A lady in the front office greeted me and handed me my schedule. The school system was a little different than what I had expected. Instead of having eight classes a day, and having those same eight every day, we had four classes on A-day and four on B-day. I took a look at my schedule. On A-day I had algebra, history, english, lunch then computer tech. On B-days I had Physics, Spanish, Photography and gym. The lady from the front office escorted me to my algebra class and I introduced myself to the teacher, Mr. Melville. He put me in a seat closer to the front and I waited for class to start.
The first thing I noticed, once people started to trickle in, was that high school was a land of predator and prey. Four mountain sized boys walked in and almost immediately started picking on some of the other kids. One of them knocked the books off of the desk of the kid sitting next to me. Then he proceeded to push the kid out of his seat as he bent over to pick them up. I shot the bully a glare as I helped the boy pick his things up.
"Well, that was uncalled for." I said.
"That was normal." he said. "You must be new."
"Yeah," I handed him his things. "I'm Jackie."
"My name's Caleb."
"And the troll in the football jersey would be…"
"Oh, that's Mitchell. I'd recommend staying away from him and his friends."
"I'll remember that." I said. I looked over and saw his watch. "Hey, is that a TARDIS watch?"
Caleb grinned. "Sure is. Are you a Whovian?"
I nodded.
"That's awesome!"
I laughed at his enthusiasm.
"What other classes do you have?" he asked.
I showed him my schedule.
"Hey, we have all the same classes together. If you want, I could show you around."
"Yeah, that'd be great." I said with a smile. "That would sure beat the assistant principal escorting me all the time."
Caleb laughed. "That would be very embarrassing." I laughed too and at that point, I knew that we were going to be good friends.
History and English went very smoothly and by the time lunch came around, I was famished.
"So Jackie," Caleb asked me as we sat down in the cafeteria. "I never asked you, where did you go to middle school?"
"I was actually home schooled for elementary school and middle school." I told him. "But I'm excited to be here."
"Cool." he said, taking a bite of his food. The two of us talked for almost the entire lunch period and were having a great time. Then Mitchell and his friends showed up.
"Whatcha' got there?" he asked, grabbing Caleb's TARDIS themed lunch box.
"Just my lunch," Caleb said. I noticed a spark of fear in his eyes.
"Not anymore." Mitchell said. "It's my lunch now."
"Come on man, please give it back." Caleb reached over for his lunch but Mitchell held it just out of his reach.
"Nah…" he said mockingly, "I think I'll keep it." He shoved Caleb in the chest and Caleb fell back into his seat.
"Mitchell," I said, standing up. "Please give Caleb his lunch back."
"Well, who do we have here?" he asked with a laugh. "Is this your girlfriend?"
Caleb shook his head.
"I figured. You're too much of a dork to even have friends." He went in to shove Caleb again, but I grabbed his arm and stopped him. "Leave him alone." I said firmly.
"You have no idea who you're dealing with." Mitchell growled. He swung around and backhanded me in the face. "Brock, Joe, why don't you teach our new friend here a lesson."
His two friends stepped forward and grinned deviously. My mind was going a hundred miles an hour as I analyzed these guys and tried to figure a way out of this. "Alright. Brock: 6'3" 210 pounds-ish. Small limp, right leg. Bad knee. Take that out, he goes down. Joe: 6'0" 195lbs. Big arms watch out for punches. Use momentum."
"Hey, look guys," I said, faking my nervousness but getting into a ready stance. "Can't we just talk about this?"
Joe rushed at me first. I grabbed his arm and swung him into a nearby lunch table. Then Brock came around and punched me in the face. I ducked behind him and kicked him in the knee, sending him to the floor. Joe then tried to tackle me but I faked him out and flipped him onto Brock. Then Mitchell jumped in and grabbed my arm. I managed to swat away a few of his blows but he still knocked the wind out of me. I wiggled out of his grip and pushed him into his friends. They were all about to tackle me when a few teachers finally stepped in. "Enough!" One of them shouted. "All of you, to the principal's office. Now!"
I looked over at Caleb, who was staring at me absolutely awestruck. I shot him a smile as I left the lunch room.
"You got in a fight on your first day, Ms. Coulson," Principal Saunders said as I sat across from his desk. "That's not a promising start."
