Chapter 10: New Arrangement

I pushed the doors open to the gym and ran in, to see some of the boys shooting hoops. I gripped onto my basketball and ran in.
"Giamatti, over here!" Jason called, motioning me to come over. He looked pretty intense, something extremely rare because he was too laid back to ever be intense.
"What's up?" I asked, running over. He pulled my arm and dragged me into the locker room, just before actually getting inside. I heard voices, coming from the far end of the room. Familiar voices.
"Yeah, I told her she did it," I heard.
"Shane?" I whispered as lowly as I could, perking my ears up to get the gist of what was going on, because at this point, I was clueless. Jason nodded, shifting his eyes.
"They kissed, they really did," he said even louder. Jason hit me, making sure I paid attention. "I saw her kiss him on the floor," he added, "even Kelly knows, he's just being dumb. He's not even the same guy he was before she moved here."
I listened, betrayal and rage filling inside of me. I looked Jason, shaking my head.
"Don't listen to him, man, he's full of s**t," he whispered.
I thought about it: me and Shane and had been close friends for as long as I can remember and for him to drop it like that, over girl business? It was the most ludicrous statement I had ever heard.
We heard footsteps approaching and swiftly made it back onto the court, shooting hoops happily as if we hadn't heard the Benedict in the locker room. Shane finally made his way onto the court, a sly smile on his face. "Sup guys! Let's do this," he said, energized. He was so full of it. I wanted to confront him so badly, but I knew it'd lead to another vicious cycle of drama and I wasn't having that.

I ran down the court to  make a lay up and thought I had, but was ambushed and thrown to the floor only a few seconds after.
"Tyler!" the guys yelled, running toward me. Everything turned bright and I had no idea what was going on. I got up and shook my head a few times, blinked really fast, and tried to get my vision straight.
"Are you okay?" I heard.
"What the hell, dude? It's just a game for fun today, what are you doing?" I heard someone else shout.
I fell back onto the ground wearily and just stared, waiting until the brightness stopped. After 10 minutes of shouting and yelling, I shook my head to see the team mates arguing before me. Shane was on one side, surrounded by others, yelling at the top of his lungs.
"We have a few weeks before play offs, you better pray to god he doesn't have a concussion," Jason said coldly.
"What the hell is going on with you?" Jake asked.
"He's not a p***y, he'll live," Shane smirked, looking in my direction. I was so lost. I got up and walked to the circle.
"What's going on?" I asked.
"Mr. Rumor-spreader over here's taking the practice game against his OWN team mates a little too far," Jake sneered, staring at Shane in the eyes. And that's when the ticking of the bomb stopped.
"Excuse me?" Shane asked, his eyes bulging out of his head, "Rumor spreader?" He asked, shouting.
A few of the team mates nodded, carelessly. Shane ran up to Jake and shoved him.
"Hey, hey, hey!" I screamed, catching Jake before he hit the ground.
"Don't 'hey, hey, hey' me," he said, making his way around me to Jake. What had gotten into him? I had never seen this conniving side of him before.
"Oh wait, Giamatti, you shouldn't have caught me, Shane might tell Kelly that you kissed me on the ground here," he said in a high-pitched, exaggerated, girly voice.
Shane went into a cursing frenzy, trying to make his way around the guys. Pushing and shoving began between everyone and I had a feeling all hell was going to break loose when a loud whistle was heard from behind us.
"What the hell is going on here?!" Coach Wheeler demanded, running up to the crowd and pulling the boys apart. I stood there and watched the aftermath. Jake, Jason, Ross, Blake, they were all red with rage and Shane stood there, his hands balled into hard fists.
"We were playing a practice game and Shane knocked Giamatti to the ground and he hit his head or something because he was on the floor for ten minutes and wouldn't say anything, he just lied there," Ross said in a nutshell.
"And the pushing and shoving?" Coach asked. Silence. No one answered. "You will ANSWER me when I ask you something," he emphasized. His echo boomed through the empty gym. You could smell the tension in the air. His eyes met mine and I nodded and we both knew what the nod meant. "Shane, we're going to talk about this. If we don't get to the bottom of this, say hello to the bench," he said in Shane's direction, "and goodbye to the play offs," he said, shifting his eyes to every other team member. The guys groaned, some gasped, and some began yelling in anger.
"Get your asses to the locker room and get ready for class," he yelled, walking me to his office. Coach always pried things out of people, it was like his hidden talent. I knew I'd have to give him an explanation some time.
"I need to know what's going on, but first, we need get you to the nurse's office. We can't have you with a concussion, weeks from the play offs," he said worrily. He handed me a pass, "Go get checked out, we'll talk later."

