The whole class takes Mr. Teak's introduction as a sign for them to sit down again, "No one gave you permission to be seated. Stand up. In the mornings when you get here you will be silent. I do not tolerate tardiness, disobedience, or any violation of school rules. When I talk you will be silent."
He looks over at the boys in the second row who up until that point have been trying to whisper about how much he sucks as a teacher, and that they didn't care who he thinks he is, and how they were going to do whatever they wanted and no teacher can stop them.
"Let's get some things straight. Now I know that I was absent yesterday, and I will be every Thursday. Where I go and what I do is of no concern to you. Now I do not like it when students move around in my class, so I hope you like the person you are sitting next to because you'll be sitting next to them for the rest of the year. This is non-negotiable." With this he sealed their fate in being stuck sitting next to each other every morning, all year long. "I have work to do in the mornings so you will please remain silent, anyone caught talking will receive detention for as long as I feel you deserve. Now you may be seated,"
He concludes his opening speech. Everyone quietly sits down deciding that it's not worth the hassle today. Iona sits down and gets back to my mostly untouched homework that she only has fifteen minutes to finish. Something to the right of her table catches my eye. Jacks half out of his seat sliding a note onto her desk. She quickly looks around to make sure that no one else saw him passing it to her. The last thing she wants is to get herself into trouble with this teacher in particular. Luckily the speech seems to have worked its magic and everyone else is quietly focusing on whatever they're doing. She unfolds it and reads what he's so desperately had to tell her.
-Hey Princess. Want to ditch school with me and do something fun instead?-
'What does he think he's doing? We can't just skip class and do whatever we want, whenever we want. Who is this guy? The resident Bad Boy?' She quickly brushes her penile across the page.
-First- don't call me Princess.
Second- what the hell? We can't just cut class and do whatever!-
She looks around the class again just to make sure no one see, and then passes the note back. 'When did this happen? Since when do I pass notes in class and do homework on the day it's due? I don't! I really need to get my head on straight before this becomes a problem.'
It's about four minutes later before she sees the paper to her right reappear. Having just finished her literate questions as well as everything except the history essay which is only due two weeks from now, she decides to see what he's said.
-First- why can't I call you Princess, Princess?
Second- yes we can, it won't hurt to skip one day.
Third- it's too nice outside to be stuck inside a classroom. So I'm going to the beach, with or without you-
She looks to the left out the window she's sitting next to. She hates to admit it but he's right, and today she would rather be out on the water than stuck in school. She looks to her right again. He's smiling at her and she can't help but smile back. The feeling from this morning is back for round two. She shakes her head side to side as she looks back down at the piece of paper. She's convinced that she's officially going crazy because she can't explain what she's about to do any other way.
-Only one day?-
He reads it and then quickly scratches something down, before passing it back. She unfolds it quickly, not even bothering to check if anyone one noticed.
-Only one day. I promise that I can get us out of here without anyone knowing. We can ride there, stop at your house so you can get your swimwear. We won't get caught and we won't get in trouble. The best part is that the teachers are just going to let us go ;)-
Having no idea what he's planning to do or how he's planning to do it, but she finds herself trusting him. He's the craziest person she's ever met. She must really want to go to the beach, because that's just what she's going to do.
-Okay I don't know how you're going to pull this off, but I'm with you :)-
He looks across at her and smiles the biggest, brightest smile she's ever seen.
-Follow my lead. I need you to act like you need to go to the nurses office. So cramps or whatever you think you can pull off. Trust me.-
'This boy is so weird.' Something other than Iona seems to be controlling her brain because for some reason that's beyond her she finds herself trusting him. In case you need some perspective, it did take her two years to be able to trust Nicole and Liz and now she's trusting someone she's barely known for two days. Only the thing to explain it is that she feels like she's known him for so much longer.
She looks over at him again and she suddenly understands what he's planning on doing. It's like they've been planning it for weeks; the perfect way to skip school without getting in trouble for it. She nods to show him that she gets it, she trusts him, and they're doing this.
She stands up and starts to walk to the front of the class, making sure everyone's eyes are on her. She stops, takes a deep breath, and sways a bit for effect before closing her eyes.
Then she falls.
She can hear screams from her classmates as they see her go down backwards, one her way to letting her head kiss the floor. Only she knew that it wouldn't get that close, and she was right. She's hardly started to fall when she feels his arms come up around her. Stopping her from getting hurt. Like some crazy trust exercise you humans tend to do for reasons that escape me.
She can hear cheering from the other guys in the class, but she keeps her eyes closed and her face blank. If they want this to work she needs to make this look as real as possible. Besides she doesn't need to open her eyes to know that it was Jack that caught her. Not because he wants to get out of class, or because he had an idea of what she was going to do. No, it's because as he caught her it sent sparks straight through her everywhere she felt his skin touch hers. I don't know why but that's how she knows that it's him.
"Quick, you there. Yes, you over there holding her, take her to the nurse. You can come bake and get her things later, just get her to the nurse now." Mr. Teak seems quite determined that she gets to the nurse. He's really not that bad of a teacher, just a little uptight. Looks like step one is completed. He seems rather distressed, I almost feel bad for the poor teacher. It's getting hard not to laugh. Iona should get some or other acting award for just lying there like she's knocked out.
She can feel Jack moving as he gently turns so he can pick her up. Before she realises it, he's holding her bridal style and he's standing up. To her surprise he picks her up without any trouble. She lets her head rest against his shoulder as he carries her out of the classroom. She makes sure that they're outside of the classroom before she opens her eyes. She finds herself looking into the deepest sea green eyes, and feeling her cheeks changing colour she looks away.
"That was pretty impressive back there." he's still looking at her, she can feel his gaze on her. She doesn't seem to mind though, but she can feel her cheeks have flushed pink.
"Thanks, and thanks for catching me when I fell." She can hear him chuckle as she says this.
"You really scared me when you did that. I don't think I would forgive myself if you got hurt because of me."
"Well thanks anyway for catching me then." For reasons she can't understand he's still carrying her," Um you can put me down now. I think I've recovered from my fall. I should be able to walk."
She feels bad for letting him carry her this far, and she's worried that she's too heavy for him to carry all the way there. This is also the first time someone's carried her around since she was a little girl, but Jack seems to have other plans. "Nope."
"I'm sorry, what?" She remarks, still in his arms.
"I'm not letting you down. I'm carrying you to the nurse, and there's nothing you can say to change that." he smirks at her when he says this.
"Okay, but don't say I didn't warn you tomorrow when you have a sore back from carrying my heavy ass around."
He just laughs again and shakes his head. "You're not that heavy. Besides, I'm a big strong boy. I'm going to carry you to the nurses office and then out to the bike after that okay, Iona?"
He makes her feel better and now she's laughing at how he put so much meaning into using her name. 'My name. My real name, he found out just like he said he would. Only we haven't had Math yet. How did he find out what my name is?'
Well Dear Reader, he just looked at her homework this morning where she wrote her name over and over and over again on the sheets of lined paper holding her answers. The thing is that she doesn't mind that he knows. She's actually happy he knows. She's taken back by the fact that he found out so quickly, but she doesn't bother to ask him how he found out. She knows he won't tell her anyway.
"Whatever, Jack." She says still laughing. 'We're really doing this, I'm really doing this. We're skipping school to go to the beach.'
Time for step two; Leaving school without getting in trouble.