the first day of the quarter

The First Day of the Quarter

As my alarm went off I wanted to cry. I didn’t know why I did this to myself, I hated school. Today was the first day of the spring quarter, my second quarter this time around. I went to school strictly to try to stay in touch with the outside world. If I sat too still, I could lose a whole decade and not know it. So, when I started looking around at the world and felt lost, I went to college for a few years to keep up to date on things.

This time around I didn’t wait as long as I normally did; normally I went every other decade. But this time only nine years had passed. Sometimes I felt like I should just go north, lose myself in the wilderness. Others had done it when they became too out of touch. If didn’t spent enough time in the world, you stop caring. And the need and the want to fit in were lost forever.

"I don’t think I would miss much." I said getting out of bed.

I walked into the bathroom to shower and to brush my teeth. The thought made me smile; brushing my teeth seemed so silly. It wasn’t like I could get cavities or bad breath from not doing it.

After my morning shower I went into my closet to find something to wear. I dropped the towel on the floor and looked at myself naked in the full length mirror. I sighed; it wasn’t that I was unhappy with my body. But why did I have to stand out so much.

I was tall and thin and beautifully shaped. I had dark thick red hair that went to my waist, with ice blue eyes that didn’t look real. Years ago before the change, I had never seen myself in a mirror, so I had never seen my reflection except in water. Now my beauty was nothing more than a reminder of the long years I had lived.

My years had been nothing but a long space of loneliness. Everyone that I had known while human had been dead for many, many years. Back then, I didn’t care for people much. They seemed mean and cruel; and from what I’ve seen, not much had changed. Others of my kind weren’t much better; all they seemed to want to do was fight. So since the change, there had been only one vampire that I hadn’t fought or killed on first sight.

I had to say, that was one of the blessings of living in America. Most, or all the vampires that lived here were much weaker then I. I didn’t run across them much, but for the most part they would run once they sensed me. I would feel them, but never would I see them.

I stuffed my gloominess away and got dressed. I grabbed a pair of old jeans, a simple T-shirt and a hoody sweatshirt. I grabbed a pair of ankle socks and went down stairs. Sitting on my couch, I put my shoes and socks on and grabbed my backpack and headed to school.

It wasn’t raining yet, so I threw my backpack into the back of my old truck and headed to school. I turned the heat on and thought about how boring today would be. I had math first thing, American History after and English one-o-one in the afternoon. I was grateful my English was partially done online. I would only have to go to it once a week on Thursdays, but I had to go to it today so we could go over the syllabus.

Oh how I hated Mondays. Just saying the word seemed to make my skin crawl when I was in school. I think the only thing worse than Mondays, were Monday mornings. I needed to do something different this time around. I needed to make some friends. I knew that was one of the reasons I came to school, but I never seemed to talk to anyone.

I pulled into the student lot and parked. I took a deep breath and got out. I opened my back pack and took out my I-pod. Just recently I was turned on to seventy’s rock. I was surprised that I missed it the first time around, who knows where my mind was forty years ago. I put in my head phones and dropped my I-pod down the front of my hoody. Catching it, I put it in my pocket and pull my hood over my head. As I walked to my first class I tried to scan the parking lot for people that might be interesting to talk to.

First I looked at the smoke pit, no one there I wanted to talk to. Nothing but boys who looked as if they needed to take a bath; no thank you. Over by the doors to the library, there were a few girls who just came from yoga. They seemed young, didn’t care for hearing stories about how much their parents sucked. There were people walking with headphones in their ears all over the place, didn’t anyone just talk to strangers for the sake of talking?

Whatever.

I just went to my first class. As I entered into the room, I saw the class was half empty. I saw a table open in the back corner that would work, it had a window by it. I sat down and pulled a notebook out of my backpack and dropped it on the floor beside me. I opened it and wrote the day’s date on the first page. I wrote yay math under the date and sighed.

