Chapter 21

Alec

So my first high school experience in America scarred me for my entire existence. It pretty much sucked. Homeroom was a nightmare, but my next class, Gym, if anything was worse. The teacher split us into teams to play basketball, which I had never played before. Sure, I don't think a vampire could look klutzy, but I'm sure if anyone could do it, I could. To make matters worse, Lexi or Nessie weren't in my class, but Sarah was. And I did not like the looks she kept giving me. That girl Nessie was talking to before school…Steph, was also in my gym class. I glanced around, trying to figure out what to do. I didn't want to stand by myself like a loser in the corner.

"Hey," Sarah said coming up to me, "you're new here right?" Scratch that, I'd like to be the loser in the corner now please.

"Yes." Oh my god, could this girl leave me alone. If she was in all my classes, I swear, I was probably going to snap by the end of the day.

"Well, guess what? I'm going to show you around school." No way in hell was that going to happen!

"Um….." She didn't even give me a chance to reply and decline her offer, she just plowed on.

"Don't worry, everyone will like you when you hang out with me, and it will be good to have friends here." Of course she was Little Miss Popular.

"Actually—" I began, trying to cut her off.

"Come on, let's go. You can be on the team with my friends, some of the basketball stars." And embarrass myself even further? No thanks. I really need to ditch this girl.

"I—" I tried once more to speak, but my attempts were in vain.

Sarah grabbed my hand and dragged me away, not even listening to my protests.

"Guys," she announced to her group of girl friends, "this is…uh…"

"Alec," I supplied, still trying to tug my hand away discreetly, and without hurting Sarah. She didn't even know my name! This girl was crazy.

"Hey, I'm Kate," a tan girl said, blinking rapidly at me "and this is Colleen" and pointed to a shorter, slightly paler girl, who also smile and flashed her eyelashes at me.

"Um…Hello," I replied, trying to see if I could find a way out of this situation; these girls were really starting to bug me. I then had a mean and brilliant idea "Listen, I promised Renesmee that I would introduce myself to her friend Steph, and I really don't want her to get annoyed at me. I'll catch you later." I quickly yanked my hand out of Sarah's grasp and quickly walked over to Steph and her friend as Sarah stared at me, a huge pout mingled with disbelief on her face.

"Um…Hello," I said, "I'm Alec Keegan. I'm new here, and Renesmee wanted to make that I met her friends."

"She…she did?" Steph asked, not believing me.

"Yeah, after all, we didn't really have an introduction earlier." I kind of felt bad lying, but I did anyway. Desperate times calls for desperate measures, or something like that. I continue to tell even more lies in order to solidify my fake reason for coming over here. "Nez is really concerned about me not finding my classes and not fitting in and stuff. She's a bit like an overprotective mother sometimes. At least she can tell Carlisle that she did everything she could to help Lexi and I fit in." I smiled at them after I rambled on.

"Lexi was the girl with you, right?" one of Steph's friends asked. "And hi, my name's Karen."

"Hi. Yeah Karen," I replied, "Lexi and I have been best friends since we can remember. But we're both new at the whole American school routine."

"So," Steph stammered, "are you liking school? Is it different than the one you went to in…" she trailed off, unsure of where I was from.

"Italy," I supplied. "And yes, vastly different." Because in Italy, I did not go to school, I lived in a castle and lured tourists to their death. "In my school in Italy, it was a lot more old fashioned and strict." Very old fashioned at Volturi Caslte; Alice would have a fashion heart attack. "Here it is much more laid back and casual. I like it here."

"That's great," Karen said. I nodded. Our conversation stopped because the coach blew his whistle, signaling us to get into teams. The girls went off to play volleyball and the boys got into their basketball teams. The teams had apparently already been assigned. So I stood there dumbly while the coach looked at me, trying to decide upon which team I would be placed.

"Keegan," he said and I nodded. "You ever play basketball before?"

"No sir," I replied. He liked being called sir, I could tell.

"Alright. I'm assuming you know how the game is played though, correct?"

"Yes."

"You'll be on the blue team," he said, pointing to a group in the corner of the gym doing lay-ups. "They'll teach you."

"Yes coach," I replied, and jogged to where the boys were practicing.

"Um…the coach sent me here," was my way of introducing myself.

The boys paused and they all came over to me. "You play?"

"No, sorry," I told them, "coach sent me here so you could teach me."

"We can do that," a tall boy replied, making his way until he was right in front of me. "My name is Will. You're new here, right?"

"Yeah, I'm Alec Keegan, from Italy."

"You're one of the two exchange students staying with the Cullens, right?" a boy asked.

"Luke," Will chided him, "don't be nosy."

"Hey man!" Luke replied, "you know…"

"Dude, enough," another guy interrupted.

"Whatever Matt," Luke responded. He looked at me expectantly.

"Yeah, I am," I replied. "The other person is my friend Lexi."

"Alexandra Kelly?" Matt asked, "She was in my homeroom."

"That's her," I confirmed.

"Boys!" coach called over to us. "Enough chit-chat! Start teaching! Or playing! Just get your butts moving!" We looked at each other, laughed, and shrugged.

I learned a bit about basketball, and actually, I wasn't too bad. In fact, I was quite "a beast" as some of the boys said. Thank you vampire skills. I found out that these guys in American High Schools aren't as bad or weird or stupid as films portray them. Well, some are, but these jocks were not the dumb jocks of Hollywood movies. And thankfully they weren't singing soprano like Zac Efron either.

"Catch you later Alec!" Will called over his shoulder as he headed off to his next class.

"Later Will" I called back.

"Alec," Matt said, coming over to me, "what is your next class?"

I pulled out my schedule and checked it. "Chemistry."

"I have Chem as well," Matt replied, "come on, I'll show you where the classroom is."

"That would be great," I replied honestly, as I grabbed my backpack and followed him to our next class.