Chapter 4

Sigh... Was all John had to say. Just like so many other times at Frederickson Academy, John was sitting at the front of the office, waiting to be seen by the principle, to have his chance to say what happened. Only this time he sat in a different office, in a new school, with different staff, all on the first day. But like other times no one would believe him, for this situation was very similar to the others. John would come stop the bullying, but would end up fighting them. The teachers would come, and the opponents would over exaggerate their injuries, even though John hadn't done much damage. But of course there are no bystanders to witness anything, the person John had saved would run and not talk. The followers would not doubt support their leader's story and the staff will believe them because there are three of them and only one of him, so they'd chose the majority.

'Yep,' John thought, continuing to wait, 'definitely been here before.' It had been 10 minutes now and still nobody came to get him. He could see the office staff staring occasionally with a disappointing stare. They probably thought he was another reckless and irresponsible jock. 'Great,' he thought to himself again, 'Got in a fight on the first day of school, so much for making a good impression. It doesn't help that they probably have records about my previous incidents from Frederickson Academy too.'

Sighing again, as he saw two people come around the corner at the back. The first was a man, around 5'5, probably in the mid 40's, with salt and pepper hair. He was obviously the principle, since he was the only one in the office with a suit and tie. The second person was a student, he looked Asian and also looked around John's age. He looked familiar, but John couldn't pinpoint where he saw him. The thing that surprised John the most was the kid was in a wheelchair. From what John could tell the chair seemed to be motorized, controlled by a joystick on the right hand side.

Noticing they were coming towards him, John quickly stood up, stuffing his hands in pockets, awaiting the lecture.

"Mr. Sheppard?" the principle asked, stopping in front of him, while the student moved to the side.

"Hello sir." John said, leaning side to side, confused with why the student was still there.

"I'm Mr. Remus, Principle of Carlton High." He introduced, "I hear you were in a fight?"

"Yes sir," John replied, ready to defend himself, "But I was just-" but Mr. Remus cut him off with his hand.

"No need to explain." He stated, "I know exactly what happened. You're free to go."

"I know sir, but I- wait what?" This completely caught him off guard, usually by now there should be detention, not freedom.

"Mr. Long here," gesturing towards the student, "had witnessed what happened and informed us about the situation." 'That's why he looks familiar! He's the one I saw during the fight!' John thought, remembering the student's face.

"So there's no need to explain. You can go now, but I must give you a warning and I will be contacting your parents." 'No! If father finds out, then I'll be gone before anyone can say grounded!'

"I don't think that's necessary sir." the student finally spoke, apparently John's facial expression must have told him everything.

"But I must Lawrence. Its protocol."

"You didn't get hurt. Did you?" directing the question to John.

"No."

"And Mrs. Parker said that the two other students are fine. Right?" This time directing the question towards Mr. Remus.

"Right."

"See. No harm, no foul." He stated with a smile, at first the Mr. Remus didn't look like he was going to agree, but it was enough to convince him.

"All right." He said, sighing a little, "but take this as a warning though, Mr. Sheppard."

"I will sir." John replied, glad he had gotten out of that problem. "Now both of you go get lunch before the bell goes." Turning around to go back into his office.

John turned towards the exit, seeing the one called Lawrence struggling to open the door from his chair.

"Here let me." John said, quickly opening the door for both of them to exit.

"Thanks." He replied, it was the least John could do to repay him for helping him out.

"Um, thanks for helping me out back there." John stated, as they walked they hallway.

"Oh, no problem." He replied, "You see something, you say something. Not enough people do that anymore." John nodded in agreement, "That was brave of you to go up against three guys alone. Where'd you learn how to fight like that?"

"Oh. Uh, my dad's friend taught me." John said, lying somewhat. He didn't want to immediately expose he came from a rich background, "I'm John by the way."

"Nice to meet you, John." he said, shaking his hand while still directing his chair, "I'm Lawrence."

"So you're new here. Right?"

"Yeah. How'd you know?"

"You were in my English class this morning and the teacher was quite loud when talking to you."

"Right." Feeling slightly guilty for not remembering, "Do they always do that?"

"Yeah, but it's better than making you stand up in the middle of class."

"That's true."

"So what makes you come to Carlton High? It's odd getting a new student in the middle of October."

"To be honest I didn't like my previous school."

"Let me guess. You got into a lot of trouble, trying to do the right thing." 'How they hell did he know that?' John thought.

"Yeah." with insecurity in his voice.

"Now you're probably wondering how I knew that." looking up to him as he just nods, "It's all in the logic."

"..."

"Just a lucky guess."

"Right."

"Oh God!" causing John to become alert, wondering what was wrong.

"What!? What is it?"

"Argh! I was suppose to meet Alice for lunch!" Rrriiiiiiiinnnggg! "Great and there goes the bell!" he continued, "I got to go. Why don't we get together tomorrow? I'm sure Alice would like to meet you!" spinning his chair around and backing it up.

"Uh, sure." agreed John, shifting his bag again to his other shoulder.

"Great! See you later!" called out Lawrence as he put his chair to full and sped down the hallway to the second building.

'Huh. Maybe this day wasn't so bad after all.' John thought, still standing in the middle of the hallway. Students had begun to flood out of their classrooms, causing him to realize if he didn't move, he'd not only be trampled on, but late for class, again. Crash! Another girl bumped into him, and once again she had managed to drop everything all over the floor. 'This better not happen every day.' He thought, as he began picking up the girls books, while she apologized for the tenth time, 'Stupid cliché.'