III. Chemistry

"For every minute you remain angry, you give up sixty seconds of peace of mind." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Alice was intoxicating. No matter how much I wanted to get her out of my head, I couldn't. The golden eyes of hers - it took me a while to conclude that it must have been some kind of a strange mutation, since it wasn't the contact lenses. My aunt had been using lenses since three years ago, and I'm sure Alice's eyes didn't look like that at all.
Her heavenly, exalting voice... oh my, with the memory, I felt like having withdrawal symptoms. Well, most probably, meeting another person with voice as angelic as Alice's, at the first lesson of mine wasn't helping either; but it wasn't in my powers to change that now, was it?
The moment I recieved my schedule from the chubby lady in an office as small as my "new" room at Emily's, my eyes automatically searched for the Chemistry. To understand, Chemistry was the only love of my life. I adored the subject - experimenting with various liquids, powders, searching for cellulose, starch, proving the presence of glucose, and much more. Everything had its sense, its logical reasoning. There weren't any stupid exceptions to the rules in Chemistry, as in normal life - no; there were only the strict, merciless rules. So, yeah, Chemistry was simply a paradise on Earth for me.

"Good morning, class," the teacher - an asian woman in her early 30's - welcomed us in the laboratory. "This subject is elective, for that I expect you to do your best. Those of you who have signed up for Analytical Chemistry will obviously need the knowledge in the future; or are self-murderers, since Analytics definitely isn't a walk through rosy garden."

The woman managed to summarize the subject and her expectations in two sentences and for that, I was slowly starting to like her. "My name is Irene Gao. I will be your teacher for at least this year. Now, each of you will come to me and choose a topic for your essay. The essays will be the result of your year work, so I recommend you to prepare yourselves well."
After that, the class errupted into wide whisper. I felt a urge to start biting my nails for obviously the same reason as the rest of the class started chatting - nervousness. The girl next to me though - unlike the rest of us, normal, deprivated students - snorted, shut her exercise-book closed and then, turned her head away from the teacher to watch out of the window. Her reaction made me wonder, how was it that she wasn't nervous. It made me curious enough to look at her even.

Immediately, I started to regret the decision. Mainly since my temporary neighbor was as beautiful as Alice was. Uhm, nope, that wasn't quite the right definition. Remember when I said that Alice was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen? Then forget it. This girl was definitely the most beautiful one, and I had slowly started doubting my sexual preference. Until now, I thought I had been a strict heterosexual, however, if this particular girl asked me to do any lasciviousness with her, I wouldn't refuse (although I'd do with Alice as well, for that matter).

"Miss Hale," the professor sighed wearily, pulling me out of the chain of thoughts. Thanks god for that anyways. "Do you have any objections to the work assignment?"

And obviously, I wasn't the only one who noticed the girl's actions either. My neighbor turned her head back, to look at the teacher, her emotions obviously struggling among themselves, letting her surroundings know that she was trying to avoid any other expressions of contempt. In the end, her "good" self obviously won the fight, yet the girl rolled her eyes.
"Of course I don't," she retorted sharply.

"Marvelous," professor Gao smiled at her as sincerely as she could, then pulled out paper cards in various colours - blue, green, black and red. She arranged them on the table, letting us adjust to the colours. "These are the topics of your essays. Red colour means a part of the Atom Structure. Black means a particular group of elements from the Periodic system of the Elements; green is the theory of Organic Chemistry and blue means your favorite Nomenclature. You will come to me, announce the colour you've chosen. I'll pull out one card for you then. Understood?"

No one replied, so the professor remarked something about the silence meaning yes. "Aldridge, Victor!" She called and a boy from the first row walked over to her. He chose black colour, as far as I remember. Since then, I stopped paying attention. My eyes spontaneously moved to the girl next to me, as I observed her features once again.
She had a long, dense, straight, blonde hair, which looked like it was made of silk or satin, even though a poor light of the cheapest saving-energy bulb in the classroom had been reflecting itself on it. Her skin was pale and absolutely perfect, not carrying any trace of acne or other signs of puberty, although I hadn't noticed the use of make-up. Her features were perfect, angelic, stunning - in this point, I'd leave the rest to your imagination. What captured my eyes though, were her eyes. Once again, they had the colour of melting gold; in this girl's case, they were a bit darker than Alice's irises were, but that was just a slight difference.

The moment I opened my mouth to ask her, if she was somehow related to Alice, the teacher called my name and so there, I had to leave my desk. To set the record straight, I did so reluctantly.

"Miss Callaghan," the professor looked at me in expectation. "I was told you're new. Welcome to Forks."

"Umm... thank you, professor," I replied hesitantly, she nodded.

"Did you have Analytical Chemistry back at your last school?"

