Chapter 6: A Compromise & Food

"Ow!" I yelped, and put my finger in my mouth. I felt a jolt of pain in my finger when I searched for my sketchbook in my backpack. Taking a look at the wound, there was a small cut near my fingernail on my left finger. Taking another look in my bag, I realized I cut myself with my tape.

"What happened?" Pete was sitting next to me.

"I cut myself with a tape dispenser and now my finger is bleeding a lot. Do you think Galloway has any band-aids?"

"I think the only thing he'll have in his drawers of alcohol are empty bottles of whiskey." He smirked. I huffed, hating how Galloway was always drunk during class. All he ever did was assign us a bunch of vocabulary words.

"Yeah, that's probably true. I'll just ask the nurse later. Is it time for lunch already?" Pete gazed at the clock on the wall; 11:24am.

"Ugh, no wonder I'm so hungry. What will we eat today? Edna's sandwiches that are barely considered edible, make our own sandwiches at my place, or food from town?"

"I don't know. Won't Jimmy be hanging with us now?" Pete scoot his chair back, and stretched.

"Ohhh, I almost forgot about him. Hey, what do you think about him?"

Pete gave me a curious look. "Jimmy? I guess he's alright, but he's kinda mean. He seems to have a soft spot for you, though." Hearing that sentence made my face heat up.

"I don't think it's just for me though." I looked away from Pete, wondering if what I said is even true.

"Should we put our stuff back in our lockers?" I said as I put my things away, along with the majority of the classroom.

"If we're not staying for lunch, yeah."

Once I had everything put away, I stood up, and slid on my backpack. It made me think about how I had completely forgotten my bag because I had been so deep in thought about Jimmy and Gary. I met eyes with Pete once I decided to stop observing the state of the classroom.

"Gaaary has... math, right?" I squinted my eyes with uncertainty, voice going up a few pitches.

"Yup." The bell rang, and the chatter from the students became even louder when the door opened. Pete somehow managed to escape being trampled by the students that filled the halls. After everyone left for lunch, we stuffed our things into our lockers, then left to meet up the other boys in the lunchroom.

Entering the lunchroom, I instantly found Gary and Jimmy sitting at the end of one of the lunch tables. I skipped to them, and slapped my hands onto the table, leaning forward.

"Sooo, fellas, what will we be doing today?" I gleamed.

"Not eat Edna's cooking. But before we do anything, I need to get something from my room first. You guys stay here." Gary said.

I sat next to Pete as Gary got up. I stared at him from behind as he left, and waited a few moments before I shot up from my seat and chased after him. I smiled to myself, and tip-toed up to him. Once I was only a few steps behind him, I yelled, "Boo!", but he wasn't even the slightest bit spooked. He turned his head slowly to face me, and raised a brow.

"Gonna take more than that to scare me. Weren't you gonna stay with your girlfriends?"

"Whatever Gary. I'll scare you one day, and I thought you would need some company." He opened the door, and almost closed it in my face. I scowled at him, and he chuckled.

"Fine, but don't go into my room with me."

"But then I'll be all by myself in the hallway!"

"You said you wanted to come, and you'll still be able to keep me company as I search for something."

"Ugh. Sometimes, I really hate you." I pouted.

"I know."

When we reached the boy's dorm, it was empty, as it usually was during the day. We walked down the hallway. At Gary's door, he motioned for me to stand next to it while he rummaged through his belongings. I half expected for him to slam the door shut, but surprisingly, he closed it softly. A little too softly, though, because the door began to slowly open. I grabbed the doorknob, about to close it, until I noticed how frantically he was searching through the dresser near the door. He was talking to himself, but it wasn't loud enough for me to hear.

Now he began to pull out clothes from his dresser, until he found what he had been looking for. A pill bottle, of course. But the label had been somewhat scratched off, and it was full. I thought now was a good time to step in. The door creaked open, causing Gary to jump. He stared up at me with doe-like eyes for a moment, then narrowed them into a glare.

"I thought I told you to stay outside." He said in a voice full of authority, which intimidated me a lot.

"And I thought you were supposed to be taking meds for your disorders. What's that in your hand?" I asked with a voice with equal force.

"It's none of your business, that's what." He clutched the bottle tightly, and hid it behind him. He slowly stood up from his spot on the ground.

"Gary, you are my friend, and I care for you. So please tell me what's going on, or I swear to God, I will make you." I threatened. The palms of my hands began to hurt from how hard I had been clenching my fists, my long nails stabbing me.

"So be it." He hissed.

I let out a yell as I tackled him, and this time I didn't miss. We were both growling, and Gary was continuously trying to push me off of him, but I was heavier than I let on. I laughed, knowing he wasn't gonna win this time.

"God damn it... Kat, why the Hell are you so heavy!?" I heard him utter. I continued laughing with a haughty tone, but soon fell backwards, and flat on my back. I groaned, looking around for him. I saw him getting up, but before he could make another move, I grabbed his foot, causing him to almost trip.

"Kat! Let go!" He attempted to walk away, but my grip was too strong.

"Tell me what this medicine business is!"

"No!"

"Fine!" I replied through clenched teeth, and tripped him. As he fell, I ran to the door to lock it. I stood in front of the doorknob, refusing access to Gary.

He stood up slowly, running his hand through his disheveled hair. His eyebrows we're knit together as always, his eyes burning brightly.

"Kat, get out of the way."

"Make me." I stuck my tongue out.

His face showed how irritated he was. He walked towards me, and I couldn't let myself show how nervous I was from his intimidation.

At first, he thought he could pull me away easily by pulling my arm, but it didn't work. I grasped onto the doorknob behind me, then turned away to stop Gary from even trying to get a hold of the knob.

