Chapter One

"People!" Mr. Hosney's screech caught her attention. She let an ear bud fall lazily to her shoulder and took a moment to check the time. Six more minutes.

"Responsibility." She hid her phone further under the desk, her eyes drifting over towards the boy at the front of the room. He was fidgeting under the class's gaze, nervously fiddling with his hands.

Mr. Hosney offered him a curt nod, and he began his speech.

"So, for my family genealogy report, I decided to do it on my great-great-grandfather, who was a famous man, Captain Archibald Witwicky. Very famous explorer. In fact, he was one of the first to explore the Arctic Circle, which is a big deal. In 1897, he took 41 brave sailors straight into the Arctic Shelf." She hummed faintly to herself, taking in the information. She had to admit; it was a nice change of pace from all of the unbearably dull projects presented before him.

There was a moment of silence; the boy seemed stuck in his thoughts. Her eye caught a glaring flash of light, but by the time she faced the window to her left, there was nothing there. At least, nothing out of the ordinary. A couple cars were parked patiently outside as students bustled about.

"So, that's the story, right?" She turned back to see him haphazardly shuffling through some ancient-looking documents, before dropping them back onto the stand he was positioned behind.

"And here we have some of the basic instruments and tools used by 19th-century seamen." She involuntarily groaned at the giggles filling the room at his choice of words. Even eleven years of schooling couldn't teach some children a little bit of class.

"This here is the quadrant, which you can get for eighty bucks. It's all for sale by the way." She squinted sharply. There was the flash again. She whipped her head around faster this time, but still, she caught nothing. Girls were hugging goodbye, couples were making out, a car was exiting the school grounds. She rubbed her eyes a little too harshly, before taking another peek out of the window. Those late night calls were really getting to her.

"Like the sextant here. Fifty dollars for this, which is a bargain." Another batch of laughter erupted in the classroom, only adding to her oncoming headache. She pressed her cheek to the cool laminate of her desk, trying her best to tune out the noise. Her arms nestled around her head, but she still heard the boy's babbling and the class' demeaning laughter at his expense. He was trying to sell something or other.

Her phone buzzed once. Twice. Three times. An uncontrollable grin itched at her lips. The name "Madsen" shone back at her on her cellphone screen.

"Unfortunately, my great-great-grandfather, the genius that he was, wound up going blind and crazy in a psycho ward, drawing these strange symbols and babbling on about some giant ice man that he thought he'd discovered."

She was in the middle of typing her response when the final bell rang out.

"Okay. Might be a pop quiz tomorrow. Might not." Mr. Hosney called over the chaos. She was vaguely aware of the students hurrying to file out around her, too caught up in trying to compose the perfect comeback for one of Mags' infamously horrible jokes. "Sleep in fear tonight." The teacher added as an afterthought.

She wasn't looking as she assembled her things, sliding any belongings off of her desk and into the sack on her lap. She slipped her phone into her back pocket, swinging her legs to the side of her desk. As she stood to leave, a snickering blonde tore past, shoving her back into her seat and scattering her bag's components across the floor.

She rose up bitterly and stole a glance at the girl. Although many colorful responses sprung to her mind, each one died on her tongue.

"Yup. Thanks for that. Have a nice day." She mumbled into her chest, keeping her head down as she reassembled her things. She heard their laughter drift away as they went.

"'Son, I'm going to buy you a car, but I want you to bring me two thousand dollars and three A's. Okay, I got the two thousand and I got two A's. Okay, here's the dream. Your B-? Pft. Dream gone. Kaput. Sir, just ask yourself, 'What would Jesus do?'" She glanced up to see the boy's pleading. Mr. Hosney seemed to consider it, before handing back the report with a smile.

"B+."

A piercing whine split apart the almost empty room. Her eyebrows shot up to her hairline. Was that-

"Sir. Sir, sir, sir, sir. You don't understand. This is it for me!" He sputtered out his words, staggering over to the side of Mr. Hosney's desk. Several knickknacks clattered to the ground, and the boy lounged to pick them up. On his knees, he hugged the novelties tight to his chest. "You're deciding my social fate right now. Right here, right now. This is a popularity death sentence."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Witwicky. I simply cannot give you a grade you haven't earned. That would be preposterous. Purely unethical of me." There was a happy lilt to his voice, as if the teacher was eager to disappoint him. The sound made her stomach clench, but she timidly approached the desk anyway.

"Ah, Mia. Here is your report. Absolutely perfect, as always." Mr. Hosney praised, his smile stretching grossly across his face. She nodded mutely, turning to leave.

She veered respectfully around the boy, all the while feeling his burning gaze at her back. The whimpering came back, quieter this time but much more pathetic. Mia heard his broken mumbles, growing steadily louder and louder. She didn't make it but halfway out of the room, before she turned sharply back around.

The boy's blubbering came to a harsh halt. His watery eyes blinked owlishly up at her. A sound of disbelief bubbled up from the back of her throat as she walked to his side. She slid an arm around his and yanked him to his feet, dragging him the couple feet back to stand before Mr. Dickface.

"Um, I think there is a slight error in the grading of my project." She began with a charming smile. "See, I didn't fully utilize any documents in my presentation of this report. And… yup, right here. 'Properly portray information from documents collected by the student.' Four out of Four." Mia coolly picked up one of the many red pens strewn across his desk, took both hands to maneuver it into Mr. Hosney's limp hand, and directed the tip to her paper.

"There it is. Zerooo. Much better." She beamed at the revised grade. She looked between the two men, happy with how she resolved the situation. After some silence followed, she realized they need further clarification.

