From a Different Angle
Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville, or any of the bands, songs or names mentioned; I do not even own my characters because I do not have a copyright on them. However, I doubt anybody except me will know how to write for them.-).
Summary: A New Student at Smallville High, and for once she's not a freak.
A/N: Please review and tell me if I should continue or not, since I usually have a biased opinion of my work (who doesn't?), and I don't care about flames…fire's pretty…
A/N 2: The words with stars around them are lyrics…In a perfect world,
this would never happen.
In a perfect world,
You'd still be here…The whiney voices of Simple Plan resonated through Sarah's ears as she walked down the hall thinking, What is a perfect world anyway? There's no such thing. In a perfect world, she wouldn't be here, pining away in the corridors of Smallville High. She'd be back in the peaceful suburbs of Maryland, completely aware of her surroundings and both socially and physically active again.
It had been two weeks since Sarah had arrived in this quiet, yet intriguing, rural town. It had been a week since she had run out of steam. She had stopped trying to snoop and pry around the town. She figured if she was supposed to know, she would. By that time, it had been too late to try out for autumn sports, and too early to start practicing for lacrosse, if they had a team, that is.
Sarah knew that all the open fields and bright colors should be helping energize her, not de-energize her, but she couldn't find anything to do. Every night, she went to bed feeling she hadn't accomplished anything, and when she finally got to sleep, her dreams were even more restless than in reality.
The last thing she had left was music. It was her lifeline now, the only thing between her and complete and utter boredom. She preferred to listen to Alternative Rock, Green Day and Blink-182, but anything was acceptable to her. She'd grown up listening to the blues, spent her pre-adolescent years listening to 50's pop, and had only recently tuned into modern music. Soon she came to be known as, "That new girl with the headphones."
Sarah especially needed her music today. For this morning, Sarah's mom, Mrs.Tetch, had told Sarah she had volunteered her daughter for the school newspaper, The Torch. Aside from the chorus of, "Come on baby, light my fire," popping into Sarah's head, (the curse of the musically obsessed) she was completely shocked. Except for a Journalism class she had taken last year, Sarah had no training at all. She knew for a fact that she sucked at being a reporter.
"What? W..why?" Sarah had stammered.
"So you can find something to do. For the past two weeks you've literally been locked up in your room."
So after fighting a battle she already knew she had lost, Sarah reluctantly agreed to "give it a try." At least the Newspaper counted as an English grade, meaning she didn't have to sit through that boring class again. She was to start at the paper during fifth period, and she had just gotten out of second. A sure to be long day stretched before her.
Sarah entered Science with a heavy heart, all she wanted to do was fall asleep on the desk. Then, the person next to her started to talk. It had taken two weeks, but someone had finally noticed her. Simple Plan was drowning out the girl's voice, but Sarah quickly pulled out her headphones to hear what the student had to say.
"..the new girl, right? I've heard a bit about you, but I wanted to find out myself. Sarah, right? Oh, it wasn't bad things, just the run-of-the-mill new girl rumors." The girl comforted. She had strawberry-blond hair, and a very cheery face. Not that Sarah really cared, but she noticed that the girl was wearing blue jeans and a boyfriend sweater, the kind Sarah could tell was bought at the Gap and not, in fact, given to her by her boyfriend.
Sarah also noticed how she might look against this girl. Sarah's dark brown hair was tied back into a mess ponytail, since she hadn't really expected anyone to pay special attention to her. She had slipped on a pair of rugged jeans, that she had had for about a year, and it showed. There were slight stains here and there, not really noticeable, but enough to show that they held many memories. The pants reminded her of home. However, the shirt was brand new, since her mother had considerately taken her shopping the day after they had arrived. It was from Pac Sun, and had a bright yellow ducky on the back. The girls face was extremely cheery, compared to Sarah's ghostly appearance. Her new friend's attitude was almost creepy, if you asked Sarah, but then again, her idea of a good time now was sitting alone in her room…
"Um…I'm sorry. I didn't catch your name."
"I'm Mindy D." She gushed.
"Oh, are there a lot of Mindy's in the school, then?" Sarah inquired, noticing the almost elementary technique of using initials to separate one person from another.
" I guess. I'd have to say about fourteen."
"Oh. That's a high number." Sarah said, slightly amazed.
"Are you okay?" Mindy misinterpreted. "I can take you to the nurse if you want me to, let me ask the teacher…" Sarah interrupted Mindy before she could raise her hand and cause a disturbance.
"Oh no, I'm fine." Sarah assured. "I'm just having a hard time trying to …" She had lost track of thought, before now she hadn't noticed exactly how much sleep she'd been losing. Or maybe Mindy was just wearing her out.
"…adjust?" Mindy supplied, "Yeah, that took me a while too. When I moved here from Metropolis, everything was just so…colorful, I mean, really…"
"Metropolis?" Sarah interrupted.
"You know that huge skyline that's looming over every corner of the town?"
" Um..yeah, I think I passed it on the way in."
"That's Metropolis."
"Oh."
"Oh, home, sweet, home, did you know there's a Pulitzer prize winning newspaper from there? It's called the Daily Planet…Only the best reporters work there." Mindy rambled on.
"How great." Sarah said, attempting to be enthusiastic.
Mindy rambled on for most of the next class and a half. The only time Sarah really paid attention was when she was talking about the cute guys. Not that Sarah cared, she just wanted to know who to stay away from.
"So, basically the main hottie in the school is Clark Kent. He's unmistakable; basically he's 6'2, wears plaid, and has the most gorgeous smile anyone has ever seen."
"Actually, I don't think I've seen him." Sarah would have remembered running into a primary colored giant.
