August 2000

First day of my last year of high school. I thought this day would NEVER get here. Damn public school, and their bullshit standards. I was ready to be out of here and get on with my life. I was ready for college, and to study things that interested me, and not what some stupid politician in a cheap suit said I SHOULD study. God, I was bored already.

I sat in my first period French class doodling in the notebook I had been using since Freshman year. My teacher always said take notes, but I never did, and I was one of her top students. So the notebook served mostly to keep my attention from wondering too far during class.

The moment I happened to look up from my notebook, he walked in. I was surprised; mostly as this was a 4th year class, and I was positive he was a new student. I knew all the other students in the French classes here. We'd been in class together all 4 years. I smiled. I was always a fan of meeting new people. Even better, he sat in the empty desk next to me in the back of the class.

Once the class got settled in, my teacher took morning roll. I zoned out until I heard my name called.

"Mercedes Hall."

"Here."

My mind wandered again, thinking about nothing in particular as I waited on the class to get started.

I guess I should tell you something about me. You got the name, so we can skip that pleasantry. And you know where I'm at in school. So we have that covered. Now that I think of it, there's not much else to tell. I live in your average Midwestern town, bit of a loner, a younger brother, and that's that. I grew up with a mom who stayed home, and a dad who worked outside of the house. We don't have much, but what we have is enough. I want to go off to LSU next year and get my Bachelor's in French. I love music and I love reading. I don't think my looks stand out too much: Average height, average weight—curves where girls should have them, but nothing special—wavy blonde hair, blue eyes, and well, that's about it. Like I said, normal.

Ok, not as normal as I let on. My mom passed a few years ago, and every night I put up with a racket every night from my dad. Sometimes he got a bit physical, mostly it was just him coming home and throwing tantrums about how we ruined his life. He could've been so great, and so wonderful, but instead he 'sold out' and here we are now. Mostly, he took it out on me, or at the very least, I heard the endless ranting. But then my dad would turn around, and expect me to be his best friend and companion and support him through everything (it got more weird than I liked admitting). My brother, on the other hand…my dad groomed him to be his best friend. My dad could do no wrong in my brother's eyes. The only difference was, at least I still loved my brother. I didn't blame him or get mad at him, I just had a hell of a time putting up with what was going on at home.

"Sam Winchester."

"Here."

Hearing the new kid's name got my attention and brought me back to reality. Probably a good thing. If I got thinking too much about what my home life was like, I'd be in a funk the rest of the day. I had gotten out of the house with relatively few scrapes this morning, so I wanted to keep it that way.

I watched him for a second, trying to figure him out. He kept his head down, like he was hiding, and he had a rugged country boy look to him: flannel shirt, jeans, work boots, pretty standard issue. But his demeanor spoke otherwise. He seemed the nerdy bookish type. I liked that.

I must have been staring, as he looked over at me, a bit annoyed.

"What?"

"Oh um…sorry," I said, "I um…my name's Mercedes."

"Sam," he said, his tone a bit annoyed but a bit pleased at the same time.

"Nice to meet you," I said.

"You too," he answered.

"Mademoiselle Hall," my teacher's voice interrupted us. She asked me in French if there was something I wanted to share with the class. Of course there wasn't, I answered, and sunk down in my chair.

During class, we were assigned to work with a partner a few times. I ended up getting paired with Sam for the day. We got through our exercises, and used the few extra minutes to talk.

"So, you're new here?" I asked him", and used the few extra minutes to talk.

I ended up getting paired with Sam for the day. We got through e wasn'ue..

"Yep."

"Did you just move to town?"

He nodded his head.

"Been here long?"

"No."

"You're a senior then too, like me?"

"Yep."

"Do you have the capacity to answer questions with more than one word or gesture?"

That did it. He smiled a bit, and started to relax.

"I do, I just…I'm not good at meeting new people. I try not to get too close."

"Hey we're in the same boat there. Well, kind of. I've known most of these people since middle school, and they don't want anything to do with me."

"Why's that?"

"I'm too weird, I guess. Been called a freak more times than I'd like to admit."

"That makes 2 of us."

"You too?"

"All the time."

"You don't seem like a freak to me. I think you're pretty cool. I mean in just a few minutes I've known you."

"You're joking, right?"

"No, not at all. You're different. And I'm a big fan of different."

"Maybe we will get along well after all," he answered as our teacher called us back to class time.

Class ended a few minutes later and the bell rang. We packed our thing up, and headed out the door.

"Which lunch period do you have?" I asked him.

"Um, let me check," he pulled his schedule card out of his pocket, "Lunch C…whatever that means."

"Oh great! So do I!" I smiled. I usually eat alone in the auxiliary lunch room. You can join me if you want."

"Sure, that sounds good to me," he answered.

"Awesome. I'll wait for you there."

"Great," he said, smiling, "thank so much for being so cool. I mean…well I'm not used to people just being nice."

"Had to happen sometime," I said. Sam smiled.

"See you at lunch then?" He asked.

"See you then," I answered and we headed off to our next class.