Classes Divided
Chapter 10
I know I mentioned a girlfriend for quite a few chapters, but that ended about a month ago. Anybody want to take one for the team and date me?
"You can't keep moping around all day, Ekko."
"I can, and I will." Jinx let go of my chin as I turned back to look at my brother. He was laid face-down in Jinx's bed, pillow on the back of his head, but carefull placed so he didn't mess up his Mohawk.
"Hold still!" She whined, moving my head back. "You know how much I hate doing this." Jinx said, spreading some more concealer over my cheek and mumbling to herself.
"Ek, you're not going to lie in bed all day."
"I am."
"You only got rejected because Janna's a teacher!" Jinx yelled, which made me wince. "Students can't date teachers!"
"Why should that matter?!" As Jinx fished with my makeup, I sighed.
"Go take your meds." She got up and walked into the bathroom, leaving me to walk over to Ekko and stand over him. "You're going to school. Jinx needs you to hang out with her."
"Why don't you?"
"You two have the same lessons because you're both smart. A rock could beat me in a spelling contest." I heard him try not to laugh. "You're going to school."
"Make me." My eye twitched. Challenge fucking accepted. Ekko started whining as I worked my arm under his stomach and lifted him onto the shoulder.
"Jinx, grab my backpack, will you?" I grinned to her as she walked out of the bathroom, stopping in the doorway to stare.
"Ekko doesn't have his shoes on. I got it." I swung my bag onto my free shoulder when Jinx handed it to me. She knelt down to stuff Ekko's shoes into his own bag and stood up with it. Grinning, I walked out of the room and locked the door behind Jinx.
"Take me back to bed!" He whined, punching me pathetically. "I want to stay inside!"
"You're going to school!" As soon as we stepped out of the apartment building, people stared. The stares that other people gave me stopped bothering me a while ago. I don't think that anybody's ever seen me carry Ekko like this, though. Even with him over my shoulder, he didn't put up much of a fight. He probably knew that it was pointless.
"What happens when we get to school, Vi?" Jinx asked, gripping my elbow with her free hand. "You can't carry him around all day."
"Then you'll have to drag him around." She stared at me for a second, then looked at the floor and nodded. "Unless Ekko wants to stop being a complete tool?" I suggested, nudging him.
"I'm in the throes of heartbreak! Leave me alone!"
"You're so fucking dramatic."
"Oh, uhm, hi?" I turned my head, catching a glimpse of brown hair.
"What are you three doing now?" I turned and grinned at Yasuo. It sucks that he teaches history, because he has the hair for art.
"Ekko's being dramatic." He looked up at me and sighed. Then I noticed one of the kids from my literature class hiding behind him. I don't even know her name.
"I don't…" He sighed. "Put him down, Vi." Shrugging, I dropped my backpack and lifted Ekko back up, placing him on his feet.
"Take me back to bed!" He whined, falling against me. I heard the kid giggle. She looked out from behind Yas, golden eyes shining in the early morning sun.
"You don't need to keep hiding behind me, Taliyah." She looked up at him, then back at me.
"We're not scary!" Jinx laughed.
"Just dramatic as fuck, apparently." I pushed Ekko off me and held him in place. "Suck it up. One of the teachers doesn't want me to carry you."
"But I'm upset!" Sighing, I turned him around.
"Why are you upset?" Yasuo asked. "I doubt that any of us would like our students to be sad."
"Janna does." He huffed. "She rejected me."
"You…" Yasuo sighed and put his head in his hands. "You can't date a teacher, Ekko."
"So?!" Jinx laughed at him yelling. "What kind of world do we live in?!" This is going to be a long day.
~~~~~~~~~~~~X~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is one of the few times in a while that I've sat in the school's cafeteria to eat my lunch. I don't know why, but I don't want to hang out in the gym today. Maybe it's because I have a lot of math homework and I'm about as smart as a brick wall. Grumbling, I erased what I'd written.
"Having a few problems?" I looked up, and smiled widely as Jayce sat next to me.
"One of the few." He looked over my arm at the paper. "You're the first person other than my brother and sister to sit with me in here, Jayce."
"I would have been the first if he didn't almost trip me up." Caitlyn said, sitting across from me. "That was like watching a lion jump at its prey."
"If you jump on me, we are gonna have some serious issues." I said, holding one of my hands up to Jayce. He laughed and waved me off.
"I have no intention of it." He moved his food tray and pulled my homework over.
"I can see that you haven't looked into your potential learning disability." I watched Caitlyn's face. "There's really no excuse to not look into it, Vi."
"I don't have an excuse, I have the truth." I started eating again. "Jinx has more important issues, and I don't want any attention taken from her."
"That's an excuse." People were starting to stare again. I don't know if they think I'm moving my way up the social ladder or what, but the people I hang out with are my friends.
"This is where you went wrong." Jayce pulled my arm over so he could put my homework down. "You forgot to carry the four here."
"Of course I did…" I started writing again. "Fucking hopeless…"
"You're not hopeless." Jayce said, patting my back. I looked up to talk to Caitlyn, grinning when I locked eyes with Lux, who was stood behind her.
"Who is it?" Cait asked, turning to look. "Lux? Are you alright?" The kid was going red in the face, hugging her arms, and trying to avoid looking at both me and Caitlyn.