"With this being zero," she snatched back the writing utensil, situating it comfortably in her grip. "My final grade would then be…" She flipped impatiently back to her cover page, crossing out the '100' and the 'Excellence! ' to replace them with a "96."

"Now, I'm assuming here, correct me if I am wrong, but that is still the highest grade for this assignment in the class, yes?" Mia tucked a rather troublesome lock of hair behind her ear, pivoting to face her teacher for his response.

Mr. Hosney tripped over his tongue, staring blankly at the students in front of him. The boy took that opportunity to arise from his doleful stupor, reaching across the desk to snap in his teacher's face. Mr. Hosney blanched.

"U-um, um, yes. Yes! You are right." He stuttered out his response, cold beads of sweat accumulating at his receding hairline. "But, Mia-" He made an effort to stand as she walked over to her fellow classmate.

"Then…" She reached for his report and motioned for him to turn around. He quickly did as she asked. "With the added curve you promised for this last minute assignment, each student should be awarded…" She placed the report on his back, scribbling away with the red ink. "Exactly… four… points."

"Look at that. An A-." She threw a confident smile over her shoulder at Mr. Hosney. He couldn't have looked more dazed. Once she was finished, she handed the report back to the boy and placed the pen back onto the desk.

"Well, thank you, Mr. Hosney. I would've just felt terrible if I were to receive a grade that I did not earn. Purely unethical." She smugly added before turning and making her way back out of the classroom.

"Have a nice day!"

"Hey!" Young Sam Witwicky shouted after the girl, racing to follow her.

"Hey! Hey girl! With the jeans and the- Brains! Honor Society! Whizbanger!" He skidded to a halt when she stopped before him. "Oh wow. You stopped quick there."

"Whizbanger?" She said it like it left a bad taste in her mouth, eyeing him questionably.

"Woo. Yeah hey, um, I need to thank you for that. What you did in there, that was… I mean, I've never seen Hosney so-" He wrung his hands out in front of him, nervously shifting from one foot to the other. She looked distracted, constantly glancing at her phone.

"No problem. Just… take me on a ride sometime." She smiled politely back at Sam.

"Ride? Oh, you want a ride? W-with me?" His mouth went dry, involuntarily inching closer to her.

"In your new car?" She backed away from him just as much as he moved towards her. She was already slipping one of her headphone pods back into her ear. He looked disappointedly at his feet.

"Yeah, yeah I could do that. I'm a great driver. Smooth like..." When Sam looked back up, the young woman was already half way down the street.

"Asphalt."

"I'm telling you, Mags. I need to get out of here. This weekend. Me, you, and Chinese takeout. I can even help you with that thing you were working on! What was it again?" Mia rambled pleadingly, holding her phone between her cheek and her shoulder.

"Oh, that? Don't worry about that. It's nothing. Now, if I'm seeing you this weekend, I want you to be my main focus. I can drop that silly little thing for the meantime." Maggie Madsen spoke quickly from the other end of the line. A couple cars whizzed by as Mia strolled leisurely along the sidewalk. Mia fiddled with the strings on her jacket, nodding along with her friend's words. That is, until the words fully registered.

"Mags." She moaned angrily. "Mags! You promised you were doing everything by the book this time!"

"And it is!" Maggie didn't have to see the look on Mia's face to know she didn't believe her. "It will be." Maggie followed up swiftly. "Come on. Let's talk about Chinese again. I heard Ethan still works there! You know, he still asks about you every time I visit. No more braces and he's finally growing into those ears."

There it was again. The glare of light. Or was it a glint? She looked around at the once busy street. Now, it was empty. Hey eyes traced along the side streets connected to the road, and an old scratched up car caught her eye. It looked familiar. Maybe it was the color: a golden yellow dulled with age.

She couldn't understand why, but she was drawn closer. She took a step and then another. A stream of honks drug her out of her reverie.

"Mia?" Maggie called out worriedly. "Mia!" She yelled when she received no response.

"Hey." Mia breathlessly answered. She stared at the vehicle closest to her. The yellow car had reversed into oncoming traffic, crashing its side into the front of another car. It wasn't as bad of a collision as it could have been. The driver had slammed on his breaks when he noticed Mia heading out into the street. She took a moment to assess the damage before hurriedly making her way back onto the sidewalk.

"Thank God. Everything alright?" Mia heard Maggie's voice next to her ear, but somehow it sounded distant. She couldn't keep her eyes off of the yellow car in front of her.

"Sorry, Mags. Talk later." She ended the call curtly. If that car hadn't backed up when it did… As quick as the yellow car had come, it raced off.

"Hey-!" The driver of the other vehicle had only begun to leave his seat. He called out to the yellow car as it swerved around a corner out of sight.

"Hey, you!" The angry driver called out to Mia. She pointed towards herself. "Yeah you. You saw that right? That guy came out of nowhere! And what- what about you? What were you thinking?" He started to walk over to the side of the road, mumbling obscenities under his breath. But before he could make it to her side, she sped off, blurting out some hasty apologies behind her.

"Wait, hey! Did you-!" He shrieked after her lamely. She was gone in the same direction of the demon car. The man turned to look at the sorry state of his car and let out one final cry of aggravation.

Mia jogged down the path, focusing only on making it to her home as swiftly as possible, but there it was again. The yellow car was parked a couple houses down from her house. She paused only for a moment before she heard her uncle's voice calling out to her from inside the kitchen.

"Mia! Come in, dinner's ready!" She hesitated, still gawking wide eyed at the car down the street. "What are you doing out there?" Her uncle had made it to the front door, peering out at her.

"Nothing." She shook off the feeling of familiarity and dread, and she followed him inside.