High School Misfits
Chapter 1
~ Sora, the New Kid ~
Beep! Beep! Beep!
At the precise moment when it struck 7:15 AM, the alarm clock made its repetitive beeping noise, each beat getting louder and louder. Beside the alarm clock was a snoring teenage boy, slowly opening his eyes at the annoying sound the device was making.
"Geez…Give me five more minutes," the boy muttered to the gadget, slamming the snooze button with his bare fist. With that, he shuffled against the blankets and tried to continue his slumber again.
However, the door suddenly banged open, revealing a panicked young woman. "Sora!" she yelped, her voice echoing throughout the room. The woman shouted so loud, it made the boy jump out of his bed and on to the floor.
"Aww, mom," the teenager called Sora groaned out, rubbing the back of his neck. "You didn't have to yell that loud…"
His mother clicked her tongue in a disapproving matter. "Sora, school starts in about ten minutes," she stated, "and it takes about fifteen minutes to walk there."
Sora's cerulean eyes widened large at this. "WHAT?!" he exclaimed, bounding off the floor and instantly grabbing a random shirt off the ground and placing it over the undershirt he was wearing. Sora then snatched his backpack (that nearly had nothing but a few papers) and dashed his way out and on to school.
His mother quirked an eyebrow, a bit surprised on how fast her son could be even if it were still early in the morning. She paced around his room and her eyes fell down on a pair of crumpled jeans on the ground. She lifted the piece of clothing and sighed out, "And yet, he forgot to put on his pants…"
~ * ~ * ~
The fresh-looking hallway that the entrance of the school first leads to was packed with many students, socializing in their own little groups. The main gossip, however, started in the cheerleading squad's corp.
"So, anyway, the teacher mentioned the new kid didn't come to class yesterday because he caught a cold," one preppy girl whispered to her group.
A nerd corp. was beside them and eavesdropped on the conversation. In an instant, their conversations lead into this topic. "I wonder if he has any interest in the Trigonometry theory!" a short boy squeaked out to his friends.
All over the hallway, the other crowds overheard and started gossiping about this new kid coming to their school.
"I hope he's really tall…"
"I heard he was really short."
"He might carry one of those huge backpacks…"
"I hope he won't destroy my back," a nerd had shrilled and quivered at the thought behind one of his friends.
All of a sudden, the entrance doors busted open, revealing one perspiring and tired-looking Sora. Silence had quickly come across all of the looking crowds. "I made it!" he shouted confidently to the whole entire hallway.
All of a sudden, a burst of laughter came through one of the corps. "He made it to school in his boxers," one of them chortled.
Sora heard this and slowly looked down, just hoping he won't see the boxers he slept in last night were in view for everyone to see. Sadly, he saw the undergarment in clear sight and that was no doubt.
Embarrassed, the teen fled his way towards his way to his new locker. However, Sora was stopped by a boy with dirty blond hair and blue eyes, having a what-are-you-doing expression on his face. "Hey, name's Tidus," the boy cheerfully introduced. "Looks like you're having a nice first day here, umm…"
"Sora," the humiliated teen answered quickly.
Tidus gave their conversation a sudden silence while pondering over Sora's name. "Huh…another uncommon name in this school," Tidus finally murmured to himself. The blond scratched the back of his head and turned his attention back to Sora. "Well, no use in standing in your underwear like that. C'mon, I'll get you an extra pair of my gym clothes." Tidus began walking the opposite direction and Sora followed him, aware of the fact that he desperately needed the clothing.
Tidus then suddenly stopped in his pace, making Sora crash into him, since he really didn't look straight past him, and knocked both of them to the floor. "Ouch…" both of them complained.
" 'ey, you two okay?"
Sora slowly looked up and saw a pair of brown eyes staring at him with a confused look.
Tidus quickly jumped up to his feet and nodded impatiently to the new figure. "The new kid forgot his pants," he stated, trying to move forward.
"Yeah, I know that," the taller figure said, still blocking Tidus's pathway. "That's why I ran quickly to give the new guy a pair so he won't have to get stuck with your dirty one…"
The blond lifted an eyebrow and gritted his teeth. "They're not that dirty…" Tidus mumbled. Noticing Sora was still sitting there on the floor, Tidus tugged the collar of Sora's shirt and pulled the boy up. "This is Wakka, Sora," Tidus introduced to him, gesturing a hand towards his friend.
