Economics Starts With A D

My economics class was uncharacteristically quiet. Usually there was a solid stream of background noise - pencils tapping desks, papers rustling, quiet mutterings, an occasional snore. But today the silence was so profound that if I was to drop a pin it’d sound like someone had just smashed a gong. Could it be Mr. Phelps had finally killed the class with boredom? A loud snore punctuated the silence as if in answer to my internal question. A chorus of snickering followed it. Phew. Good to know they’d survived the torture our teacher called assigned reading. I looked down at the thick book on my desk which I had given up on after the first paragraph made me feel drowsy. Of course, the information he was trying to drill into our brains was so outdated it wasn’t even relevant in today’s economic society, so it was a waste of time reading it anyway. I should know, seeing how Riley made me meet up with the working forces behind our company over the summer. This included The Chief Financial Officer Melanie Brown, the Chief Accounting Officer Lincoln Barrett, and Executive Manager Malcolm Holden, but more commonly known to me as Serena Holden’s father. Let me just say that there is nothing worse than spending your free time, much less your summer vacation, with your worst enemies dad. Complaining to Riley had gotten me nowhere. He’d insisted it was for my own good. Learning the ropes, he’d called it. Cruel and unusual punishment was more like it. Melanie had drilled me about the economic structure of America and Azalea Shippings standing point within it all, Lincoln had thrown me so many numbers I’d started seeing them flash across my eyelids whenever I closed them, and Mr. Holden’s incessant ravings about his perfect little angel Serena while he explained the inner workings of hiring and firing people just about drove me up the wall. Not only had I wasted most of my summer swamped with paperwork, but I’d missed out on going to the lake with Courtney’s family. No words can express how it felt to give up a week of Lake Tahoe to unwillingly learn all about dear Serena’s summer adventures in minute detail, down to her harrowing ordeal of having her hairdresser put in highlights that were “Golden Blonde“ instead of “Honey Blonde”. Like there’s a difference!
I glanced at the clock by the classroom door. Time was ticking by painfully slow, which surprised me considering the last three weeks had passed in a blur. Between avoiding Aidan, trying to stay two steps ahead of Serena‘s evil plots, and studiously ignoring Tyson I’d barely had time to breathe. The last was proving remarkably easy. Especially considering Miss Clarke’s proposal on the second day of school. Worried about the lack of class time we’d have to complete our assignments, she’d suggested that we sit with our partners until the assignments completion. That way if there was a spare twenty minutes at the end of a period, precious time wouldn’t be wasted moving about the room to locate each other and settle into new seats. I had almost protested when she’d sprung this on us the second day of classes. Suffice to say, I was of the opinion that it only took thirty seconds at most to pick your butt up and plant it in another seat. She made it sound like shuffling about the room was akin to rocket science and therefore required a lot of time and effort. However, my protest had died on my lips when I realised that assigned seating would work greatly in my favour concerning my plan to avoid Aidan. And judging by the scathing look on his face, I’d say it had also registered in his mind that he wouldn’t be able to harass me during the only class we shared. I’d watched with great amusement as he’d grudgingly stood and trudged over to Serena, who was still directing her look of appalled outrage at our teacher. When Aidan had taken the seat next to her, she’d redirected her venomous glare at him like this was all his fault. I’d only been able to stifle my laughter by clamping a hand over my mouth, all too delighted to witness one of her evil little schemes backfiring. I guess it’s true what they say. Karma is one mean b***h. I’d continued to revel in my small victory, triumphant smile threatening to crack my face, when the chair beside me was yanked out. My feet, which had been propped on the edge of the seat, suddenly hit the floor, the jolt startling me. I’d snapped my head up, eyes narrowed, when my gaze landed on Tyson who was matching my scowl with one of his own. Oh, craptastic. I’d been so consumed watching Aidan and Serena get a taste of their own medicine I’d completely forgotten about him. Of course, with one victory came a loss. I’d become free of Aidan only to be stuck with Tyson, whom I’d vowed to ignore after our little discussion the day before. Without a word he’d dumped his bag on the ground and sat down, placing his head in his arms on the table. I’d caught a whiff of his heady scent, a sweet, musky fragrance that could only be described as truly delicious, and had to keep up a mantra in my head: you‘re ignoring him; you don’t like him. You‘re ignoring him. Unfortunately, while my mind was happy to comply, my body was not cooperating. When it wasn’t skipping a beat, my treacherous heart was pounding rapidly in my chest, all too aware of his close proximity. Still, despite forces beyond my control trying to thwart my dream of a simple life, I’d been successful in both avoiding Aidan and ignoring Tyson.
