Scars
Chapter 4:
Tending Scars
By: Yuy Ren
Looking at the large pile of test papers, Quatre thought of Trowa, wondering how much he will have to pay him to mark all of them. Sighing, knowing that Trowa's fee would be more than Quatre made being a teacher, he hesitantly picked up one and started to work. He had overheard students talk about how teachers have it easy, that they go out of their way to torture students.Heck Quatre thought, kids think they are SO important. If I had extra time, I'd rather go down to the night club with Duo than stay home on Sunday night, marking.
RIINNG
"Yuy-Maxwell-Barton-Winner-Chang residence. How may I help you?"
"Quat, don't, I repeat, DO NOT answer the phone like that again. I swear if a girl I'm trying to hook up with called and you answer like that, I'm going to chop you up and serve you to Trowa." Duo's voice came through the phone, only half joking.
"What's wrong with 'How may I help you?' " Quatre retorted, smirking to himself.
"Ah… I was talking abo- Quat! You KNOW what I mean. Whatever, come down to the club ok? Reserved you a seat by the pretty lady."
"Hehe, tempting Duo, but I'm busy. Talk to you later."
Hanging up before Duo could respond, Quatre set out to once again mark tests.
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From the distance, Trowa watched Duo scream into the receiver and slamming the pay phone down, then slowly made his way back to where Trowa and Wufei sat.
"So, how'd it go?" asked Trowa.
"Blondie hung up on me. Damn, that fiddle fiddler."
Trowa raised an eyebrow. "fiddle fiddler?"
"Shut up, I couldn't think of anything on the spot."
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Blinking twice, Jenna realized why her face felt like it was melting off. The morning sun had taken possession of half her room and was shining flat onto her face. Sighing, she got out of bed and made her way to the bathroom.
The humming from down the hall startled her, and it took her a moment to realize that Rofis had stayed over and is now happily singing in the kitchen. She dressed herself and proceeded to join her singing friend to breakfast, not to song.
"Go~o~O~d morning, Jen~n~A!"
"Please don't sing."
"Sorry."
"What are you still doing here? Don't you need to go home and get your bag before you head to school?"
"Actually, I already did. I got it about an hour earlier. Went when my house was still asleep, I thought I wouldn't be able to get into here again, but your mom sure wakes up early." Rofis commented, making conversation as he got out his bag as proof. Then opening his bag, he fished out a Palm Pilot. The newest make. Jenna knew that by the angle Rofis was holding it, he took it out meaning to show off. Jenna thought that since it's early and she was tired, might as well let him have his fun.
"What's that?"
"A palm pilot, what does it look like?"
"That's cool, wish I had one."
"Yeah? I wish you had one too, there are some cool games on this thing that are two player. Get one, Jen."
"Me broke.
"Yeah? You're broke a lot lately. Why don't you get a job? I heard the gas station down the street is hiring."
Jenna thought about if for a second. It had been a long time since her last job, which she had to quit because school, no wait, mom got in the way. Liking the idea that her bank account will have deposits rather than withdrawals, she placed 'Get a Job' into her mental things-to-do list.
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"Jenna, you have GOT to help me." Relena stated, very firmly, as she grabbed her friends shoulder and stared into her eyes.
"What can I do for you, Miss Relena?" Jenna mocked as Relena rolled her eyes. Shaking her head, reminding herself of the business at hand, Relena pulled out a slip of paper and handed it to Jenna. "I want you to take this paper, and give it to someone. Will you do that for me?"
Jenna eyed the paper suspiciously, and then eyed Relena suspiciously.
"Do I get to read it?"
"No."
"Then I'm sorry, I can't help you."
"Ok! fine, read it. But PROMISE me you won't say anything." Jenna nodded and mimed zipping up her mouth. She unfolded the paper and read, eyes wider by each line.
"WHAT THE HE- " Relena covered her mouth before she could finish her sentence and demanded her to shut up.
"You said you won't say anything. OK, you read it, now deliver it!"
"But this is-"
"I KNOW what it is, jeez, I wrote it after all. Come on Jenna please? Just deliver it for me, please?"
"OK, who's and where's the lucky guy?"
"Um.. he's in the faculty lounge…and goes by the name of.. Mr. Yuy."
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Jenna walked down the hall, towards to faculty lounge on the second floor. She had never, in her entire life, thought that she would be delivering a love letter to a teacher, even if it wasn't her letter. Jenna had asked how it happened, and Relena told the entire story about how Mr. Yuy, like a knight in shining armor, came and rescued her when she was in distress and was chased by an unknown 'bad guy'. She had looked so animated when she described how Mr. Yuy had held her close, and comforted her. All this was explained with dreamy eyes, as if Relena was merely reciting the event for her own benefit, not to inform Jenna.
The letter; Relena hadn't signed it. The sender was 'your secret admirer'. How cliché Jenna thought, as she opened the faculty lounge door. She poked her head it and peeked around. Nobody was there. She entered the room, seeing multiple messy desks in one gigantic, air conditioned room, with TV and couch too. Jenna shook her head, getting back on track and walked around looking for chemistry content on any of the desks. Then, by pure luck, she noticed familiar writing and saw that it was her chemistry test.
Bingo.
She placed the letter on the desk and turned to --- meet Mr. Yuy face to face. He gave her an incomprehensive look and tried to look beyond her at his desk.
"What are you doing?"
:Nothing.. um I mean.. I'm doing something, obviously… I was supposed to get something for Mr. Darak, my math teacher."
"Math office is down the hall."
"Oh it is, is it? I'm sorry, I messed up, see I came up the stairs on the left wing and then I got disoriented because if you flip the school to the mirror image, this would be the math … office…I'll just go now.. have a nice-" not finishing her sentence, she ran out the door.
