' Do not turn around, don't turn around, don't turn around'. I kept repeating this to myself because I knew if I did, I would run back to dad's car and demand he take me home, and then I would have to stay with him, all day, which would double my chances of letting something about the shark-thing slip, not what I needed. So I walked up to the building, through the front doors, and saw a sign that said " ALL FRESHMEN REPORT TO THE GYM" So I followed the arrow on the sign to the gym, where the other freshmen were. I sat down on a bleacher and tried to ignore the people around me. The principle gave the stereotypical 'welcome to high school, you're going to have a great time' speech. Honestly the whole thing made me want to gag. After the principles truly inspiring speech, I went up and got my schedule, it was pretty normal 9th grade stuff English, History, Science and Algebra. For my electives Marine Biology, ok that could not have been more perfect, at least I could have one class I did not despise. But my other elective I did not know if I was going to explode, or make something explode. Home economics, I was going to have to cook? I can't stand the taste of anything sweet, or spicy, how am I supposed to cook that stuff? Class has not even started yet, and I want out! I thought I wanted out after the principles speech, after morning classes I want to rip out all these people's throats and feed them to my shark uncles. The second I walked into English some dolt yells " Ok whoever is the next person to walk in, gets a face full of it!". Having no idea what they were talking about I walked through the door of find a shoe being thrown at me. Thanking my shark reflexes made me act quickly and catch the shoe avoiding a face full of it. Wow lame but accurate. After catching the shoe I looked up to see the person who a thrown it. The kid with light brown hair, light freckles on his face, and expensive looking clothes. What did Max call these people, oh ya jocks the idiot guys who think they own the world, when in reality they were the ones who had just thrown a shoe at the king of the ocean! Looking up at him he gave me a cheeky smile.
" Hey dude can I have my shoe back"? He ask in an arrogant manner,
" Sure" I replied in the same tone and hulled the shoe at him. The jock moved his hands to his face to try and bloke the blow. Even though I did not aim for his face, the idiot would surly go crying to his mommy his pathetic face got messed up, and I did not need the attention, so I aimed for is gut and it hit perfectly. He doubled over, looking like he had just gotten the wind knocked out of him, oh wait he had. I Thought with a smile, no one messes with the king of the ocean! After that I quickly went to the front of the class, and toke a seat. Not a minute later the teacher walked, in a middle aged man, with greying hair, a tired expression on his face with a cup full of coffee. Guess I'm not the only one how does not want to be here.
" Ok class" he said " My name is Mr. Broody and this is 9th grade English".
Ah thank you Sherlock Homes just because we are in English class, does not mean we do not understand English. He went on to give a speech very similar to the principles, I wonder if all the teachers get together and plan these speech's so they sound almost exactly alike, just to bore us students, I would not put it against them. Mr. Broody then went on to explain the material that we would be covering, all the books I have already read. Yes I read! You would not believe what people would dump into the ocean, and what is inside sunken ships. Reading is good hobby. And that is how it pretty much went for the rest of the morning. Me bore to death while some quack talked about material I already now. Finally lunch a break from those boring speech's, but then I have to suffer through listening to these sad excuses for class mates for an hour, great just great. I walked through the cafeteria looking around to find an empty table, I finally found one in the far back completely deserted, perfect. I started walking towards it hearing bits and pieces of peoples conversations.
" oh did you hear she broke up with him," " Mr. B is sucks", " What do you think of this skirt", " Did you see that movie, it was awesome". And I'm the weird one. I finally reached my table, quickly sat down and opened my paper bag lunch box, and pulled out my favorite food. Raw fish and sea weed, or sushi. As I opened that plastic container, I then felt a presence, so I turned around to find that idiot jock how had thrown the shoe, with his little friends behind him. Wow the guy needed his friends with him to talk to me, what a wimp! Without asking he sat across from me and, started to talk.
" Look dude sorry bout this morning, but you really have a good arm, ever think of joining a team". He said in a lad back manner.
