Hope you guys are enjoying the story so far. This chapter still has to do with Ben, but I promise you'll be seeing more of Kate very soon. Just a little note that any of the text that's italicized means that it is a text message, email, or anything that the character is meant to read. Enjoy!

Chapter 2: Chasing Dreams

Monday just couldn't wait to come. It was officially the first day of classes for everyone at Blackwell. All of the students didn't have their first class until 10 am. One of the many benefits of attending a private academy. Students often took advantage of this to wake up early and get some studying in, grab some breakfast at the Two Whales diner, or simply sleep in, like Ben was doing.

Ben was completely wrecked after two nights of partying hard as the Vortex Club had thrown down a second night in a row. Along with that, he couldn't really sleep due to the excitement of starting his first day of school. His alarm went off again to wake him before he would hit the snooze button. He checked his phone to see that it was 8:30 am. He had an hour and a half to shower, get dressed, grab a bite to eat, and head to his first class of the day.

After finally getting up, he quickly made up his bed and figured that he could use some music to get him in the mood. He walked over to his bureau which had a wood polished vinyl record player sitting on top of it. It belonged to his mother when she was his age and given to him once he got older and she discovered that he had a passion for music.

Ben had all of his mother's old albums that she loved to listen to, and all of them were now in his possession. The only thing that he couldn't decide on at the moment was what to listen to. He flipped through all of the albums on his shelf to see what he was in the mood for. Electric Light Orchestra, The Jackson 5, Led Zeppelin, Earth, Wind, & Fire, The Beetles. After nearly two minutes of searching, he finally found an album that would that would satisfy him, Redbone.

"It might be older than me, but it's still a winner." Ben said to himself.

He began to slip the vinyl record out of the sleeve of its album cover, blew off the dust on the surface of the record and placed it on top of the turntable. He then lifted to the tone arm of the player and moved it towards the record. All he had to do was wait a few seconds for music to project from it and he could start grooving in his room. It wasn't long before he could hear the start of his favorite song by the iconic Native American rock band, Come and Get Your Love.

Ben was immediately lip synching and dancing, all while in the privacy of his own room. It was a bit too early to be blasting music on Monday morning as Ben got a couple complaints from his fellow neighbors.

"Hey, turn that down!" Ben heard from Nathan, who lived right next door to him.

It wasn't long until the song had come to an end, which reminded Ben that he shouldn't waste any more time and take a shower to help him wake up. Though his little jam session had mostly done that for him already. He grabbed his shower caddy, which had all of his essential toiletries and made his way down to the boys' bathroom.

As he walked into the bathroom, he saw an unoccupied sink, which he made his way over to in order to brush his teeth. Just a few seconds later, Ben was greeted by his teammates, Zach and Logan, who had entered the bathroom shortly after him.

"Dude what is your secret? You are ripped!" Logan said to Ben, referring to his muscular build, while playfully punching his bicep.

"What can I say?" Ben asked wittingly. "It's part of the Ferris family genes." He said.

"Well in that case, I bet all the ladies were swooning over you're old man back when he was our age." Logan stated.

"Speaking of which," Zach added as he jumped into the conversation. "We saw you leaving the party Friday and Saturday night with Victoria."

"Yeah, what's that all about?" Logan asked with interest.

"Oh you know, she just wanted to invite me back to her room for wine and discuss our tastes in art." Ben replied to both of them with sarcasm.

"Bullshit, dude." Logan scoffed, calling Ben out on his lie.

"Come on bro, give us the details on what she's like" Zach pleaded as he felt Ben was holding out on them. "Is she a freak? She has to be with that haircut." He senselessly theorized.

"Better yet, what kind of crazy shit is she into? You two end up sixty-nining on the first night?" He asked mockingly.

"Tell you what guys," Ben calmly said as he felt that his conversation with the two was quickly becoming idiotic. "There's nothing serious going on between me and Vic anyway, so you can always go up to room 221 and play twenty questions with her yourself." He then proceeded to step into the empty shower and close the curtain behind him, blocking his view of dumb and dumber.

"Vic?" Zach stated, curiously stating Ben's preference to use a nickname for Victoria.

"He's definitely still tapping that bro." Logan said to Zach as he restrained himself from snickering.

After Ben jumped out of the shower. He walked back into the room to dry himself off and quickly changed into a t-shirt, a pair of jeans, and put on his favorite pair of black high top Converses, similar to the ones he had seen the brown haired girl wearing.

