Guys, 12 reviews for the first chapter, 11 of those in the first 24 hours? You people seriously are amazing. I love each and every one of you! As I said before, I don't know the upload schedule for this since I have several projects running right now, This, a collab with swagUpwindowsDOWN which you should definitely check out on her page when it's finished, and two original stories that aren't being uploaded anywhere, Also, I'm really sick right now, so I'm doing all I can!
Enjoy!
It appeared that Math was in a completely different building to the entrance and their homeroom, James's tight grip pulling him out of a back door onto a large yard with a few seating areas placed on the grass.
"This is the outdoor eating area, Newbie." James informed him, grinning at the boy he held and showing his shiny white teeth. "We don't use it often since it gets cold a lot, though, on the rare warm days it's fun to sit out here."
Logan nodded, showing that he'd heard and understood what James had said, but still stayed silent. James huffed a little, much like Carlos had and pulled his grip away, crossing his arms and staring at the shorter boy, trying to be intimidating.
"Why won't you talk to us, Newbie? Can I at least know your name?"
Logan looked thoughtful for a second, leaning down and pulling a small notepad and pen from his pocket. Flipping it open, Logan scribbled on the blank page, biting his bottom lip as he did. Slowly but surely, he turned the notepad to face James, allowing him to read what it said.
James squinted his eyes a little, leaning over to see the small, fancy handwriting. "Logan Mitchell? That's your name?" Logan nodded in affirmation. "Why couldn't you have just told us that?" Logan shrugged this time and pushed James a little to make him continue walking. James broke into a grin. "Okay okay I'm going!"
Logan allowed himself to smile as he walked with James; maybe this kid wasn't so bad.
The Math classroom was small, only really room for about 15 students inside. As the two boys stepped in, the middle-aged, balding teacher at the front, looked over, and beamed.
"Ah, you must be Logan Mitchell! Come, come and I'll explain to you what we're doing today!"
Logan thought this teacher was well too enthusiastic about Math as the man babbled on about algebra, something that seemed very easy to the young genius.
James took his seat towards the back of the class, watching his new friend and the teacher speak. Logan didn't seem to be talking to the teachers either, however, they weren't getting angry with him or telling him off for ignoring them like they would to any other student. What was with the special treatment?
He huffed for a moment, and then sighed, almost hitting himself in the face. There had to be a reason Logan wouldn't speak to him and the others, a perfectly reasonable explanation for his silence. He and the others just had to find out. Satisfied that Logan was still taking all of the teacher's attention, James pulled out his cell and began texting his two best friends.
'Newbie's name is Logan Mitchell, he wrote it to me, still no words, working on it.'
Happy that the message got the point across, he locked the screen and placed it back in his pocket, seconds before the teacher turned to face them. In the time that the teacher had been explaining things to Logan, the whole, small, class had arrived and seated, the only free space was beside James thankfully.
"Good morning class, we have a new student joining us today, his name is Logan Mitchell and he will be joining us in here until further notice. Please make him feel welcome. Logan, please take a seat next to Mr Diamond, I'm sure you two have met before since you arrived with him."
Logan smiled lightly as he made his way over and sat next to James. A blonde girl sat at the back of the class put her hand up, pouting lightly.
"Yes, Jo? Is there a problem?"
Jo nodded her head a little. "Yes sir, why is it Logan didn't have to introduce himself? We all had to when we joined; you made us write a whole speech for the class about our likes and dislikes!" The class around her chorused in agreement, while mumbling between each other possible explanations.
The teacher sighed lightly. "Well, Jo, you see, that is none of your nor anybody else's business. That information is between me, Logan, and the other teachers, if you want to know, you ask him yourself. Now, let's begin the lesson."
With that said, Jo shrunk back into her chair, a little put down. The teacher, whose name Logan soon learnt was Mr Clement, began teaching them about working out brackets, pretty basic Algebra, but James seemed to be struggling. Logan watched him as he went over a question over and over, mumbling angrily to himself. Leaning over, Logan took out his notepad again and wrote down two basic words.
'Need help?' he questioned, looking up at James with his big eyes. James looked shocked for a moment, before nodding and watching Logan as he wrote. 'With working out brackets, you just need to work it out as you go along, and the number just outside the brackets means you times that number by everything inside, such as, here, there's 3(x+2), this means you have to times x by 3, making 3x, then times 3 by 2, making 6, understand?'
