Prologue
Date: 08/24/2009
The First Day of School
Chris glared at the hand-painted ship navigation wheel plastered onto the bricks. He stared valiantly at the unwavering colors of the American flag fluttering in the calm breeze that went with the early morning, before sunlight had even hit this part of the Earth. The sidewalk paved to the entrance to Trafalgar Middle School was a long one, and he trotted every step, until finally, arriving inside, and into the long line of eighth graders eager to receive their schedule.
"Ah, the first day of school. It was so enriching. So many new faces, and all of my old friends!" thought Chris with a mental snap. Ten minutes later, he was up, and uttered the name "Chris Stafford" to the portly drone of the Lee County School District. The employee quickly versed through some papers, finding only one with his name on it. She handed the orange paper off to him.
"Let's see… first period, Home Ec… great…" he thought. Of course, Chris was rather feminine, but that didn't mean he had to enjoy being in a cooking and sewing class…
He opened the door with a grimace, nodding to Mrs. Genarro, the Home Ec teacher at Trafalgar for many years now. She was a rather gentle and nimble lady, one who always seemed to be smiling.
"Could I see your schedule?" she asked, as her dark brown eyes seemed to stare into the depths of his soul. He nodded and handed her the orange piece of paper.
"Mm, okay Chris! Welcome to my Home Economics class! You can have a seat wherever you like!" she exclaimed, with a slight… bounce?
"The teachers here have always been creepy… oh well, at least I'm out of here after this year!" thought Chris with an evil grimace. High school was always said to be more fun than middle school, anyways.
Chris sat down at a table that was currently unpopulated. He laid in wait of the children that last year, surrounded him as friends. But this time, Chris might have a few unexpected surprises for them…
The clock ticked closer and closer to displaying 9:45 am. Students from all areas of the large school came flourishing in to room 281, the Home Ec room.
Two students quickly grabbed a pair of chairs in front of Chris. One was a tall and athletic boy, with short and spiked blonde hair. The other was a short guy sporting a Miami Heat jersey. He had brown hair, and those sort of crystal blue eyes you could only imagine in movies. Finally, some kids Chris knew!
"Hey, guys! How'd summer go?" said Chris with a curt smile at the two boys. A gleam was apparent and viewable in Chris' blue eyes.
"My summer was awesome, dude. I got to go to Disney World!" shouted the brown-haired boy, known to Chris as Dakota. His hair swept around his broad shoulders as he gestured towards the other boy.
"Pssh, I didn't do a damn thing! I stayed home and practiced my writing a bit more. I think I'm getting really good! I can show you at lunch or something," gestured the memorable boy known as Joel. "How did yours go?" he asked.
"It was awesome! I went to Cleveland to see my relatives. We went to a basketball game every week!" exclaimed Chris. The two children before him seemed a bit surprised. The Lakers had won many championships, compared to the Cavaliers' zero.
"Cool. I wonder where Kyle is. We haven't seen him since last year. It's about time we got the group back together," stated Joel softly, his voice lisping from the tentative grouping of the words.
Two minutes passed, and the surprisingly loud bell churned through the open hallways, alerting everyone that it was time for class to begin. Ten seconds later, without hesitation, the rusty metal door veered open, revealing a tall black-haired child, dressed in a skater shirt with basketball shorts.
"And… who might you be?" prodded the teacher, grabbing for the student's schedule, clutched firmly in his hand. She wrestled it from his hands and read from it.
"Welcome to my class, Kyle. Great way to start the year, with a tardy, you know," she stated dryly, wrapping her arms around a clipboard, marking the letters "PTU" next to his name. Kyle grabbed a chair next to the three conferring boys and made a sweeping gesture, noticing that it's been a long time since they last spoke.
"What's happening, Chris, Joel, Daky?" he asked in an abruptly deep voice. Kyle's voice was deeper than most for his age, displaying such depth and perception that was yet to hit a squeaky and childish voice such as Chris'.
Chris' small voice was drowned out in the sea of chatting amongst the home economics class of well over thirty people. The teacher mustered a blurring shout, silencing many of the forebodingly speaking children, long enough for Chris to pass around a note.
"This will be easier than trying to talk over these psychopaths…" he thought quickly as he received the note back, scribbling around on it before passing it along to the next person.
The teacher took charge and started handing out several sheets of paper.
"This is your syllabus. It shows the whole outline of the course. I expect you to stick to it and know what you need. You should also know who your kitchen partners are by the end of next week!" she announced. Groups of children looked around at each other, making a look as if asking if they wanted to be partners in the home economics kitchen or not. Chris, Kyle, Joel, and Dakota didn't even have to ask. After all, they've known each other for seven years now. Even Chris still remembered the day they met back in first grade. Everything from giggling in sex education class back in fifth grade to copying homework from each other in Life Science last year was all committed to memory.