A bright light was shining in my eyes, courtesy of the nurse. "Hmmm," she said to herself. She shined the light in my other eye, following another "Hmmm. Your eyes are dilating properly, I'm sure it's fine." She ran a few more tests. One of them made me really dizzy and that's all she needed to know to confirm a diagnosis.
"You have a mild concussion, nothing too much to worry about. Take some pain killers and try to go to sleep if your head hurts, drink plenty of water, and don't play too much for a few days," she finished.
I felt fine, head-wise, I was just confused about what had gone down earlier. Why would Shane tell Kelly something like that? It was just bizarre. "Here's your pass, you need to head back to your science class. Feel better, honey," she added. I walked into Edwards' room to see everyone standing up, holding their bags and books. Today could not get any more confusing.
"You're just in time for the new seating arrangement, Mr. Giamatti," Mrs. Edwards said enthusiastically. I didn't care until I shot a glance at JC. I sit next to her. New seating chart. All the pieces were being put together. My stomach began doing cartwheels, this day was just a heap of stupid. She looked up at me and smiled. I frowned, motioning to our table in the back. She laughed and clutched onto her books. I was about to enter day dream mode all over again, but Edwards began calling our names to our new seats. With my horrible luck, I ended up two seats behind Shane. Kelly was two seats to my left. Slowly and shortly, the students standing around the room were assigned their new seats. JC and Anthony were left and there were only two seats left. One next to Paul Edmonton, a soccer player, in the back and one next to Shane in the front. My brain was not working properly because I hadn't even though of JC ending up next to Shane. It's like I couldn't see what was going on. So it didn't hit me until Edwards called her name and pointed to the seat right next to Shane. Shane, Kelly, JC, and my eyes all were popping out of our heads. She walked towards his table and sat down, not saying a word. I balled my hands into fists and tried to control myself. This was going to get really ugly. I kept an eye on both of them. Shane eyed her down and scooted his seat away from her, with his nose crinkled. The new-douchebag-Shane was such a..douchebag. Edwards began her boring lecture about protons but my eyes didn't move away from them. I saw Shane c**k his head, turn around and smile at Kelly. She smiled back and nodded to him, mouthing "Do it." I propped up onto my elbows, paying close attention. He scooted his stool closer to her and smiled. He rested his face on his knuckles and stared at her, like he was in love. Edwards passed out a worksheet just in time. Hopefully she'd let us work with partners.
"you may work with a partner, but you have to get it done," she added, pulling out her New Moon book. Edwards, you read my mind. Although it was creepy to know someone of her age was into Twilight. Anyways, it was perfect timing because I could hear everything between them.
"You're really pretty," he said, his smile getting bigger. I raised my eyebrow, trying not to get worked up. She focused on her worksheet and mumbled "thanks" in a question kind of way. He began asking dumb questions, but I got caught up in how she looked today to even notice. Her dark hair was wavy, falling above her back, perfectly. I was drifting into day dream mode. I remembered how much fun we had at lunch, the feeling of her hand in mine when I helped her down from my car, man, anyone could have said I was falling. Falling hard. Someone moved into the seat next to me and nudged me to get me out of my daze. I looked to my left to see Jake and Jason with their sheets, staring in Shane's direction. Their jaws dropped and they looked at me. I could read their minds. "What the f**k?!" was most likely the question lingering in their brains. I nodded and sighed.
"I got this," Jake said, smiling and getting up. I raised an eyebrow, and tried to pull him back, but he already made his way over to her table.
"Hey JC," he said cooly, leaning against her table. She smiled and looked up at him.
"Hey Jake, what's up?" she asked, flipping pages in her book. She always did her work, she was smart, she was great in school. I loved that.
"Want to team up and be partners? Okay, cool! I'll take that as a yes," he said, before she could say anything. He began grabbing her things and tossing them in our direction. I caught her pencil and her book, Jason caught her bag. We both laughed. Jake was a genius. She smiled, got up, and walked to our table. Her dress came just above her knees, her tan arms and legs glistening.
"Ah, Jake! You're such a life saver," she began, "thank you so much!"
"He saves all of the damsels in distress," Jason added.
"It's a gift," Jake said, posing like an angel. We all busted out into laughter.
"Okay, now let's get to work," JC said, smiling, looking around for a seat.
"Just take a seat on the Giamatti, already!" Jake exclaimed, laughing. Her facial expression changed to that of suspicion and put her hands on her hips, eyeing Jake down.
"We're in school, Jake, not a club."
"Well I really don't feel like doing this worksheet," Jake refuted.
"I'll help you!" JC offered. He laughed and grabbed a pencil. And she got along with my friends, it was great. We opened our books and read silently. When we were done, she helped us answer the questions, explaining all the scientific processes. We scribbled down the answers and finished before most of the other groups.
