"Mister Hunter…Mister Hunter!"

"Uh…yes, Miss?"

"Am I keeping you from something far more important?"

Many, many things. "No, Miss."

"Then stop playing around with your watch or I'll have it confiscated."

Over my dead body!

"Good, and now that you've graced us with your attention, please explain to the class your theory behind the fall of the Roman Empire?"

Eric groaned inwardly. Ordinarily he would have humoured Miss Wells with an intelligent, if not entirely accurate explanation, but today he simply wasn't in the mood. "Uh, maybe they all got food poisoning from the hotdog vender working the Roman baths?"

The boy's remark drew a rowdy laughter from the class. Miss Wells clapped her hands and called over the top of the noise, "Quiet! Students, enough!"

As the rumble slowly died down, Eric didn't feel even the slightest remorse over disrupting the history class – it had been the fault of the teacher, by stupidly putting forth such a mind-numbing challenge. Now if she'd gone and asked him to decode the Voynich Manuscript, which has continued to puzzle scholars throughout the centuries, he may have given it the deserved attention and responded accordingly.

"Mister Hunter, any more nonsense answers like that one and you'll be making up for lost time in this room after school."

Whatever, Eric reflected before considering that perhaps he could try to act out in all his classes tomorrow and be kept back so late, he would have to miss out on his appointment with 'Doctor Phil.'

"Mister Hunter…"

"Yes, Miss?"

"An appropriate answer to my question, please."

Eric pretended to consider, then he shrugged his shoulders, "I…"

Brrrrriiiiinnggg! Brrrrriiiiinnggg!

"Okay, don't forget I need the outline for your assignments on my desk by next Monday…" the students began packing up their notes while the teacher was issuing the instructions, "…and be sure to designate the specific areas you and your partner will be completing…Class dismissed."

Carl caught up with his friend as they edged their way out the door along with the rest of the group, "Hey, E. You want to do the project together?"

"Yeah," Eric responded absently while making their way along the hall.

"I was thinking we could do it on the Aztecs. What do you think about that?"

Eric had been hoping to do the project on the ancient Xiongnu Empire but what did it matter anyway. "Sounds like a good plan," he mumbled as they reached the lockers. Carl lowered his voice. "You okay, E?"

"Yeah," Eric turned and forced his face into a smile. "I'm fine." He opened his locker and at the same time, both sets of eyes trailed to a pastel yellow envelope, decorated with a fancy E, sitting atop of the textbooks. "What the?" Eric raised his brows as he reached in and retrieved said envelope.

"Who's it from?" Carl grabbed it from his friend's hand and turned it over, looking for a clue but the back was blank.

Eric snatched the envelope back and held it up to the light, trying to get a clue himself but there was nothing obvious.

"Do you think it's from your mom?"

Eric could only hope. He knew he should wait till later so he could steam open the envelope, least a clue be in the sticky gum but he didn't have the patience to wait more than a second longer than he had to. He ripped it open without much care and pulled out a small folded piece of paper.

"Well," Carl asked again, "who is it from?"

While holding his breath, Eric unfolded the note and… "Who the frig is Rose?"

Carl chuckled, "Rose, you know, Rosie Adintay."

Eric shrugged, "Is that name supposed to mean something to me?"

"Yeah, you blockhead. She's in half our classes. She sits behind you in math and across from you in Italian."

"Is she that girl with…" Eric struggled to select an identifying characteristic… "long hair?"

"Yes, that's her," Carl confirmed sarcastically. "Man you really are ultra observant!"

"How the hell am I supposed to know who she is?"

Carl rolled his eyes, "When we have Italian after, I'll snap a photo with my NaNOT, but in the meantime, what did she write?"

Eric speed read the note in his head before giving his friend the bullet points, "She says she thought I may have changed schools when I was away last week and she's happy to see me back. She also asks at the end if I am going to the Winter Wonderland dance."

"What are you going to say?" Carl inquired excitedly.

"What do you mean, 'what am I going to say?'"

"Well, are you going to go to the dance with her? It sounds like she's asking."

"I'm not going to any stupid dance and even if I was, I certainly wouldn't be going with someone." Eric refolded the note and went about collecting a textbook from the locker. "What's that supposed to mean anyways? We walk in together?"

"I dunno exactly," Carl shrugged. "It just seems like you're lucky to be asked. No one's ever asked me before."

"Are you going?"

"Mom always makes me. She says I'd be an embarrassment to her if I didn't show up, like all the other mothers would think there was something wrong with her for not sending me along to support a school fundraiser."

"Are the dances here fun?"

"Not really. Mostly we just stand around talking to the other boys and the girls stand around going on with giggly bullshit. Towards the end, everyone starts to get into it but it really depends on the band they hire or the DJ. The last one was totally lame and everyone left early."

"Wow, I don't think I can pass up on that. I better let Rose know immediately to count me in."

Carl glanced at his friend sceptically, "You really should think about going, if for no other reason than I'll have someone to hang out with. But for now, what are you going to do about the note? Are you going to reply?"

"What do you think?" Eric shoved the envelope deep into his bag and closed the locker.

Carl closed up his own and proceeded off down the hall. "Suit yourself…I'll catch you at recess."

"Yeah, see ya." Eric moved off in the opposite direction with images and sounds of the totally awesome beach parties him and his mom had attended every Monday night on Las Palmas de Gran. The locals would celebrate the end of the tourist taxing weekend with a celebration fiesta that involved proper dancing music, courtesy of Pavlo's Reggae Troop, and the store owners sharing the left over seafood, fresh fruit and meats in a buffet spread that was a feast enough for everyone. The celebration would always go well into the early hours of Tuesday morning and as a result, most business wouldn't reopen until well after lunch, or not at all.

Eric smiled at the memory as he walked along the hall to his next class then, without knowing why, he reached into his bag and foraged around till he found the note once more. He unfolded the crumbled piece of paper and reread the message written by this Rose…Adintay. She had nice handwriting and he had to admit, it was a kind, if not daring thing to do. But Eric's smile soon transformed into a frown as he began to question the girl's motive and wondered momentarily if he was being set up. Was the note nothing more than a practical joke? Who would know? It seemed odd that out of the blue, this girl who had never talked to him in the past, decided to leave a note in his locker. The more he thought about it, the more he accepted that it had to be some kind of prank – one that he wasn't going to fall for it. And if by some small chance that it wasn't, the last thing he needed was a new friend. Any friendships he made during his stay in Brooklyn were destined to have a limited shelf life. It was going to be difficult enough walking out on Carl without so much as a, 'it's been fun. Catch you sometime if you're ever in my corner of the world.' Eric screwed up the paper and disposed of it into depths of his bag as he entered his next class, but as he did, he found himself looking forward to Italian class…out of morbid curiosity of course.