Heero stared after her, knowing that the girl had lied, and then turned around to see what the girl had dropped on his desk. He picked up the piece of paper that was not there before he went on coffee break and read it. It was typed.
Hello,
I know I haven't known you for a long time
but I would like to say that you are a very
nice person and definitely someone I would
like to get to know better. I hope that when
you find out who I am, you would feel the
same way.
Your Secret Admirer.
He read it again, and then put it down onto the table. He glanced over at the test on top of the pile, reading the name. 'Jenna Gollins.'
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Leaning over a sink in the girl's bathroom, Jenna took a deep breath. She was so surprised to see Mr. Yuy pop out of nowhere. Heck, she didn't even hear him open the door, or walk across the room. How can anyone be so quiet? Splashing some cold water onto her face, she calmed down and prepared to tell Relena that mission was accomplished. But now, she had to get to that interview down at the gas station. Rofis, who knew that she would go to the interview, had already scheduled it for her. Thanks Rove, Jenna thought sincerely. You're a real pal.
Half and hour later, Jenna found herself face to face with an old man, asking her a bunch of questions.
"So, Wendy."
"Jenna"
"Right, Wendy, why are you interested in this job?"
"Jenna."
"No, I'm Mark, this is my gas station." The old man claimed, pointing at the sign that said 'Mark's Gas Station.'
"You going to answer me or not, Wendy?"
Not bothering to argue, she proceeded to answer the question. "I'm interested in this job because I believe it would help build my experience and social skills."
"You want money, don't you?"
"Money would be nice too…"
"I'll tell you something, kid, forget about all those things people tell you to say when an employer asks 'Why are you interested?' On my turf, money is the best answer. I want people who want money, because money is a good motivation! T'makes them young'uns work hard. Because if they don't they aint going to get that money." Mark puffed, leaning closer to Jenna.
"Um… ok sir. I would like to work here because I need money."
"Good on you, mate. You got the job. You'l start…. Now"
Wow, that was easy.
"Now, Tom over there will show you around." Mark leaned out the window of his small office and hollered the name until a call was returned. Within moments, a brown haired young man entered the office.
"You called?"
"Tom, my boy," Mark puffed. Getting up and walking towards to the young man, "this here's Wendy, she's new."
"I can see that, Mark."
"I'd like you to show her around, how everything works and so on, she's taking the Monday evening and Friday evening shifts. You're my only full-time employee. So do me this favor, Tom, and I'll think about giving you another plaque."
The young man made a face. "Mark, keep the plaque, how about a bonus?"
"I'll think about it. That will depend on your performance. I'll have my eye on you, young man, be nice to the lady."
"Don't worry, Mark, I'm a perfect gentleman." With that, the young man winked at Jenna and motioned her to follow him.
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Jenna followed Tom for about half an hour as he showed her around, and also familiarized her with the technical 'gas-station slang', as he called it. He talked about everything from what she needs to take care of and what everybody else took care of. Then he proceeded to talk about the working habits of every worker, finally finishing off with introducing her to everybody at the gas station while talking about when the breaks are.
"And this here's Tina. She's the first cashy." He said as he motioned to a girl at one of the cash registers.
"It means I'm cashier for station one." She translated, winking and Jenna. Jenna could do nothing but smile back.
"Yeah, and her next break is in 15 minutes, when she'll have a 15 minutes break which Gordon over there will cover for her and she'll cover him later. They are married."
"Really?" Jenna stared astounded, it seemed a little odd for Gordon looked at least twice Tina's age, who looked about 20.
"Oh, sorry. Being married to another employee of this station means that you are partners. Break partners. You cover one another at breaks and since I'm the full-time employee, I'm married to everybody here." Tom said with a surprisingly straight face.
"So who am I married to?" Jenna braved to ask.
"Well, so far, just me. When you get into actually working here, in a few weeks, we'll be able to tell who you work best with and who can most easily cover for you. Since this is a pretty big station with an auto-repair shop and a convenience store in the back, both Mark's, by the way, we need a running system for all the workers here.
Jenna glanced around and noticed the auto repair shop for the first time. Tom had mentioned earlier that every seven hours of work adds up to one bag of potato ships. Employers were allowed to take a small bag of chips for every seven hours of work.
The people are nice, Jenna thought. I could get used to this.
Tom stopped walking and gave Jenna a sideward glance.
"What¡¯s your real name?"
"Excuse me?"
"I've been calling you 'Wendy' for the past half hour, but it took you some time to register I'm talking to you every time. So I figured old Mark must have given you a name that he thought you would be called based on your appearance."
Jenna made a face. The brown haired young man smiled.
"I know it doesn't make much sense. But he's getting senile, don't blame him."
Jenna thought for a moment. "My name's Jenna… but wait.. are you really 'Tom'?"
He smiled at her and held out his hand.
"Hi Jenna, nice to meet you. I'm Trowa."
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TO be continued
Ok um..
Yes, I dun own GW.
OK to the ppl
Vylian Li: a) Haha. I knew you'd say that. :P b)Thanks, I'll try. c) Maybe, but they are good people¡… I mean.. characters. d) Oh they have a purpose… dun worry. Actually, I'm beginning to think if Relena is just along for the ride¡…lol. Yes… I'll finish this one… Dun worry, I'll finish the other one too… I"m just a little… behind…
ally127: Thanks! Keep reading!~
Bama: Wah~! Sorry. Hehe, I know they are SUPPOSED to be lovers… but… trying for a fresh approach could make for something pretty interesting, right? Hehe.
Ani Anime: Thanks for reading! Thanks for your support!
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