"Nice to meet ya, bruddah," Wakka greeted Sora and handed him a pair of sweatpants. "Lucky for you, I cleaned this pair last night."
"Thanks, Wakka," Sora expressed gratitude as he accepted the clothing. Apparently not caring, the teen quickly slipped into the sweatpants right there in the hallway.
Tidus and Wakka stared at Sora. "Eh," Wakka finally said, shrugging his shoulders. "Looks a bit too big…"
"Maybe it's because you're two heads taller than him, Wakka…" Tidus then turned to Sora looking as if something important was about to happen to him. "So, want to join my blitzball team, Sora?" he asked, elbowing the boy's shoulder repeatedly.
Sora raised his eyebrows. "Blitzball?" he questioned quizzically.
The eldest of the three of them grabbed Tidus's down into a lighthearted headlock. "Hey, don't listen to what he says, ya?" Wakka warned Sora. "He thinks there could be an underwater sport invented and keeps saying it'll be named blitzball…"
Tidus escaped from Wakka's grip and rubbed his throat to catch back his bit of air supply. "I will be able to get blitzball to be real, you'll see!" Tidus shouted for Wakka and Sora to hear.
The auburn haired teen palmed his forehead and shook his head. "This is exactly why you keep getting laughed at, Tidus," Wakka sighed.
By this time, Sora began to let his eyes wander over to where other groups were talking in the hallway, still waiting for the tardy bell to ring for the first class. The first crowd that captured his attention contained a dozen people wearing the exact same clothing as if they were uniformed. All of them sported a black hoodie, faded-black jeans, and to end it, black converse. The group contained eleven guys and only one girl. They all huddled close together, as if they were planning something.
"Excuse me," Sora uttered to Tidus and Wakka, "but who are they?" The brunet boy pointed towards the clumped group as he asked.
The duo of friends turned to where Sora was pointing at. "Oh, they're more like the students you should steer clear from…they like to call themselves the Organization," Tidus informed Sora. "Though, I like to call them the Klepto Club," he added with a snigger.
Wakka, however, didn't think that was funny and conked the blond on his skull. "Hey, don't be calling them that," he chided to Tidus. "Besides, the nicknames people give you are much worse than that," Wakka added to remind him.
Tidus groaned. "Don't remind me…" he moaned out, shaking his head from left to right in shame.
Sora shifted his attention back to the other groups in the hallway. Some of them looked unfriendly while others looked as if they were still in the awkward stages. Finally, Sora's eye was captured by three friends who were just casually laughing amongst themselves, looking absolutely the coolest among everyone other group in the hallway.
The cheerful blond noticed what group Sora was glancing at. "Those are the popular kids, if you're wondering," Tidus enlightened. "Of course them being popular, they're known to be liked by the majority of the students here in this school." He then pointed to one of them, a silver-haired boy who dressed in an athletics jacket, stuffing his hands inside the pockets in a relaxed manner. "That's Riku, the quarterback of the football team here. A lot of the girls here are all over him…" Tidus then proceeded to make a gagged-like looking face, apparently disgusted by this. "He mainly likes to show off his strength by challenging the nerds…Wakka could try to take him down, yeah?" he added, looking up to Wakka.
The former friend shook his head. "I'd rather not try really…" Wakka confessed, rubbing the back of his neck.
Tidus rolled his eyes at his friend's cowardly method. "Anyway, the next popular kid on the list…" Tidus signified the next student who sported a cream-colored jacket and spiky ginger-colored hair. "…is Roxas. He joined the popular group near the end of last school year for some odd reason nobody really knows..."
Sora looked at the last person in the trio of friends, a red-haired girl who continuously grinned and laughed at what her other two friends were chatting about.
"Finally, that's Kairi," Tidus finished listing, snapping Sora back to pay attention to what he was saying. "She's a pretty, smart and outgoing girl who's captured the boys' attention here."
"Even Tidus thought she was cute when he first saw her," Wakka chimed, laughing.
Tidus kicked the ground in mortification. "Well, Kairi's however…stubborn and naïve that she's rejected nearly every guy who's asked her out," he stated. "So, tough luck if you were planning that, Sora…"
Sora sputtered at this. "What?" he asked in an incredulous tone.