" A team"? I asked,
" Well I am, on all the teams that include any type of throwing, football, baseball basketball, even the goalie in soccer". He boosted "David Patterson, the one and only". He raised his arms flexing his muscles, while all this friends hooted, and hollered. What a joke.
" I'll think about it". I said hoping he would just drop it, and let me be, I was expecting a call from dad after all, and I did not want to miss that.
" Ok dude, so we cool about this morning"? He asked, reaching towards my lunch to take one of my sushi. I quickly grabbed his hand and flung it back, sharks were every territorial about their food. And if he was not carful he could become my food.
" Ya we're cool". I said with forced calmness. Just then I heard a ringing, what was it Max would say' saved by the bell'. I quickly pulled my cell phone out, and held it up to show all of the idiots I had a call, they got the message and left, finally. As soon as they were out of hearing distance I immediately answered the call.
" Hello".
" Hey Sharkboy how is your first day of high school?".
" Ah….. No one has been killed yet". I said proudly, a week ago if the idiot jock had done what he just did to me he would have become my personal sushi bar, wow myself control is really growing, must be the human thing.
" Good job Sharkboy I'm so proud of you". I smiled I knew he meant to say it as a joke, but it still made happy to know that I made him proud.
" Alright wipe that grin off your face, and tell me truly, how your day's' been?". How did he know I was smiling.
" Sharkboy I knew you enough to know your reactions, now tell me how your day's been!"
Again with the creepy mind reading. So I launched into the story of my morning, dad was good audience asking for details constantly and asking times if David's shoe had hurt me.
" Seriously dad I caught the shoe has in, IT DID NOT HURT ME!"
" Are you sure Sharkboy, that thing did not hurt your hand, or scratch you, and do not down play anything!"
" Yes dad I am 100% sure that I am un-injured". Once we had established that I was not going to die of a shoe, I went on with my story, and told him what had happened not five minutes ago.
"Well that was nice of him to apologize". Dad said more kindly.
" That's funny, because I don't remember him saying ' I'm sorry for hulling a shoe at your face'! I said angrily, I was not really mad about the shoe thing anymore just irritated that he thought he could just take my food.
" Well Sharkboy people like him have too big pride for their own good. 'Sorry' is just not in their vocabulary".
" He wanted to take my food". I said angrily, but all I heard on the other end was laughing.
" THIS IS NOT FUNNY!".
" I know you're a Sharkboy, but don't you think this is going a little too far". ' His words rug through my head, somewhere in my sub-conscience I knew he was joking, but in context he sounded so real, and I had no idea how to react.
" Sharkboy, are you there, hello?" I heard dad say.
" Ah ya I'm still here"
" Alright I'm guessing lunch is almost over, so I'll pick you up when school is over, and just try to ignore the people".
" Easy for you to say". I said regaining my voice, glad that he had not pressed the issue.
" You will be fine, see you later, bye"
" Bye". I said and the connection went dead, just then the bell rang, signally it was time to my own personal demise Home Economics'. After the usual boring lecture, I found that we would not be cooking for a could more weeks, so that we could study kitchen safety, honestly that is laughable. I'm live in the ocean and even I know how to use a blender.
It was not until my last class of the day anything interesting happened. Marine Biology the one class that I was looking forward to, unlike all the other teachers, this one did not give a speech. But had the students play a sort of game, the teacher would have a ball, and would throw it at a student, and would ask a question. In return the student was to say their name, one interesting fact about themselves, and answer the question. I really did not care about the other kids, but the questions the teacher asked were pretty tough, I mean me the king of the ocean had to truly think about what the answers to the questions were. When the teacher Ms. Lewis threw the ball at me I just let instinct take over, and watched as the ball came to me in slow motion, so I raised one hand a gapped it, sinking my fingers into the plastic. It was only when I heard all the sounds of shock that I realize to humans what I just did would be considered un-natural. Ok I have to be more careful, I looked up at Ms. Lewis she looked un-impressed as asked in cool voice.