"See? That wasn't too hard," she said, ecstatically.
"You got a smart one, Giamatti," Jason said, looking at his paper, "I understand all of this stuff now." JC grabbed all of our papers and smiled.
"Glad I could help! I'm going to turn all these in for you guys, be right back." She got up, tugged at her dress, and walked to the front. Like usual, I stared.
"She's a keeper," Jake added. I smiled and nodded.
"You really like her, don't you?" Jason asked. I nodded once again.
"I don't know what it is," I finally said. We all watched Edwards go over our papers, as JC made her way back to the table.
"Wait a minute, Jordyn, can you come here for a second?" she asked, putting her book down. She turned around and walked back to Edwards' table, looking down at our papers. She laughed and began talking to Edwards. We all wondered what was going on. Edwards was actually smiling and having a conversation, none of the other kids could get remotely close to doing that. She made her way back and leaned against the table again. Her necklace dangled below her chest, her long hair almost touching the table. She pushed her hair aside and smiled at me. I looked at her intently and mouthed out, "You."
She looked back at me confused and mouthed out, "Me what?"
I laughed and mouthed out, "Pretty." She smiled and scooted me out of my stool and sat down.
"Well would ya look at that," Jake began, looking in Shane's direction. Kelly was sitting next to him, her legs crossed in her mini skirt. They were talking silently, most likely up to something again. Shane and Kelly looked in our direction, but we all knew who they were shooting dirty glances to. I got closer to JC and put my hand on her shoulder as she looked down.
"There's no talent show going on, you can get back to your conversation," Jake mumbled, loud enough for them to hear.
"Not a talent show, more like a circus freak show, look at that dress" Kelly added, laughing. I sighed and looked at the guys. It was going to get ugly all over again.
"Aw, cute," Jake began, "did you borrow that trailer trash loincloth of a skirt from Shane?"
That did it, I couldn't help it and began laughing. I laughed so hard, I thought I my sides were going to burst. Jason looked at me and roared in laughter. One of my one, the guys in the back began howling with laughter. Jake put his arm around JC and laughed as well.
"I got your back, don't sweat it," he said, almost crying from laughter. She eventually laughed and smiled in Kelly's direction. Kelly was red at this point, looking to Shane for back up, but he failed to deliver.
"QUIET!" Edwards yelled, erasing the board, "work on another assignment if you're done."

For the remainder of the period, we sat and talked. I moved closer to JC and put my arm around her, while the guys talked about the play offs. Her skin was soft, it felt like silk. I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket, she shifted around.
"I think you should attend to the vibration in your pants," she said slyly. I laughed and pulled my phone out. I had a new voicemail or something. I was getting ready to put it back in my pocket, but she grabbed it instead. She started touching the screen and playing with it.
"iPhone?" she asked, "Nice." She fidgeted around with it for a little bit more and then got up and put the phone in my face. "Smile!" she exclaimed, snapping the picture. "This is pretty nifty," she added. She went up to Jake and poked him.
"What?" he asked, right as the camera clicked. "Hey!" he shouted, getting angry.
"I'm sorry, I didn't know you'd get mad.." she trailed off.
"I wasn't ready!" he protested, smiling. He got next to me and posed, throwing up our team's sign. I laughed and threw it up too and made a serious face. The phone clicked.
"Got it!" she laughed, "I make a great photographer."
"Put the phones away, guys," Edwards said, making her way over to our table. JC put the phone behind her and looked up.
"So I checked your papers," she said seriously. We all looked down. The class got quiet. "I have never seen these boys productive, Miss Emerson, I noticed you helping them. Good job and please, keep it up, if it means these hooligans get their work done."
Ross, Blake, and Tucker howled in the back, clapping. "You guys aren't dumb after all!" they shouted. We all laughed and high fived her, some lightly punched her shoulders. Before we got too loud, the principal was heard to make an announcement.
"The snow cone stand is now open and don't forget to cast your votes for the spring fling prince and princess in the media building!" The bell rang shortly after and everyone darted out.
"Snow cones?! Hell yeah!" Jake exclaimed, running out with the rest of the team. I watched JC put all of her things away. She was surprised when she looked up.
"You waited?"
"Of course," I said, walking to her. I grabbed her books from her. "Remember our deal?"
She laughed and nodded, "I do, but I heard what happened this morning, so I'm not making you carry my books." She reached to grab them, but I held them above her head. She tried jumping to grab them.
"C'mon, Tyler!" she whined, "Give me my books!"
"Under one condition!" I said, holding the books higher. She stopped and crossed her arms.
"And that is?" she asked. I pointed to the bulletin board, that read "Science projects are coming up! Due next month."
She read my mind and smiled, "I'll be your partner, then."