Wakka elbowed Sora's shoulder. "Ehh, you think she's cute, ya?" he asked teasingly.
The spiky brown-haired teen held his hands up and waved it around, denying. "I-I didn't say that!" Sora nervously cried out.
Tidus raised his eyebrows at Sora's new expression. "Wow, you make the weirdest face when you wave your hands like that," Tidus notified.
Sora calmed himself down by placing his hands onto his face. "Sorry, I just got carried away there," he explained, taking deep breaths. "So, do you two think you can show me the way to my first class?"
Wakka and Tidus signaled a thumbs-up to Sora. "Sure thing," they both said in unison. However, a new and fairly loud and shrill voice came into their ears.
"TIDUS! WAKKA!"
The three boys jerked their heads towards the direction the sound was coming from. Sprinting towards them was about a five foot girl, looking thoroughly furious.
"You two promised you'd meet me outside of the school!" the girl whined, slapping both of them on their arms.
Tidus scratched his cheek with his pointer finger. "Uh…we did?" he asked, honestly unaware what the new figure was talking about. "Selphie, you never actually mentioned a word about meeting you there…"
The student called Selphie huffed. "Maybe you two need to clean your pensive minds out and listen to me!" She turned and noticed Sora, who was just staring at the sudden conversation. "Ohh!" she exclaimed. "This is the new kid I kept hearing about!"
Sora rubbed the back of his neck, curious on how and why he was already known around the school if he didn't know any one of them. "Sora," he introduced.
"Selphie," she greeted back quickly. Selphie then rounded back to the two other boys. "C'mon! I need to discuss something with you two!" she informed them hastily. Without a reply from either one of them, Selphie grabbed the duo's ear with each hand and dragged them back to another part of the school.
"Uh, Sora, guess you'll be stuck by yourself!" Tidus called back out. "Ouch!" he added in complaint after Selphie started tugging his ear harder.
The three of them disappeared out of Sora's sight just like that, leaving him all alone in the hallway. He sighed in despair from losing the two to hang out with him and pulled out his crumpled schedule from his backpack.
"Argh, geometry first in the morning?" he asked aloud sullenly. "What a way to start off the day…" Sora squinted at the room number and made his way towards his first class.
As he was walking, the warning bell had at last rung…and Sora didn't expect what would happen next. As soon as the warning bell made the noise, every group in the hallway scattered this way and that, pushing and shoving their way to their next classrooms. It was this that Sora was knocked down to the ground all of a sudden.
"Hey!" Sora shouted from the ground. He quickly got back up on his feet, but as soon as he did, Sora was shoved and run into, making it difficult to reach his first class.
Eventually, Sora was able to make it through the crowds of ramming students and made it to his Geometry classroom right when the tardy bell had rung.
Everyone took their assigned seats immediately and stayed unusually silent. Sora scratched his head, wondering how the rowdy students were able to rapidly calm down. He found his answer when a strict voice called his name. Sora turned his head and found out that the voice belonged to a rather stout and frog-faced looking woman who was seemingly the teacher.
"Sora, I presume?" she asked in an unfriendly tone. "Take a seat next to Roxas…ROXAS! Raise your hand!" she commanded the blond boy, who slowly and lazily rose up his hand for Sora to see.
Sora saw Roxas's hand from the far back corner of the classroom and quickly made his way there, trying to avoid stares from his new peers. The teen obtained his desk at last and sighed gratefully for sitting where people couldn't really turn and glance at him.
Roxas, on the other hand, could. Right when their Geometry teacher started to chatter about their lesson for the day, Roxas leaned over to Sora to say something. "Hey, you're the new kid who showed up in his boxers," Roxas stated again.
Sora groaned at this, wanting to forget that scene forever. "Yeah, I know…" Sora responded.
"At least you got sweatpants now, right?"
The short conversation between the two was interrupted by their chubby-looking instructor. "Roxas! Sora! If you two had been paying attention, we're working in pairs!" she shouted in frustration. "Unless either one you want to show how to work the problem on the blackboard, I insist you do the work!"
Roxas groaned to himself when the teacher was out of earshot. "What an old hag," the spiky blond mumbled, lying back on his seat and lifted his feet onto the top of the desk.