" What is the average life span of a Tiger shark?" Ok this is was easy, and I was actually expecting something hard.
" In the wild average 27 years, but they can live up to 50 years". I said as tossed the ball back to her in a slow human fashion.
" And your name is…" Ms. Lewis asked.
A few people chuckled, which only made me more uneasy, under my seat I made my hands into a fist to try and not go in to a frenzy.
" Taylor, Taylor Conner". I said in a forced even tone.
" And one interesting fact about yourself…." Ok what do I say?
"I was raised by a band of sharks" I said lamely, hey it was true, and good practice for when I would have to tell dad, and the best part was none of these people would believe me, and no one did. I could hear them chuckle, and snort. Ms. Lewis was again, not impressed.
" Well that would explain how you knew the answer to the question, besides being raised by sharks do you have any other history with marine biology?"
" My dad is a marine biologist". I said with a shrug. I could hear a few people scoff, and whisper 'teacher's pet'. These humans were honestly stupid. My dad is a marine biologist so what?
" Well that explains being raised by sharks, has your dad done any work we would know." Crap I could lie, but don't teachers meet parents for the those' parent teacher conferences', no wonder Max hates school. Ok can't lie try the truth.
" He's Adam Conner". When I said this Ms. Lewis blinked several times finally looking genuinely shocked. I could hear those brats all around me, saying what is must be like to be the kid of someone famous, already spreading rumors about my life. They think they know me, when in reality, they do not even though I have not lived with my dad for years.
" Oh well that explains how you knew the answer to my question." Said Ms. Lewis
After class I had people come up to me and ask questions.
" What's it's like being the son of a famous person?", " Do you get to swim with sharks?, " Do you have an indoor pool?", " Do you have a girlfriend?".
That last one really shocked me, when I turned around to see the girl who had asked that, she screamed one thing, GOLD-DIGGER! She was dressed in a short skirt, with a V-neck top, and had way to much makeup on, honestly she looked like a clown. I really don't get the point of makeup, it's meant to make people look better, when it mostly has the opposite effect. So I had no problem saying
" Yes I do have a girlfriend". I said with a smirk, that would get rid of her, but all she did was give me back a smirk, and started to look at something behind me, I had no idea that she was doing or cared, so I was started to walk away when I heard a voice.
" You didn't tell me you had a girlfriend". Crap, I turned around, and their dad was, hands on his hips, looking shocked.
" Dad what are you doing here?".
" Schools over I came to pick you up". All these brats asking me questions made me miss out on the fact that my first had of hell was over, and now I couldn't even revel in it!
" So why didn't you tell me you had a girlfriend?" Dad asked, ok what do I say, can't tell him about lavagirl yet, so improvise.
" Never came up". I said lightly starting to walking to the car away from that gold-digger hopefully she would not spread rumors but I realize that there was a slim chance of that.
" Well can I meet her".
" NO!" I said quite loudly some people around us started to give me some glares, but I ignored them I kept walking.
" Sharkboy I know you think I'm going to embarrasses you, but I promise I'll keep it to a minimum". Embarrassment is what he thought I was worried about, well when I thought about it, there is a good reason to be worried about that. Great, just great. Finally we reached the car I quickly got in the passenger seat, dad got in on the over side, and gave me a look.
"Come on Sharkboy give your old man a chance". He said, I knew he was not going to let this thing go so I said.
" I'll think about it". He gave me one more look and nodded realizing this was probably the best offer he was going to get. Then quite randomly grabbed my hands turning them over, as if checking for something.
" Dad…. What you are doing?"
" Making sure that shoe really did not hurt you".
" DAD!" I said astonished and, slightly annoyed.
" It's my job kid". Then dad grabbing me in a head lock, which I finally wormed my way out of as he started up the car.
" So kid how was the afternoon". And I told him of my first day of school, thinking maybe I could survive going to school here.