Serena on the other hand was an entirely different matter. That girl was in a league of her own. True to the silent promise in the evil glare she’d bestowed on me on day one, she’d gone out of her way to try to make my life as miserable as possible. I’d lost count of the times she’d had her minions “accidentally” shoulder bump me with enough force to land me on my a*s, or the amount of times their fingers had been “accidentally” tangled in my hair. The word “oops” was fast becoming a word I never wanted to hear again, as it was always accompanied by some form of foul play. I was learning how to bounce off lockers with a grace a prima ballerina would envy and my feet now had minds of their own, jumping over outstretched legs before they could trip me. My pens still kept mysteriously disappearing from my desk, and my locker had been ransacked yesterday, everything in it now missing - including the locker combination dial. And today had been the worst yet. I’d had to run home and change clothes after first break because some blonde bimbo had doused me with her jumbo sized raspberry slushy. But even so, I had not retaliated, instead hoping that my lack of reaction would make her grow bored and leave me alone. I was beginning to think that had been a wrong move. All I seemed to be doing was making her even more determined to crush me. And for what exactly? Because Tyson had rejected her offer. Tyson, not me, Yet I didn’t see him being tormented for his fast refusal. No, the blame fell straight to me, the innocent bystander.
Needless to say I wasn’t a happy camper, and this coma inducing, supposedly vitally important lesson wasn’t helping my mood. A piece of paper being slapped onto my desk startled me, and I realised I had daydreamed the entire period away. My economics teacher, Mr. Phelps, loomed over me, his hand resting on the down turned piece of paper. His face was stuck halfway between annoyance and disappointment, his lips pursed slightly, his shrewd eyes scrutinising me from behind a pair of wire rimmed glasses.
“Miss Duke,” he drawled. “Very disappointing. I expected a lot more from you.”
Puzzled, I watched him walk away to hand out the rest of the pile he was holding. What was that all about? I snatched the piece of paper off my desk and turned it over. I gasped out loud, a noise of both surprise and indignation. It was last weeks pop quiz. He’d said it would help him ascertain what we already knew, and give him a starting point for the years work that lay ahead of us. I’d thought it would be a piece of cake and it’d seemed all too easy as I was answering the multitude of questions, but maybe I was a bit too arrogant. That’s what the big fat D in the top right hand corner of my page was telling me. And to emphasise my failure, it was circled and even underlined. Still, I continued to stare at the offending letter, sure I was imagining it. When it didn’t change I scanned through my answers and became even more perplexed. They were all right, but Mr. Phelps had marked them wrong.
The bell rang overhead but I barely heard it as everyone else rushed to the door, eager to be rid of the schools most boring teacher. I however, hastily packed my things in my bag, and test in hand made my way over to his desk. He was busy hovering over a large stack of papers, scribbling notes in the margins. If he noticed my presence, he didn’t let on. I cleared my throat pointedly. He continued to ignore me. Vexed, but still slightly nervous - teachers, well any authority figures really, made me timid - I decided to dive off the deep and get straight to the point.
“Mr. Phelps, I think there’s been some kind of mistake with my test,” I said tentatively.
Mr. Phelps didn’t even spare me a glance. “No mistake, I assure you. I marked the tests myself.”
My common sense dictated that I cut my losses and hightail it out of there before I said anything to upset him, but my stubborn side refused to budge. Not quite sure what to do, I placed it on the edge of his desk. “Well then, I was wondering if you could tell my why you‘ve marked all of these as wrong answers.”
He let out an exasperated sigh and picked up my test, flicking it in obvious annoyance, and looked it over. I waited with baited breath, twisting my fingers together nervously. After what seemed like forever, he dropped the paper and offered me a perturbed frown.
“I marked them wrong Miss Duke, because they are indeed incorrect answers. Perhaps if you put a bit more effort into your studies, you might be more pleased with the results.”
I stared at him blankly. Surely he hadn’t just confirmed that he was an incompetent moron and didn‘t know his own subject. Because I just so happened to get those answers from a very accurate, reliable and intelligent source.
“Was there something else you needed?” he asked, returning his attention back to a stack of papers he was grading.
“You’re wrong,” I blurted.
“I beg your pardon?” he exclaimed. Oh great, now I was in for it. I felt like a kid who’d been told not to touch the rattle snake but had gone ahead and stabbed at it with a stick. Now the snake was pissed and had me in its sights.
I sighed. Might as well finish what I started.
“What I mean is, I have a family friend who majored in economics and accounting at Yale. She’s now in charge of ensuring the financial security of a multimillion dollar international shipping company.” Of course, I refrained from telling him that it was my company. Little details like that weren’t important. “We went over a range of topics during the summer, including everything in your test. Are you telling me that she doesn’t know what she’s talking about?” I questioned.
Mr Phelps seemed to sit up straighter, puffing his chest out and straightening his wire rimmed glasses on his nose. Then he levelled me with a disdainful glare, like I’d insulted his very being by challenging him in something he was supposed to know like the back of his hand.
“Miss Duke,” he exploded. “I will not sit here and be lectured by the likes of you about a subject that I am more than qualified to teach. My grading is final. I suggest that instead of getting questionable facts from your friend,” he sneered the word friend like it discredited my source of information. “You should concentrate more on what is actually going on in the classroom rather than spending the hour staring out the window into space.”
I felt my face heat inexplicably, my body’s reaction to being scolded by a teacher. Unfortunately, my mind was working just fine and before I could stop myself I pretty much dug my own grave.
