Chapter 3

First period was English with Mr. Mariner. I walked into the room right before the bell rang and plopped down into my seat, front and center. Mr. Mariner walked in completely disheveled. He threw his books down on his desk, a bunch of papers flying to the floor. He bent down to pick them up and looked right at me for a couple of seconds. He then quickly jumped into the lesson, yelling at us all.

            “Let’s see who did the homework last night. It’s time for a pop quiz!”

            Groans sounded throughout the room as we all pulled out a piece of paper and pen. This one kid in the back, left corner raised their hand. That was not a good idea at the moment; clearly the kid was new.

            “What do you want?!” Mr. Mariner practically shouted at the poor kid.

            “Umm, I’m new to this school Sir. In fact today is my first day, so I didn’t know there was an assignment,” the kid said.

            The voice, it was so familiar. I spun around in my seat to see Eliot sitting in the back corner lowering his arm. He glanced over at me and gave me a worried smile. I returned the smile with a nod.

            “Okay. Have you ever read the poem, The Chimney Sweeper?” Mr. Mariner replied.

            “Yes, I have a couple times.”

            “Good! Then you will do just fine on this pop quiz.”

            “But Sir—“

            “No buts. You are taking this quiz.”

            Eliot gave in and pulled out his own piece of paper and pen, then sat patiently for Mr. Mariner to begin the quiz.

            It seemed to take forever but the class finally ended. The sound of the bell was like opening a jar of air that has been sealed for a hundred years; a mass amount of pressure was released. However, as everyone was practically sprinting out of the room, Mr. Mariner spoke.

            “Mr. Turner, would you please stay after. I would like to speak with you.”

            After that, we ran out of the room even faster. When I got to the door, I took a look back at Eliot and mouthed ‘Are you okay?’ and he nodded in response. But I didn’t believe him because I knew how Mr. Mariner is better than he did. So I waited outside the classroom for Eliot to come out; just to make sure he truly was all right.

            He finally came out of the room a couple minutes later with a scared look on his face. I don’t know what  Mr. Mariner said to him, but it affected him in a bad way. This made me even more worried about him. What a horrible beginning to his first day at a new school.

            “Eliot, are you okay? He was so out of hand in there.” I said to him. But he walked right by me. I reached out and grabbed his arm, making him spin around. “Eliot, what’s going on with you?”

            “What are you talking about?” he responded with a confused look on his face.

            “Did you not just hear me talk to you?”

            “Oh, no I didn’t,” he said as if he still wasn’t paying attention to me; like his mind was somewhere else.

            “I asked you if you were okay. Mr. Mariner was completely ridiculous in there.”

            “It’s fine. I shouldn’t have spoken back.” Eliot said in the most monotone voice I had ever heard.

            “What do you mean it’s fine?!” I said, my voice rising slightly. “The Marine shouldn’t have acted like that. I am still in shock.”

            “The Marine?”

            “Yeah. That’s what we all secretly call Mr. Mariner because he is such a hard a*s.”

            “Oh I see.”

            “Yeah…well I have to get to my next class. Maybe I’ll see you at lunch?”

            “Uh. Yeah. Sure.”

            “Goodbye, Eliot.”

            “Bye, Amy.”

             I turned and basically ran away from him. That was beyond awkward. I had never seen him like that. Then again we hadn’t met face to face until now; so maybe he was nervous and didn’t know what to say. But we had talked so much already. He must know that I like him; I mean I pretty much spelled it out for him.

            The next few periods went by quickly; I don’t remember anything about them. All I knew was that something was wrong with Eliot and I needed to find out what.

            My friend Emily came up behind me when I was walking out of the classroom and grabbed my wrist. I jumped and spun around to see that it was just she. “Jesus Christ Emily, you scared the s**t out of me.”

            “Well I wouldn’t have to do that if you weren’t ignoring me when I was calling your name.”

            “You were calling my name?”

            “Yeah ever since the bell rang a minute ago.”

            “Oh, I’m sorry. My mind is kinda elsewhere.”

            “Clearly. What’s bothering you?”

            “It’s nothing.” I said, looking away from her so that she couldn’t see that I was lying.”

            “Amy, seriously? Turning your head isn’t going to hide the fact that you are lying. Be honest, what’s going on?”

            “Okay. So do you remember that guy Eliot that I was telling you about?”

            “Yeah, what about him?”

            “Well he goes to school here now and –“

            “What?! He goes here?”

            “Yes. Now do you want to know or not?”

            Emily made the sign with her hand that she had sealed her lips and thrown away the key.

            “As I was saying, he goes to school here and he is in my English class.”

            “That’s good isn’t it?”

            “I thought it would be, but he was acting weird today after what happened in class.”

            “What do you mean and what happened?”

            We had made it to the lunchroom and went over to our usual table by the window facing the quad. As I was taking my lunch bag out of my backpack, I saw Eliot walk over to the table where the football players and cheerleaders sat. Clearly he must be in a better mood and having no trouble making friends. Then why was he in such a bad mood around me? I don’t remember doing anything that would make him mad at me.

            Emily saw that I was staring at something. She followed my gaze over to where Eliot was now sitting. “Is that him?” she asked.

            “Yeah, that’s him.”

            “What a cutie! Now tell me what happened in class.”

