First Day of School

Athena had a week before school started, which was fine with her since she loved school. Not that she didn't have enough to do already, almost everyday she was with the guys, either going to the movies, Charles, Bowling or hanging out at each others houses.

Well, Gerry hardly ever came, which had Athena worried since that was one her friends, "Hopefully, I didn't do anything that would make him angry with me. Or maybe it's mom." Athena said thinking out loud as she walked down the hall towards the kitchen.

" I wouldn't worry about Gerry's mom, she is just weird anyway, and I never really understood her.' Sheryl said coming up behind her.

"What are you doing up so early, on a Sunday, you usually don't get up till around eleven." Athena said taking a bowl out of the cupboard.

"Well, I see it like this you've gone to Rev's church once already, so I asked Daddy if I could go with you this morning and he said it was alright with him, if it was alright with you; so is it?" Sheryl said looking over at Athena.

Flashback "I'll be back around two." Athena said as she came downstairs and into the kitchen.

"Hold it were are you going?" Coach asked before she could reach the door.

Turning around Athena put on her smile and said, " To church."

"I can see this but where at and who with?" Coach asked walking into the hallway.

"Well, it's a church, and it's in town and I'm meeting some of the guys." She said very softly.

"Ok, then let me rephrase that, what part of town, and which guys." Coach asked crossing his arms around his chest.

"Well," she said shuffling her feet from side to side. "It's outside the burg, and Sunshine, Louie, Alan, Ju, Blue, Pete and Rev will be there. So can I go now?" She asked very fast.

" This wouldn't happen to be Rev's church would it now?" He asked.

"Yes, it would but I don't see what the big deal is, I asked his parents and they said it was ok. They even offered me and the guys lunch at their house after church. Plus, I won't be by myself, I'll have the guys they will look out for me, so Please can I go, I'm already running late." Athena asked in a pleading tone.

"Alright, but you call me when you get there and when you are heading home." Coach said waving her out of the house.

"Thanks Coach." Athena said running out of the house and making her way to the church.

She had the best day her life that Sunday; she had sat with the guys. Clapped sang and danced around with everyone else in the church. It was so different from the Masses she had attended when she was younger. Afterwards Mrs. Harris had made them all fried chicken, mashed potatoes, corn, and collar greens. Athena had to say that Mrs. Harris was the best cook in world, even better than her mother who used to be a chief. Then she had the guys sat in the living room listening to the Temptations, and some others that Athena's parents had listened to. End Flashback

"Yeah, I guess you can come along if you want, I know the guys would love it." Athena said as she sat down to eat her cereal.

In thirty minutes they were out the door and walking to the church where they meet up with Alan and Sunshine halfway.

"Hey, guys. I've brought a visitor with me today." Athena said walking up to them. That's when they stopped and saw Sheryl.

"Well hey shortie, how's the weather down there." Alan said smiling down at Sheryl.

"I don't know you tell me how is the weather up there, it looks like it is to thin since you have no brain cells left." Sheryl said with a grin.

"Yep, she is definitely your cousin." Sunshine said with a grin.

"Hey she learns from the best and you can't get any better than me, unless you want me to turn into Coach Boone." Athena said with a grin.

"Oh, please no one Boone is enough, we can't have two." Alan said with panic in his voice.

They walked in silence together for a few minutes before they saw a familiar guy coming towards them with a group of people. It wasn't Pete or any of the other guys because they weren't close enough to be near the church yet. Some thing inside Athena told her that she needed to get Sheryl out of here.

Stopping she looked down at Sheryl she said, " Sheryl, do you know how to get to the church from here?"

"Yeah, but why?" Sheryl asked looking at Athena.

"Just don't ask questions, get there as fast as you can, and tell the others that we have ran into some trouble and need help, now go." Athena said pushing Sheryl towards an alley.

She watched as Sheryl ran towards the end before looking at the guys saying, " Do you guys know how to protect yourselves?"

"Yeah, but what has that go to do with anything?" Sunshine asked.

"Yeah, why did you send Sheryl away?" Alan asked.