"Umm…shouldn't we start on the work?" Sora inquired sheepishly.
The other boy groaned some more, but removed his feet from the desk and sat up straight, looking at the paper that was passed out. "Okay, but I'm warning you…I suck at math," Roxas acknowledged to Sora. "Since usually, I doze off when the moment the plump chicken starts talking…"
"Err, ok," Sora answered and took a look at the piece of paper. Unfortunately, all Sora saw were random numbers and shapes placed all over, and he was already getting confused by just looking at it.
Roxas raised an eyebrow at Sora's perplexed face. "You don't have a clue either, huh?" Roxas finally asked.
Sora, not wanting to look at the piece of work anymore, shook his head. "Nuh-uh…" he sighed.
The blond boy casually leaned over to one of his smarter classmates. "Hey…you, what's the answer to questions one through five?" Roxas nonchalantly asked the nerd.
The nerd excitedly replied back the answers. "It goes A, C, B, C, D!" the nerd squeaked. "Thanks for asking!"
Sora gaped at the nerd on what he said to Roxas. "Uhh…thank you for asking?" Sora thought, bewildered. "Who thanks someone who copies your work?"
Roxas, after finishing circling the answers, slipped his paper towards to where Sora had a view of it. "Here you go…just finish the hag's work, and you'll be getting an A in here all the time," Roxas updated to Sora. After talking, Roxas let out a conspicuous yawn for everyone in the class to hear and laced his fingers behind his head, a perfect relaxing position.
Sora quietly copied Roxas's paper. Of course he knew that cheating wasn't the right way to go, but seeing how the teacher was going to act all year, Sora just willingly obliged to just get the work done. "Yeah, math is going to suck this year," he thought, placing a balled-up fist against his forehead.
Sora's thoughts on math were interrupted when Roxas finally spoke again. "So…new guy," the blond started out.
"Sora," the brown-haired corrected, not wanting to adopt "the new guy" as his nickname.
"Right, Sora. How do you think of the school so far?" Roxas asked nonchalantly.
"Umm…" Sora hesitated. He really didn't have an answer yet on how he felt about his new school considering it was only the first class of the day. "I think it's…okay?"
Roxas closed his eyes, about ready to fall asleep. "Uh-huh…word of advice, this school consists of groups and nothing else," he informed. "If you don't find the right friends to sit and hang out with, you won't be able to reach the top of the social ladder…" With that, the relaxed teen leaned back on his seat and finally went to sleep.
Sora pondered on what Roxas had said to him just now. "If I don't find the right friends to hang out with, I'll be a loner?" he mused to himself.
The newcomer of the school suddenly had a visualization of him hanging out with the three popular kids in school: Riku, Roxas, and Kairi. He would be known all over the school, never having to worry about being shoved in lockers anymore or being poked at because of his unusual way his spiky hair turned out. Sora would be able to laugh amongst them, cracking up jokes and just having fun with each other. "How will I reach that group?" he thought miserably.
Suddenly, the school bell had rung to signal to go to the next class. Roxas instantly got out of his sleeping form and got up from his desk.
"See you, new kid," Roxas hurriedly said and ran out of the dreadful math classroom.
Sora slowly got up from his seat and proceeded to walk towards his next class. He pulled out the crumpled schedule again and checked. "Biology…" Sora sighed. "Joy…"
~ * ~ * ~
After Sora's fourth class had ended for the day, the teen rushed out and headed towards the cafeteria. Already when he got there though, the lines for the lunch food were already packed with yelling students, some trying to make their way towards the front without being shoved to the ground.
Not wanting to be hurt, Sora made his way towards the very end of a line where he found Tidus and Wakka talking amongst them.
"Hey, how'd the classes go so far?" Wakka called out, noticing Sora walking towards them. "What you think of the teachers?"
"Probably thinks they're a pain in the ass already," Tidus muttered. "Look how much homework he has in his hands."
It was true. What were just empty-handed hands in the beginning of the school day were now clutching many pieces of paper, all containing educational work. It was amazing Sora hadn't dropped a single paper yet.
"You can say that, Tidus," Sora groaned out, agreeing with him. "The history teacher just took one glance at me and started pop quizzing me right in front of the class!"
