For a school so academically inclined, news seemed to travel incredibly quickly. The girl had only arrived an hour or so ago, apparently 5 minutes late to AP Calc (Clarke wasn't in that class, it was more of Monty's kinda thing), and still everyone was buzzing about her. As much as news about some new girl stepping in to take Fin's spot in the class quota enthralled Clarke, she was just a little more wrapped up in the Studio Art project she was supposed to have finished in two periods. She was only a sketch behind out of the 8 they were supposed to turn in that week, but she didn't like how close she was cutting it.
"She's rough. Or, she looks rough. I heard she grew up in the town," Monty continued, slamming his locker door shut.
"No one from the town comes here," Jasper said, giving his own locker a good shove closed. "Right Clarke? Clarke?"
"Hmm?" Clarke pushed off from the cold metal wall, shutting her sketchbook with a distracted sigh. "What were you saying?"
"I wasn't. I was asking," Jasper retorted with a scowl. "Town kids don't come here. Right, Mrs. President?"
"Right." Clarke shot him an apologetic glance and eased her sketchbook into her messenger bag. She'd have time to work at lunch, probably, as long as Bellamy didn't call up another one of his spur of the moment 'emergency' student gov meetings again. Even if he wanted to, she could technically veto. "They could, theoretically, but it doesn't really happen. JAHA has a whole country to choose from. Johnstone isn't exactly an academic metropolis."
"See?" Jasper gave Monty a shove, smirking. As far as Clarke could tell, there was nothing either of them loved more than being right.
"Its possible, though. Clarke said its possible," Monty shoved back, with a smirk of his own.
"Possible, but not..."
Clarke's focus shifted out of the conversation as she caught a familiar set of eyes locking on her as he walked down the hall. Every day, Clarke found herself reminding herself how lucky she was to have him there. It was a total fluke that both of them had been accepted in the first place.
"You finish proofing my budget report yet," he asked playfully, placing a kiss on her cheek. Clarke placed a gentle hand on his chest, stepping back. A grin played on her lips, but she tried setting it into a firm look as best she could.
"You know the rules about PDA as well as I do, Bellamy." Clarke reached into her bag, pulling out the red file he'd handed her yesterday, all corrected, with three separate, newly reworked copies of what he'd given her originally. "And you know I did. Has Raven agreed to reset the lighting board for the showcase next week yet?"
"You know she hasn't," he laughed leaning against the locked a bit closer to the blonde than she would have liked in such an open space. "She says she's still mad at you for letting Fin get expelled."
Clarke frowned slightly, rezipping her bag shut. "Did you tell her that it wasn't my choice and he shouldn't have gotten in that fight at the JH game?"
"You know I did."
"Fantastic. As if I didn't have enough to deal with. Especially with the-"
"There she is!"
Monty's not so quiet whisper cut through their conversation, and Clarke felt herself take a step away from Bellamy to look at whatever he was going on about. It was the new girl. Clarke didn't know why she was surprised, it was so rare they got anyone new midsemester like this, especially not a new Senior. They hardly got new Senior's at the beginning on the year, much less now. Much less ones with tattoos.
"Rough," Jasper said under his breath, his eyes trained on her like seemingly everyone else in the previously noisy hall. Now it was silent as a cemetery. And Clarke was just as silent as the rest of the peanut gallery.
But the new girl wasn't looking at any of them. She had her hands clenched, shoved in the pockets of her old, beat-up looking denim jacket. JAHA didn't have a dress code, exactly, but there was a way that everyone usually dressed, and that was not it. With a few diversions here and there, mostly everyone wore pretty much the same prepschool kinda style as Clarke. Even Clarke was a little out there, mostly because she preferred jeans to plaid, but still. She'd earned that, she'd been at JAHA for almost four years. She got to wear jeans and not be questioned. Octavia too, but that was mostly because she was a jock and didn't really care about wearing anything but her uniform or some kind of workout gear most of the time. But this girl.. it was different. Her jeans were black, and ripped in three placed Clarke could see. Her T-shirt was ripped as well, but too far away for Clarke to see clearly. and her shoes weren't the usual shining, new-looking vans usually sported around JAHA, but a pair of maroon combat boots that looked like they'd been worn almost enough to have a few holes of their own. And the tattoo Clarke could see, the one on her neck, was small, but the girl certainly wasn't trying to hide it with her hair up like that.
But it wasn't until she girl turned to lock eyes with Clarke, suddenly, and with a familiarity that kind of made Clarke want to crawl out of her skin, that she realized she knew her. And that the new girl seen her naked.
"I need to go to the bathroom," Clarke blurted, breaking eye contact with the new chick after what seemed like way too long to hold the gaze of a stranger. She darted away from the lockers, nearly shoving Bellamy in the process, and half-sprinted to the girls room.
When she got there from halfway across campus, Clarke was more grateful to find it empty than she thought she'd ever be. The girl stumbled into a stall, locking the stall behind her, before glancing at her watch. She had thirty more minutes before the faculty meeting ended and she had to get to AP Lit/Comp, which meant she had thirty minutes to get her shit together. It was almost two years ago. Just because Clarke had been pretty much mortified by everything that had happened between her and the new girl, a girl she thought she'd never see again, didn't mean it had stuck with her nearly as much. It was Clarke's nightmare after all, not hers.
Sinking back onto the toilet seat, Clarke settled herself to focussing on her breathing for a few minutes. She was so focused, actually, that she didn't notice that someone had come in until she heard a small cough. She glanced at her watch. Great, only ten minutes now. Whatever. At least no one in her Lit class had seen her naked. Well, Bellamy didn't count. And they were little then anyway, and Octavia had been there. Not exactly romantic if Clarke still had some baby teeth.
Letting out a sigh, Clarke opened the stall door, and froze, her eyes settling on a pair of maroon combat boots planted infront of her.
"Griffin, right?"