Over the next few minutes the class filled up. And not to my surprise the seat next to me stayed opened. The teacher came in with a briefcase and a stack of papers; he placed his briefcase on his desk.

"My name is Mr. Oliver. If you would, please take a syllabus." he said placing a stack in front of the first few people in the front row.

"This is math ninety-seven. If you’re not in ninety-seven you’re in the wrong place. Any questions? No, great." he said not giving anyone a chance to answer.

Mr. Oliver took roll; after my name was called I turned my music back on and looked out the window as he droned on. About half way through roll, someone sat down heavily next to me. I didn’t even bother looking at the person; I just gazed out the window and thought about flying away for good.

Because we only went to class three times a week, the classes were an hour and twenty minutes long. Needless to say it was a long hour and twenty minutes. The moment the class was over, the person that came in late was gone. I guess she liked our class as much as I did.

I gathered up my stuff and headed to my history class. I had a ten minute break in between my two classes; I had a terribly long walk across the hall. I went in and sat in the same place. Unfortunately, there wasn’t the view from the window in this classroom. This was going to be a long quarter, especially because I lived through half of what was going to be taught. And I knew they weren’t going to get it right, but what could I say?

History was taught by a boring man named Mr. Corbin. He made sure everyone had their phones off; he didn’t care for text messaging while he was teaching. He called role and when I answered I was there he asked me to remove my hood.

Great, no music.

After class I had a few hours until my English class. I went out to my truck and

pulled out an old book I had. It was in Latin and on the Byzantine Empire. I loved to read Latin; it was such a descriptive language. When I found myself nodding off I didn’t fight it. I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. But I was rudely woken up by a knock on my window. I looked out, there was a dirty looking boy standing there.

I rolled my window down, "Yes?"

"Do you have any pot?"

Pot? I wondered if he meant grass. "No I don’t." I said rudely and rolled my window back up.

People never call marijuana grass anymore; I took my phone out and looked ’pot’ up on the internet to make sure.

"Well, at least I learned something useful today. They don’t call marijuana grass anymore." I said seeing I was right.

English class was quick; we didn’t stay the whole hour and twenty minutes. Our teacher, Mr. Philips went through the syllabus and excused us. I walked numbingly back to my truck grateful the day was done. I fired up my truck and Fred Flintstoned out of the parking lot for home.

I parked my truck out front of my house and went inside. I went directly to the laundry room and stripped out of my clothes and put on my one piece, black bathing suit. I walked downstairs to get into the pool. That was the one nice thing I had done when I had this house built, I had an indoor pool put in.

I walked to the edge of the deep end and dove in. My wings shot out and I used them like fins in the water. I dove to the bottom of the pool and shot along the bottom the length of it. When I got to the other end, I shot right out and landed on the edge. I hopped back in and folded my wings up and swam normal for a few laps trying to rid myself of the blandness of the day.

After my swim, I changed into some sweats and took out my history syllabus and looked what I was going to have to do for the essay that was due at end of next week. The Revolutionary War was within the range of topics I could choose from.

Well, that would work for me since I lived through it. But I needed to narrow it down to a certain topic. I had witnessed the famous Boston Massacre from a roof top, so I figured I would write on that. Plus I had some cool books that were in

Latin from my personal library so I wouldn’t have to write the same old paper I was sure Mr. Corbin was used too.

I spent the evening over dinner writing an outline for it. The sooner I could get the paper written the better. I spent the last few hours of my day working on it and dreading my next day at school on Wednesday. I watched a little news on TV, and went to bed.

Tuesdays were my business days. One of the things you ended up with when you lived a long time was money. Two hundred years ago I owned a great deal of land. And over the years I had sold it to make a nice fortune. Plus I invested wisely, and that helped a great deal. So once a week I talk to my stock broker and yell at him for awhile. I would talk to my accountant to make sure he was taking care of my finances correctly. Tuesdays were always an ulcer day for me, and I was glad when the business part of it was done.

