You can tell a lot about someone from the way they hold their pencil.
Do they follow the lines? Hold it loosely, or firmly? Cursive? Or chicken scratch?
It all tells something about them.
Take me for instance, pencil firmly grasped, sprawled out light chicken scratch across the neatly organized lines, nervous bite marks spread along the yellow surface of said pencil, making it look more like a chew toy for a pet hamster.
It was just the judgmental side that said all those things though. For if I saw someone else holding this sort of pencil, I would immediately think the person held some shy qualities. Quiet, nervous, messy, yet organized, and somewhat of an awkward freak. I guess that best described me anyway. Hence a pencil telling a lot about someone. Even someone like me who was, in reality, a nobody.
No one else in the class, now that I took the time to notice, had a pencil that looked anywhere near similar to mine. Hell, most of them were mechanical.
You can't tell a lot about a person using a mechanical pencil. Except that, well, they were more electronically advanced then the rest of us.
My own pencil spun around my fingers carefully, me watching the whole time, as if it were the most interesting thing in the world. Honestly, it was more interesting then the history lesson the teacher bragged on about. Some crap about the Quileute legends, as if we haven't heard it a million times around the camp fire the past few weeks. It was like every other day there was another bonfire. Uncle Harry said it had something to do with new members of Sam's gang. Not that any of them bothered to come to school much anymore. Much to the dismay of half my school's female population. Not including myself, of course.
"Pay attention." A voice hissed as a foot made contact with my leg. Rolling my eyes, I glared at Skippy who decided it was his new job to reinvent me. Academically, I wasn't the brightest, not that I wasn't smart, just that I didn't care. And he wanted to change that. Make me more like him and actually pay attention. He even dared to say he wasn't going to let me steal his homework anymore. The fiend.
Now I know what you're thinking. What kind of best friend is he, right?
I know.
"I'll pay attention when you get a boyfriend." I chuckled, laughing at my own horrible joke.
Skippy was always…how do I put this….he always had one foot sticking out of the closet, but just couldn't get his other one out there. Leaving him perfectly in the middle. If he didn't hurry up and throw himself into La Push's guy dating scene, I was gonna have to go in that closet and push him out myself.
"You're not funny." He dead panned, as if I didn't know.
Bad jokes were kind of my trade mark.
At least…they would be if I had anyone other than three or four people to tell my awful jokes to. Sigh.
Brushing auburn strands from my eyes, I glanced to the back of the class where some of the La Push gang lounged, causing a ruckus on one of the only days they decided to show up. You'd think after two weeks of being gone, they'd just quit already. It's not like we weren't all expecting it anyway.
"Is this almost over?" I looked up at the clock that's been broken for the whole year. Damn it. I always do that.
I really need to learn that the clock isn't going to magically start working again, no matter how many times I glare at it. Who am I kidding? The clock just needed a good beating is all.
"About another minute." He nodded, secretly checking his phone. See what I mean? Mechanical pencil, cell phone. So electronically dependent. Tisk, tisk.
Perking up at the possibility of getting out of this hell hole in about a minute, I forgot to slouch and look bored. Come on. Come on. Come on.
The bell rung loudly, signaling lunch. Ahh, sweet music to my ears.
"Happy?" Skippy laughed as I jumped up from my seat and threw my notebook in my bag, along with his. Hey, I need the notes….and he won't mind me stealing it, as long as I give it back. I think.
"Delighted." I bounced in anticipation as he slowly packed up his things. The only thing worse then having one of the late lunches was waiting for Skippy to pack his already full bag before we could eat.
"Off to see the wizard?" He stuck his arm out for me to take, leading the way out of the class after the last of the kids.
"The wonderful wizard of Oz." I finished, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "I'm soooo hungry."
Skippy, being used to my complaining, just brushed me off like he has for the last two years of high school, and opened the door for me so I could run into the lunch line as quickly as possible.
"Woah, Ace, leave some food for the rest of us." I heard the voice before I felt the heavy arm drop over my shoulder. Turning to Ozzy, I quirked a brow, ruffling his long, blond hair, and going on my tip toes to do so. If only I wasn't so damned short…
I guess you could say we were the skater group at the school. You know, if ya wanna be stereotypical and all. We had our preps, our Goths, and our skaters. And I definitely fell into that category. Me and Ally being the only girls of the group, not that we minded. Besides, the group wasn't that big to begin with. Maybe six kids, including myself and Skippy.
All of us nick named odd things because of one stupid joke or another that just kinda sticked. Like me for instance. Ace, as in my incredibly horrible poker skills.
Yeah, not one of my best moments.
And Skippy, cause he's a giant Wizard Of Oz fanatic, and skips a lot.
Or Ozzy, being from Briton wasn't the most popular thing in our school.
…We don't have a lot of great moments.
