Finding Fae

Even with all of the moving around, one thing remained the same. I hated school. When you’re always the new kid, often in the middle of the school year, you tend to be one of three things: ignored, a curiosity, or a target. The first two I could bear, but that last one was always difficult. It wasn’t because I wasn’t able to defend myself. I was more than capable of it, actually. I just wasn’t allowed to defend myself unless it was life or death.

“Keep your head down and don’t get noticed,” Dad said as he dropped me off.

Whatever. I just needed to survive this hell for another three months. Eighteen couldn’t happen fast enough and I was counting the days until my birthday. Then, I could legally do whatever the heck I wanted. Get my driver’s license, a job, rent an apartment, stop freaking moving all the dang time. That was the dream life.

I walked in to the building and was greeted by the typical stink of high school. Boredom and despair covered by too much body spray and a subtle hint of stink that mad me think of a sweaty jock strap. Don’t ask how I know what that smells like. It was horrible.

The office was easy to find and the secretary nearly made me bust out laughing. She had red curly hair piled on the top of her head and secured with an assortment of chopsticks and pens. She wore an off white blouse and a bright green skirt suit, complete with jacket. She had half frame glasses perched halfway down her long, narrow nose, secured with an almost gaudy gold chain around her neck. Her fingers tapped loudly on the keyboard in front of her, her nails several inches long and painted a metallic green color. Overall, she sort of reminded me of a reptile, but a nice one, like a garden lizard or maybe one of those super shy snakes that were the size of your palm.

“Can I help you?” she asked, looking up with a smile that made her almost amber colored eyes brighten.

“I’m new. Fae Young. I was supposed to get my schedule and books,” I said, handing her my registration papers.

“Oh,” she looked at the calendar a little shocked. “Is it Thursday already? My, how time just slips away.”

She took the paperwork and tapped loudly on the computer for a moment before she smiled again.

“There seems to be a small problem with a couple of your classes, so if you take a seat, I’ll get the school’s guidance counselor in here to sort things out,” she said and pointed towards a row of chairs along the wall.

I sat down and let my head fall back to the wall with a gentle thump. I really didn’t want to be here, but if I was going to be stuck here, the office was the one place where I could avoid the general school population.

After a few minutes, an older man with a bald spot on the top of his head that he was trying, and failing, to hide entered the office. He looked... round. He wasn’t overweight, but his gut was a bit rotund from lack of exercise and poor diet. He wore a tweed suit and white shirt, which was incredibly cliche for a teacher and his cheeks were a little rosy. He had the general air of a jovial man, sort of like Santa Claus, without the beard.

“Good morning Miss Fields,” he smiled at the secretary before he looked at me. “You must be Miss Young. I’m Mr. Rhodes, the guidance counselor here at Paul West High. I hear there’s an issue with the classes you signed up for.”

“I wouldn’t know. I just got here,” I said flatly.

“Well, let’s see what we can do about getting it sorted out, shall we?” he smiled and motioned for me to follow him.

We went down a little hallway that had a few offices and conference rooms along the way before we got to the one with a name plate on the door that stated: “Unger Rhodes Guidance Counselor” in big bold letters.

“Unger? Seriously?” I said pointing at the letters.

“An unfortunate family tradition for the second son to inherit the name,” he made a mock horrified face which soon turned into a wicked grin fit for Loki himself. “First born get Siegfried.”

“Ouch,” I grimaced and sat down in the chair in front of the desk while Mr. Rhodes got his computer working.

“I’m eternally grateful I was the second son,” he smiled. “So, it looks like the classes for Science, Math, and your electives are all full. It’s odd that it processed your registration this way. Let’s see if I can’t juggle a few things around first and get you squeezed in.”

He typed and clicked away for a few minutes before he drowned and shook his head.

“I know that the third block Math isn’t full, but for some reason, it’s not letting me put you in the class,” he eyed the screen with clear irritation. “I’ll have to get the IT guys involved, but that could take days. In the meantime, would you be willing to sit in on the advanced classes for the two core subjects?”