Later that afternoon I took a long swim, something I did almost every day. The water was starting to look murky, so I reminded myself that I needed to call the pool people to come out and clean it.

That evening I cleaned my fish tank that I had in my office. I loved to play with my tank, it was very relaxing thing to do. I love to watch the fish swim around the reef I had made for them. The seventy-five gallon tank was my first attempt in keeping salt water fish, and so far it was going well.

I took a quick shower and went to bed. I was dreading the day I was going to have tomorrow and I figured the sooner I went to bed, the sooner I could get the day over with.

"Why do I even bother?" I asked the dark ceiling.

"Because you have nothing better to do, that’s why." I responded to myself.

"Maybe I should move back to Europe?" I wondered to myself, "No, I’m not that bored." I snuggled up to my body pillow and drifted off to sleep.

The next morning didn’t feel any different than the day prior. Whatever, I got up, took a shower and got dressed the same way I did on Monday. I could already feel the routine starting. Boredom followed by boredom, with a little more boredom. I laughed to myself and headed to school.

"What do you know?" I said as I pulled into the same spot I did yesterday, "It’s

like I never left." I said smiling without humor.

I got out of my truck and headed to math class. As I was walking towards the door I noticed a girl standing right outside the door talking angrily on her phone. I about gasp when I really got a look at her. She was averaged height, beautiful straight blond hair pulled back in a lose ponytail. She was wearing black stretch workout pants that came midway down her calves. She wore a white form fitting athletic zip up jacket. And who ever she was talking to, she sure seemed mad at.

I smiled at her anger, how someone with such beauty could be so angry was beyond me. As I walked passed her she got off the phone.

"Hey Tammy I got to go." she hung up and walked a few steps towards me, "Hey, do you got a minute?" she asked.

"Sure." I said not slowing down.

I wasn’t too sure what she wanted to talk about, but I didn’t know her and if she wanted to talk she was going to have to keep up.

"Are you going to math today?" she asked.

I didn’t know how she knew I had math, I didn’t remember even seeing her, "Yeah, I was planning on it."

"Okay good," she said and walked away.

What the hell was that? I wondered to myself as I walked up the stairs to my classroom.

"People get stranger by the generation." I mumbled to myself.

I parked myself back in the same seat I sat in yesterday. It was going to rain today I thought looking out the window at the sky.

Mr. Oliver called the class to order and took roll. I looked around the room to see if the weird girl that had stopped me as I came in the building was in the class. She wasn’t here so I just shook my head at the thought of her. When he was finished he opened his teacher’s book to try to get the lesson going. Then the strange girl came in, she smiled at me and came and sat down in the empty seat next to me.

"Miss Tailor?" Mr. Oliver asked.

"Yes, sorry I’m late." she said.

"Class starts at eight o’clock, not eight-oh-seven." he said looking at his watch.

"Sorry."

"Don’t be sorry, be here on time please." he said going up to the white board.

"I’m glad you’re here." she whispered to me.

I kind of looked around at the room before responding to her, "Okay, why?" I said trying not to be rude.

"Well on Monday you seemed like you could care less about this class. Oh by the way I liked your taste in music."

I was really confused now, I didn’t even remember seeing her on Monday. How in the world would she know what I was listening too?

"You have no idea what I’m talking about do you?"

"No, not really." I replied.

"Wow, you were really spacing out on Monday. I sat next to you, and you don’t even remember." she said with mock sadness.

I wasn’t really sure what to say to her, I had never talked to anyone like this before, "You were wondering if I was coming to class?" I asked not knowing what else to say.

"Oh yeah. Did you look at the math homework on-line yet?"

"No I haven’t."

"Blah, I hate math. And it sucks that we have to do it all our work on-line. I was hoping for more out of this class then on-line work. I’m Anne by the way."

"I’m Penelope. But call me Pip."

"That’s cute, both names are that is."

"Thank you, I like the name Anne, it was my grandmother’s name. Though I don’t remember her."

