Chapter 1: "Cloud Nine? Never Heard of It."

I couldn’t bring myself to believe that I was really going through with this.  I, Natalie Brassfield, had just accepted a ride home with some senior boys after missing my bus.  I climbed in the backseat of the white Expedition and stared out my window.  The entire ride, the boys would turn back to look at me every now and then and then exchange glances and smile widely.  I simply ignored their strange behavior and kept my focus on the outside world cut off from me by a thin sheet of glass.

“So,” the dark haired boy with light green eyes across from me began. “What grade did you say you were in?” he smiled lightly.

His words hard startled me out of my daydreaming and I glanced up at him and the radiance of his eyes caught my breath as the light twinkled inside them. “I’m a junior,” I stuttered, “I’m 17.” I blushed and then quickly looked away and the boy obviously disappointed I turned away also directed his attention to the window on the door beside him.

The boy driving which was known well throughout the high school was Dylan Brimes.  The jock, I guess you could classify him as, but he didn’t obtain the jerk-like quality that most jocks had.  Instead he was very quiet and polite to anyone who tried to talk to him.  Strangely, he kept all to himself.  Many people think it was because he was in love with this girl whom had obviously dumped him because they weren’t going anywhere.

I sighed and everyone’s attention shone bright upon me and my cheeks became hot to realize that I had been caught staring at him.  It was the boy sitting in the passenger seat beside Dylan who had tried to strike up a conversation.

“You’re new here aren’t you?  Um, I think the teacher said your name was Natalie, am I right?” he asked.

“Yes, my name is Natalie.” I paused for a brief moment to see if the conversation was going to be carried onward.

He suddenly realized that I was waiting for an introduction and stuck his hand out hand out for me to shake, “My name is Eric Coleman, you might know my sister, Elizabeth Coleman?” he asked me lightly and I shook his hand smiling half-heartedly.

“Nice to meet you, Eric.” I said simply and turned back to look out my window again.

“I’m Bruce MaKanahey,” The dark haired and light-eyed boy introduced himself to me. “I’m in your biology class, but your new, so it’s okay if you still haven’t noticed me yet.” He said smiling.

“I’m not sure if I would have to introduce myself, Natalie.” An unfamiliar, low, mature voice spoke from the front end of the car and I knew immediately whose voice it was.

“An introduction from you Mr. Brimes would be quite redundant.  I think I have heard your name many times from the swooning cheerleaders whom watch your every move.” I said still staring out my window, but from the smugness of his voice I could tell he was smiling.

“Really now?  And how much do you know about me from these swooning cheerleaders?” His voice urged me onwards complacently.

I turned my face to where I could look at him easier. “Enough.”

I made the whole trip seem as if I didn’t want any attention from any of the three boys.  And that only made each one want to try to direct my attention upon them.  The only one whom was not trying to keep me involved in a conversation with him was Dylan.  He just kept his eyes on the road and drove one-handed down the road silently.  I was relieved to know he was also trying to escape attention as I was, but it wasn’t working, for Bruce and Eric kept asking us questions and talking about things that involved us both.

He didn’t really seem to pay attention to the other two boys because most of his attention was directed upon me.  The rush of attention had made me uneasy and I did the best I could to fight it off.

“So, Natalie.  Where did you move to Louisiana from?” Dylan asked keeping his brilliant blue eyes on the road.

“From New York.” I answered quickly feeling the glare from both boys sitting in front and beside me increase with jealousy.

“Ah, the city that never sleeps.  How many broad way shows have you been to?” he asked me with a dapper smile dancing with his lips.

“Um, my mother was a dancer in the musicals, so over sixty I would presume.” I asked my eyes alive with the memory of my mother singing and dancing across the stage while everyone in the crowd flowed with the emotion of the play.

Suddenly the car came to a stop. “Okay Eric.” He said as Eric looked out of his window at his house.  Then Bruce said, “Hey, Eric?  Do you think I could spend the night with you this weekend?  I need help with algebra and chemistry, and I was wondering if we could hit the skate park later on?”

“Sure.  My parents are gone to Pennsylvania.  They aren’t planning to be back until the Saturday before next so, we should be good till then.” Eric answered, his smile revealing all his straight white teeth.  They both climbed out of Dylan’s Expedition and walked up the pathway to Eric’s nice two-story house.