"I'm assuming you have already talked to the other boys about this, sir?"
Principal Saunders nodded. "Yes. Mitchell, Brock and Joe already gave me their story."
"Did you talk to Caleb?"
"Who?"
"Caleb. The boy that they were bullying."
"They left that part out."
"As would be expected." I said. "They wanted to keep from getting in trouble and to play the victim."
"And you don't?"
"No sir. I'm willing to accept the consequences for what I did. But I did it in self defense. I stood up to them because I could plainly see that no one else would. And when I did, they tried to beat me up."
Principal Saunders seemed to think about this for a while. "I have has a few complaints about these boys in the past, but someone has vouched for them every time."
"That's because everyone is scared of them. It may be my first day here, but I've seen things that have been going on forever. These boys seem to think that they're in control of the school and they're willing to do anything to keep it that way."
"I'll talk to Caleb." Principal Saunders said, "But I will have to inform your parents about what happened."
I shifted my weight uncomfortably. "Umm… you may want to check my file again, sir."
He took another look at my file and his eyes went wide when he saw Tony Stark's name on it. "I'm sorry Ms. Coulson. I didn't realize–"
"Hold on a second please. Just because his name is on there, doesn't change a thing. I don't want to be treated any different than anyone else."
"That's understandable."
"I'm just warning you know, he can be a little bit of a hot-head."
Principal Saunders nodded.
"And please don't tell anyone else about my family. I don't want any special treatment."
He nodded. "I'll make sure of that."
"Thanks."
"You are dismissed."
I got up and started to leave his office. "And Ms. Coulson, try not to get into anymore fights."
I smiled. "Will do sir."
As the final bell rang, and I walked outside, Caleb caught up with me. "So, how'd if go?" He asked.
"I think it went well." I told him. "From what I heard, those guys tried to play the victim."
"They always do that." Caleb said. "Did you know that they got suspended?"
"Really?" I was pretty surprised. "I didn't think that Principal Saunders would do that."
Caleb nodded. "Hey, do your parents pick you up or do you rode the bus?"
"My uncle is coming to pick me up."
"Ah. I just didn't want you to wait by yourself. My mom picks me up."
We sat and talked for a whole until Caleb's mom came. "I'll see you tomorrow, Jackie." He said with a wave.
I waved back. "Bye Caleb."
I sat by myself for another ten minutes. It was almost 3:15 and Uncle Steve was nowhere to be seen. I looked around the school yard and saw a group of girls coming towards me. "You must be the new girl." One of them said, she looked like the leader of the group.
"Yes, I'm Jackie." I said, standing up.
"I'm Ashlyn," she said. "And this is Lanah and Heather."
"Hi." I said, looking at the other two girls.
"I just have to ask," Ashlyn said in a snide tone. "Where did you get your jacket?"
"I think I-
"It looks like you got it from the geek surplus store." She laughed.
"Hey-"
"Listen closely, twerp." Ashlyn said, taking a step closer to me. "You've made our boyfriends look like idiots. So, you've made us look like idiots. And that's not good."
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Steve pull up in his truck.
"We will not look like idiots." Ashlyn said, getting in my face. "So you're going to tell everyone that the whole thing was your fault. Or we will make your life here, miserable."
"Are you threatening me? Because its not working."
Ashlyn made an attempt to shove me, but I stood firm. "If you'll excuse me," I said politely, "my ride is here." I turned around and made a beeline to the truck.
"How was school?" Steve asked me as we drove home.
"It was good." I told him. "I made a friend."
"Good, I'm glad." He seemed happy but I could tell that he knew about the fight. And if he wasn't bringing it up now, that meant we'd be talking about it at dinner. With everyone there. I was screwed.
"What's their name?"
"His name's Caleb. He's a freshman too and we have all our classes together."
"Now Jackie," he said, "You know the rules about boys…"
"Yes, I know. No dating until I'm 16 and you all need to meet him. But Caleb is just a friend. There's no need to worry about any of that stuff."
"Alright. I'll have Tony do a background check on him once we get home."
"Steve!" I exclaimed. I knew he was just joking but I also know that I had the most over-protective family ever.