After grabbing his backpack hanging on the back rest of his chair, he checked his phone to see that he had two unread messages.

The first was from Victoria which had read:

Victoria:

Hey! This weekend was soooo much fun. You're also a great time to be around with. Don't know if we have any classes together but we'll definitely see each other around this week. TTYL :)

Ben didn't even know what to think when he saw this. He didn't mind hanging out with Victoria, but he had told himself that what happened between them on Friday night was just a one-time thing. The next night they just hung out in her room again and smoked some bud they both bought off of Nathan, using her "peace pipe".

While the two of them were both stoned out their minds they began to converse about their lives to know more about each other. Ben just felt that Victoria was a bit too dramatic about everything, and it didn't seem like it was the weed talking either. Though he did enjoy their little "toke sesh", after having passed a mandatory drug test before football started.

To Ben, smoking with another person again had reminded him of his summers he spent in Arcadia Bay where he would invite his friend, Chloe Price over to chill out and get high together. He and Chloe weren't really close or anything. He had met her a few years back at a party that another friend in Arcadia Bay was throwing. They ended meeting while smoking outside of the house and kept in touch ever since. Chloe would mostly come over to Ben's house whenever his dad wasn't around either to medicate, or when she needed to get away from her strict, no-nonsense step-father, who also happened to be a security guard at Blackwell.

Ben simply replied to the text by saying:

Yeah! It was definitely a blast hanging with you and the other new Vortex Club members. Talk soon!

Ben then looked at the second text which happened to be from Nathan. It read:

Yo Big Ben, what's up? Just picked up an application in the hallway for class elections. I'm running for class president and I think you'd be the perfect running mate for VP. The Vortex Club is gonna run shit here at Blackwell!

Ben didn't seem opposed to the idea of running alongside Nathan. He seemed like an alright dude from the first weekend. He even supplied Ben with the bud he used to smoke with Victoria. Plus he figured that there would be no harm in getting involved in a club or two at Blackwell, as long as it didn't conflict with football.

Ben sent a reply to the message which said:

Hell yeah guy! I'm down to run with you, it'll be an awesome year if we get elected too. Let's make Blackwell great again lol

In just seconds he saw a text back from Nate that read:

Word! I already put your name down on the application anyway. We even got Hayden as secretary, Victoria as treasurer, and Taylor and Courtney as our two required senators. Time to fuck shit up! #PrescottFerris2013

Ben was confused as to why Nathan was getting so riled up about a class election. And did he seriously just make that a hashtag? Ben didn't think that much of it and left his dorm to grab a quick bite from the school's cafeteria and head to his first class.

Ben was always the type to show up to class a couple days early on the first day of school, mainly so he wouldn't get lost trying to find the room. He took a banana and a muffin from the café for the go and proceeded to make his way to his first class, The Art of Drama.

Ben made sure to register for this class when he had first realized over the summer that he wanted to act. The only thing was that he wasn't very confident telling people about his dreams to pursue an acting career. In fact, he felt embarrassed. Victoria was the only person so far at Blackwell that he had mentioned it to. He hadn't shared his dream with any of his fellow teammates, and he sure didn't tell his dad about it either. His father admired Ben for being an athlete his entire life and the two had spent a whole week together during the summer visiting colleges and universities with the best D1 football teams.

Ben walked into the school auditorium, where the class was held and was greeted by a woman from the front of the room near the stage. She appeared to be young, looking around the age of her early 30s. She had long brunette hair which was tied into a ponytail, and was wearing a red blouse, with black slacks and pumps, along with a pair of thick black rimmed glasses. This was Ben's teacher Ms. O'Dea.

Ben had looked up all of his teachers on "Rate My Professors" to find out how tough each of his classes would be and how much homework he would get. From doing his research, he learned that Ms. O'Dea had studied at Carnegie Mellon, which had one of the best drama programs in the country, and obtained her Masters in Theatre. She had also performed in numerous Broadway plays in New York City and London, and even starred in a couple of Independent films. Now she was back in her native home of Arcadia Bay and working fulltime at Blackwell to help the younger generation find a passion for acting. Though Ben felt that he already had this passion before he even signed up for the class.

"Hi there," She said in a cheerful squeaky voice. "You must be…" She asked trying to guess Ben's name.

"Ben." He answered.