"It’s a family name. Man I hate math." Anne said.

"It’s not that bad. There’s the tutor center, they’ll always help you. If you want, I can help you too."

I couldn’t believe I just offered her my help. What was I thinking? If I spent any time with her I would just end up killing her. Not that human blood was all that appetizing to me, that just seemed my luck. End up killing her, then having a bunch of vampire hunters chasing for the next hundred years.

"That is, I mean, I have a lot of free time." I stammered, oh just shut up Pip I

thought to myself.

"Could you?" Anne said quickly, "That’s what I was fighting with my roommate with. She was supposed to help me tonight, and she bailed. I have enough trouble doing math that I don’t want to worry about not being able to mess with the web site too."

"I think I could help with that too. I know my way around computers." I had taken a computer course a few years ago, strictly to learn the stupid things.

"Oh, you’re a life saver. If I pass this class, I’ll be your slave for life." she said jokingly.

"I hear that doesn’t turn out well for the slave." I said.

"Probably not." she joked.

After that we listened to Mr. Oliver’s lecture on math. I think I liked this Anne girl. She seemed nice and had a quick wit. I think the thing I liked the most about her was she seemed completely reckless. I wonder how she would react to the idea of sitting next to me being what I was.

After class, Anne wasn’t as quick to leave as she did yesterday, which I kind of liked. So I tried to do the small talk thing.

"Do you have class next hour?"

"No. Next hour, I like that. It seems so formal; I don’t have class again until after lunch. I’m only taking two classes this quarter because of this one. What about you? Do you have class next hour?" she joked.

"Yes. But after that I don’t have anything."

"Great, do you think you could help me for a little bit before I go to my next class?"

"Sure, I don’t mind." I said.

"Where’s your next class?" Anne asked.

"Across the hall."

"Cool, if you’re truly free I would really enjoy your help."

What did that mean I wondered, "I’m free."

"Alright, I’ll be waiting for you out there in the common area then." Anne turned and left messing with her phone.

What the heck just happened? Well that certainly wasn’t what I was expecting

when I woke up this morning. Could I be friends with this young girl Anne? I think I could, I didn’t really believe that I would kill her. But I needed to really think about how close I would let her get to me.

But that idea brought me to a screaming halt. How much could I really be friends with her? There was no way on earth I could tell her the truth of what I was. And how could I invite her over? My house would be a little hard to explain.

But even with the friendship part, what could I tell her about me? Hi Anne, I’m a four-hundred year old vampire name Penelope. Now that we got that out of the way, did you know my middle name is Grace?

"Miss Alexander, did you need anything?" Mr. Oliver asked.

I looked around and realized that he and I were the only ones left in the room.

"You seemed a little confused." he said.

"I am, but not about math." I said and walked out of the class room and went to history.

There was someone in the seat I sat in yesterday and I was stuck sitting next to a fat guy in the middle of the room that smelled funny.

Great.

I believed that history class was the longest in the history of the world. What was I going to do? I wanted so much to be close to someone, hell I bought two jet skies in the hope I would be able to ride them with a friend. Both of my cars, and my truck only sat two. I had to be making more out of this than I needed too. But never in all my long years had I ever been close to anyone, human or otherwise. I knew I was making a big deal out of this whole thing. It wasn’t like she was going to ask me to go get matching best friend tattoos.

By the time class ended my heart was racing. This was ridicules; there was no reason to be this wigged out over helping someone with their math homework. I gathered my stuff and headed out of the classroom. Anne was sitting on one of the communal couches waiting for me.

"You’re not bailing on me are you?" she asked when I got up to her.

"No, why?" I asked.

"You looked troubled."

"I’m sorry, no it’s not you."

"Is everything okay?"

"Yeah, I had to sit next to a fat guy that smelled like bad cheese." I lied.

"I could see why you would be troubled." after a moment she spoke again, "Is that him?" she asked nodding at someone.