Brought back to the center of attention, but by someone different this time, Dylan.  “Natalie, why don’t you sit up here beside me?”  He had turned around to look at me this time and I found myself staring at him like a star struck idiot.  He smiled and I couldn’t force the words to surface to my mouth, so I just continued to stare.  “Well?”  He asked smiling to the side now, revealing a dimple in his left cheek.

I finally found myself and answered, “Sure,” and climbed out of the car and into the passenger seat beside him.

Sitting beside him was almost a wanting, but then again it was something to be afraid of and I didn’t know why.  Dylan, even though he was handsome, was very muscular too.  His chest and rock solid abs stood out unmistakably from his black muscle shirt as well did his arms, which looked like they were used for wrestling anacondas.  His dark hair that reached the beginning of his collar and was beginning to grow down into his brilliantly blue eyes made him look all the more mysterious, and I hadn’t really noticed this until I had began to really look him over.  It was strange to get such a terrifying chill when you sat next to the most popular guy in school.

To me, he looked more like a collage graduate football player heading for the play-offs next season.  Even with the ‘angel face’ that the cheerleaders had decided to title it as you always got a second thought about just being around him.

“So, Natalie.  You’re a girl whom I find very interesting.  You obviously don’t like attention, and you seem so quiet.  It’s time I got to know you.” He smiled looking over at me slightly.

“Why would you want to get to know me?  I’m just the ‘new girl’ that has to start building from nothing.  And no, I do not wish for attention.  I’m not a drama queen like the cheerleaders they feed off that.  And if I become your friend, or whatever you are calling it, I would automatically be the front page of the high school gossip newspaper.” I said to him and his eyes were still bright even though he was just put down.

“You’re telling me, you don’t want to be my friend just because of publicity?” He chuckled smugly.

“I didn’t say that.”

“Oh, but you did.  Quote, ‘I do not wish for attention’ now piece that with this, ‘And if I become your friend, or whatever you’re calling it, I would automatically be the front page of the high school gossip newspaper.” So therefore, you know if you became my friend everyone would find it interesting to follow in my footsteps and do the same, but you are so used to being alone you don’t want to.” He said his ice-blue eyes had melted sympathetically so now they looked as if they were churning clouds in the sky-blue atmosphere.

“I wouldn’t mind being your friend, but I just don’t want the school to blow up about it.” I said simply and his cheeks ran red and his smile increased giving away the dimples in his cheeks.

“You mean like a secret friendship?”

“Well, that depends by what you mean by ‘friendship’ when you put it that way.” I said turning to look out the window again.  Meaning to change the subject I started a new sentence to hopefully get his mind off of whatever he might’ve been thinking.  “So, when do you think I’ll get to my stop?  I’ve never seen this route before and there’s only one road that leads to my house for a good four miles.  Sadly we live out in the country because of my mother’s ‘southern dream’.  She’s been watching too many old TV shows like Bonanza.”

“Yeah, if she wanted to live that ‘southern dream’ she would have to go back to the 1940’s.”  He said smiling warmly at me now and I finally smiled back.  “You have a pretty smile, Natalie.  I’m glad I finally got to see it today.  At first I was afraid you weren’t going to smile for me at all.”

“Not meaning to be rude, but of all the girls in the high school, why did you pick new girl Natalie Brassfield in eleventh grade?  Why not Stacie Logan or Melinda Peters off of the cheerleading squad?  I’m sure they would’ve excepted a ride home with you.” I said my radiant green eyes hardening like icy crystals.  “I thought only seniors found it ‘cool’ to only talk to seniors not little eleventh graders.”

“First of all, you are not little.  Second of all, you were new and I was just being nice.  You missed your bus and you needed a ride home, so I thought it would’ve"”

“So, you did it out of the kindness of your heart, huh?  Not because I was new and I was the hot spot of attention?  No senior just asks any junior if she wants a ride home, especially not a new one.”  The bitterness of my words had stung him because he knew I was right and it surprised me as well to find I was.

“I don’t want attention.  I’m not like every other guy in high school.  If it was my choice I wouldn’t have chose this life, but my parents do everything for me and I have no say whatsoever so I don’t bother trying to fight it.”