"Yes, in Dublin, I passed a one-year-long seminar," my response was followed with a few sounds from the class, and my eyes automatically found their way to my desk. I found my unbelievably beautiful neighbor turning around, speaking to someone behind her, whom I hadn't gotten the chance to spot, since his/her face was in alignment of her big-volumed, blonde head. I wondered who it was she had been talking to, directing my eyes back to the teacher.

"Great," the woman smiled at me. "Now, what colour would you like to choose?"

"Blue," I said firmly, while professor Gao blinked twice.

"Excuse me, Miss Callaghan, do you really want the Nomenclature? Voluntarily?" She was obviously surprised with my choice of topic, but I couldn't care less. To justify my choice of topic, Nomenclature was the easiest of all the four topics for me. It was all about learning the principle, having a book of Mathematical, physical and chemical tables at hand, and using the principle and Tables to deal with the instance. Nomenclature was logical, while I preferred logic to cramming.

"Yes, is there any problem with it?"

"Oh no, dear! It's just that... the students would usually do anything to avoid it," she reasoned, however, stretched her hand to the blue pile and pulled a card out of it. She read the inscription quickly, frowning a bit. After writing down into her list, she handed the card to me. It had an inscription "INORGANICS" on it, which made me sigh. Inorganics wasn't the topic of my dreams. I couldn't see how it would help me with the entrance exams for Pharmacy - the faculty I wanted to go to after college - for that matter, the Organics nomenclature would have been better for me.

"Miss Callaghan, are you satisfied with the topic?" The woman asked, concerned. I nodded quickly, not wanting to bother her: "I am, professor. Thank you."

"All right then. If there's something you'll need me to explain or clarify, come to my office at the consultation hours." Lifting the corners of my lips up softly, I turned to leave for my desk. "Oh, and Miss Callaghan!" I turned around to look at her. She beckoned at me. "I've noticed you've chosen the seat next to Miss Hale, which is a rather... brave move. If I may advice you, don't let her destroy your day."

I'd bet my face turned into its confused form. According to what happened at the beginning of the lesson, it seemed rather natural that the professor didn't like her. But to warn me about it in front of the whole class? It wasn't polite; moreover, my neighbor could have heard her! Well, the truth was that she couldn't, since the classroom was huge and our desk was at its back. Good. At least something was safe.

"Umm... hello," I greeted her for the second time this morning, hoping to plant an unconstrained conversation. She hadn't even looked at me.
"I'm Gwyneth, just in case you would need to talk to me," this time, my tone of voice was more ironical. Still, there came no reaction from her. I breathed in deeply, to continue.
"Alright, before I manage to completely embarass myself, I must ask you one thing. Are you related to-"

"Hale, Rosalie," the teacher called out, and the blonde-haired girl stood up. Once again, she hadn't given me a single look (nor an answer to my question), passing around me to the aisle and walking to the professor's desk.
My curiousity forced me to check what colour she picked up. Right then though, I realized I hadn't my distance glasses on yet, therefore I had to narrow my eyes to see the colour she was choosing. And if I wasn't mistaken, it was the blue pile. Blue meant the Nomenclature... Coincidence? I think not.

After Hale sat down on her seat, she turned around, swinging back on her chair. "What a huge surprise, I got the Organics again! I swear, Gao is doing this to me on purpose," she told the person behind us morosely. Whoever it was sitting behind, he chuckled softly, instead of making a proper response. I wished to turn around and murder the person who chuckled at her choice of topic with my glare, but I knew it would be highly impolite. For that, I remained in my original position, feeling the anger at her spoiledness grow inside chest.

I considered myself to be a phlegmatic person, however, their behaviour was undoubtfully awful. Who was she to sneer over Organics?! There wasn't any better topic in Chemistry, than the one she managed to pick up. I knew that, the professor knew that, everyone in their right mind knew that. Besides the blonde cow, who was sitting right next to me.
I grabbed a random book, in order to occupy my hands with something else than drumming against the desk in anger.

Where the hell was the justice when I needed it?!

Suddenly, something strange happened though. You know the moment, when you order your brain to calm down, yet you cannot get rid of the tense feeling in the pit of your stomach? Well, this felt like its exact opposite. I discovered an odd feeling of serenity in my stomach. My brain felt the anger at Hale in its full power, however, my body was slowly adjusting to the peaceful nothing that stemmed in my belly. It was something I had never felt before, which was pretty creepy. I thought I was well aware of my reactions to various incentives, after nineteen years of life. Obviously, I was mistaken.

The bell rang and I grabbed my bag, walking out of the classroom as quickly as I could. I had packed my things long before it rang, so there, I was free to run away from all the negative aspects this class was reason to as the first one. My murderous walking pace hadn't slowed down, until I bumped into someone.

Or something? Yeah, it must have been something. It was, after all, as hard as a wall.