"Can I have the chicken?" I stuck my tray out to the lunch lady and she plopped the meaty substance on my plate without thinking twice.
"Same." Ozzy chuckled behind me as I skipped off to the table and left him on his own. Hey, a girl's gotta eat.
"Chicken again?" Ally, from the time she got lost in Seattle and sat in an Alley for two hours, poked at the breaded meat, if you could even call it that.
"Of course, meh darling." I grinned, trying to sound like Ozzy. But my fake British accent kinda sucked.
I sounded more Australian then anything.
Man, I'm a loser.
"Want it?" Tripp asked, holding out his plate from across the table. Tripp, as in falling off the skateboard at every given opportunity, smiled as I snatched the plate away and hugged it close to my side.
My chicken.
"So my loves, what're we doin today?" Ozzy slid into the seat beside me, looking around the table as if he actually expected us to jump at the question.
"What do you think dumb ass?" Ally snapped, picking at her own food.
"Skating?" Skippy and Tripp laughed. Honestly Ozzy, what else do we ever do?
Besides Skippy who sometimes well, skipped out to study on occasions. Other than him, the rest of us eat, breathe and sleep skate.
Shaking my hair from my green orbs, I blinked down at my plate, almost half gone by now. I wasn't too talkative when there was food in front of me. It was just too distracting.
"You need some new jeans, Ace." Tripp commented distantly, causing me to glance down at the millions of holes splattered throughout my favorite pair of red skinny jeans.
"I like 'em." I defended, wiggling to a higher position in my seat, though it did nothing for my 5'3 height.
"I know." He rolled his eyes. It seemed like Tripp always wanted someone to go shopping with. Mostly so he could show off his money, but I had a certain feeling that he was just as shy about his sexuality as Skippy was. Though he didn't show it at all. I just don't know any other guy besides him that actually WANTED to shop.
We broke into different conversations then. Me listening to Skippy talk animatedly about some Wizard Of OZ documentary he watched, while Ozzy and Ally went into some deep talk about the wheels of a skateboard. Giggling softly as Tripp tried to but into everyone's conversations and failing miserably.
It wasn't long before the bell rang and we all went our separate ways, me and Ozzy heading off to English. The only class I wasn't failing.
"After you." Ozzy smiled like a true British gentleman, waving me through the door with a wave of his hand, and then quickly dropping it on the girls coming in after us.
"Nice." I giggled, taking my seat in the back where I sat next to some preppy kid who liked to click his pen loudly, right in my ear. One day he was gonna get smacked.
That'll teach him not to click in people's ears.
Every head turned as one of the kids in Sam's gang came rushing in, taking the seat in front of me. I didn't look at him, being sure to keep my head down so I wouldn't gag. I recognized him as Paul, this senior kid like Ozzy, but he was certainly not an adorable British man. No, he was some jack ass whore kid who never really did too well in this class to begin with. Which explains why he was in a Junior English class. Though, Ozzy was in the class too, it was different. Cause like I said, I liked Ozzy. And this Paul kid was just some kid who liked to skip school and jump off cliffs with the rest of his gang. If I liked him enough, I'd probably give him some awesome nick name, like Cliffy. How cool is that?
Cliffy. Like a guy in a gang or something.
…Oh wait…he is a guy in a gang…
Uhm, you know what I mean.
I think.
Cough, cough.
Sighing, I smiled at Ozzy as he turned and gave me a thumbs up when the teacher walked in, some young, British guy that was incredibly bias and gave Ozzy straight A's, though he didn't do any of his work.
"Shit." The mumble came quickly from in front of me as a pencil came tumbling towards me. I bent down, picking it up gently. It was small, and yellow. Bite marks were spread evenly along the side, as if it were a chew toy for a hamster. If it weren't for Cliffy turning around expectantly, I would of thought it was my pencil.
Finally sitting back up, I turned to him and placed the pencil in his hand before meeting his eyes.
That's when my world came to a crashing halt. Suddenly. It didn't matter what my plans for this weekend were, or what I was gonna wear tomorrow, or if I would ever eat another piece of chicken ever again. In that moment, all that mattered was the pencil between us and the way his angry, grey eyes starred into mine, a clash of emotions flickering through them. Like a lightning storm, and the thunder was simply the thudding of my heart, that I was sure he could hear.
"Thanks." I breathed, having no reason to thank him what so ever.
Actually, he should be thanking ME. I was the one who picked up his pencil. Why wasn't he thanking me? Did he have no manners? And was he still starring at me? Or was I still starring at him? How long has it been?
I wouldn't know because all the damn clocks in this school are broken.
But it had to have been a while. Me, getting lost in those eyes. It wasn't that hard to do.
"Sorry." He mumbled, rushing out of his seat and through the classroom doors as quickly as he came.
You can tell a lot about someone by the way they hold their pencil.
But you can tell a hell of a lot more by looking in their eyes.