F I V E

I slammed the door of my locker shut. I was late, again, and Dad was going to kill me. This was the fifth time I was late in the month-Today was the 8th of December. I had detention, too, to top it off. Yippee.

At least he hadn't followed me here. Maybe he stopped, or, better yet, maybe it had all been a coincidence. It wasn't like he'd enroll in Liberty just to-

He was standing in the office, being handed his schedule.

I nearly dropped my books and screamed. Instead, I merely headed to second period quicker than normal.

When I opened the door, he was there too.

Sitting. In a desk.

Right. Next. To. Where. I. Sit.

In my head, I saw me standing in the front of Social Studies class, mouth agape, and frozen.

In real life, my eyes were glazed over, in a careful mask of indifference. My mouth was relaxed, and I moved steadily, books under my arm, to my seat.

When I sat, he turned to me.

"Hi, I'm Maxwell." He offered his hand for me to shake. "Max, for short. What's your name?"

"Kim," I spat harshly before turning away.

I flipped my planner open to today's page. Under the section labeled SOCIAL STUDIES, I copied down our homework. Slamming it closed, I pulled out a black notebook from my backpack.

I opened it, and started to draw with the pencil I'd pulled out earlier.

Halfway into the lesson-Something about World War II-I felt a piece of paper bite into my arm.

Nice picture.

I so desperately wanted to crumple it up. No one was supposed to ever, ever, see what was inside of that note book. Not ever Jazz had seen most of it.

Stop looking at my stuff!

I threw it at him and slammed my notebook closed.

Max came up to me after class. "Hey, Kim. I was wondering-"

"No."

"I haven't even-"

"No." I kept walking.

"Look, I-"

I sighed. Turning around, I said, "Look. I have a boyfriend. I don't want to show you around. No, we can't hang out sometime, get to know each other, or be friends. I'd prefer it if you just acted like everyone else, and stopped talking to me."

"Okay."

"I said no!"

He blinked. "Okay?"

Feeling really stupid, I walked into math.