No AN… too lazy!
Iggy sat on the couch in Mr. Hall, or Ethan's, office.
"So. What do you plan on doing with me?" Iggy asked.
"Umm… I'm really not sure." Ethan said truthfully. "You can choose, though." Ethan munched on a chip he had pulled from his lunch that he had taken from under his desk. A realization dawned on him.
"Oh! You must be hungry!" Ethan exclaimed.
"No dip Sherlock." Iggy said, rolling his eyes.
"Glad to see you still have a sense of humor. Here, you want to go grab something in the cafeteria?" Ethan asked.
"Sure," Iggy said, standing up. "Which way?"
"I'll tell you when, but it's left, right, left. OK?" Ethan said, pushing Iggy out the door.
"Left." He said, and Iggy turned.
A couple more steps.
"Right." Iggy turned right.
A minute later.
"Left, and here we are. Cafeteria." Ethan said, grabbing Iggy's shoulder, turning him towards the line, which was now empty.
"Hey Ethan!" said Wanda the lunch lady.
Wanda Snivels was a big African American Lady with big boobs, a curly afro, and a big tummy. She had a deep southern accent. She was always happy and always saved some food for Ethan, knowing that he usually had at least one student with him.
"Hi Wanda! Saved me anything?" Ethan said, coming over to the register with Iggy.
"Of course honey! And who might you be?" She asked Iggy.
"Uh, Jeff Griffiths. Nice to meet you." Iggy told her, facing her.
"Ok, hon, would you like a sandwich? Wanda asked.
"Sure." Iggy said, and she grabbed one and held it out. She stood there and looked at Ethan confused, who had spaced out.
He saw this and grabbed the sandwich out of her hands (nicely) and placed it in Iggy's. His fingers wrapped around the aluminum.
As Ethan led Iggy to his seat, he said, "Let me grab a water bottle. I'll be back." Iggy sat down and he walked back to Wanda.
"What is it with this boy?" Wanda asked in a loud whisper. The register was about 20 feet away from the lunch table.
"He's like Alec." Ethan thought to his own son, only 11, small, sturdy, freckled, and blind.
"Oh." Wanda said, nodding apologetically. "Isn't that Natalie's domain?"
"Hmh. She's why I have him. She went a little too far on her initiation. I found him in the hallway."
Wanda knew of Natalie's initiation. Ethan and Wanda were good friends, best friends, even. Ethan's wife Sara, and her were even friends. Ethan confided in Wanda the stories that kids told him. It helped lift a burden off his chest.
Why Wanda, and not Sara? Sara, his beautiful wife, who poured her heart into everything she did? She couldn't handle it. After they learned about Alec's blindness, she was torn apart. She didn't want him to be deprived of anything. Now, he was so limited. She would be ripped to shreds if he shared a lot of sob stories with her.
"Natalie's initiation, huh? That woman, no beast, should be fired." Wanda scoffed, turning to the sink and washing a pan.
"Don't you know? I've been trying to get it done, but no one wants the job!" Ethan said, turning back to Iggy.
"You'd be great, Ethan." Wanda said unexpectedly.
"Me, no, of course not!" Ethan said, surprised. He'd never thought about it.
Iggy stood from his table and came over to where Ethan and Wanda were, aluminum crumpled in his hand.
"Thanks for the sandwich." He told Wanda.
"No problem, honey!" She said, and added, "If you need anything, find me, ok?
Iggy cracked a small smile. "Will do."
Ethan opened the door and led Iggy into his office as the 6th period bell rang.
"So your son's blind?" Iggy asked, plopping onto the couch.
Ethan was taken aback.
"Yeah, how'd you know?" he asked.
"I heard you telling Wanda. Duh." Iggy said nonchalantly.
Ethan was even more surprised.
"How'd you hear? We were at least 20 feet away!" he yelped.
"I have abnormally good hearing. I didn't exactly have a guide as a kid when this happened, so I kinda learned to work with what I had."
