled at her when he stopped before brutally turning around as if she wasn't there.
Olive was miffed, again but she was now determined after hearing him laugh.
She wanted to see if she could make him laugh again.
'Hey, do you want to go to an afterschool outing?' Olive asked him.
He looked back like he couldn't believe she was still there and she swallowed a load of saliva.
'No.'
Cold, brutal, harsh and it had no excuse for being ugly, not even Jason's face could make up for it.