"Who is that?" Adrian spun around as a short girl with long brown hair and striking blue eyes wandered past. Grace turned around to look too.
"I heard we were getting a new girl. That must be her!" Grace giggled. "Let's go meet her!" She started to walk away but Adrian grabbed her by the arm.
"No, Grace! We can't be the first people to say 'hi' to her."
"Well why not? If you were new, wouldn't you want someone to say 'hi' to you?" Grace looked discouraged.
"Yeah, but..." Adrian started to think of an excuse but Ricky popped out of nowhere.
"Did you see the new girl?" Ricky asked with a sly smirk on his face.
"Yeah, she looks like a slut." Adrian pursed her lips.
"Adrian!" Grace yelled out. "That's not very nice.
"I think I'm gonna go talk to her." Ricky walked away leaving Grace and Adrian by their lockers. Adrian slammed her locker and stalked angrily away. Grace followed along. Ricky slyly edged up next to the
new girl. She just looked over at him then looked back at her locker really fast. "Hey." He smiled and looked at her.
"Hi." The new girl shyly responded.
"I'm Ricky. You must be new."
"Yeah, I'm Nikki. I just transferred here. My dad got a new job."
"Well I just wanted to welcome you." Ricky grinned and patted her on the back. "See you around, new girl." and he walked away. Nikki smiled and stared at his butt while he walked away. The first person to talk to her was a hot guy. She was so happy! She turned around to find a short, colored girl in her face. "Um, hello? Can I help you?" She said to the girl.
"Yeah I'm Lauren. Me and my friend Amy saw you talking to Ricky. We just figured we better warn you."
"Warn me about what?" Nikki looked at the girl puzzled.
"Well, walk with me." Lauren instructed. Nikki shut her locker and they walked down the hall together. "Ok, well where should I start. Last year, at band camp, he hit on Amy, an innocent freshman, and made her believe that he wanted to be with her. So she had sex with him. Needless to say, they're both parents of a little boy."
"What!" Nikki sounded astonished. "That's crazy. I don't believe that. And anyways he wouldn't have sex with me. I'm a virgin."
Lauren started shaking her head. "So was Amy. Do you wanna meet her?"
"No not right now, I have to get to the office to get my schedule, bye." Nikki hurried up and rushed away. Lauren scampered back over to Amy.
"What did you tell her, what did she say?" Amy immediately screeched.
"I just told her about you and Ricky."
"Well why did she run away like that?" Amy peered down the hall.
"I asked if she wanted to meet you and she said 'no.' She told me she had to go to the office to get her schedule." Lauren informed Amy.
"Oh ok, well I gotta go meet Ben. I told him I'd meet him outside the cafeteria before homeroom." Amy closed her locker and walked away from her friend. On the way down the hall she passed Jack and Grace holding hands. "Hey guys." She smiled and waved. They waved back. She kept walking and eventually was outside the cafeteria. Ben was standing there in his new sweater vest waiting for her.
"Hey Amy." He leaned in and kissed her. "How are you this morning? How was John?"
"John was good. He slept when I took him to the nursery. I think Ricky is going to take him to his apartment tonight. I don't know yet though. And I'm pretty good. How are you? How is Betty and your Dad?"
"Oh they're great." Ben looked discouraged.
"What's wrong?" Amy grabbed his hand.
"I don't know I have to go." Ben said quickly and walked away. Amy got frustrated and went to grab a coffee in the cafeteria before class. Ben stomped down the hall but he came up on Ricky at his locker.
"Whoa whoa whoa what's wrong there Sausage Prince?" Ricky stopped Ben in his tracks.
"I don't know. It's Amy she's got me so frustrated."
"What kind of frustration?" Ricky looked at him sternly.
"You know what kind of frustration I'm talking about." Ben looked Ricky in the eye. Ricky pushed him against the locker.
"Look, if you don't wanna be with her because she won't have sex with you, then don't. You don't realize that she was a virgin that I manipulated and ended up getting pregnant. You don't realize what she went through. And I'm tired of you whining about how you don't get any. Just break up with her and go get some then. Because while she's raising my son, she doesn't need to deal with your 'problems.'"
"Ok ok." Ben backed away slowly from Ricky and walked down the hall. He wasn't looking and ran face first into someone. He looked and it was a girl that he's never seen, she was now laying on the floor. He reached down to help her up. "I'm so so so sorry."
"It's ok. I'm having a weird first day here anyway." Nikki smiled and grabbed Ben's hand to stand up.
"Do you wanna sit with me at lunch and talk about it?" Ben looked into her ice blue eyes and grinned.
"Sure, I'd like that." She shook his his hand and then headed off to her first day of class. The next few hours at the school were boring. Then it was lunchtime. Everyone went to their normal tables except Ben went to sit by himself. Amy didn't really pay attention because of how weird he had acted this morning. She didn't even bother to look to see where he sat. She just ate her lunch with Madison and Lauren like usual. Nikki walked into the cafeteria with her brown paper bag. She looked around to see the familiar face of Ben and she did. She quickly started to move towards him but was stopped by Adrian.