Tidus and Wakka stared. "I dunno, maybe it has something to do with your hair?" Tidus jokingly suggested. "I mean, the history teacher has a grudge against most of the hairdos teens have these days…don't worry about it, she's an old fart."
Surprisingly, the lunch line moved quickly and the three of them were already inside the room where they served the food.
"Who was that girl earlier who dragged you two away?" Sora asked. "She looked a bit furious about something…"
"Selphie?" Wakka said. "Eh, she usually has a fit about something every day, right Tidus?"
Tidus nodded. "Some things I'll never understand about women and their needs," he acknowledged, scratching his head. "Speaking of Selphie, here she comes now…"
Indeed, the brunette girl was running towards the three teenagers. "I've been trying to find you two all day!" Selphie exclaimed at them, causing other people to shift their attention to them. "Why did you guys run away from me after I said I had a problem?!"
"Because," Tidus started to say, "every time you say you have a problem, it ends up having us getting slapped and kicked for not showing enough sympathyfor you."
Selphie huffed at Tidus and turned her attention to Sora. "They are so mean to me, you see?" she whined, pointing at the two boys who were making a face at the unaware girl.
"Uh-huh…"
Finally after getting the school food (which had an appearance that made you want to gag), the four of them sat at a table near the far corner. Sora took his chance of looking at where the groups of students were sitting, memorizing their spots so Sora didn't have to take the chance in sitting at the wrong table. He first spotted the Organization group who has claimed the big round table at the farthest corner, distancing themselves from everyone else. The nerds were also clumped together, books in their hands and snorting in their trays. After long last, Sora found the three popular kids sitting at the table in the center of the cafeteria, surrounded by cheerleaders and jocks.
"They're always there," Tidus affirmed to Sora. "Cheerleaders take their chance to ask either Roxas or Riku out and jocks are there to take their chance to ask Kairi out…" He rolled his eyes. "They really ought to just give up now…"
Wakka agreed with Tidus. "The three of them don't even look the slightest bit interested in any of them," the red-haired added. "The cheerleaders and the jocks just hope they can get into the popular clan too, eh?"
"That's high school for you guys," Selphie concluded, munching down the piece of disgusting piece of uncooked meat that was called a hamburger.
Sora took a deep breath and readied himself on what he was about to enlighten to the three friends. "I…was thinking of trying to get in that popular group too," Sora admitted, rubbing the back of his neck.
Tidus, who was drinking a bottle of water, spat it out on the whole table in shock. "You serious?!" he shouted in awe. "Are you nuts? No way will they actually accept you in there!"
"Hey, give the new guy a chance, ya?" Wakka recommended to Tidus. "Who knows? Maybe he'll actually get there."
Tidus shook his head. "Nuh-uh, those three have been together since freshman year," he stated. "Most likely they won't let anyone else in their group."
Selphie turned to Sora. "What's your plan into making them consider you?" she asked curiously. "I mean, you have to have a plan."
Sora cleared his throat and started to reveal his "plan" to the three of them. "I saw Roxas earlier ask a random nerd in math class today for the answers," Sora started out, "and so if I know the answers for their homework and school life, I could, maybe you know, keep in touch with them?"
Wakka, Tidus, and Selphie stared at Sora. "Basically, what you're saying is," Tidus started, "you're gonna let them use you?" He shook his head in disbelief. "Now that is crazy…"
"Hate to break it to you, Sora, but Tidus's is right…you shouldn't have to do that in order to just keep in touch with them," Wakka declared.
Selphie giggled and the three boys turned their heads over to her. "Maybe he's doing all this to impress Kairi," she suggested.
Sora's cheeks began to flame up a bit when he heard Selphie's suggestion. "W-what?" Sora stammered. "There's a reason into why I'm doing this…and that's not it!"
Selphie rolled her eyes. "Whatever you say."
Tidus crossed his arms and laced his fingers behind his head. "I can't stop you, man, but you sure about this plan?" Tidus asked.
Sora nodded honestly. "First things first…I really need to start studying if I have to know the answers…" Sora confessed.
Wakka palmed his forehead. "Geez, you're not smart and yet you want to go with this plan?" he inquired. "What in the heck of a school did you come from?"
"Not this kind of school, that's for sure," Sora muttered, finally grabbing a hold of a fry and chomping it down.