“Will it make my GPA suffer?” I asked. Honestly, I couldn’t give half a royal crap about my GPA, but it was a question any normal teenager would ask.

“Not enough to make a difference,” he shook his head. “You shouldn’t be there long enough for it to matter, but we have to have records of you in a class, especially the core subjects.”

“As long as it’s not too long, I guess I’ll make do,” I shrugged.

“Good. Now, your electives are another matter,” he said clicking a few things. “Currently, we have two languages, athletics, art, and music.”

“I’m not athletically inclined,” I made a face and Mr. Rhodes laughed.

“That’s the nicest way I’ve ever heard someone say that,” he said. “You only need one, though.”

“Which languages?”

“French and Spanish,” he squinted at the screen.

“Pass. Let’s do art,” I said.

“Alright,” he said clicking a few more times before his printer came to life. He grabbed a stack of books and took out the Math and Science copies before handing them over. “Here are your books, minus the advanced classes, which you’ll get in the classroom. Your locker number is on your schedule and here’s your lock and combination. Oh, and a map of the school, because this place is kind of a maze until you get used to it.”

I shoved everything into my bag except for the map and schedule and the check in sheet the teachers needed to sign in each class.

“Turn that in at the end of the day and I’ll see you when the system is fixed to rework your schedule, probably next week,” he said and smiled as he stood and lead me back through the hall and opened the door for the office.

I stepped out and was immediately knocked over, barely catching myself on the doorframe as the stars danced in my eyes.

“Ow,” I said, rubbing my forehead after hitting it on whatever just tried to run me over hard enough to leave a small bump already forming.

“Be careful, Zane. You nearly ended up flattening our newest student,” Mr. Rhodes said, slightly annoyed, but still as jolly as ever.

“How the hell was I supposed to know some twig was there?” came the reply. He sounded like his nose was pinched and I looked up to see a blonde haired, blue eyed kid that looked like a mix between football captain and chess club president. And, yes, he was holding his nose and checking to see if it was bleeding.

“I would watch that language if I were you before I have to write you up again,” Mr. Rhodes warned. “Now, what’s the big hurry?”

Mr. Rhodes and Zane went into the office and I couldn’t help the scoff. Not even a faked apology for nearly turning me into a pancake. Rude.

I looked for my locker and got things put away, checking my schedule and smiling a little. My faked transcript said I was average in regular classes when in reality, I was basically on college level courses. I was fluent in Spanish, French, and conversational in German, played a piano decently, sang well enough to not make ears bleed, and could out last nearly anyone in nearly every sport I tried. But, I couldn’t do any of that in high school. Don’t draw attention and stay unnoticed.

This was the first time, ever, that I’ve been in any classes my father didn’t pick himself. It was liberating and made me feel like maybe this school wouldn’t be so terrible after all.

Boy, was I wrong. I learned my lesson not even twenty minutes into the first class of the day that, out of the three options for being the new kid, it was looking like I was going to end up a target. I was tripped on the way to my desk, pushed and shoved in the halls, and it was impossible not to hear the half whispered jokes and poorly concealed giggles every time I walked by anyone and my lunch was “bumped” spilling everything into the floor.

“Pricks,” someone said as they helped me clean up what I could off the floor.

Looking up, I saw the boy from earlier who had nearly given me a concussion.

“Zane, right?” I asked as he picked up my tray and stood.

“Twig,” he grinned, looking like kid with a new toy.

“Fae,” I glared at him.

“Like fairies and stuff? Nice,” he said and handed me the remains of my lunch. “For the record, I’m sorry about running into you. I was kinda in a hurry. You have a remarkably hard head, by the way.”

“Not nearly as hard as your nose,” I frowned as I tossed the ruined food in the garbage and rubbed my still sore forehead.

Zane laughed and dug in his bag, handing me an apple, a granola bar, and a bottle of water.

“I’d start bringing lunch if I were you,” he said, putting his arm around my shoulders and leading me through the cafeteria towards a table with a few other guys. “This place is cliquey as hell and you, little fairy, don’t fit in any of them in any obvious ways. Until you find your circle, minimize the target on your back.”