I looked and saw the guy I sat next to, "Yes."

Anne chuckled to herself, "You ready to go do some math?" she asked with false enthusiasm.

"Yes."

"Do you know where the tutor center is?"

"I believe it’s next to the math lab."

"Yeah I think I remember Mr. Oliver saying that."

We walked along quietly until we were almost there, "So how’s your day going?" Anne asked.

"Other than cheese guy okay I guess."

"Cheese guy, I like that. That’ll be our new term, if a guy is bothersome. We’ll just say cheese guy and we’ll know what we’re talking about."

"Okay." I said chuckling.

We both signed into the tutor center and sat at computers next to each other. We both turned on our computers and brought up the math site to do our homework.

"You’ll need to make a profile." I said to Anne.

"Okay, how do you do that?"

"Follow what I do."

I took Anne through the steps to get her logged in. She made her profile, when I saw that she typed in cheese guy as her password I laughed.

"You saw what I did?" she whispered.

"Yes I did."

"Good, now you can log in and do my homework for me when I suck this."

I chuckled, "You do fine. With me teaching you, there’s no doubt."

"You better hope so."

"Or what?" I said not thinking.

"Or I’ll tie you up and beat you."

We both chuckled together and got some funny looks from the other students. I breezed through my homework as quickly as I could. I was starting to hear some great profanities from Anne as she kept getting the red screen of death because her answers wrong. I signed out of my computer and wheeled over to her to help.

"What are you doing over here?" I asked.

"Getting irritated."

As I leaned close to point at screen to show her what she was doing wrong, Anne stopped looking at the screen and looked at me.

I instantly became self-conscious that I was doing something wrong. I didn’t make it a habit being this close to humans.

"What?" I asked.

"You smell wonderful, what kind of body spray do you use? I’ve never smell that kind before."

I was taken aback, that was not a question I knew how to answer. I didn’t use body spray, and I didn’t wash with anything out of the ordinary. Honesty worked best I figured.

"I don’t use anything, that’s just the way I smell I guess."

Anne took a deep breath, "You smell really good, do you know that?"

Her comment surprised me and made me uncomfortable, "No, I didn’t know that."

"I didn’t make you uncomfortable did I?" Anne asked.

"No." I lied.

"Has no one told you that before?"

I smiled trying to play it off, "No. And to tell you the truth, I’ve never thought about it before."

Anne chuckled, "Maybe you shouldn’t shower for a few days, lose the deodorant. If you smelled like cheese guy, you wouldn’t be complimented." she joked.

"Yeah, people would say other things." I joked back.

Anne leaned her head into me and laughed, "Oh Pip, you’re something else."

"Thank you, I think." we laughed again and went back to Anne’s math problem.

We finished a little bit before it was time for Anne to go to her next class, so I walked Anne back to the main building.

"We should do this tomorrow if you’re willing and free. I think you’re a better teacher than Oliver is."

I smiled at the thought. I had more fun today than I could remember, "That would be fine. I don’t have anything planned tomorrow other than my afternoon class. But on Friday I have no class. So if you would like to meet up in the tutor center to work on it, we can." what was I doing I wondered.

"That would be awesome! Here, let me give you my number." Anne pulled out her cell, "What is it? And I’ll text you."

I gave it to Anne and she texted me, "Here, now we have each other’s number. Thanks for the help Pip."

"You’re welcome." I said, Anne gave me a quick smile and went inside.

"Wow, what a first week." I said quietly and headed towards my truck. As I walked past the smoke pit, it was still filled with the grungy young boys that were there yesterday. One of them was the guy who asked if I had any pot. Did he expect me to give him some if I did? I could see him looking at me as I walk by.

"Hey," I yelled at him, "I still don’t have any marijuana!" a couple of people turned to see what I was yelling at. I could see some of his bodies laughing at him as I got in my truck.

I snickered to myself as I started it; I turned the radio to classic rock while it was warming up. Turning the heat on, I pulled out of the parking lot to go home.

