It was a matter of time I got into the bus I had almost missed it. People were staring at me giving each other whispers and gossip.
"Wasn't he supposed to be dead?"
"Yeah"
"Freak…"
I was standing on the aisle, irritated, looking for a seat where the others didn't put their bags on. I was glad I saw one.
The person beside was staring at the window, her face quite observant. And I noticed, she was new. Her short and sleek hair waved along the speed of the bus, her elegant stature covered in an ivory blouse and a black vest, her skinny jeans smoothly fitted along her legs to her ankles, and her callused, yet seemingly dainty feet clad in strapped sandals.
I slid beside her hoping that she wouldn't engage in a fit or something. She was still staring out. I wonder what she was thinking; she didn't look nervous or excited like most of what new kids do.
The wind blew her hair awry; she tucked her bangs behind her ears and looked at me, smiling. Her face was a little pointed at the edges, like an elf's, prominent yet elegant, and her eyes were electric blue, twinkling.
"Hi" she said
Her voice was high like a singer's. Soothing.
Considering that I was quite a loner, I was absolutely surprised, no one that I didn't know of ever said hi to me, in this case she was first, aside from Jane of course.
"Hi" I said, confused.
"I'm Bethany King"
She took her hand out, offering a handshake.
"I'm Jake Thorne"
I shook her hand.
"Nice to meet you Jake"
"You too Bethany"
The courtesy was quite awkward; rarely anyone in this town was like that. She looked kind of rich. No, not spoiled rich, rich like royalty or something near that. I think courtesy was very common on where she was from.
"So" I tried to make a conversation. "Where you from?"
"Oh. I live up, the Grove division of Fairfields" she answered
Because Fairfields was a huge suburban it had to be divided into three. Grove, Forest and Garden. Grove, the northern part of Fairfields, was where the rich people was, like the Upper East Side in the Big Apple. Forest was where the middle-class people lived. It was ordinary, different kinds of houses still, like Grove, but smaller lots. Garden was where the middle-lower class people were, it was kind of boring, uniform houses and lawns and et cetera.
I live up on Grove anyways.
"Really? I live there too." I said, with slight surprise.
"I live on Willow. How about you?" she asked
"Oh, that's the street behind ours. I live on Redwood"
Me and Beth are friends now. Yes, Beth. She was quite cool, she played the violin, does gymnastics just for work out and lives with her uncle, it was because her mother left her there when she was four. She said that she was going away.
The bus halted. It was time for school, I once again entered the bright yellow doors and passed through a thousand pairs of piercing eyes. It seemed that it wasn't only the students staring at me, teachers were included.
Such display of a teacher really disliking me was displayed in algebra. Old plump Mrs. Creed attacked me with gibberish questions and hovered over me like a vulture hovers a thirsty horse over the desert. I sunk my head as low as I can to try to hide from Creed I couldn't take any of her attacking anymore!
The bell rang. Whew. A second more in class I would've died. Gym class was next. Physical activities aren't really my likes, but it's still fine. It's where Jane and I share classes.
I speedwalked to my locker to grab my gym uniform, ducking my head to avoid the piercing eyes. I, then suddenly bumped on someone.
"Freak!" She squealed, sharp enough for everyone in a radius of ten meters could hear.
"Sorry" I mustered, continuing to speedwalk to my locker.
Finally, I got there; I stuffed my books in and grabbed my bag of clothes. As I turned around a tiny, short haired girl greeted me.
"Hi Jake!" she said, beaming.
"Hey… Beth" I said back
The pause in between was there to check around if people were still glaring at me, lucky enough, the numbers decreased.
"What's your next class Jake?" she asked, quite enthusiastic.
"Gym" I answered dumbly.
"Really?' she said "it's my next class too!"
"Okay then, let's go there" I paused "together"
It was a good thing I had Beth around. It kinda equalizes the hating mood around me. Beth was the new pretty kid so she's bound to be popular, and I'm the school's freak, bound to be despised by everyone.
We were a foot away from the bright yellow door to the gym when Beth said:
"Where do I get my gym uniform?" she asked
"You have to fill out an order in the PE office" I said
"Oh" she whispered, marking a wondering expression on her elven face.
We went through the yellow doors and was surrounded in a faint noise of whispers
"The office is there" I pointed to a screen door on the other side
"Okay" she said half-running towards it "thanks Jake!"
She continued skidding to the door, making her hair bob happily.
She disappeared behind the door, leaving me alone with whispering people, evilly talking behind my back.
A whistle blew, time for classes.
In the locker room, I hurriedly changed into the white shirt and yellow jogging pants they call gym clothes.
"How d'you work out Thorne?" Alek Slavenski asked, a buff ashen blonde haired guy.
"Uh" I tried to think of a reason to cover up my Spiderman-ish morph "my dad said I was skinny so he forced me to work out"
I ended that statement with a "ha"
"Oh" was all he said back
I was glad for that, that way he wouldn't have dug deeper into the topic.
We were out of the locker room, sitting on the bleachers. I was actually listening to what the coach – Mr. Henry, had in store for our class today.
"Today we have a new classmate" he said, looking at his clipboard "come out here Beth"
There was a gentle force that bumped beside me, it was that Jane was already beside me.
"Hey Jake" she said, trying to say something else "I'm really sorry for-"
I cut her off
"I should be sorry Jane" I explained myself "I only knew that you were concerned and that you had to do it because you didn't know what else to do. I'm really sorry because I got mad at you instead of trying to thank you for it"
There was a pause.