"Well hello Ben, and welcome." She said in the most approachable manner. "Just find a seat anywhere in the first row, and we'll get started soon." She addressed handing him a syllabus.

He then took a seat next to another student, who was on his phone waiting for the class to start, and flipped through the syllabus. Once a couple more students managed to successfully find their way to the class, Ms. O'Dea went up a short set of stairs leading up to the stage of the auditorium and walked toward the front center of it to begin speaking to the class of thirteen students.

"Hello everyone, and welcome to The Art of Drama." She shouted to make her entrance. "Some of you are taking this class that I'm teaching for the sole purpose of completing one of your art electives. Some of you are also here because you desire to learn how to become actors yourselves." She declared to her class "No matter what your reason is, you will learn so much in this course, from acting to improvisation and playwriting."

Ben was already looking forward to this class just from listening to Ms. O'Dea's spiel that she was giving. He then found some slight disappointment afterwards from a piece of news that she gave next.

"I also want to let each of you know that next week Tuesday at 6 PM, we will be having auditions for our fall production which this year will be…"

Ms. O'Dea let out a small pause before informing her class on what the play was going to be, which she then revealed as…

"The Wizard of Oz." She shouted in probably the most cheerful voice Ben had ever heard from any teacher he had in his entire life.

However, this only reminded Ben that he would not be able to make it to the audition since it was taking place the same time football practice would start.

"So these first two days, we will be playing a couple of name and word association games to help us know each other better, since fellow actors require trust and good acquaintance to work with each other". She told her class.

"Oh and one more thing before we get started," She said as she briefly stopped her speech again "Unlike most of your teachers, please feel free to refer to me as Sarah instead of Ms. O'Dea. We're all actors in here after all." She added.

Class had finally ended as there was the sound of a loud and unpleasant ringing bell directing everyone to go to their next class.

"Enjoy the rest of your day everyone, and remember to check the syllabus for your first homework assignment that's due when we meet again on Wednesday". Ms. O'Dea, or Sarah as she preferred, urged to her students.

Ben was already liking Sarah's style. She had seemed really laid back for a teacher, something he wasn't expecting at a private academy. He looked at his schedule that he took a picture of on his phone to see what and where his next class would be. It was Video Production and the instructor of the class on his schedule was known as Mark Jefferson.

Ben walked into the computer lab where his Video Production class was held, not only to see his teacher was not in the room, but to also discover that his pal Zach was in the class with him. At least he knew who would choose to work with if partners were ever required for a project.

Ben sat at the computer next to the one Zach sat at and the two exchanged a conversation before class started.

"How was your first class?" Ben asked

"Eh, it was P.E. so nothing I couldn't handle" Zach boasted. "How bout you?" He asked Ben.

"Drama class. My teacher's apparently a former actress, who came back here to teach kids how to act." He explained. "Plus, she's a total smoke show." He added.

"Well, I would hope so. You did just say that she was an actress" Zach said as if the two things were of course supposed to go together. "So you trying to get laid backstage or something?" Zach joked.

"Heh, funny but no thanks. I'm not trying to get someone fired from here." Ben argued.

"Relax, dude. You're legal age of consent anyway. All you gotta do is not brag about it to anyone, except for all of the Bigfoots." Zach stated as he laughed.

"Fuck you, dude." Ben replied, laughing at Zach's advice. He was beginning to get the strange feeling that Zach and Logan were getting a little too curious about his own sex life.

Moments later, a tall man with an average build walked into the room. He was wearing blue jeans with black loafers, a white dress shirt, with the top two buttons undone, and a black blazer. He had brown eyes and brown hair that was worn in a choppy messy style and a light trendy beard. He also wore a pair of thick black and white framed glasses. Ben had thought that this guy was lost trying to find his way an art convention for hipsters. But without a doubt, this man was in fact Mark Jefferson.

"Good morning, everyone! Please a find an empty computer to sit at as you walk in." said Mr. Jefferson as he was beginning class. "Welcome to Video Production, My name is Mark Jefferson and I'll be instructing this course." He stated.

"Throughout our time together, you'll learn all of the fundamentals necessary to help you create great quality videos and walk out of this room on the very last day as professional videographers." He confidently stated.

Ben also did some digging on Jefferson as well. But instead of going on Rate my Professor he simply just had to do a Google search on the guy, and he'd find a plethora of results. He was apparently a famous photographer who was well known across the United States and made his big break in the '90s.