Man, this Anne girl was something else. I couldn’t believe she liked the way I smelled. Well, I learned something new both days this week. Marijuana isn’t called grass anymore, its call pot. Second, I learned that I smell good. I smiled at the thought. I wished I knew if this was normal or not, but I was willing to bet that nothing was ever normal with Anne.

I knocked out all the notes I was going to need to write my history essay, but I wasn’t in the mood to go to bed yet. I wasn’t hungry, but I had a bit of a busy mind tonight. I decided that I would go down stairs and swim for a bit.

After I swam laps for a good hour, I believed that I could sleep. I changed out of my swim suit and headed up stairs to shower before bed. As I laid there, I let my mind drift back through day’s events. Anne seemed to be at the forefront of my mind.

Her laugh, her wit, and the way she complained about her math. It seemed like something out of a make believe story. Like the ugly duckling or something. But that really didn’t cover it, I wasn’t ugly, nor was Anne. Anne had a natural beauty that I couldn’t even touch.

My beauty was fake, unnatural. A gift normally saved for the dark and the wicked. It was nearly impossible for vampires to be created by accident. The amount of blood the victim had to actually consume to change would kill a normal person if they had lost that much.

The undead, I chuckled at the thought, spent their time in the darker places of the world. And the humans that visited those places were anything but victims. They were monsters already, just waiting to be set lose in the world.

I was changed by a monster, the fiend told me I was going to be burned as a witch. Whether or not it was true, I never found out. I didn’t care for the idea of a date with a wood pile, or something worse. The monster intended to make me his slave, but he was weak after he changed me. I was saved only by chance. An organization known as the Order of the Brotherhood had killed him. The Brotherhood was too focused on him to worry about me. I had escaped into death, but I didn’t die. I was alive, but not living. And then today, Anne crash landed into my life to make me feel alive again.

I wondered.

I wondered why the thought of Anne made me so happy. Was it her mortality? Did she live her life knowing that every moment could be her last? Was that knowledge the key for her to live so free, so reckless? I liked Anne, she said what she thought. There was no filter between her brain and her mouth, at least none that I could see.

What about her beauty? Never have I seen beauty that matched both the inside and the outside in a person. Normally a beautiful person on the outside was cruel on the inside. Who thought the world owed them something because of their looks; those were the very worst of people.

The other, who were not something to look at and had the most wonderful souls, such a tragic combination. But Anne over flowed with happiness, except when I came to math, but outside of that not even the rain seemed to get her down.

Her beautiful hair looked so soft; I wondered what it would be like to brush it? I wondered what kind of man she would fall in love with.

I didn’t care for men; they’re the blackest hearted creatures that I have ever known. Whether vampire or human, it didn’t real seem to matter. I couldn’t help but watch these TV shows about perfect husbands caught trying to meet little girls on-line.

Or wives getting on their husband’s computer and seeing it full of naked women. How do women in these times even trust a man? None of those worries seemed to bother Anne, except math.

I chuckled to myself thinking about her getting mad at the red screen of death. Then I had gotten too close and she told me I smelled good. I wonder if she even knew how the things she said affected the people around her. To know her was to love her.

As I drifted off to sleep, those last few words stayed with me. It was like water dripping off the roof of your house onto something hollow. Love her, love her, love her. I tried to place the front of that sentence back in front of the drip, but it was lost now. All there was left was the dripping sound of ‘love her‘.

‘I was flying. It was dark outside, I was over a forest. My eyes scanned the forest floor for prey like a hawk. I had a hunger that burned though my whole body. Circling around, I saw movement on the forest floor. It was a blond woman.

She ran for all she was worth, but her fear hindered her progress. She tripped frequently; she couldn’t seem to stay on her feet. She knew she was being pursued, that much was obvious. She had no hope of getting away. I had lost her for a moment until I circled around, that wasn’t going to happen a second time.