"Don't you two recognize who is coming down the road." Athena said moving her head down the road.

"It can't be, he wouldn't come to this part of town, and there are too many blacks." Alan said.

"But he would if he had his buddies with him." Athena pointed out.

"Well, it looks like we are going to have some company then." Sunshine said taking his hands out of his pockets.

"No, what we are going to do is keep walking like we didn't see them to begin with." Athena said as she started to walk again.

As Ray and his buddies were walking down the sidewalk, he turned to one guy and said, "You leave the girl to me. I don't care about the others."

As the two groups meet, Athena started to get her blood pumping, just like she would do before a match, since she used to take boxing lessons everyday after school.

"A girl can never know too many kinds of self defense." Was her mother's reasoning behind it all.

"So what are the two Hippies and dumbo here doing in this part of town?" One of Ray's friends asked.

"I don't know, why don't you tell us why a group that hates African American people, are doing in this part of town, then we might tell you why we are here." Athena said crossing her arms over her chest.

"We don't have to justify what we do to the likes of you." Ray said getting in front of her face.

"Then I guess we don't have to tell you, what we are doing here either, cause you sure don't look like our Daddy or anyone else we have to answer to." Athena said glaring at him.

She would have said something else if Sunshine hadn't gotten in front of her, "Look, we are just going to meet up with some friends so way move out of our way cause we aren't here to pick a fight."

"No but it looks like Bongo brain here and his goonies are." Athena said getting out from behind Sunshine.

"Well then let's just see what Mrs. Thing has up her sleeves." Ray said pushing past Sunshine.

"Come on then and try, I'll give you three tries after that, we will see who needs help." Athena said getting in Ray's face, "That is unless you are afraid to hit a girl, but then I don't think you are since you want to prove to everyone how macho you are." Athena said glaring at Ray.

"Ok, then let's see then." Ray said trying to backhand her but he made no contact since Athena moved out of the way with a duck.

"Looks, like Buds here has to lay off the crabs, cause it's slowing him down, you have two more tries big boy." Athena said bring her head back up only to move again when a fist tried to hit her.

"Oh dear me, he has one try left whatever will he do it, no one knows." Athena said moving back in front of Ray. But she didn't see his fist coming toward her; nor did she hear Sunshine's or Alan's warning because they were to busy fighting his friends. When his fist made contact her head snapped backwards, bring her head back up she rubbed her hand over her lip, to find blood on there.

"Well, it looks like he could do it, but I have news for you now, you drew blood, be prepared to get very injured." Athena said brining her knee up to get Ray in his crouch, he started to crumple up she brought her knee back up to make contact with his face. "Oh dear, did I do that, opps I'm sorry." Athena said with a smile.

It wasn't until she felt a hand around her ankle did she feel herself fall. Pretty soon she was looking up at Ray, "So what are you going to do now?" He asked as he punched her in the face and chest.

Athena brought all her weight up to get him off of her, when he feel backwards she kicked him in his side, "I was wondering why I played three years of soccer, and now I know why." She said with a grin still kicking him in his side.

Something snapped in her mind, maybe it was the fact that she liked to fight or protect herself, but she just kept on and on until all she could see was red. She didn't even feel herself take the sides of Ray's shirt between her fists and press into his throat telling him through clinched teeth. "This my friend is the Blood choke hold, my dad taught it to me, see with in five seconds you will feel blood enter your throat and then you will being to choke."

It wasn't until she felt multiple hands on her that she finally snapped out of it, when she looked around she could see, Ju, Blue, Pete and the others around her. When she saw Ray crawl away from her trying to breathe did it all finally kick in.

"Oh my god, what did I do?" She asked softly.

"Well you tried to kill him, Athena." Sunshine said.

"Yeah we tried to get you off of him but your grip was so strong that we couldn't until the other guys came." Alan said.

"I didn't mean to, I didn't know what I did, God, I didn't." Athena said getting nervous, because now Ray could go to the police and say that she tried to kill him.

