VIVI

Chasing Yesterday

By: Lucas McDrake

Chapter 2-Rube Goldberg To This

And, yet again, extreme boredom reigns supreme, I thought sarcastically as I listened to the geography teacher ramble on about Russia. At least this is the second to last week of school, I quickly added.

Finally, after an eternity of listening to the monotone of the teacher and the occasional snore of my fellow students, the bell rang. Everyone nearly jumped up in unison, and flowed out of the doors to follow the flooding of the halls. I followed a current headed toward the freshman hall. Stopping at my locker, I gathered my things for Physics, and, finding that their weren't enough students to describe it as a current anymore, headed towards Mr. Johnson's room.

Unlike the previous class, I actually usually enjoyed this class. After all, who doesn't enjoy comedy shows? From the occasional electrocution of a student, to all the mild insults he threw at people who's self esteems he had already made sure were unbreakable, who wouldn't laugh?

I plopped into my seat, exactly in the middle of all the desks. Then I noticed that Mr. Johnson wasn't sitting in his usual seat at the front of the class. Instead, there was a woman standing behind the long lab table at the front.

Oh, yeah! Duh! I reminded myself. This was one of those days that he said that he'd be 'missing in action'.

When the bell rang, the substitute stated, "Mr. Johnson told me to hand out these worksheets for you guys to do. When you finish the front side, you may...get into your groups for your 'Rube Goldberg' project, or whatever it's called."

A 'Rube Goldberg' is a contraption that does something simple in the most complicated way. Mr. Johnson had the Physics class do it every year. This year, because of the recent outbreak of Swine flu, he was having us make a contraption that would dispense some hand sanitizer. The contraption had to at least have five object to object transfers (as in, an object hits another one, and makes that one move along while the first one stops), and seven energy to energy transfers (only a Physics student would know what that meant).

As I got my worksheet, the substitute declared, "You may also talk to your fellow students about the worksheet, but if you start talking about anything but Physics, then I'll take your privileges away."

Nearly everyone excitedly got in groups of cliques or friends within the class. Except me, of course.

I sat alone, working on my worksheet. It was a cartoon of a 'Rube Goldberg' that we had to explain each of the steps. Occasionally, someone would turn to me and ask a question like, "What is step G?", or "What does the switch do?" I would answer each, like the nerd I was, and then turn back to my work.

Finishing up, I realized that I didn't really have a group for the 'Rube Goldberg' project.

"Come over here and help us, Vivi!"

I turned to see that Jen was the source of the voice. Quickly, I smiled, and obliged, "Sure, Jen."

Once I had transported myself to a desk close to her group, she asked, "I sort of don't get this step."

I looked at her sheet, and saw that she was pointing at step M. "The hummingbird pecks at the pencil until it's too short to be held by the stand, and it falls," I explained. "Then, it hits the knife, and gets sharpened."

She quickly scrawled what I had said down on the paper, and muttered a quick, "Thanks."

"No problem," I feigned a smile. "I'm glad to help."

As she finished writing down the answer, she asked, "Would you like to be in our group with us?"

I glanced at Stevey. He was an autistic kid that I had happened to befriend last year in junior high. Now, he always clung onto me like a magnet, expecting me to always want him around. The only reason why he wasn't always in Special Ed was because he had 'high functioning autism', which meant that he was extremely smart, but can't deal with emotional chaos. A.k.a.-he has to have everything his way, or else he has a breakdown. Literally.

I always had to keep in mind that he didn't know in the slightest how annoying he was, and he was still a very little kid in heart...and mind.

"Stevey will have to come in, too," I sighed.

Jen huffed, her platinum blond hair waving with the move. "Seriously...I'm sorry to say it, Vivi, but...how can you stand him?"

I sighed again. "I have no idea."

And I seriously didn't. I mean, everyone else was always ticked off, and didn't want to come near him, while I was the only one that could put him in control of himself, and could actually tolerate his presence.

...I guess that just came with being a nerd.

"Well, anyway...I guess he can come in, too," Jen stated, turning to Dave, her brother. I recognized disgust in her blue eyes. "That's four..." Then, she turned back toward the class looking for someone. "Hey, Nori!"

We were sitting in a back corner of the classroom. Nori was sitting in the opposite corner of desks from us, which was closer to the lab tables that occupied the other half of the room. Nori jerked her head up, and looked at us, her black hair bobbing to the side.

"Want to come and join our group? We have room for one more!"

She smiled, though it obviously didn't touch her eyes, and agreed, "Sure, I'll join." Taking her stuff over to our circle of desks, she looked around. "Wait. There's only four people here."

"Oh, Stevey's in here, too," Jen quickly explained, openly showing her disgust at the prospect. Then, she turned to me, and offered, "I think that you might as well bring Stevey over right now. We'll need his smarts to come up with a way to dispense the hand sanitizer."