"Let's not talk about this again please" I asked of her
"Okay, forgiven and forgotten" she said her mouth slightly creasing to a smile
There was another gentle thud beside me.
It was Beth
"Hi Jake" Beth said, now in gym clothes.
"Hi Beth" I replied, out of courtesy, I had to introduce them to each other. "Beth this is Jane. Jane, Beth"
They greeted each other with smiles.
The whistle blew. Time to assume to gym places.
A minute later Ms. Mendez the principal's assistant came in with a note on her hand, her tapping heels a warning bell for people in the class to be called for the principal. This effect had caused the students to slightly freeze on where they were standing.
"Jacob Thorne" Mr. Henry exclaimed, making my back shiver. "The principal wants to talk to you."
I walked to Ms. Mendez looking gloomy.
"Serves that freak right" I heard a girl say
"Yeah…"
Then I exited the gym.
"Don't be sad Jake" she said as we slowly walked to the office.
"What?" that was a pretty stupid question to ask if you were called by the principal.
"You aren't called for a bad thing" she smiled "you were called for something good. Why do you think I came to you in person instead of wailing it on the PA?"
God. She was right, maybe I hadn't noticed this before but she was beaming, her plus-sized figure made her look more jolly with a smile.
We entered the office door. The office was quite - classy. There was a steel desk in front of the clear glassed windows, the walls were embedded with framed awards and the tables: style uniform to the steel desk, on the sides had trophies on it, and there was a big leather office chair behind the table .It was where Mrs. Lao sat, for a really tiny principal she had a really sharp mouth, but that mouth now was formed to a smile, almost ear to ear.
"You are probably wondering why you are here Jacob" She said, with a sound of gratefulness and a hint of authority.
"Jake" she suddenly said "May I call you Jake?"
I nodded.
"Do you remember, perhaps doing something last Saturday?" she asked
A shock of horror struck me. I was doing something last Saturday, but it was nothing ordinary. I had saved a guy's life from a huge car explosion and walked away with a scratch.
"I wasn't doing anything last Saturday…" the last syllable of the sentence trailed off.
"Please…" she said reaching over to tap my shoulder "… Don't hide it"
"Don't hide what?" I asked, trying to hide my deepest secret
"You saved Sid Crowley form that car explosion" she said, like how scientists conclude a theory.
I was silent there. I didn't know what to do. I sweated beads; my ears flooded with heat and turned tomato red. I gulped.
Mrs. Lao waved her hand. Ms. Mendez hurriedly stalked out and after a few minutes she came in with an almond haired guy with a slightly muscular build and a white bandage on his left arm; from the back of his hand to a few inches before it reaches the elbow.
I realized it was Sid Crowley whom I saved.
The expression on his shiny face, showed like someone had seen an angel. He rushed to me and gave me a firm handshake with his right hand, his lips pulled tightly into a smile, and tears began to dampen his eyes.
"I would have been dead, if you didn't drag me out of that van" he said releasing his handshake and sat down.
"Hm" was all I could make up. I still felt nervous you know.
"because of your bravery Jake…" Mrs. Lao said placing a pencil into its holder "we will commemorate it with a little celebration"
Now my whole body tingled. I felt my shirt sticking and my ears hot as a light bulb.
"Y-you shouldn't have" I said, trying to sound appreciative instead of being nervous
"No." she said sternly "We should."
Mrs. Lao's expression seemed that she has never quite learned how to appreciate someone. She seemed quite lucky that she has a husband.
I smirked at the idea.
"Anything funny Jake?" she asked
"No. Nothing" I said, still clinging to the idea
It was half an hour after when they ended the planning for my commemoration. After that, I lunged toward biology.
"Jake Thorne" Mr. Dansforth, the English Biology Teacher said "Take your seat."
Everything else throughout the day was boring. Finally, the bell had rung and signaled the end of classes.
I was just about to head to the bus when something, something that felt like a very skilled football player tackled me. I didn't know if it was impact of his tackle or that we were moving very fast, everything was a blur. Like how things were if you looked outside a from a train. Then, we halted.
After my recovery from the dizzying speed, I realized I was on the roof of a building.
"I'm sorry" a guy said.
I saw him near me and lay out his hand, he had black hair and brown eyes, he looked like he really meant that sorry.
I looked at him and pulled his hand, making me stand up.
"Who are you?" I said, quite demandingly.
"I'm West Rosen" He said rubbing his palms together
"What happened?" I asked
"Uh" West said, he seemed like he was pulling back on something "I'm like you"
This seemed like a start of an explanation.
"Like me how?" I said
"You know" He scratched his head "People like you. People with abilities, powers"
His last sentence shocked me. I should have known that I'm not the only person who can do inexplicable things.
After a few seconds of pausing I asked:
"If you're like me, how did you get me here?"
"I can fly, you know, like Superman." He answered
"Why did you bring me here?" another question popped out.
"I brought you here, to warn you" he said "your ability, to heal, is the most special among the other abilities, people are after you, Jake, heck, people are after people like us. You have to let your guard up"
And with that he flew.
Saturday was nearing, and a speech was expected from me. Beth had been friendlier and friendlier these days, she was the only person I felt comfortable with these days, being popular has disadvantages, you have less privacy and everyone looks up to you, they expect something good or awesome from you. I don't like being pressured, who does anyway?