Once we got home, and after an after school snack, I went up to my room and did my homework. After that I had a martial arts lesson with Uncle Clint and a music lesson with Aunt Natasha. The whole time, I had a feeling of nervousness growing in my chest. Dinner was coming quickly, and not only that, everyone was home. Even Thor. I was writing in my room when the call to judgement came. "Ms. Jackie," Jarvis said, "Captain Rogers requests that you come downstairs for dinner."
"Alright. Thanks Jarvis." I said. "I'll be down in a second."
Jarvis and I have a very interesting relationship. When I was first adopted, Jarvis scared the daylights out of me. For a while, I even thought he was a ghost. But as time went on, he became one of my very good friends. Even though he was only and AI (Artificial intelligence.)
As I walked down to the kitchen, my heart was pounding like a crazy drum solo. The smell of Aunt Natasha's roasted potatoes and smoked ham was mouth watering. But the knot in my stomach kept me from having much of an appetite.
Dinner was pretty normal. Tony and Bruce talked about their current projects, Steve was still trying to explain Baseball to Thor, and Natasha and Clint told stories about their past missions. I almost thought that no one would bring it up. Then Tony spoke up. "We got a call from your school today, Jackie."
I looked down at my plate and pretended to be intrigued by what was left of my ham.
"You got in a fight today." he said as if it were a blatant sentence and not a question.
"Yeah, I did." I said quietly.
"Did you win?" Thor asked, making me smile.
"Thor." Steve said sternly. "We are not encouraging this."
"But did you win?" Clint asked.
"Clint!" Natasha exclaimed.
I nodded. "Yeah, I won."
Clint smiled at me. "That's my girl."
"So what exactly happened?" Bruce asked.
I explained everything. How they were picking on Caleb, how I had told them several times to knock it off and how they had thrown the first punch.
"How big were these guys?" Natasha asked.
I thought about it for a moment. "I'd say about six feet tall, roughly two hundred pounds."
"Each?"
I nodded.
"That's hardly a fair fight." Thor said. "You could have easily have gotten hurt."
"I didn't want to get in a fight." I said. "But they were picking on my friend. You all taught me to stand up to bullies so that's what I did. I'm sorry that I got in trouble."
Steve sighed. "We're glad that you did the right thing, but you're still in trouble for fighting."
"I understand." I said. "May I please be excused?"
They all nodded and I left the table.
"Come on, Steve," Tony insisted. "You can't punish her. We all would have done the same thing."
"I know." Steve said as they finished up their meal. "But fighting isn't right unless it is absolutely necessary. Jackie should have gotten a teacher."
"I agree with Steve." Bruce said.
"But she did what we all taught her to do." Thor pointed out.
"What do you think, Clint?" Natasha asked. "Jackie is technically your kid."
Clint thought about it for a moment. "Let's just take away her computer privileges for tomorrow. It's nothing too serious." he said, "I can tell you're all proud of her for doing the right thing. I am too."
They all smiled. "I'll go talk to Jackie later." Clint said. The six of them put the rest of dinner away and Clint went up to Jackie's room once they were done.
"Hey Kiddo," Clint said, knocking on my bedroom door. "Can I come in?"
"Sure." I replied.
He walked in and sat down at my desk.
"How much trouble am I in?" I asked, getting straight to the point.
Clint smiled. "Not really."
I looked confused.
"You don't get any media privileges tomorrow." he told me. "But we're all very proud of you for standing up for your friend."
I smiled. "I just did what you taught me to do."
"No one else will tell you this, but we all think it was pretty awesome how you threw them around like that. I doubt they'll ever mess with you or your friends ever again."
I smiled.
He stood up and gave me a hug. "We're very proud of you, Jackie."
"Thanks Uncle Clint."
"You should probably get ready for bed. You have school tomorrow. Steve will have my head if I keep you up."
"Alright."
Clint left my room and I got ready for bed. After a quick shower, I slipped into my pajamas, said goodnight to my family and went to bed.
Hey everyone, it's me JJ. I just wanted to say thanks for reading my story. Please leave a comment or review to tell me what you liked and what you think I could do better. I love feedback. Also, I am currently looking for someone to do cover art for my stories. Like real cover art. And if its good and I like it, I'm willing to pay for you to do it for me. If anyone is interested, just shoot me a message. Thanks a ton! :)