I flew into a large tree that was in the direction of her travel. I tucked my wings in and scaled down the tree headfirst like a spider. I waited ten feet above the ground and watched her approach. When she came close, I cart-wheeled off the tree and landed directly in front of her, it was Anne. I had a large smile across my face, a deep hunger shot through my body.

My sudden appearance made her scream. Anne tried to run, but tripped over

her own feet and fell. I was on her like a snake strike; I stood over her and let my true face slide out. Anne’s eyes were wide with fright, I reached down with both hands and ripped her up from the ground by her arms.

Anne looked horrified into my vampire face for a single moment, and then we kiss with all the passions are bodies could manage.’

I sat up with a gasp, "Holy moly!" I said looking around.

I flopped back on my bed with my hands over my face. It was a little after five in the morning, there was no way I was going back to sleep after that dream. I got up and took a shower and got ready for school.

I didn’t know what bothered me more, hunting Anne to feed on her, or kissing her instead of killing her. Oh man, what a way to start a day. Never in my whole life had I ever dreamed of kissing anyone. The only person that had ever tried was the monster that changed me.

How was I supposed to see her today? How was I supposed to sit next to her and have those thoughts running through my brain? I almost felt like staying home. If this was the results of having friends, not sure I needed them. But instantly my inside rejected the thought, I just enjoyed Anne’s company too much.

What in the world was I going to do?

I decided there was no way I was going to be able to anything constructive the way I was feeling at the moment. I went and found my bathing suit and decided I should swim for a bit.

As I swam, I tried to block out the memory of the dream with little success. I believe the only way I could get this dream out of my head was to analyze it honestly. To look and explore the different themes within the dream. First, I was hunting. I didn’t know what I was hunting until I found Anne running in the woods. But that was something in itself I believed, the fact that it turned out to be Anne at this point was strictly coincidence.

But when I noticed it was Anne, the hunger pains grew. I could remember the frenzy that started in my body at seeing her. I remembered that I hadn’t eaten dinner last night; the though made me wonder what Anne had ate for dinner. I stopped myself; that had nothing to do with what I was thinking about.

When Anne fell on the ground, I yanked her up like I was going to feed on her. I

had never fed on humans before. So the dream, me wanting to feed had surprised me. But if I remembered correctly, there was no thought of wanting to feed. So what was I hungry for?

"Oh screw this; I’m not thinking about this anymore." I said getting out of the pool.

I looked at the clock on the wall and saw I was going to be late to class.

"Crap."

I changed quickly back into my school clothes and rushed out the door. Thankfully when I got my truck started my backpack was in the front seat, otherwise I would have forgot it. I spun the truck around and headed for school. Well looks like I was having another first, I had never been late to class before.

I quietly slipped into class seeing Anne in her seat. I felt the overwhelming feeling that she could tell what I was thinking. She smiled widely when she saw me; she held my eyes for a minute and nodded me over to sit.

"Thank you for joining us this morning Miss Alexander." Mr. Oliver said, I blushed and went and sat down next to Anne and tried my best to act natural.

Anne asked me with her eyes what the deal was; I just rolled my eyes and lightly shook my head. She smiled and went back to Mr. Oliver’s lecture which I was sure she wasn’t understanding.

Once class was over Anne looked at me, "I was getting ready to text you to ask where you were. I was getting worried."

"Oh, I had a weird morning. Don’t worry about it." I said.

"You okay?" she asked.

"Yeah. I had a weird dream last night that kind of made a mess of my morning." I explained.

"Oh I hate that, was it a naked dream?" she asked.

"Ah, no." I said to which I was grateful, I really didn’t need that on top of everything else.

"Are we meeting after your next class to help me with my math?" Anne asked.

"Sure."

"Are you sure you’re okay?" Anne asked.

"Yeah I’m fine, I got to go." I said annoyed with myself.

I got up and headed out, "See you in a bit." I said over my shoulder as I tried to make an escape.