"We know that 'Athena we say what happened so it's ok." Sunshine said sitting down next to her. (Ok enough with the drama)

Her day finished out quite well considering what had happened early that morning, but needless to say the whole town knew, and took Ray's side. Who wouldn't he had been in the town longer and was one of the All American football players. But unfortunately the Cops believed Athena since Sunshine and Alan were there to tell them their side of the story and since Athena wasn't the one to hit first she was actually protecting herself. But to the community that didn't matter one bit. So Athena spent the rest of her day in her room away from Sheryl, who now looked at her like she was some crazy person. Coach had tried to talk to her but left after she gave him five minutes of silence. The rest of her week flew by with Alan, Gerry and Sunshine coming over to watch Mighty Mouse.

"So I hear you gave Ray an ass whopping." Gerry said during a commercial.

"I don't' want to talk about it right now, Gerry so can we just watch the cartoon in peace." Athena said not looking at anyone but the screen.

The three of them just shrugged it off and went back to watching their cartoon. Pretty soon, Athena was heading to her first day of school, which wasn't so good since the bus was meeting with protestors and everything.

And people telling her that she didn't belong and that she needed to go back where she came from, "If only that were possible." She thought to herself. She saw Gerry with his girlfriend, "Hey Superman, how's life treating you?" she asked walking up.

Emma just gave her the once over while Gerry answered her, "Oh, 'Athena gal this is Emma, Emma this is Athena." Gerry said introducing them both to each other.

"I know who she is, she is the girl that tried to kill Ray." Emma said with disgust.

"Well, Princess you can believe what you will, but that's not what happened I should know I was there, and let's see you weren't so you might to keep your opinion to yourself, or at least get your facts straight before you open your mouth." Athena said getting defensive.

Just to make matters more interesting, Julius decided to walk at that time, "Hey Superman." He said walking up giving Gerry a hug.

"Hey there Ms. Killer." Ju added with a grin.

"Hey yourself, hey have you meet Emma? No I guess you haven't. Big Ju, this is Emma, Gerry's girlfriend, Emma this is Julius, Gerry's brother and one of his friends. Why don't you say hello." Athena said with a grin as she watched Ju hold out his hand.

But Emma just rolled her eyes at them and walked off, "Oh just throw a tantrum like two year old." Athena yelled after her.

"Athena wasn't very nice." Gerry said looking down at her.

"Well, she deserved it, Julius was just trying to be nice and she blew him off like he was nothing. Plus, I think you could do better than some pampered, stuck up ice princess that's afraid to look in front of her nose." Athena said to him.

" Well, you could have been nicer, yourself." Gerry said getting annoyed now.

"Well, I don't like her so what do you think of that Superman." Athena said walking off towards Louie and Blue.

After she found her locker, she meet with Pete, Sunshine, and Louie down the hall, since they all had Government together with Mr. Cate.

"Well, where do we sit?" Sunshine asked when the entered the class room.

"Louie take that sit right there, Sunshine that one and Pete that one." Athena said pointing out the different seats to where she had Sunshine in front of her, Louie beside her and Pete behind her. While the class was filling Athena could feel the stares of her classmates, she knew what they all thought about her, and they all believed what Ray was telling everyone.

Mr. Cate turned out to be a crusty old man, who instead of looking at a girl's face he would instead talk to your chest.

"Hey, 'Then gal what do you have next?" Pete asked from behind her.

"Chemistry with Gabor." She whispered back.

"Well, then you'll be with Sunshine, Gerry, Me and Alan." Pete said.

"Oh, joy the fun continues." She whispered back to him as she was copied the notes for the board.

She then had lunch with all the guys, fifth period was her Algebra II class, with Coach Parker, Ju, Blue, Pete, Alan and Gerry would be in there to keep her company, she would definitely need it cause she hated math. She then had her British Lit class, with Sunshine, Rev, and Julius. The one class she knew she would love would be her Advanced Placement European History, with Coach Garland, Alan, Rev, Louie, Sunshine would all be in there also she wouldn't be alone with the students who actually thought she tried to kill Ray. So her first day was full of trips, pushes, stares and comments made to her. But like her Dad taught her, "keep your head held high and your shoulders square, and don't lose your temper."