            “The Marine came stumbling into the classroom. He walked over to his desk and basically threw his things on the desk. But he missed and everything fell onto the floor. Then he bent over to pick it all up and he started directly at me; it was weird. He got up and then it was like a switch was flipped. He started yelling at us and gave us a pop quiz on the poem we were supposed to read last night. But, Eliot spoke up about how it was his first day here and he didn’t know there was homework. The Marine became even more mad and yelled at Eliot. In the end, Eliot gave in and took the quiz. Then he got held after class ‘cause the Marine wanted to talk to him. So I waited for him to come out and that’s when I noticed that Eliot was acting weird.”

             “Wait, the Marine was starting at you?”

            “Yeah. At least I’m pretty sure it was me that he was staring at.”

            “Why would he be doing that?”

            “That’s what I was wondering. But I was probably just imagining it.”

            “Yeah. I mean after all that has happened you aren’t thinking straight.”

            “True. But what do you think is wrong with Eliot?”

            “No idea. He could just be in shock from how mean the Marine was.”

            “Yeah I guess so.”

            “Amy, don’t worry about it. He will come around. Just give him some time to adjust to the new school.”

            “You are right. I am a little stressed from everything that happened last night.” I said.

I couldn’t help it; I looked over to where Eliot was sitting. He was laughing at what someone must have said at the table. From here, it looked like he fit right in, which he probably did. I felt like if he had sat here with Emily and me, he would have looked out of place and awkward. Knowing that didn’t make my mood any better. As selfish as it was, I wanted him to fit in with my group of friends and not the jocks and cheerleaders.

I sighed. “Why does he have to pick them?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Eliot, why does he have to pick them to be the first people to welcome him in?” I said as I nodded over at the jock table. I took a sip of my water.

“I have no idea why anyone picks them to be their first impression of this school. We all know that it’s the wrong one. We are the real ones here.”  After she said it, Emily snapped her fingers and made one of the funniest faces I had ever seen.

I burst out laughing and spit my water all over Emily. She made a disgusted face and wiped the water off her face. I gained composure and said, “I am so sorry! Next time watch what you say when I am drinking.”

“How about next time you watch where you spit?”

We looked at each other and started laughing. Our eyes started to tear up we were laughing so hard. We were wiping the tears from our eyes when Eliot walked over to our table.

“Hey,” he said in the nonchalant tone that he had perfected.

“Oh, hey Eliot. This is my best friend Emily.” I said as I nodded toward Emily.

“Hi.” he said to Emily.

“Hey, what’s up?” she answered.

“Not too much. I was actually wondering if I could talk to Amy.”  Eliot said as he stuck his hands into his jeans pockets and rolled back onto his heels.

Emily and I quickly glanced at each other. I nodded, letting her know that it was okay. She got up and put all of her trash into her lunch bag. “I’ll be going,” she said as she walked out to the trashcans. When she left the lunchroom, she glanced back at us and winked at me. This made me giggle a little.

Eliot sat down across from me. “So how has your day been?”

“Could be better to be honest.”

“Oh I’m sorry. How come it has been bad?”

“Long story,” I said as I stirred my Snack Pack cup with a plastic spoon. “How has your day been?”

“It’s been getting better actually.”

“Lucky you.” I said with a hint of sarcasm.

He did not look too pleased with the tone I had just taken with him, but he didn’t acknowledge it if he was. “Look I just wanted to apologize for earlier today. I shouldn’t have acted like that.”

“It’s fine.” I lied.

“Amy, really? I was such an a*s. I shouldn’t have treated you like that, especially since I’m aware of what you are going through right now.”

“Yes really. Eliot, I said it was fine.”

“Then why don’t I believe you,” he said. “I know we haven’t been talking that long, but we have been talking long enough that I can tell when something is bothering you.”

“Nothing is bothering me. I am just not having the best day.”

“Amy, don’t lie to me. I saw your face earlier today when you walked away; you were hurt.”

“Fine, you’re right; I was hurt.”

“Well I want to apologize for hurting you. I didn’t want to hurt you.”

I sat there and didn’t say anything.

“You don’t believe me do you?”

“I don’t know. Everything is changing so quickly I can’t wrap my head around it.”

“I know things are changing, but you should know that I am here for you.”

“I did think that. But you were acting so differently this morning that I didn’t know what to think.”

“You’re right. I was acting differently, but I promise that I am better now. I had a chance to think things through and I realized that it was stupid of me to let some teacher affect me like that.”

“The Marine has that affect on people sometimes.”

“I can tell. So will you please accept my apology?”

“Let me think…………yeah I will.” I said in a playful tone.

A big smile came across Eliot’s face. “Thanks. You don’t know how relieved I am. I thought you were really mad at me.”

“I was never mad at you, just confused about what you were thinking and feeling.”

“Well I know that now.”

The ball rang bringing an end to lunch. Eliot got up and slipped his backpack over his shoulder.

“I’ll see you later?” he asked.

“Of course.”  I answered with a smile.

He took two steps forward and stood right next to me. He bent down, kissed me on the cheek, whispered: “you look beautiful today” in my ear, and walked away without looking back.

 I do not know what it is about him, but Eliot has this way of redeeming himself when he knows he has done something wrong. He ends up saying the right thing, the one thing that you have wanted him to say. The worst part is that he does it in a way that you never see it coming and it’s not possible to stay mad at him. It truly was an admirable quality; there was no denying that. The only problem was that there was no way to defend yourself from this. No way to know that he was going to pull this trick out of his pocket. When I thought about it, it was actually an aggravating quality for him to have because I realized it gave him control.

I picked up my trash, packed by backpack, and left the cafeteria in a better mood than when I had entered.