“I don’t see how that has anything to do with finding attention distasteful.”

“My parents say I have to be spot on at everything, that I have to be the president of every club.  The straight A student, that one student every young man wanted to be and the one that every young lady wants as her date.  And I just don’t understand how to be all of these things at one time, it’s very difficult.” His mature tone was so warm it could’ve been liquid honey swirling in the atmosphere around us.

His voice was hypnotizing and I almost slurred when I tried to speak to him, but I didn’t let his affection or attraction break through the hard wall that I had built to keep me from falling in love with him.  He was already dragging every girl in school around by their purses, why one more?  What difference did I make if he couldn’t have me? “Well, you should stand up to your parents and tell them to quit running your life.  Not in a rude way, no, that would ruin everything, but you must at least ease them off of your back.” I said calmly turning away from my window to stare out of the windshield to the world ahead of us.

“Natalie Brassfield, you are not at all like other girls I have met.”

“No, I am not.  I do not swoon at the sight of you and I don’t faint when you talk to me.” I said smugly holding back a laugh at many of the girls’ pathetic attempts to try to make contact with him without passing out.

He frowned.  “Is that all you can think of me as?  Some big shot whom thinks he owns it all?” His low voice began to decrescendo as he spoke, his words finally following up in the form of nothing.

“Well that’s what everyone certainly thinks.  If you would overhear the girls in the locker rooms, you would know what everyone thinks!  ‘Oh look at Dylan’s new Expedition! O.m.g!  I wish he would go out with me so he could buy me nice things with all of his money!!!” She squealed in mockery of the ‘Dylan Brimes Stalkers’

His face twisted up into a smug smile to find my imitation quite humoring, completely forgetting the part where everyone thought he was a ‘big shot’.  “Do they really say that?” He laughed.  “O.m.g, that’s the funniest letters used to form a word I think I’ve ever heard!” His face was bright red and his lungs brimming with laughter.

“Jeez, it’s not that funny.” I said trying to hold back from laughing with him.

He grabbed a hold of himself and brought his rushing currents of laughter to their end and sighed.  “Man, no one has made me laugh that hard in a long time!” He shouted, his voice playful.

“Yeah, and it wasn’t even that funny.” I stated bluntly looking back out my window.

“You know, for a girl, you have violent mood swings.” He smiled.  “One second you’re happy, the next dramatic, after that in some kind of angry state, then your all sympathetic, and then you get all real mad again.” He chuckled lightly.  “To find your kind of type, I bet you would have to comb the earth.” He smiled at me with a special light reflecting in his eye.

“Really?  And by that what do you mean?”

“You’re very unique.” He smiled gently, but there was a hint in his smile he was meaning to take this somewhere else.

To change the subject, I looked at the field and noted that there were deer and to watch out.  I turned away from him, but my mind still had full focus on him.  He is gorgeous, but he isn’t for me, I told myself.  Today was just a coincidence, and I bet when I go back to school Monday he won’t even notice I’m alive.

Well, at least that’s the way I thought it would be.  Instead, he wouldn’t quit starring at me; it was like I was some kind of hypnotic toy.  I dared not to look in his direction because if our gazes met, I wouldn’t be able to look away.  I just wanted to burst out at him and tell him to stop staring, but I already had the school talking, why try to get noticed more?  It was big enough that he had given me a ride home that day, if I went and talked to him that would make everyone go insane.

Restraining to do so, I just simply ignored him and explained as best as I could to the new friends that I had earned for being Dylan’s friend. Most of the girls had their own spot reserved on the cheerleading squad, and the others were either friends of the preppy girls or girls considered the outcasts who just wanted to know what being with Dylan was like.

Morgan blew her bubble gum into a pink bubble, and then asked. “So, did you kiss him?” Her pale, half-hearted face and dark hair did nothing to compliment her hollow, black eyes.  Her appearance made you think you were talking to a ghost, so I could see why Dylan had said “No.” to her, even if she was a cheerleader.

“I’d think not even close.  Why would I want to kiss him?” I asked in disgust as my eyebrows formed a hard line together.  “Who is he to me?” I said and shrugged.

