Disclaimer: This story is completely original. All characters, settings, and events are spawned from my own mixed up little mind and may not be used, copied, or adapted without my express written permission. Do not steal my story!!!
2.
A dunk of her head under the bathroom sink and a set of gym clothes later, Toby yanked her locker open. She shoved the plastic bag of her spaghetti-soaked clothes into the bottom of it, sighing as she started pulling out her books for her next class.
"You make it easy for them, you know," a rich baritone voice from her side said. She glanced past her locker door to see Dominic looking at her. He was nothing short of model-handsome, from his tousled black hair to his eyes that Toby always thought of as 'shock you senseless' blue. She turned back to her locker. She herself wasn't much of anything, too thin with pencil straight dark brown hair about the color of a chocolate bar. The only thing she was proud of were her eyes – a gold-flecked shade of green that called back to her Irish history.
"I don't."
Dominic sighed. "Why don't you ever say anything, Tobes? Tell a teacher what they did to you, at least…"
Toby shrugged one shoulder. "How will that help? They'll have to go to detention for one day, maybe, then they'll be free and even angrier than before. I should have known not to open my mouth in the first place, fire codes be damned."
"Language," Dominic warned, reaching up and running his hand through his hair. Toby always half-expected the world to slow down dramatically, like one would see in a movie, when he did that.
"Why, are you going to tell my mom? Why are you talking to me, anyway?"
"I can't talk to my little sister?" He grinned off-handedly at her and she shook her head.
"We're not even remotely related. Just because our mothers are—"
"—joined at the hip? Clones of each other? Two identical peas in a two-pea pod?"
Toby couldn't stop herself from grinning at him. "Something like that." She pushed her locker shut, looking over at him. "Look, thanks anyway. But don't worry about it. It was only a little spaghetti sauce."
"A 'little'?" One of Dominic's eyebrows arched but Toby just fixed him with a steady gaze. He grinned, holding his hands up to stave off her 'evil eye'. "All right, all right, fine. Get to class, little miss reclusive."
"And don't you dare say anything to them again," Toby accused, pointing her finger sternly at him. "The last time you tried to help, they shoved me into the school pool. Fully clothed!"
Dominic sighed. "All right, but don't think we're done talking about this."
"Yeah we are. See you," Toby said, turning to head to class. She didn't look back to see if he was watching her, but made her way through the crowd to her Calculus class room. The moment she entered the door, conversation ceased and all eyes turned to her. She ducked her head and moved to her place in the back, a flurry of whispers and furtively pointed fingers flying around her.
"Be careful, princess!" A foot stuck out in the aisle caught her ankle, and she went down in a flurry of papers and mocking laughter.
Her hands and knees stinging, she didn't look up but simply began to reach for her papers even as the teacher came in. "Quiet, quiet," he intoned and students turned away from Toby.
As she strained for a packet of paper that had fallen under a girl's desk, the girl planted her toe in the middle and moved it out of Toby's reach. Quick giggles followed her action and Toby dropped her hand. Don't cry. Don't cry. Don't.
"I'll get it, Princess!"
The teeny, tiny voice by her ear was there and gone so quickly she wondered if she'd imagined it. She glanced up at the boy sitting at the desk, but he wasn't paying her any more attention. Then her eyes were drawn back to the packet as it twitched, lifting up by one corner. She stared as it slowly dragged itself across the floor, then was deposited in her hand.
"Miss Dethewright, please return to your seat."
She jumped at the teacher's voice, glancing up to see everyone staring at her again. "Sorry," she muttered, grabbing the last of her papers and hurrying to her seat. Several students snickered, but this time she didn't hear them. She was staring at the paper in her hand and trying to ignore the prickling at the back of her neck that said someone was watching her.