Chapter One
Rachel's POV
The first time you saw Quinn was the first day of your Freshman year at High School. She was waiting outside a classroom, surrounded by chattering cheerleaders. But Quinn wasn't chattering with them. On the contrary, you noticed how she had her head slightly bowed and was looking down, picking at some red nail varnish with long delicate fingers.
Quinn stands out, against the sea of red and white. Her eyes are a strikingly beautiful hazel green and her long legs accentuated by her short Cheerios skirt. Different things about her catch your eye, but you can't stare anymore because you've passed her in the hallway.
You remember vividly the second time you saw Quinn.
You had the opportunity to stare at her this time. You were waiting early outside the classroom for your English lesson, a lesson you had been looking forward to the most. It was a nice day, and most other people were outside during the break, but you had wanted to make a good impression on your teachers, and had turned up early for every lesson. There were a few other people in the hallway, hanging by their lockers but the bell didn't ring for a few more minutes yet.
Quinn approached you, walking down the corridor and she hesitantly looked up at the number on the door as she passed the classroom, and then walked a few more paces past you, before stopping and standing, facing out towards the corridor, but she never looked in your direction. You were going to say something, but you never did, you didn't know what to say.
Quinn lent back against the wall and got a book out of her back. You didn't recognise the book cover, and she was just too far away from you for you to read any of the writing on it.
Soon the hallway filled up with students and Quinn was surrounded by friends, although she only looked up from the book when she was spoken to, otherwise she had her head down staring at the pages.
The bell rung and the teacher arrived and you sighed to yourself because arriving early hadn't gotten you any extra credit.
You remember how the teacher, Mrs Cooke, instructed you all to stand at the back of the classrooms she could put you in a seating plan. The whole class, including you, let out a groan in response. We're in High School! You had thought, we're old enough to sit where we want.
You made your way to the back of the classroom, and as you turned around, you noticed what Quinn's book was called. Looking for Alaska by John Green. You didn't think Quinn was into geography, but then again, you didn't know Quinn at all that well.
It was only after you became friends with Quinn in your Senior Year that you admit to her that you looked up the book as soon as you got home, found out it wasn't about geography, so you ordered it on Amazon. You remember how the book came the next Saturday and you had finished reading it by the time you went to bed late at night (and also how you spent the day after crying and thinking about the labyrinth of suffering and you even persuaded you dads to read the book too).
The teacher placed you randomly around the room, splitting up the cheerleaders and the jocks and making sure everyone was mixed up. It didn't matter to you, you hardly had any friends, yet alone friends in that class.
By chance, you ended up sitting next to Quinn at the back of the classroom. You noticed how Quinn liked to lean against the wall, how she wrote in a blue A4 notebook in neat curvasive handwriting and how she kept all her papers in immaculate and highly organised folders.
You noticed how she doodled a lot and she wrote poems (some of which you read, if you could get away with Quinn not noticing - and your favourite was one named 'Art's Positive Energies', although you revealed to yourself, and three years later to her, that you did not have a clue what it was about, but it was beautiful anyhow). Quinn also chose a 'word of the day' and wrote it at the top of her sheet of paper along with its definition, and quickly, your vocabulary expanded and you started using words such as 'catatonic' in essays whenever you could .
You could tell, just from sitting next to her in that one lesson, that Quinn was smart, witty and had a wild imagination.