“Um, he’s captain of the football team, president of the drama club.  He’s a straight A student!”  Shy-Anne exclaimed dramatically. “And his parents have money!” She said smiling darkly as she prepped her hair in the mirror of the locker room. “He’s everything a girl like us,” she rotated her arm around the room pointing to every “important girl” in the room, which her index finger had missed me, “could ever dream of calling “ours”! She sighed and then gave a squeal at the thought that was never going to happen.  I would be glad if it did, though.  So I could get him and these cheerleaders off of my backs.

For some strange reason all of the girls on the squad " or basically any of the girls that drool at the sound of his name " were oblivious to him.  In the car that day, he was only interested about me, which wasn’t unusual when you were the only one I had to talk to, but he cared nothing for any of the other girls, but of only me.  And his questions were pretty normal, but something was still weird about him.  Something had yet to find its place to click and fit in with the rest of the puzzle.

I shook the tiring thought off of my shoulders, dressed out of my gym clothes, and continued on through the day with school.  Of course, no one had made it that easy.  Everyone was still buzzing about ‘Dylan and Natalie’, which we were a couple never meant to be, it was simply a ride home from school.  Then I truly began to wonder.  What was he saying to the ‘incrowd’?  What lies was he feeding them, what did they know?  Was he telling them everything I said to him?   My face grew a bright red around the cheeks to think of him telling the cheerleaders that he knows because of a certain someone they swoon at the thought of him, which by now should’ve been completely obvious.

If he had said anything about what I had told him, no one was saying anything back.  They just completed there routine of classes and went about there on business… well most of them.  The cheerleaders were there own snobby selves, pushing freshmen geeks into their lockers as they passed or sticking duct tape in Marlie Bishop’s waist-long blonde hair.  They had there own way of being ‘rude,’ and it was as far away from anything you could call rude. 

Today, Brooke, the cheer captain, spilt green Gatorade down the front of Kaleen’s sixty-dollar shirt her mother had bought her from Maurice’s, in the cafeteria.  She had claimed it had been only an accident and a simple misunderstanding when Kaleen knew well enough Brooke had done it because she was jealous she did not have that specific shirt.  I did my best to stay out of their way, not bothering to dress up or try to stop them because I had no say or power over them if they tried to kill me.  Not even the tough guys were dumb enough to try to mess with the cheerleaders, they were worse than them!

I walked to my locker and twisted the knob 7 to the left, 4 to the right, and 12 to the left again, and my locker popped open.  I exchanged my history book with my biology book and a spiral then shut my locker and twisted the knob again so it sat at a different number.  On my way down the hall I heard a pair of footsteps close behind that sounded awful familiar.  I looked behind me and Bruce was traveling a few feet behind me, a smile appeared on his face when I turned around.

“You headed to Professor Keeves’s lab?” He asked casually as we strolled down the hall together, glad we weren’t catching anyone’s attention.

“Yeah, biology.  Sounds fun, huh?” I said with mock excitement, too tired to care about anything right now after athletics in fourth period, even if it was the last class of the day.

“It’s okay, not exactly failing at it, and the Professor is a nice man too.” He said shrugging.  I knew he had a ninety-eight percent grade average in biology and health, so I could tell he wasn’t trying to brag.

“I see.” I said jogging down the steps and outside the building, across the parking lot, and into the medium sized building that contained Mrs. Beasley’s room, the science lab, Mr. Keeves’s room, and Mr. Grover’s room.

The building looked quite normal for a school building on the outside, but once you walked inside, the building seemed like it had shrunk the sizes.  Mr. Grover was teaching the freshmen about the organs and functions of the frog as Bruce and I passed.  It made me think back to my first year in high school, and how all of the senior boys would all gather around my friends and I just to flirt and hang out with us, and us only imagining how our mothers would kill us if they ever found out.  I smiled at the old memory and then felt it fade away as reality came back into my life telling me that life was over.

I walked into Professor Keeves’s room and sat in my seat and waited for class to begin quietly.  Everyone else in the room decided to be defiant and talk even though, shortly before he had left, he had warned them not to talk.

As if my thoughts had summoned him into the room, he walked in, shaking his head. “I thought I told you not to talk!” He bellowed. “Mary, Brian, Luke, Sawyer, and Michael all have detention today after school!”  There was a quiet groan from the students and the room went quiet as Mr. Keeves turned his back to them and began to teach.