“It’s Fae, not fairy,” I corrected.

“Like a pixie?” one of the other guys said as Zane pointed out a chair for me.

“Meet Ben,” Zane grinned. He reminded me of a golden retriever, always smiling and happy.

Ben was a little stockier than Zane and had dark brown hair and matching eyes. While Zane had a slightly fair skin tone with a natural looking tan, Ben had olive skin that pointed to some relative being Mediterranean, darkened by a deep tan from lots of time outdoors.

“Blaine, my less attractive twin brother,” Zane pointed to the darker version of himself next to Ben.

Blaine and Zane looked identical, except Blaine had slightly darker hair, darker eyes, and a darker complexion.

“And Nando,” he said, pointing to the guy next to me.

He was pudgy, kind of on the short side, had a mess of black curly hair and droopy, dark brown eyes and was clearly of a Latino descent.

“Fernando, but that’s my deadbeat dad’s name. Call me anything but that,” he smiled and shook my hand.

“Miss Pixie is the new target here at Paul West,” Zane explained.

“Can we not call me that?” I made a face.

“Nope. You’re stuck with it now,” Ben smiled widely.

“Great.”

“What’s your schedule like?” Nando asked.

Thankfully, I ended up with one of the guys in most of my classes, except for AP Algebra and Art. They seemed like my type of people, too. Nice, witty, full of laughter, and quick with a well timed joke.

After lunch wasn’t as horrible. I was still pushed and tripped and gossiped about, but having one of the guys made it difficult to focus on any of it and I got through History class relatively well.

I made it to Algebra, the second to last class of the day, without much incident and even managed to avoid getting tripped on the way to my seat. I was a bit bummed that this class and Art after it didn’t have a familiar face, but I could make it.

Class has just started and I was figuring out where the class was when the door opened and this guy walks in.

He was kind of tall, around six feet three, and had a physique that only came from actual work and not brainless weight lifting. There was a small bulk to him, but toned and obviously more than any athletics department could create. Black hair that was just long enough to be tied back at the nape of his neck had me wishing I knew what shampoo he used because it looked like silk or maybe velvet.

I didn’t even notice that I had been staring a little bit until he looked at me. Holy cheesecake, those bright green eyes were both inviting and terrifying. It kind of hurt, to be honest.

He said nothing as we walked down the rows of desks, not breaking the eye contact I suddenly couldn’t look away from, despite the tiny bit of panic creeping up my spine as he got closer. I felt like I was about to crumple like a soda can by the time he finally looked away and took the seat behind me.

The teacher, who had paused in his lesson when I’ll-Steal-Your-Soul-With-My-Eyes entered, picked up as if nothing had happened at all. In the grand scheme of things, nothing had happened, but my tiny world was shaken senseless.

The bell rang for the end of class and things went back to the hell I was expecting. After the little staring episode, I felt almost numb, like my whole body had fallen asleep, so I wasn’t as quick to catch myself after a particularly vicious shove. I ended up falling backwards, cracking my head on the hard floor hard enough to see stars dancing in a dark tunnel.

“Mother Fluff,” I groaned and reached up to feel for blood or broken bits of skull.

Aside from a splitting headache and what will soon turn into a wicked bump, I was in the clear. I was slowly getting back to my feet when I got my wobbly leg kicked out from under me so, this time, I ended up kissing the floor and tasting blood as the stars renewed their dance.

I felt a strong hand at my elbow and was pulled up and roughly shoved dragged through the hall, which was now, oddly, quiet. I looked around, confused, and nearly choked when Souls Stealer pushed me towards the girls restroom. He looked good. Angry, but incredibly attractive in his dark gray shirt and black jeans.

“Stay out of the way,” he practically growled before stomping away, leaving me to my own devices to clean up the mess that was my face.

Just like that, the spell of silence broke and everyone went to class. I pushed open the door to the bathroom and started cleaning up my face. Busted lip and an annoying cut on the inside of my mouth was the damage and I took a moment to seethe in hatred for all things school. This place sucked.