“Maybe I would pay attention if what you taught us was relevant to today’s economic structure instead of a bunch of textbook bullshit that you dredge up out of your old college economics books,” I retorted. We both froze, me with my mouth open in shock of what I’d just inadvertently said, and him with a face so red and angry I probably could have fried an egg on it. Oh my god, I thought. He was going to kill me.
Mr. Phelps took a deep, calming breath and I was very relieved to see some of the angry blush leak from his face.
“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that, Miss Duke. I highly suggest that you make your exit now before you say something you truly regret, and I lose my patience.”
If ever there was an easy way out of detention, I had just been given it. But instead of hauling a*s out of there, I had to go and make one last ditch effort to change that D. Because I was Noah Duke, the girl with a death wish. And I deserved the A I should have been given.
“But Mr Phelps,” I started.
“Leave!” he bellowed.
Forget the bloody A. I scampered out of the room so fast I didn‘t see the person walking down the corridor towards me until I collided with them. I let out an “oomph” of surprise, the sound muffled by the persons jacket, and staggered backwards from the momentum of the rebound. My bag hit the floor, its contents scattering a few feet in every direction and I would have fallen flat on my butt but a hand shot out to grab my elbow. I grasped it gratefully and started to apologise, when I looked up. My grateful smile fled my face. Instead I adopted a very haughty expression and glared at the one person I least wanted to bump into.
“Oh, it’s you,” I said.
Tyson’s eyebrow quirked as he stared down at me. “I see “Sorry” would be a bit of a stretch,” he muttered.
I glared at him. “Oh, just like saying hello to someone when they greet you in the halls is a ‘bit of a stretch’?” I asked pointedly.
The corners of his mouth quirked, and I got the distinct feeling he was trying not to laugh at me. Great, why did I let this guy get to me so much?
“You’re still mad about that?” His eyes glittering with amusement.
“No,” I snapped. “Of course not. I don’t waste time worrying about what you do or don’t say to me. Please, you’re not that important.”
“You might sound more convincing if you weren’t still clinging to me,” he said, looking down at my hand, which still had it’s death grip on his arm. Mortified, I whipped my hand back, the skin on my bare arm tingling from his touch.
“Whatever,” was my brilliant, snappy comeback, and I knelt down to retrieve my bag. Good god, Noah, I berated myself. Is it really that hard to stay cool in front of him? So far, all I’d shown him was that I was a blundering idiot who was an expert at walking into things. I started gathering my scattered belongings, shoving them into my bag haphazardly. I expected Tyson to take the hint and leave me to it, but to my shock he knelt down beside me and started picking up my fallen books and pens. In no time at all my bag was repacked and slung across my shoulder, and I stood awkwardly in the hall facing Tyson.
“Thanks,” I said reluctantly.
He shrugged in response, never one for too many words. When it was clear he had nothing else to add, I decided to take my leave before the awkward silence made me blurt out something stupid.
“Alrighty then.” I turned, and had only taken three steps when he called me back.
“What?”
But instead of talking, he grabbed my hand and began scribbling on it with a pen. I sucked in a sharp breath. Just the slight touch of his hands on mine sent a tingling sensation all the way up my arm. At the same time my heart went into palpitation mode and my stomach swarmed with butterflies. I tried desperately to stamp them down. I needed to kill those suckers before they could really get going, because I had enough going on in my life without adding strange bodily reactions to a boy I didn’t even like. One that did nothing but irritate me and found my small blunders amusing. He dropped my hand when he was done and slipped the pen into his jeans pocket. I looked up, taking in his broad shoulders and his angular face. Oh, for Gods sake. Be still, you stupid malfunctioning heart! I scolded myself as it yet again picked up it’s pace. At this rate, I’d have a heart attack before I reached eighteen.
“For the assignment,” he said, oblivious to my internal struggle.
It was only then that I looked at my hand and discovered he’d written his cell phone number on it. “Don’t give it to anyone else. I don’t want a bunch of random chicks calling me every ten minutes.”
“Sure,” I mumbled. Because I had so many girlfriends I just couldn’t decide which one to blab to first. Wait a minute. Did this mean I wasn’t just some random chick to him anymore? Um, not that I cared, seeing as how I didn’t like him and all.
He turned and started walking away without so much as a goodbye.
“Ah, don’t you need mine then?” I called to his retreating back.
“Later,” was his response.
Translation: I probably wouldn’t use it even if you did give it to me.
So, just to clarify, I’ve been promoted from “random chick” but still had a long way to go if I ever wanted to be considered a friend. But like I told myself before, it’s not like I cared about such trivial things.

Reviews

[life*of*equiluxe]

In your chapter "Twisted Fate" you mentioned that the World History room was formerly a science lab and that they had benches, but then later on you said Tyson pulled out the chair next to her. In this chapter he also pulled out the chair from under her feet. Just wanted to point that out- the only inconsistency I have noticed! Still loving this!

[Ray]

I need more!!! I'm so obsessed now, I should be doing homework might I add. Lol

[life*of*equiluxe]

I like how 8 ends and 9 begins. I am not really sure that I would specifically say that something is missing inbetween. You state that about 3 weeks has passed and give a run down of what has happened in that time period. Maybe add something about whether Riley has been home or not, or how home life has been? Is she starting to think about what Tyson said about not letting Serena get the best of her, even though she is obviously trying to take the high road?