Uhhh guys you know that the kid Chen pushed into the water was Jay, right? I wasn't supposed to simply imply it or anything it was outright supposed to be Jay.

Lloyd thought things couldn't get worse since he moved in with Morro, but man was he wrong.

First there was the incident at the party. And now he had to go back to school. With all the guests who saw him at the pool. For once in his life, Lloyd was sad that he had healed. Not entirely though, but enough to go to school.

His bus had changed though. But Lloyd knew that wouldn't make a difference given his popularity.

Lloyd and Morro didn't say much to each other as they walked to the bus stop. Lloyd double checked that his hoodie was on as he boarded the bus. And Lloyd suddenly wanted the Earth to swallow him whole.

Cole was there. The person who Lloyd wanted to avoid just as much as Kai and Chen at this point. Lloyd quickly looked down, pretending he didn't notice him. He found an empty seat and sat there. Cole looked as if he wanted to say something, but Lloyd put on his headphones and put the music on full volume. Now he couldn't hear anyone while The Weekend Whip was playing.

The second the bus reached school, Lloyd ran out of it, and into the building. He then decided to go hide in the emptiest place available until the first class started.

When it was time for maths class, Lloyd decided to delay his arrival by a few more minutes so that he could avoid Chen and Kai until they reached their classes.

Lloyd chose to take the longest route to his classroom. And then he noticed someone else. It was a boy wearing an orange scarf and a blue sweater. It took Lloyd a couple of seconds to realise that this was the same boy Chen pushed into the water.

The crime that Lloyd was blamed for.

Lloyd ran off as fast as he could.

Physics class was the worst. Lloyd realised that he was with the four people he wanted to stay away from- Chen, Kai, Cole and the blue sweater kid. He released when the teacher finally spoke so he could focus on something else.

"Alright class, choose a partner for this project!" And Lloyd began to panic again. Who was he supposed to partner up with now? He would've asked Cole if Chen hadn't ruined his friendship with him. Besides, Cole was partners with the freckled kid.

"Okay, John and Lisa, Jenny and Claire..." The teacher began noting down the parings. "Chen and Kai, Cole and Jay..." Jay. Wasn't that Cole's friend who he couldn't find at the party? That just made everything a whole lot worse. Lloyd was blamed for drowning Cole's friend.

"Lloyd and- oh, you're alone again. No, wait, we have an even amount of students today, who's left... Zane! Zane, you and Lloyd are partners." Lloyd turned around to see a boy with white hair combed upwards. His eyes were blue and his skin was quite pale. He looked like a robot. Zane smiled and waved at Lloyd.

"Okay, today you'll be planning your projects. You may begin."

Lloyd walked up to Zane. "Uh, hi, I'm-" Zane interrupted his introduction.

"Lloyd Montgomery Garmadon, son of Lord Garmadon, aged fourteen, in Grade 9." Lloyd was startled at all this information. So Zane knew he was Garmadon's son. Why wasn't he angry? "I'm Zane Julien," he continued. "I'm a normal human. Just like you." The last couple of statements seemed rather ominous to Lloyd, but he let it go.

"Nice to meet you, Zane. So which topic are we choosing for our project? I missed every lesson since the start of the school year because I was having health issues, so can you enlighten me please?" Zane's happy expression didn't change. He went on to list every page the class had learnt for the last seven weeks. They settled on a topic and the class ended. Lloyd had to admit, he didn't have such a bad time talking to Zane. They even had a few casual conversations during the class. Lloyd avoided talking about his father, though.

Lloyd managed to bypass any interactions with his schoolmates, even Chen and Kai. On the way back home, Lloyd received a text on his phone from an unknown number.

Message from ~Zane Julien (a normal human):

Hello, Lloyd. It is I, Zane, the regular human you spoke to today. I got your number from the school databases. I thought texting you would make working on our Physics project much easier.

Lloyd was surprised to see Zane's text. He texted back.

Hey, Zane! Let's discuss the project. What materials do we need?

He turned off his phone and decided to look out the window for a while. In the end, only himself, Morro and Cole were left in the bus. The bus stopped in front of Cole's house. As he got off, Lloyd could've sworn he heard someone saying, "Bye, Lloyd." Did Cole just speak to him again? Even after what happened at the party?

I must be imagining this, Lloyd thought. He pretended he didn't hear and kept looking out of the window.

That night in bed, Lloyd thought of Zane.

He knew he was my father. But he was still so friendly.

It took Lloyd some time to realise that he had been smiling for quite a while now.

And he couldn't stop.

How was the chapter?