An exasperated sigh was heard from behind. My eyes peered at the wall, and I saw Gary's shadow throw his head back, and then placed his hands behind his head.

All of a sudden, I felt a pair of hands on my waist, tugging me away from the door with force. I tightened my grip on the knob, hoping that Gary wouldn't pull me off. But unluckily for me, my hands were starting to sweat, and my hold on it loosened.

"Ha!" Gary exclaimed, as he was now able to move me. He yanked me out of the way, quickly unlocking the door. Now was my chance to at least pickpocket the medicine.

I was unsuccessful, though, because right when Gary had unlocked the door, he looked back at me as sharply as an owl.

"Give me my meds." I slowly walked backwards, not a clue of what to do now. I closed my eyes, and breathed out shakily.

"Only if you tell me what's going on with everything."

"Everything?" He cocked a brow.

"Not literally everything, just what's been going on with all the medicines, and stuff." He turned to the side for a moment, then faced me again.

"Fine." He sat down on his bed. I looked at him for a moment, then sat across from him on Pete's bed.

"The pills that I had in my hand are the ones for my personality disorder, but I hate taking them because I feel like I'm not reaching my true potential with them. And I have other pills for A.D.D., paranoia, narcissism, stuff like that. People always called me psychotic or sociopathic whenever I wasn't on them." He huffed, fiddling with his watch. His eyes glanced up at me, probably to see if I was listening. He continued.

"The reason why I'm like this... Is because of my father. That imbecile got himself imprisoned, and that left me with a woman who couldn't care less about my existence. " He spat that last sentence out with great bitterness. "My grandfather lives around here too, but he's too embarrassed of his own son to even mention me. So that's my life story, are you happy now?"

I had absolutely nothing to say. I didn't know what to say.

"So I'm just gonna take these drugs, since there's no reason to heed any warnings." He shrugged.

I pursed my lips. "No, there are reason to heed all warnings."

"Entertain me, Katherine." I rolled my eyes at him using my name.

"Um, first of all, your friends? Most of all Pete! He's been your best friend since like, day one! I'm pretty sure he's always been there for you, even if you always push him away. " He scoffed. I shook my head at him.

"And look! Now we're a cute little trio of friends. We're all here every day, whenever you need us, all right?" Gary picked at his fingernails, not listening.

"Not a trio anymore. A quartet. I suppose I could trust you and Pete, but Jimmy? No. Not while he keeps acting as if he's some big shot." I moaned at Gary's lack of cooperation.

"Oh my God Gary, if you could just-"

"You guys were taking long, and I was worried that you might've gotten in a fight..." Pete stood at the doorway, noting the state of his room. Shirts and pants thrown on the ground, the rug squished up. I sighed.

"We were just talking, that's all. You know how it is with Gary." I said, giving Petey a look.

"Oh, yeah. So are we still gonna go and eat out?"

"Of course!"

•••

We were walking to Shinjo's, Gary and I managing to fall behind the boys. "Let's never speak of what happened." I heard Gary say. I looked at him, but he was facing forward.

I was confused. "What? Why? All we talked about was of your fam-"

"Kat, we will not talk about it."

I began to protest. "But-"

"Never." This time he was now facing me, with a stern look. I stuck my tongue out at him, and folded my arms. I felt so angry about this, that I jogged up to Jimmy and Pete.

So, what type of food does Shinjo's serve?" I asked Pete. He tore away from his conversation with Jimmy.

"Uhh, I thinks it's like seafood, or Asian. I can't remember." I began to observe my surroundings when I noticed a makeshift ramp made up of a table and two large pieces of wood. My eyes wandered around, taking in the faces of pedestrians walking by, quickly evading when they noticed me staring at them. All of the evasion eventually led me to the beach, which seemed so serene. It was almost a pity knowing how everybody considered Bullworth as a dump of a town, when it wasn't all that bad.

'But maybe it isn't my place to say that, I haven't even been here for a month to truly experience all of what this place had to offer'. And soon, we had arrived at Shinjo's.

A bell resounded throughout the restaurant as we entered, causing a few heads to look back at us. The restaurant was somewhat classy, something I wasn't expecting. It had a theme of brown and red, with an underlying tone of Asian-ness. There were Japanese characters on some walls, totally unreadable. There were red funky-looking lights hanging, and I was so distracted by the decor that I didn't notice we already had a booth ready for us. We all followed the waiter, and he outstretched his arm to our booth, which looked pretty neat. Jimmy and Pete sat on one side, while Gary and I filled the other side. We were handed our menus, and the waiter left to go attend some other folks. The pangs of hunger were soon unbearable as I scavenged the menu.

"What're you guys gonna order?" I asked.

"I don't know, I've never really had sushi, or even most of these things on the menu." Pete openly replied.

"Me neither." Jimmy added.

"The worst that could happen would be food poisoning." Pete was taken aback, unsure about eating now. I glared at Gary.

"Jesus Gary, you don't have to say that." I continued looking through the menu.

After we ordered our food, Pete started a conversation. "What were you guys arguing about anyways?"

"How much of a girl Gary is." Gary smacked me with his menu, and continued reading it.

"Why were there clothes everywhere?"

Gary was exasperated. "No reason, Petey." Pete slumped a little in his seat, upset from Gary's harshness. I jabbed Gary in the gut, which made our booth resound with a grunting sound. He gave me the dirtiest look, and I gave him a smug smile in return.

A sound of heels clicking came from behind, and made their way to our table. I front of us stood a young woman with a notepd.

"So, what will we be having today?" She grinned.

Author's Note:

*laughs nervously*

...Trial and error, amirite?