Ethan took this as and advantage to probe deeper, and he usually did.
"So, Jeff, what was your situation growing up? You don't live with your birth parents, so what happened?"
Iggy's face darkened. He obviously wasn't talking.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to pry." Ethan said, putting a hand on Iggy's shoulder. Iggy flinched away from Ethan. Previously, he hadn't.
"Let's just say they didn't accept me when I came back." Iggy said darkly and turned away, hunched over.
"Jeff, I-…" Ethan began, and then sighed. He knew when enough was enough.
"… and you could get, like a voice recorder and that's how you could take notes." Max told Fang during 6th Period, Study Hall in the Media Room.
It was a giant square with computers, Promethian Boards, laptops, cameras, video cameras, projectors, light tables, and music playes.
"Hmm. Sounds fine." Fang said, starting on his English homework. Ms. Nagorski had given a multi paragraph essay comparing a painting versus a book.
"No, seriously!" Max pouted, lightly slapping Fang's bicep.
Just then, Isabella walked over with a boy behind her.
"Hey, Nick!" She said. "Mind if we sit?"
"Huh?" Fang said, popping his head up from the worst book ever, Across 5 Aprils. "Oh. Hey. No problem."
Seeing Max's look, she stuck out her hand. "Hi. I'm Isabella DiStrella." Max looked warily at the outstretched hand.
Seeing the tension, she retracted it, and looked to her left. Seeing the boy next to her, as if she had just noticed him, she said, "Oh! Sorry! This is Jonas Torres, my boyfriend." He smiled shyly, and wrapped a sly arm around her waist.
He was about an inch or 2 smaller than Fang. He had tan skin and curly brown hair.
Noticing that this girl was no threat to her relationship, Max smiled.
"Hi, I'm Max Ride. Nice to meet you."
Isabella and Jonas sat down across from Max and Fang at the square table and began to do their homework.
After a couple minutes, Isabella looked up.
"Hey. You busy this weekend?" She asked Max and Fang.
They looked at each other. "No, I don't think so." Max said.
"Well," Isabella said, brushing her curly bangs out of her face, "Would you like to come to the movies? They're showing X-Men Orgins,"
"First Class" Jonas corrected.
"and we're going, so why don't you two come as well? I mean, Mari and Drew will be there too, and maybe Shiva and Pete, so one more pair won't matter!" She finished, smiling.
Jonas kinda shrugged.
"We'll have to ask Dr. M, but ok, sounds fine." Fang said, looking first at Max, then at Isabella and Jonas.
"Cool!" Isabella said, and at that moment, the 7th bell rang.
"Ok, well, that's the bell. Bye!" She said, and gave Jonas a quick kiss on the cheek and waved to Max and Fang.
She walked out the door to the right, and Jonas went to the left. Max and Fang looked at each other and walked out the door to the left. They were already overwhelmed with the events of the day.
"Hey, you're T.C., right?" A tall blonde girl with blue eyes and long blonde hair to her hips ran up to Nudge.
"Yep, that's me!" Nudge said. "Who are you?"
"Oh, I'm Kailee Shippel, from gym." She reminded Nudge.
"Right… so what's up?" Nudge asked.
"Well, in gym, we were just kinda dancing around, so I was like 'hey, isn't she really good' and my twin Angela was all like 'sure' but she's kinda sarcastic so I ignore her usually but I was wondering if you did ballet?" She said in one breath.
*WOAH!* Thought Nudge, *her rambling matches mine!*
"Well, I always wanted to, but I never got the chance." Nudge answered truthfully. She and Angel were always pestering Max to let her take ballet lessons.
"You really should. We're doing Swan Lake in a few months, and you look like a natural. Here's the address. Class is at 7:00 tonight. You should really come." She wrote down the address on Nudge's binder and ran down the hallway yelling "ANGELA, COME BACK!"