While he was a photographer, part of why he was teaching a class on making videos was because for a certain period in his life, he had worked as a cinematographer alongside some of the most famous movie producers and filmmakers. Some just to name a few were James Cameron, Christopher Nolan, and even Quentin Tarantino. This was Ben's main reason for signing up for the class. He figured that Jefferson had met many more household names of the film industry and was hoping to do a little bit of networking with him as the two got to know each other more throughout the school year.

"I want all of you to know that you have an assignment due for class next week." Mr. Jefferson mentioned. The entire class then groaned in despair of having homework assigned on the first day of school.

"Don't fret yet, everyone. There's a reason why I'm giving you a week in advance to do it." He stated to relieve everyone. "For your first assignment, you'll be creating a short video that captures any of the sights here on campus or Arcadia Bay as a whole. You will however have to include the camera angles and visual effects that we'll be taking about during the next two days in class." Jefferson then implored.

After spending the remainder of the class going over the course syllabus and the students asking Mr. Jefferson to tell them stories about his many adventures in his career. The same ear wrenching bell returned to dismiss the class.

Ben then walked to his locker to put away the books he would no longer need for his next class. As he looked down the hall from his left side, he had seen the same blonde haired girl whom he briefly ran into on that Friday when other students had been moving in. She was wearing the same necklace with the gold cross again. However, her outfit was slightly different from the last time Ben saw her. She was wearing a white buttoned up blouse with a charcoal colored cardigan over it, along with a gray skirt ending at her thighs, a pair of white sneakers, and a red handbag she wore over her left shoulder. Her hair was worn into the same style bun, just like the first time Ben saw her.

She was carrying a couple of large posters that she had made and looked as if she was putting one of them up on the bulletin board in the hallway. Ben couldn't see what it had said but as she was still putting it up, Victoria and two other girls had passed by looking at what the girl was hanging up. They simply reacted by laughing at the poster. They then briefly teased her for what she was doing and made their way towards Ben.

"Hey Ben." Victoria said as she greeted him.

"What's up?" He said wondering what she and her friends were up to.

"We're heading to the school cafeteria to grab some lunch right now. Wanna come?" She asked politely.

"Sure, I'll meet you ladies there. I just gotta... take care of something real quick." Ben told her.

"Yeah, take time." She said sincerely. "We'll save you a seat for when you get there."

"Thanks, Victoria." He replied. He was hungry, but for the moment, he was more interested in finding out what it was that the cross necklace bearing girl had put up on the bulletin board. And what exactly it was that resulted in her being made fun of by Victoria and her friends.

"Hey, Kate." Ben heard someone shout from behind him. He turned around to see that it was the same brunette haired girl that was with the blonde, walking around campus on move-in day. She was making her way towards Kate. Now he definitely knew that these two were friends.

"Are you ready?" the brunette asked her friend patiently.

"Yes, I'm all set now Max. Thanks for waiting for me." the girl named Kate said.

"No problem," Max said. "Wanna go grab lunch now?"

"Oh, yes. I'm starving." Kate mentioned.

As the two girls were walking away, Ben now had the chance to make his way over to the bulletin board. It was covered with posters regarding meetings for clubs, auditions for the play that Sarah had mentioned in class, missing item flyers, and finally the red and white poster that Kate had put up which read:

Keep Calm and Practice Abstinence, with a picture of a crown above those words, followed by a passage that was from the bible:

"For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication." 1 Thessalonians 4:3-4

For more information contact Kate Marsh via student email.

It was simply just another one of those "Keep Calm" mottoes that you would see on a girl's coffee mug or on a rug on the floor of her room. Ben really couldn't see what the big deal about it was. Sure not everyone would agree with her but it wasn't like everyone was being forced to comply with what the poster was saying. After all, everyone does have their right to an opinion on things in school, even it does suggest what your sex life should be like.

Ben walked away from the bulletin board, wondering if he would have class with this Kate Marsh girl, and if so, what she would be like. Was she the kind of person to preach to people's faces about her beliefs and that they needed to give their hearts to Christ. He wouldn't know until he had actually seen it for himself. All he had hoped for was that no matter what, people would just keep an open mind of the things she said or believed in, and that no one would try to make her life a living hell because of it.

Be sure to leave a review and let me know what you think so far. In the next chapter, things will fast forward to the events of the game and we'll be seeing things through Kate's POV for a change. Stay tuned for chapter 3!