"Humph, well of course, he wasn't that popular when Whitney was in the spotlight."
"Who's he?" Sarah asked. She was actually learning something about this school now.
"He was the star quarterback during his freshman year. And Lana Lang's boyfriend for a couple of years, instantly making him the cutest guy to go out with." Seeing Sarah's confused look, which Mindy had gotten used to already, Mindy continued. "Lana Lang is the prettiest girl in school. She was a cheerleader freshman year and now she owns the Talon."
"Oh," Sarah, not quite listening again. Then she realized something peculiar. " Was?"
Mindy grew solemn. "Whitney joined the marines early last year. He… he died in battle. It was the saddest thing. Lana was depressed for a week. Or so I hear."
Suddenly moving didn't seem like such a big deal. " Oh, I'm so sorry. Wow, no one died at my school. Sure, there were riffs but…"
"Well, it happens abnormally abundant here. I mean, it's sad and everything. I really miss everyone, and feel sorry. But it happens, so you sort of learn to deal with it."
"Oh." Sarah didn't quite know what to say. How could she comfort someone who didn't really need comforting? Or really, how could she comfort them at all? Sarah wasn't the greatest with words, and she really didn't want to say anything offensive or awkward.
Thankfully the bell rang. And Mindy had a fun time telling Sarah all about where all the students ate. Basically Sarah had told Mindy that she had open lunch, which meant she could walk around her town and eat wherever as long as she was back in time. Mindy almost cried laughing so hard.
"Sorry," she said, recovering from her laughing fit. "It's just that there aren't many restaurants around here to go to. We all go to lunch in the cafeteria."
Mindy talked that whole time down to the lunch hall, and while they were waiting in the various lines and files, Sarah was introduced to Mindy's friends, or gang, or clique, or whatever. They invited her to sit with them, and she obliged. Against Sarah's best intentions, she droned out Mindy again, to think about, of all things, Mindy and her friends. Sarah was sure Mindy didn't mean to dominate the conversation, it was just her personality. And Sarah could see that all of Mindy's friends had come to the same conclusion. If someone had something to say, Mindy would consent, but then start talking directly afterwards, blocking out further argument. It would have gotten annoying to Sarah, but she actually kind of liked listening to Mindy, she already knew what to do and what not to do before she had to find out for herself.
Mindy D. didn't have fifth period with Sarah. It took a second to realize why not. Journalism. She had almost completely forgot, absorbed in what Mindy had been telling her about Halloween, which was coming up soon. Sarah's heart fell again. She had no idea what to expect from Journalism. She hadn't been smart enough to ask Mindy about it and the only newspaper related thing Mindy talked about was the Daily Planet, obviously her dream job. Sarah supposed she wouldn't have gotten an unbiased opinion anyway.
Sarah stepped into a brightly lit computer room, with files, desks, and papers galore. There was a blonde teen about her age sitting in front of one of the two computers typing rapidly, completely absorbed in what she was doing.
Not really wanting to interrupt, Sarah knocked on the side of the door lightly. "Hello?" she asked, trying to be as unassuming as she could, without looking like a mouse.
" Go back to class. I'm busy." The sturdy girl said, not lifting her eyes from the lights of the computer.
"Um…I think I am in class." Sarah replied, realizing her voice was just a tiny bit off from cracking. Why was she so intimidated by this girl?
"Oh." The girl finally looked up and tried to give a welcoming smile. Sarah could tell the girl wanted to go back to whatever she was doing on the computer. Most likely writing an article, genius, Sarah scolded herself. "I'm Chloe," the girl continued, standing up. "Um…you didn't by chance happen to sign up for this class out of your own free will, did you?"
"You can see right through me like that?" Sarah grinned; she had the inkling of a feeling that this 'class' wouldn't be that bad.
Chloe nodded, "Yeah, well, you don't really look like you're ready to go out on the front line."
Sarah nodded her head in agreement. "Well, you can go back to your article if you want. I can um…sit and read?" Sarah proposed. There was a very inviting red couch on one side of the wall. And above it there was a huge wall of newspaper clippings that looked quite interesting. On closer speculation, she found that most of them had the words 'mutant' and 'freak' linked to them.
"What is that?" Sarah asked, pointing to the wall, just as Chloe was settling herself back down to her computer.
"That," Chloe said, gazing lovingly at the wall, "is my prize possession, or possessions, I call it the Wall of Weird. We had a huge meteor shower twelve years ago that affected a lot of people. They developed some really strange abilities like transforming and some people could even split themselves in two. I'm not weirding you out, am I?" Chloe asked. Sarah realized there was slight look of shock on her face.
"Well, not really. It's just so amazing. I didn't know any of this stuff happened, and you must deal with it every other week." Chloe nodded in agreement.
"The life of a reporter," she sighed. Then she flashed Sarah another smile, and started to type rapidly on the keyboard again. Sarah set her bag down on one of the cushions, and plopped herself down on the other one. She reached for her iPod, her prize possession, it had been one of the only reasons she had consented to come to Smallville.
Three songs, and surely a page and a half of articles, later, a huge teenager ambled in. Sarah looked up and saw that he matched the perfect description that Mindy D. had given her. Dark brown hair matched with blue eyes that Sarah had to crane her neck up to see, he was wearing a worn-out red plaid shirt, obviously his favorite, and some jeans, in which his hands were modestly placed in the back pockets. It didn't take a second for Sarah to realize that this was Clark Kent.
Another A/N: Okay, I'm actually going to do something with this story. I'm having slight plot bunny problems though, anyone have any ideas on how the first conversation should go? If not, I'll try to update as soon as I can.