Brian sat in the seat behind me and always seemed to stay quiet and out of my way.  Today, he seemed to be making more contact and trying to attract my attention towards him more than usual.  “Natalie?” he whispered my name while Mr. Keeves wrote formulas and taught with his back turned to us.

“What?” I called back to him cautiously.

“I have to talk to you at the end of class.”

“Then why didn’t you wait until the end of class?” I whispered harshly.

“Oh, I don’t know, I just couldn’t wait to tell you, I guess.”

“Okay?”

“Who’s talking?” Mr. Keeves yelled as he turned around and foraged the room for talking students to chunk the whiteboard eraser at.  “If I hear one more word, I will find all of you in my room at the end of school!  I will not put up with lollygagging in my classroom!” He said sharply and looked over his shoulder once before he began to write on the board again.

Soon the class ended, and I found Brain waiting for me in the hall as he said.  “What’s up?” I asked him casually.

“I was wondering if…” He trailed off, and raised his hand to place behind his head.  “If you would like to…”

“Hey, guys!” A friend of Brian’s walked up and smiled at us with her movie-star-white grin blinding us like a second sun.

“Uh, hello, Macy.  Anyway, what were you saying, Brian?” I asked almost ignoring Macy all together and wished she hadn’t walked up with me being there.

“So, what are we talking about?” She asked coolly.

My face reddened with annoyance and I said through my teeth, “Nothing.” And I walked away.  I was only half expecting to feel Brian’s huge, tan hand grab a hold of my arm gently, and pull me back around to face him.  I kept walking down the hall silently, and I listened to Macy and Brian chat.

“So, you know, we’ve been good friends for a while.” She began.

“Yes, we have.” He smiled at her playfully.

“And… I think we need to kick it up a notch.” She concluded what seemed to be one of the toughest sentences known in high school.

I had reached the door and didn’t bother listening to the rest of the sentence.  I hadn’t been here long enough to grow a specific bond with anyone special, and I didn’t find it likely that I would before my senior year was over.  When I reached the outdoor world that had been locked outside of the science building, I sighed at the sweet scents of Bermuda grass and the pine trees.  Who I didn’t expect to find standing against the building was Dylan.  I acted as if I hadn’t noticed his presence existed, and walked right by him.  Of course, he turned around and began to follow me, which was something I knew that he would do because he had been denied attention.

“So,” He said slowly.

“So, what?” I asked him bluntly.

“Well, what are you doing right now?” He shrugged.

“Is this some kind of game?” I stopped and turned to face him.  “Am I some kind of way to give you more attention?  Don’t you get that enough of that without my help?” I felt the anger boil up inside of me as I spoke.

“What are you talking about?” He asked, his expression not lying when it let confusion and incredulous scribble all over his face.  “You have nothing to do with me getting attention.” He said honestly.  “As I’ve said before"”

“Yeah, I know, I know.  ‘You don’t want to be the center of attention all the time’.” I cut him off with a sarcastic mocking tone.  “Well, if that’s the case, what are you here with me for?” More like, why are you here at all?

“I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind me taking you out for lunch.” He said, and as if to save me from going to lunch with him, there was a long, blood-curdling scream.

Reviews

[Mary]

i liked it. it has a nice flow and it is interesting. my only suggestion is maybe space i out and indent, becasue a big lump of text is intimadating to read. keep up the good work.

[R.S. Wilder]

The budding romance between the two is sweet, but be mindful not to over-explain anything too much; having the reader not merely reading, but putting themselves in the shoes of the character to have a more personal connection with the emotions and thoughts conveyed is necessary. The flow of the story is smooth, and I like Natalie, although I would assume she has many of your personal qualities. :) Nice touch. Can't wait to read more.

[James Watts]

“I’m 17.” (try and spell out any numbers under one hundred, with the exception of addresses, dates, units of measure, weights, streets etc. Any number that can be spelled out in two words or less should be spelled out. Some on here will argue that, but it is true.)

“You’re new here aren’t you? (“You’re new here, aren’t you?)

Noticed a few spelling and grammar errors, but not many. Be mindful of the -ly adverb, especially attached to the dialogue attribution.