word
"Care to explain why you're sleeping in my class, young lady?" Lydia jerked upright as a ruler smacked her shoulder, and she blinked up at the teacher with bleary eyes.
"Oh my gosh, I am…" She yawned. "I'm so sorry. I was on a very late light last night. Jet lag."
"Hmph." He returned to the front of the room, and, within moments, Lydia's head was on the desk again. She really needed some coffee.
Somehow, she made it through the first class awake, and a bell ringing alerted her that it was time to move on. She dragged herself out of her seat, and Kai met her at the door.
"Here." He pressed a little bottle into her hand. "Drink this. It'll keep you awake."
"Oh. Thank you." She unscrewed the cap and downed it in one gulp, immediately cringing at the taste. "Gah. That tastes terrible."
"Yeah, I know." He gave her an apologetic smile, then headed off down the hall. As she followed, she mused over the fact that the ninja had the same voices as the ones she knew. Odd. Was she in an AU? They looked different…
Whatever Kai had given her apparently worked, and she managed to survive until lunch.
"This is the most boring thing I've ever had to do in my life." She complained as she moved down the cafeteria line. "And this food is disgusting."
"If I didn't know better, I'd say you've never been to school before." Lloyd teased her.
"Oh, I haven't." She glared at what looked like dried-out macaroni and cheese on her plate. "I was homeschooled back in Ohio."
"Homeschooled?" Jay echoed. "What's that?"
"You don't have homeschooling here? No wonder everything sucks!" Lydia shook her head in dismay. "Uh, it's where the parents teach you."
"Doesn't that only work if your parents are teachers?" Nya asked as the seven made their way towards an empty table in the corner.
"Nah. Neither of my parents are teachers, and my mom taught all nine of us." There was assorted gasping and choking from the ninja.
"Did you say-" Cole coughed. "Did you said nine?"
"Yep." Lydia sat down, poking a plastic-wrapped yellow thing on her tray. "What is this? Cornbread?"
"That's a twizzie. It's a dessert, it's good." Lloyd sat down next to her. "But, is nine kids… normal in Ohio?"
"Not in the least." She sniffed some kind of meat. "Yeah, I'll just starve I guess."
"At least eat this." Lloyd poked the yellow thing. "It tastes good, I promise."
"I'll take your word for it." Slowly, carefully, like she was touching a snake, Lydia unwrapped the snack cake and lifted it to her mouth. She took a tiny bite, then she could swear she did the anime thing where her pupils got really big.
"Wait. Oh my gosh. Is this a twinkie?" She took another, bigger bite. "Oh my gosh. It is. I can die happy now." Lloyd laughed, not in a mean way, just mostly in confusion.
"You're so… carefree." He told her. "You don't care what anyone thinks of you. You're just… open."
"Only around people I care about." She shoved the rest of the twinkie in her mouth as he gave her a really strange look. "I'm going to die. Tell Morro I love him."
"Who?" About three people asked.
"Morro. Boyfriend." Probably freaking out about her. At least, she hoped he was. Kinda. Was that bad? "It's been so long since I've had a twinkie. How many am I allowed to get?"
"One. But here, you can have mine." Lloyd offered his to her, and she balked.
"What? No. It's your birthday."
"It's fine. They're just pure sugar anyway, I don't mind. And you clearly enjoy them more than I do." Despite her protests, he set it on her tray.
"W-well, if you're sure-" She broke off at the sight of Kai, Nya, Zane, and Cole offering theirs to her as well.
"If you're not gonna eat anything else." Kai said with a shrug. Lydia pressed her hands against her face.
"You guys are gonna make me cry, I swear. You are the nicest people."
"You're the nicest person to us in a while." Kai pointed out. Lydia sniffled, then slowly lowered her hands from her face to look around the room. More than a few hateful glares were shot her way.
"You know what? Not a shock." Grinning to chase away the threatening tears, Lydia shook her head, accepting the offered treats. All eyes then turned to Jay, who clutched his twinkie protectively to his chest.
"You can fight me, but I won't give this up." Lydia laughed.
"I'm not gonna fight you, Jay. I wouldn't give mine away if I were you."
"That's because you're a twinkie hoarder."
"I didn't ask for- Jay, do you dislike me?" She narrowed her eyes at him. "First Kai, now Jay. There's one in every universe."
"What?" Kai tilted his head at her. "What about me?"
"Nothing. Nevermind." She unwrapped one of the generously-donated twinkies and ate half of it. "Maybe the sugar will keep me awake."
"Good luck with that." Kai put a hand on her shoulder sympathetically. "We have Mrs. Pearson's class next. She can put anyone to sleep."
"Rats.
The rest of lunch was pretty quiet, with the only action being Cheerleader Dude and his squad performing 'boo Lloyd' for another table. They only got halfway through before Lydia stood up and headed in their direction, causing them to scurry off and resume eating their lunch. Lydia was pleased to discover that she was intimidating.
About half an hour after she'd finished eating, a bell rang and all the students began to file out of the room. She noticed Lloyd giving everyone he could a friendly smile as they returned their trays to a stack and started to leave. Don't-change-the-future Lydia and let-Lloyd-have-a-nice-day Lydia had a brief fight, and let-Lloyd-have-a-nice-day Lydia won. Before they left the room, she pulled him aside.
"Lloyd, we need to talk." She announced as he started to protest. "About your smiling."
"What's… wrong with my smiling?" He looked confused and a bit hurt.
"You need to stop smiling all the time at these people who hate you. I understand you want them to like you, but it's not going to hurt. It's probably just gonna make it worse. 'Cause, by trying to treat these people like your friends, you're showing them how desperate you are for them to like you. And, being the sickos they are, they're gonna treat you worse 'cause they know it'll get to you.
"If you just ignore them for the most part, and just focus on the friends you have, they might leave you alone a little more. And honestly? These people don't deserve you. They're shallow, swayed by rumors and peer pressure to hate you. You're the sweetest guy in the school, and probably the city, and if they can't see that through their blind hatred, then they don't deserve to be around you." She took a deep breath. "Did that make any sense?"
"Um… yes, but…" He narrowed his eyes a bit. "You act like you know a lot about me. Even though we met just a few hours ago. How?" Uh oh.
"I'm very observant." Lying, a quick and easy fix for when local Lloyds start to see through your shoddily-made cover story.
"Oh." He nodded. "I… guess that makes sense. Now come on, hurry, we don't wanna be late. Again."
"Oh yeah. Shoot." Nearly tripping in her haste, Lydia dashed into the hallway, then remembered she didn't know where the classroom was. Lloyd followed her out, chuckling at her expression.
"Come on, this way. You'll know your way around soon enough." He assured her as she followed him down the hall. She sure hoped not. With any luck, Morro would track her down and get her out of here before she managed to ruin everything.
"You don't have any problem with me smiling at my friends, right?" He asked.
"No, of course not." She shook her head as she hurried to catch up with him.
"Good." He looked over his shoulder and gave her a dazzling smile. She stopped walking.
"Oh. You set me up, you sneaky little… get back here!" She yelled after him as he disappeared around the corner.
"We don't want to be late!" He called back cheerfully. Grinning and shaking her head, Lydia hurried after him.
This might not be so bad after all.
She's so optimistic :)
~FFF