"Would you like to sit with us?" Jayce asked, smiling to her. "Vi is just being terrible at maths." He laughed when I threw some food at him.
~~~~~~~~~~~~X~~~~~~~~~~~~
How can Caitlyn and Vi talk like nothing's happened?! I wasn't even in the room with them, and I can't look either of them in the eye!
"No, no, look. You're not using the brackets correctly." Jayce put an arm over Vi's shoulders and leaned over her, pointing to the paper she was writing on.
"What the fuck do I care? I'm not gonna need this stuff as an athlete." Vi huffed, dropping the pencil.
"You're just being stubborn." Caitlyn mused. "I told you to look into your disability."
"I don't have a disability!" Vi rubbed her face and ruffled her bubblegum hair. "Will you stop telling me that I do?!"
"Okay, Okay, don't start arguing." Jayce held his hands up to both of them. "Vi, it does seem like you have issues with your schoolwork, but Caitlyn, you do not need to push the issue." That seemed like a quick resolution. How long have they all been friends? As much as I see Jayce and Caitlyn most of the time at home, I don't have much in common with them.
"I'm simply trying to help." Caitlyn sniffed, putting her hands together on the table.
"It wouldn't be helpful." As Vi put the paper back in her bag, she caught my eye and smiled. Unfortunately, all I can now see when I look at her is what I saw when I looked through that keyhole. What didn't help was the… 'research' I did. I don't think it's quite normal to image your friends without clothes on, especially your female ones. What doesn't help is when I also imagine-
"Lessons will be starting again soon." Jayce said, breaking me out of my thoughts. "We should go, Caitlyn."
"Oh, yes. Because missing our politics class would be such a tragedy." I giggled and readjusted my headband. "Where will you be going, Vi?"
"To the gym. I gotta practice."
"Do you ever stop practicing?" Jayce asked with a smile.
"You don't get a body like this by slacking off." Vi grinned, pulling her t-shirt sleeve up and flexing.
"You use any excuse possible to show off." Caitlyn said, getting a laugh.
"You'd show off too if you had more muscle than boob." I covered my mouth with both hands. Did she really just say that?! Caitlyn just sighed and closed her eyes. Jayce turned away, biting his knuckle and supressing laughter.
"You're lucky that I'm sat across from you." Caitlyn said, standing up. "Come on, Jayce."
"Does this mean I don't get a hug?" Vi asked, getting up and lifting her bag onto her shoulder.
"Not from me this time." She shrugged to Caitlyn, then held her arms out for Jayce, who lifted her off her feet in a hug, laughing.
"Catch you guys tomorrow." Vi smiled, waving Jayce and Caitlyn off as they left. When she turned to me, my heartrate quickened. "Where are you off to, Lux?"
"Actually, I uh, was hoping that, uhm-" I thought about what I was going to say before I sat down. Where did they go?
"You want to hang out?" Well, that works. I nodded and got up to follow Vi when she made the hand motion.
"So," I only started to speak when the hallways were empty. "Why didn't you say goodbye on Saturday?"
"Oh, uh, I talked to Cait for a while, and when I was leaving I didn't know where you were." Yes. There certainly was some 'talking'. "And I knew that I'd end up dead if I started poking around the house." Vi looked down to me, and I flicked my eyes away. It might be a while before I can make eye contact. "Hey." I almost walked into her when she stepped in front of me.
"Is- is there a problem?" I can't even speak correctly now. Vi lifted my chin so she could look into my eyes.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm fine. Why- why do you ask?" I could feel the heat start to take over my face.
"You're not looking me in the eyes at all." She noticed? Does she know that I saw what happened between her and Caitlyn? Is it obvious that I have an overactive imagination? Does she know what I'm thinking about? I can't stop imaging what I saw, does she- "What the- Oh, fuck!"
"What?!" Vi let go of me and stepped back. Out of my train of thought, I felt something wet on my lip. I brushed my fingers over it and looked. "Why am I bleeding?!" I went to cover my nose with my hands, stopped by Vi lifting the front of her shirt to wipe the blood off, which, I'm ashamed to admit, made the blood flow faster.
"What is happening here?" Vi was pulled away from me by a girl wearing fox ears. She stopped me from putting my hands to my face with a smile. "It's alright."
"You're not one of those people that think I attacked her, right, Ahri?" Interesting name. 'Ahri' pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket and started cleaning the blood from my upper lip, moving my hand to hold it in place afterwards.
"Oh, please. I don't listen to rumours." She turned to face Vi. "I make them." Who is this girl? "Speaking of which, you haven't kept your end of the deal."
"I can't help it! I found some old friends in that social group!" Ahri folded her arms, but I heard her laugh.
"I might need to be your best friend to keep my spotlight." She turned back to me. "It's also interesting that you managed to give yourself a nosebleed from thinking too hard."
"Is that even possible?" Vi asked. Ahri gave her a sarcastic motion towards me. "What were you thinking about, Lux?"
"I, uhm," There's no way that I can tell her the truth. "I-I have to go!" I moved around them both and started running. "I'll clean this and return it, Ahri!" I called back before vanishing behind a set of double doors. I don't know what these thoughts are, but they can't be good ones.
Sexual tension powers, go!