"Nice of you to join us," the old lady replied tartly. She was thin and bony, gray hair pulled back into a stern knot. Consulting her schedule Max pasted on a smile and glided into the room, pretending she hadn't just moments ago been assaulting another student in the middle of an empty hallway.
"Mrs. Meyers, so nice to meet you," okay, maybe her tone was hedging a bit too far toward sarcasm, "I'm Max and this is Iggy. We're new."
"I'm well aware of this, Miss Ride." The class sniggered as her attempts at buttering the teacher up where shot down spectacularly. Max gave a mental shrug. At least she could say she'd tried.
"I suppose she thinks she knows everything," Max muttered, slightly cross. Apparently the lady in question was of decent hearing.
"Yes, in fact I do," The teacher shot back rather rudely if Max did say so herself. "Now if you're finished disrupting my class I would appreciate it if you and your brother took your seats." The brunette's eyes slid toward the theoretically brother in question and smirked at the sickened look that crossed his face. Well, she didn't much fancy the thought either.
"Of course, Mrs…," well, she'd forgotten the teach's name so soon? Whoops. Max turned back to Iggy and hooked arms with him and started leading him across the classroom, "this way, brother dearest." He grumbled at this and while it was low enough she couldn't pick up most of what he said, there was definitely an 'obnoxious' thrown in there somewhere. A frustrated sigh came from the front of the classroom.
"Honestly, Miss Ride," it was a little early on, Max thought, for the teacher to be taking that tone with her. It was only her first day! "I believe Mr. Martinez can find his seat on his own."
"Well, yeah," Max mused, "I suppose he could. I just didn't think you'd appreciate the blind guy sitting on half the class before he found an empty seat." There was a flurry of stifled giggles at this, whether they were in an attempt not to catch the teacher's ire or not seem rude laughing at the trials of a blind boy, Max wasn't sure. The teacher's face had taken on a lovely pink hue.
Ducking into his seat Iggy cast a slightly off target glare her way. She sniffed haughtily. Going through all that trouble and nothing so much as a thank you, the nerve. Max sank into the seat behind Iggy and turned her attention fully to the teacher.
"So what's in the lesson plans today, teach?" Consulting her schedule once more her face soured as she realized she was in history. The subject was bad enough, and now it seemed she had a teacher who wouldn't be giving her any breaks on top of it. Well, she was probably asking for it.
Max listened with half an ear as the lady promptly began passing out several sheets of paper and she blanched. What the hell was this? She voiced her concerns over what very rightly looked like a pop quiz. Wasn't this supposed to be the second day of school?
"If you had been here yesterday, Miss Ride," the look she received suggested she was rather certain there had been no familial issues leading to the absence, "you would have received your syllabus, which details the homework requirements of this class." Max went bug eyed.
"Who gives homework the first day of school?"
"I do," She replied tartly, "now, unless you've been marked as excused," the tone of her voice suggested she highly doubted this was the case and Max conceded it was quite true, "you'll have no choice but to take the quiz.
"Mr. Martinez," Max took a moment to wonder at his donning her mother's maiden name. Sure, Iggy wanted to hide from his parents but he'd had her mother and even the principle of the school helping with the sign up process. Weren't parents and principles supposed to discourage illegal activities? There were definite hints of it concerning their situation.
It occurred to Max that Iggy was, in fact, eighteen. Probably. Pretty darn close, anyway. Maybe that had something to do with it. Now what was the teacher saying?
"We'll discuss after class a few personal adjustments I'll need to make in order to meet any of your needs. In the meantime I encourage you to sit quietly so that your peers can focus on their own quizzes." Max wondered if she actually liked her job – or if she was a teacher simply because the students were the only ones who would put up with her attitude. Not that they had a choice in the matter.
Maybe she'd ask sometime.
Stifling her groan Max looked down at the sheet when it finally reached her. History, Max tried to recall what it had been they had gone over last semester. The civil war? The revolutionary war? A lot of wars. Evil kings and a pretty sweet queen. Queens who got their heads chopped off and queens who took over the world.
Squinting at the sheet she read off the first question.
When did World War II begin? World War II. Max's face scrunched up as she struggled to think. Big war. All the countries. Lots of banging, airplanes, submarines. It was a real bad time, she imagined. Was this the one where the archduke got killed? Or was it when Hitler came to power? Where they the same? Hell, it didn't matter if they were. Why, even if she had read the chapter, would she bother to remember when something started? It was the least interesting thing about it!
Leave it to a teacher to take a war and ask when it starts. Honestly, shouldn't they be talking about the who's and not the when's? Sure, they say learning history will keep the future generations from repeating it, but she doubted the blasted date would be the final decider there. She doodled Napoleon on his horse with his stubby legs and a sword in the air before skipping to the next question.
Who made up the Axis of Powers? Well, at least this one was a little bit easier. Sort of. Max assumed they were talking about the war with Hitler, and while she wasn't one hundred percent sure of the name given to either side it was a 50-50 chance. She scribbled down America, Great Britain, France, and Canada for good measure. Next question!
She scanned through the next eight question and was rather confident in the likelihood she knew approximately zero of the following questions. Ah well, maybe Mrs. Meyers took doodles as half credit? Trying to keep it rated PG Max skipped the idea of any in depth holocaust stuff – although she did draw a giant camp with barbed wire around it.
Under the question asking about the book Hitler penned in prison she drew a headshot of the man in question. She did pretty good with that mustache, actually. On his lapel she sketched the funny curved plus sign. What was it called again? Something in German, she assumed.
There was little help for her today, she decided, and once she had a few more (impressive, if she did say so herself – and she did) depictions of random people of the historical kind Max flipped over the paper and stared expectantly at the teacher. Mrs. Meyers noticed her attention and walked over with a raised eyebrow and accepted her paper silently. The lady waited until she was leaning against her desk again before pulling up her glasses and examining Max's test. Her eyes narrowed. Scanning the page briefly the teacher shot Max a wordless glare.
No extra credit for artwork, then. There went her grade.
WannaZiggyZiggah Your reviews have been absolutely heart warming. I owe you my thanks, actually. My yesterday ended on a pretty rough note and your review(s) were the exact thing I needed. I apologize for shattering your imaginations but I am indeed American. Just one of those peculiar ones that tend to be awake at 4 (or, as of now, 5) in the morning. Rest assured, I never wake up this early.
FleckedWings90900 Pleased to see you're still along for the ride! I didn't manage to finish the story last NaNo, but I'm still sitting on a good 14kt words more. Can't really say why I waited almost a year to actually post the chapters, but better uber late than never ever! I apologize if bits and pieces aren't too well polished; word sprints, while helping word count do not promote the best of writing samples.