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I groaned as a harsh scream echoed through the house. My Grandmother, Pearl, was yelling for me to wake up, same as she did every morning before school. This was why I never slept at home, always opting instead to sleep at the house of whoever I met at the latest college party. Anywhere was better than home. I dragged myself out of bed.
“Ugh, COMING!” I shouted down the stairs at her. I threw on my tank top and some jean shorts and sleepily made my way to the bathroom. After brushing my long brown hair back into a bun with a few pieces hanging down the sides of my face and doing my makeup (not quite as heavy as my grandmother’s, not quite as subtle as my sister’s), I was out the door. My sister, of course, was already waiting at the bus stop.
“Took you long enough,” she said haughtily. Kinga got a thrill out of being better than me, it seemed. As class president, captain of the debate team, and valedictorian, she was adored by everyone in school. Me? Less so. Not by the same people who cared about my sister, anyway. I had a certain… reputation, one Kinga never exactly tried to refute. It made me not-so-popular in her crowd.
“Yeah, sorry I was late. I didn’t want to come,” I said flatly. Why she was so eager to impress our good-for-nothing grandmother was beyond me. Pearl didn’t care for anything beyond slot machines. She certainly didn’t give a crap about either of us.
“Well, of course you didn’t. School isn’t any fun for people who are failures. Have you even started on your science project?”
“I’ll finish it eventually, don’t worry about me. What about you? Are you actually working on this project, or are you getting some poor sap to do it for you?”
“Uh, duh. Why would I do by myself what I can force some nobody to do?”
“Who is it this time? Max again?”
“Ew! Not after what he did last time. No, this time my test subject is Jonah Heston.”
“Jonah Heston? Second smartest kid in class Jonah Heston? How did he get roped into working for you?”
“I threatened to get him kicked out of the Science Club if he didn’t do everything I told him to.”
“Figures,” I rolled my eyes. She always did stuff like this. I don’t think she’s ever really worked a day in her life. Not that I cared about Heston at all, but she would get the smartest kid in class (besides her) to do the most important assignment in science class for her. When the bus got to our stop, she immediately bolted on, taking her seat at the front of the bus next to her lackey Max and glaring at me, daring me to sit anywhere near her. I sat on the back of the bus, putting on my headphones and zoning out until we got to school.
In class, I could barely stay awake. The material was too uninteresting, the teacher’s voice too drawling, my head too foggy from lack of sleep, for me to even remotely care about what the teacher was saying. Before I could nod off completely, though, the door swung open.
“Sorry I’m late!” It was Jonah. “I was on my way to class when I thought up a better way to modify this invention I’ve been working on for a while now, and I had to write it down before I forgot so I-”
“Detention, Heston.” The teacher said sternly.
“I,uh- okay,” Jonah said, resigned. He sat down in the seat next to me. Why the second smartest kid in class always sat in the back corner of the room was beyond me. Then again, Jonah was a weird kid. Even though he was smart, and nice, and well-liked, he was always sort of rebellious, and kind of a free-thinker. He was also a total oddball, with all kinds of weird quirks.
As the teacher started droning on again, I began to fall asleep. Soon, I was out cold.
“Forrester!”
I jolted awake. The teacher was eyeing me, his arms crossed in front of him.
“Yes, you, Violet. Obviously I’m not talking to your sister,” Kinga shot me a look from the front of the classroom, the same know-it-all smile she always had for me, “and with that little slip-up you’ve earned yourself a detention. Again.”
I sighed. “Fine.” It wouldn’t be the first time this week.
The turn out for detention that day was smaller than usual. In fact, it was only two people: me and Jonah Heston. I took my seat in the same back corner, far away from the sleeping old man meant to be our proctor for the hour. Despite every other seat being open, Jonah still sat right beside me. For a while, he didn’t say anything, and we sat in silence. I tried not to feel the absolute awkwardness that was making my skin crawl at that very moment. Then, to my relief, he finally spoke up.
“Want some gum?” he asked.
“You have gum on you?” I asked. I wasn’t expecting that.
“Sure. I got it this morning. I was going to use it as part of an invention I was working on, but I have enough to spare.” He pulled the pack of gum out of his pocket and offered me a stick. “It’s spearmint! Do you want it?”
I eyed him suspiciously. Why was he being nice to me? Why was he talking to me at all? Guys like him didn’t talk to troublemakers like me. “Hmm. Fine,” I shrugged, taking the gum from him.
“You’re Violet, right? I’m Jonah.” He said.
“I know who you are. You’re working on a project with my sister. That must be hell.” I said, not looking at him.
“Kind of. The work’s not so bad, and I like the subject, but I wish she would help me out a little. Especially since she’s just going to take all the credit anyway.”
“That really blows. Why let her do it?”
“Well, she’s class president. And she could get me kicked out of Science Club. And I don’t want to upset her or anything.”
I snorted. “You’re a real boy scout, aren’t you?”
“I’m not a boy scout! I’m my own person! I do whatever I want, whenever I want!”
“Yeah, sure sounds like it.”
“Okay, I’ll prove it to you. Let’s get out of here.”
I raised an eyebrow at him. “You want to sneak out of detention early?”
“Why not? The teacher’s not gonna wake up. We can go to the corner store and get some snacks and be back before the principal comes to dismiss us.”
“Alright, rebel boy. Let’s do it.”
We quietly stood and sneaked our way to the door. Jonah opened it just a crack and peeped out. “Okay, we’ve got a clear shot to the door. We can make it to the parking lot and get to my car without anyone noticing,” he whispered.
“Lead the way,” I nodded. I followed him out of the classroom down the hall to the back entrance, and then to the parking lot. We got into his old, beat-up van and soon we were at the corner store. A bag of chips and two slushies later, we sat in his car in the parking lot.
“Still think I’m a boy scout?” he asked.
“You got low sodium baked potato chips and gummy bears, so yes, I do still think you’re a boy scout.” I said. “But maybe you’re not as much of a goody two shoes as I thought you were at first.”
He smiled. “See? Told you! I guess that goes to show you can’t judge people based on what you think of them at first.”
“Why? What did you think of me at first?”
He paused for a second. He seemed to be deep in thought. “I thought you were misunderstood, and you were angry because nobody got you, and I could relate to that, because I never really felt like I fit in, either.” He confessed. “And I guess I always wanted to get know you better, but I never knew how, until today.”
“Really? Even with my reputation, you would want to be seen around me?”
“I don’t care about stuff like that. I only care about who you are as a person.”
I smiled, looking down at the ground. “So,” I began, “What do you think of me now?”
“I think you’re a better person than you give yourself credit for.”
My eyes left the floor of his car and shot up to his. He stared right back at me, and our eyes remained locked for a long time. After what felt like a century, I tore my eyes away from his intense gaze. “We should be getting back now if we don’t want to get caught.”
“Huh? Oh, right.” Jonah shook himself, and started his car up again. We drove back to school.
We waited around the corner until the coast was clear, then Jonah parked in the same spot he parked in that morning and we sneaked back into the classroom. The principal came not a few minutes later, and didn’t suspect a thing as he dismissed us. As we packed up out things, I nudged Jonah.
“Hey, I never got a partner for that science project. How about you work with me instead? Unless you’re too scared to get kicked out of science club, that is.”
He smiled. “You’re on.”