He looked up at James again, hoping what he'd written had made sense. Logan knew he would have been able to explain it much better in sign, but he didn't know if James knew it, and he didn't want the teasing to happen yet again, so he'd have to stick with writing for now. James nodded at him, before turning back to his work and writing down the answer and breaking out into a grin. Logan turned back to his own work sheet, working through the remainder of the questions quickly.
Mr Clement soon began to read out the answers, Logan getting every question right as always. James didn't do as well, getting 15 out of the 20 answers right, but even that was nothing to get upset over.
After a little more work, the bell rang and Logan was once again dragged out with James.
"Dude, thank you so much! I've never understood Math before!"
Logan blushed a little, turning to hide his rosy cheeks; it was hard for him to take compliments easily. He kept his brown eyes locked on the floor where he could keep control of his emotions.
"You have English now with Kendall, right? Just go down this corridor, take a left then go up the stairs, the English room you're in is just there, you should see Kendall there so don't worry about finding the next room. See you later!" James held a hand up to Logan before running off down the corridor, weaving between students as he went.
Logan sighed lightly, went through the directions James gave him a few times in his head, then went to meet Kendall.
-
The boys lunch hour arrived quickly, Kendall, Carlos and James meeting up in the outdoor seating area like normal. It was reasonably warm out considering it was September, so the all grabbed a table and sat around it, pulling out their lunches from their bags.
"So, his name is Logan eh?" Carlos asked through a mouthful of PB+J sandwich.
James sighed lightly. "Carlos, swallow then talk, alright? But yes, his name is Logan. Ken, did you have any luck getting him to talk in English?"
Kendall looked thoughtful for a second before shaking his head. "No, he sat next to me but didn't say a word, he wrote a lot out to me, but didn't physically speak. Miss Lacey didn't pull him up for a single question or make him introduce himself either; I wonder what's going on."
James nodded in agreement. "Yeah, Mr Clement didn't make him introduce himself either. I suggest we begin an operation of sorts." He smirked lightly, the mischievous glint in his eyes letting itself known.
Carlos's eyes lit up, he loved getting 'operations'. They made him feel like a spy or a ninja or something! "Tell me!" He demanded, bouncing in his seat a little in anticipation.
James and Kendall grinned at their friends enthusiasm for the plan. "Right," James began. "I think we should offer to walk Logan home after school, say we do it for all our new friends so we know where they live just in case, then we talk to his mom and see why he won't talk to us. Ideas?"
Kendall frowned slightly. "Seems a bit sneaky to me, like we're going behind his back or something."
James shrugged in reply. "Oh well, he won't talk, we'll find out why. Carlos?"
"I like the idea!" Carlos grinned. "Can we dress up in ninja suits?"
James sighed lightly, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. "No, Carlos, don't you think that'd be a little bit suspicious?"
Carlos pouted, but nodded in agreement, moodily going down to eat the pasta salad his Papi had packed for him.
The blonde of the group looked up as he saw a figure approaching, unable to keep the smile from his face. "Logan! Come sit with us." He exclaimed, moving over a little so there was space next to him for Logan to sit comfortably. Logan greeted him with a smile, before taking the space that was made for him.
The conversation for the rest of the lunch hour was kept light, including Logan by asking him questions in which he could nod or shake his head to in response, they didn't bring up their little plan with the genius, knowing that it wouldn't be graciously handled.
Then, around 5 minutes before the lunch hour would end, James broke into a grin, grabbing hold of Logan's shoulders fondly. "Hey, have you realised how much of a genius this kid is? He helped me understand Math! Math guys!" As if it was the most amazing thing someone could do.
Kendall nodded in agreement, pulling Logan from James towards himself. "Yeah, I've noticed, he helped me with my English work, I'd never understood how Haiku's worked until he explained it to me! Now, if only we could hear that wonderful voice of his explain how to write a Haiku properly instead of in writing?" Kendall urged. Well, it was worth a shot.
Logan just blushed, turning his gaze away to face the floor, lip firmly sealed shut. Kendall knew that Logan wasn't going to talk, so just let the matter drop, packing up the rubbish from their lunches and heading off to class.
"Logan, what've you got next?" Carlos questioned, leaning over the slightly taller boy's shoulders to peer at the timetable clutched in his fingers. "Chemistry huh? I'll show you to your room! I have Biology in the room next to yours." He grinned at Logan, his cheeks creasing slightly into little adorable dimples that Logan couldn't help but mirror, his own crescent dimples shining through.
Carefully linking his arm through Logan's, making sure not to be rough and knock the poor new kid over like James kept doing, he began to pull the pale boy through the crowds towards the block where they shared Science.