"Hey I'm Adrian." She said in a short, rude tone.
"Hi, I'm Nikki." Nikki smiled, trying to sound friendly.
"Yeah cut the friendly tone." Adrian licked a little of her lipgloss off. "I saw you talking to Ricky. I want you to stay away from him. Or we're going to have problems. Do you understand?"
"Yeah I do." Nikki said, then ducked her head and walked past. She sat down next to Ben. "What a weird school this is."
"You're telling me. But what happened?" Ben sounded intriuged.
"Well the first person to talk to me was some guy named Ricky and since then..." She started but Ben interupted her.
"Stay away from Ricky." Ben warned her.
"What? Why?" Nikki scratched her head. Ricky seemed nice. Why was everyone trying to make him out for the bad guy.
"Because, number one reason, Adrian. They're not dating, but she's super protective of him. And the other reason, he got my girlfriend pregnant."
"Wait you have a girlfriend?" Nikki put down her food, disgusted.
"Yeah, is that a problem?" Ben swallowed and looked at her.
"Uh yeah. You kinda hit on me. But whatever." Nikki grabbed her food and stood up. She walked over to the garbage can to throw it away. Amy was standing by the garbage.
"Hey." She smiled at Nikki. "Were you just eating lunch with Ben Bokavich?"
"Yeah. Get this he totally hit on me then was like I have a girlfriend. I hate that." Nikki complained.
"He hit on you?!" Amy raised her voice a little.
"Yeah?" Nikki answered in a questioning tone.
"He's my boyfriend!" She squealed in anger.
"Oh I'm sorry I didn't..." Amy interupted her.
"No no I'm not mad at you. I'm mad at him. This morning we were talking and he just ran away from me. He's been acting so weird lately."
"Wait if you're his girlfriend, you must be Amy. The girl with the baby?" Nikki asked her.
Amy sighed. "Yes that's me. You've been here for one day and you already know all the gossip."
"Well your friend Lauren told me about it, because I guess you guys saw me talking to Ricky. And then Ben told me, and this girl Adrian, well she threatened me. This school is like crazy!" Nikki laughed a little.
"Yeah I know. Hey after school you should meet me or something. We could go somewhere. I need a little break before I have to go pick John up from the nursery." Amy smiled and offered to Nikki.
"Ok." She handed Amy her phone. Just put your number in and I'll call you. Amy put her number in Nikki's phone and then they both trailed off. Nikki looked at the clock, she still had a half an hour before lunch was over. She decided to walk down the hall. She ventured down a hall that she doesn't have any classes in. She walked past a room and heard someone playing the drums. She stopped to listen, but quickly began walking when the drumming stopped. Quickly, she tried to get out of sight, but Ricky came out into the hall.
"Hey new girl." Ricky smiled, and Nikki turned around.
"Was that you in there?"
"Yeah it was. I'm in the band." Ricky laughed.
"Oh that's interesting." Nikki laughed.
"Come on I'll show you a little something." He reached out his hand to grab her wrist and he led her into the band room. He started to play a song on the drums while Nikki admired him.
"That was really good." Nikki complimented him after he finished playing.
"Why thank you new girl." He smiled at her. She smiled back slyly.
"So I was told to stay away from you." She twisted her hair nervously. He stood up and walked over to sit in a chair next to her.
"By who?" Ricky looked concerned.
"By this girl Lauren, then Ben, and some girl named Adrian."
"Well what did they say?"
"Adrian said you're hers, and the other two just warned me that you have a kid." Nikki looked down at the floor.
"Oh well, they're right. But Adrian, I'm not hers. She's just in love with me. At least I think. She always invites me over and stuff. But I'm not really interested in her. I'm looking for a newer interest." Ricky looked at her from the corner of his eye.
"Oh ok I see."
"Yeah. By the way, you're really pretty." He laughed and then showed her his extremely white smile.
"Do you really think that? Because when I first saw you walking towards me I was like wow, because I thought you were pretty much amazing looking." Nikki too laughed, and then flashed him her smile.
"Yes I do." Ricky learned forward and brushed her hair back with his fingers. He put his lips very close to hers and just breathed. "Do you wanna maybe hang out this afternoon. We could go get coffee or maybe go to the mall." Nikki leaned in a little to make their lips go closer.
"I would love to." She breathed on his lips, and he grabbed her hand. He pulled out a pen and wrote his number on her hand. Then he grabbed her chin and kissed her on the lips. "Call me after school new girl." He smiled, and got up and left. Dumbfounded, Nikki sat there in amazement. She kissed the school bad boy, and she liked it. She was even going to go out with him. She grabbed her phone and called Amy. "Hey Amy, can we hang out tomorrow? I still have packing plans with my mom. If that's alright with you."
"Of course it is. Nice meeting you." Amy said and hung up the phone. Nikki sat back in the band chair, and just smiled. This was going to a fun place to go to school.