I sighed, then quickly turned and yelled, "Stevey!"

Stevey turned his head, and smiled. "Hi, Vivi!"

I forced a smile, despite the fact that I felt like I was being humiliated at associating with him. I had to keep reminding myself that popularity doesn't matter. After all, I reminded myself, you're already on the bottom of the food chain. What do you have to lose?

"We're in this group," I stated, barely loud enough for him to hear over the commotion of the classroom.

Wordlessly, he brought his stuff over to our circle, and sat silently. He happened to sit in between Nori and me.

At the bottom of my paper, where there were five spaces for the names of the people in your group, I wrote, Jennifer, Steve, David, Eleanor, Vivian.

I sighed. "So...how are we going to do this?"

As we started to plan it out, I noticed that Nori kept herself out of the conversation, seemingly caught up in her own thoughts. I kept this observation to myself, though when she glanced up at me, I smiled at her before looking away, as to keep her wish to stay uninvolved.

Eventually, we figured that everyone would come over to my house at four o'clock, except Stevey. He had to go to 'respite', a program that gave the parents a break from their mentally challenged kids, though he was told that his parents didn't need a break from him. How devastated would he be if he learned the truth? It made me sad to think about it.

Stevey left class early to go to his 'respite' session.

"So..." Jen trailed off suggestively once he was out of hearing range. "Who'll gather everyone else up to go to your house?"

"Who can drive?" I asked. "I know that I can't yet..."

"I can't either," Nori quickly dismissed herself from the equation.

"I should have assumed...only seniors are left," Jen sighed.

"You guys are both seniors?" I asked.

"Yeah..." Jen trailed off. "It sort of comes with...being twins."

"Oh." Comes to show how ignorant I am towards the popular. "I...never knew."

"Anyways..." Jen brought us back to subject. "I'm sort of short on gas money..."

"So you're leaving it to me?" Dave asked in irritation, his eyes still concealed under his shaggy brown hair.

"I didn't say that," Jen stated calmly. "What's with the mood swing?"

Hesitating for a moment, he then muttered, "Nothing."

There was another tense moment of silence, in which Jen stared at Dave with...concern? I could never read emotions very well. Jen then broke the silence by rushing, "Anyway, it would be appreciated if you did the carpooling."

Another moment of silence commensed. "Fine," Dave exhaled deeply.

"Thanks," she stated. Then, she turned to me. "Your parents won't be home, right?" Jen asked me, an obvious ploy to change the subject.

I shrugged, suddenly uncomfortable, and quickly stated, "My brother won't be home."

"What about your parents?" she asked.

I hesitated before whispering, "They died in a car accident when I was five."

Everyone, even Nori, seemed taken aback. There was an awkward moment of silence. "Then why aren't you in the orphanage?" Nori spoke a full sentence for the first time since I had met her.

"I...my brother had just graduated a month previous, and he has been taking care of me ever since the accident," I explained, putting aside my surprise that Nori actually had spoken.

"I'm so sorry," Jen mumbled, sincerity pealing through her voice.

"It's alright," I excused. "Really. I never really knew my parents. I think the only person it affected very much was my brother."

There was a moment of silence. Then Dave, his blue eyes showing now, and flitting around nervously under his veil of hair, asked, "So...uh, where will your brother be after school?"

"He'll be at work," I stated, glad, for once, that guys were practically emotionless. I also felt slightly...flustered. I mean, who wouldn't be when the coveted leading-quarterback-that-always-goes-with-the-head-cheerleader spoke directly to you?

There was another moment of awkward silence. I noticed that Dave's specially-for-football muscles were twitching in nervousness. Obviously feeling a need to get rid of the silence, Dave questioned, "Uh, where does he work?"

Again with the flustering..."He's never actually showed me his office. He works as a mental therapist." I was, yet again, glad that guys were awkward around emotional moments of any kind, and usually felt the urge to get rid of them as quickly as possible. I seriously didn't want to talk about my problems to people who couldn't really understand. After all, I wasn't really that affected...unlike Nori over there. At least, that was the only conclusion I could come up with for Nori's thoughtful silences.

Gratefully, the bell rang before any more questions could be asked. Jen excused, "So, um, I'll be picking up you guys up at around three fifty. Be ready with your stuff. Where was your place again?"

After I repeated the directions to my house, we all dispersed.

So...do you like Vivi so far? Maybe I made her sound bland...

Critique is welcome! Though I hired an awesomely awesome beta (Thanks Rain'chi for all that you do!), we might have both missed some minor errors, and it would be very appreciated that, if you found one or two, you'd point them out. Please and thank you!

This time, I'm waiting for one review.

^_^

(cue for reader to commense with pressing the review button, and giving at least one word summarizing their thought processes going on upstairs)