Chapter Text
“Kayla, are you up?”
“Yeah Dad” I groan as a roll out of bed. I grab my uniform and head to the bathroom.
My name is Mckayla Nelson-Spring. I am 14 years old, and I live with my dads, Nick and Charlie. We live in a simple house in a tucked away area of Truham, about a 5-minute drive to the main part of town. Today is my first day back at Truham-Higgs Grammar School after Christmas in year 10. My dads always tell me the story about how ‘they were lucky and met at that school all those years ago, before it merged with Higgs.’ That was before the fire at Higgs that caused the schools to combine.
Today is also my dad’s first day at his new job as the P.E teacher and rugby coach at the school, taking over from Mrs. Singh, who should have retired years ago. However, my dad overthinks a lot, and is now racing through the house, panicking.
After getting changed, I grab my bag and head downstairs.
“Morning Kayla” Papa says from the kitchen table as I walk in.
“Morning Papa” I mutter while getting a bowl of cereal.
I sit down on a stool next to papa as dad rushes into the room.
“Char, have you seen my lanyard?”
“By the door babe” Papa says with a slight chuckle as dad sprints back out the room.
Everyone at the school already loves him but, dad being dad, is still panicking. I heard him and Papa up at 3am last night talking about today.
I finish my breakfast and Dad sprints past me, muttering something about being late. I laugh to myself, and we say bye to papa before driving to the school
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We arrive at Truham and dad lets out a sigh of relief as he checks his watch to see we still have 15 minutes before lessons begin. We say goodbye to each other, and he heads off towards the P.E department, while I head to the blue and yellow picnic benches outside the school.
I walk over to the usual bench and spot my 3 best friends: Louis Argent-Xu, Mia Heaney, and Ashley Greene. Louis has short, brown hair, calming, hazel brown eyes and is obsessed with movies (AN: it is Tao xu’s kid, what did you expect). Mia is tall, she has wavy brown hair with natural blond highlights, and beautiful piercing blue eyes. Ashley has jet black, shoulder length hair, green eyes, and they love to draw.
“KAYLA!” Mia squeals, rushing over to me and engulfing me in a giant hug, which I soon return.
“Hey Mia” I say with a laugh as she finally lets go. “No hugs from you two then?” I ask louis and Ashley, pretending to be offended. They both look at me with raised eyebrows and I start laughing as I sit down next to Mia.
We chat about our holidays for 10 minutes before the bell rings, when we all say bye and head off to our new form rooms.
As I walk down the corridors, I look down at my wrist to double check my form room. ‘Hamlet 5’ it says, and I sigh as I arrive outside the classroom and walk in. “Mckayla! Happy new year!” A familiar voice says.
“Hi Mrs. Greene” I say, happy to see Ashley’s mum.
“Let’s see, where did I put you on the seating plan?” She looks back at her computer “Ah yes! You are at the back. Next to Joshua Hope! He is in year 11, so just 1 year older than you. I’m sure you two will get along well! He seems kind”.
“Thanks, Miss” I mutter, walking to the back of the classroom.
Everyone knows Joshua Hope. He is one of the ‘popular’ people that nobody actually likes. AND. If that wasn’t bad enough, he is friends with James Robinson. James in known by everyone, but not for a good reason. He is rude in general but is REALLY homophobic too. He said some horrible stuff to Ashley when they started using they/them pronouns. I don’t know specifically what Jacob is like, but he hangs out with James Robinson, so he can’t be that good.
I reach the desk and sit down.
“Hi” Joshua says kindly. I look up at him and he smiles.
He has dark brown, messy hair on his head, kind eyes that can’t seem to decide between green and brown, small subtle freckles coating his face, and a soft pink blush lining his cheeks, making his tan skin stand out.
“Hi” I respond, still staring at his face. ‘Nobody mentioned he was this attractive’ I think to myself. He smirks a little before looking down at his book.
I feel my cheeks burning as I look down and try to remember what I was doing but all I can seem to focus on is stopping myself from looking back at Joshua.