Sin
Three
Alex
When I got back home from my first day of school, my mom bomb-barded me with questions. 'How were classes? Were people nice? What are the teachers like?' I tried to answer them all to the best of my ability before I went to start on the assignment Mr Armstrong had set us. Whilst I was telling her about my uneventful day, my mind wandered to the skunk-haired smoker; I mean, he was obviously laughing at me for almost tumbling over, but something about him intruiged me. I don't know whether it was the way he held my gaze slightly too long, or the fact that he seemed to stick out too, but in the opposite way that I had already managed. I just felt as though we would get on.
I hurried my way through the music project, getting it done straight away so I didn't have to worry about later. It wasn't anything different to what I normally write, just guitar tabs, but the briefing did say it had to be a 'song', does that mean I'll have to add lyrics?
Shaking my head to get the dilema out of the way, I went downstairs to have supper, dad now back from his late night sermon he had to deliver at the parish. I quickly volunteered to say Grace, ate my food and returned to my room, wanting tomorrow to hurry up.
I was slighly late to my AP math class, courtesy of my art teacher asking me to help clear up at the end of the lesson, only to see that everyone was seated differently to how they were yesterday. My desk was now occupied by a cheerleader who seemed to be re-applying make up, so my eyes scanned the unfamiliar room, landing on the only free seat that was left; it was right at the back of the room in the corner, and there was a boy sitting on the otherside, his bag placed on the seat next to him.
As I walked over, said boy didn't seem to realise I was there as he had his nose in a book that I recognised straight away. Not wanting to scare him, I cleared my throat first before saying "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle? Nice choice!"
He looked up at me timidly, then at the cover of his book. He looked like a lost puppy, he had a chubby, pale face with black glasses perched on the bridge of his nose, and a mop of shaggy blonde hair. "I didn't r-realise anyone at this school had even h-heard of him." He stuttered.
I raised a questionning eyebrow at him, making his week smile fade away, only for it to come back again once I had said "wow really, is not on the syllabus?" He laughed quietly and shook his head, and I noticed the teacher had just come through the door. "Do you mind if I...?" I trailed off, nodding at the seat next to him.
He quickly realised what I was asking and nodded frantically and then turning to me, "I'm Patrick Stump, by the way," he smiled.
"Alexander Gaskarth."
Patrick and I flew through the next hour, this was AP math and Mrs Frith was giving us equations I learnt in grade 5. As it turns out, I quickly made friends with the blonde boy to my right, we just seemed to understand one another and clicked, we liked the same books, had similar grades and wasn't loud like everyone else in this place seemed to be.
Lunch rolled around faster than it had yesterday, but maybe that was because of the built up excitement of not eating my lunch alone today. Patrick met me outside of the cafeteria and sat with me at a small table and I was telling him about how this guy was running laps around everyone else in gym, and then offering to do extra. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not bad at sport and nor do I hate it, I just excel in the academic subjects.
As soon as lunch had started it was over and I was on my way to music class, where Mr Armstrong had his feet propped on his desk and a guitar in his lap, mindlessly strumming away.
I knocked on the door three times and stepped inside. No one else was here yet excluding two girls in the back row. I walked up to the teacher's desk as he placed the acoustic on the stand behind him.
"Sir?" I started, "about the assignment, I've already written the music, but I was wondering if lyrics were essential?"
Mr Armstrong opened his mouth about to speak, when an unfamiliar voice came from beside me, "you've already finnished?" The voice asked in a tone of disbelief.
I looked over to see none other than the skunk-haired smoker, who was sharpening his pencil in the trash can below him. "Uh, yes."
Mr Armstrong walked away at this point to talk to another student, leaving the two of us stood at the front of the class as people filed in.
"You must be Alex, right?" He asked, putting his pencil in the pocket of his black hoodie. "The church boy everyone's been talking about?"
I physically rolled my eyes at this, it was the second day and already people were labelling me. I sighed and admitted defeat, "no one calls me that, it's Alexander, but yeah."
He stepped back for a second before looking at my shirt, then my pants and shoes, then worked his gaze back up to my eyes and he smiled. "You should come and sit with me and my friends," he offered, "I'm Jack by the way."
Wanting to gain my second friend of the day and not wanting to sit by myself, I follwed him over to a small group of guys who he introduced and I immediately forgot the names of.
I took the seat mext to Jack and pretended to listen to what the teacher was saying to the class. My mind was elsewhere, maybe these guys are the wrong sort of people to hang around, I mean, they smoke underage for crying out loud, and the reaction my dad would have if he even knew that I had conversed with people like this wouldn't be good.
Snapping out of it, I tried to focus on the lesson as much as I could without these thoughts flipping through my mind, but Jack burning holes in my back as he watched me out of the corner of his eye made that a whole lot more difficult.
When I got back home from my first day of school, my mom bomb-barded me with questions. 'How were classes? Were people nice? What are the teachers like?' I tried to answer them all to the best of my ability before I went to start on the assignment Mr Armstrong had set us. Whilst I was telling her about my uneventful day, my mind wandered to the skunk-haired smoker; I mean, he was obviously laughing at me for almost tumbling over, but something about him intruiged me. I don't know whether it was the way he held my gaze slightly too long, or the fact that he seemed to stick out too, but in the opposite way that I had already managed. I just felt as though we would get on.
I hurried my way through the music project, getting it done straight away so I didn't have to worry about later. It wasn't anything different to what I normally write, just guitar tabs, but the briefing did say it had to be a 'song', does that mean I'll have to add lyrics?
Shaking my head to get the dilema out of the way, I went downstairs to have supper, dad now back from his late night sermon he had to deliver at the parish. I quickly volunteered to say Grace, ate my food and returned to my room, wanting tomorrow to hurry up.
I was slighly late to my AP math class, courtesy of my art teacher asking me to help clear up at the end of the lesson, only to see that everyone was seated differently to how they were yesterday. My desk was now occupied by a cheerleader who seemed to be re-applying make up, so my eyes scanned the unfamiliar room, landing on the only free seat that was left; it was right at the back of the room in the corner, and there was a boy sitting on the otherside, his bag placed on the seat next to him.
As I walked over, said boy didn't seem to realise I was there as he had his nose in a book that I recognised straight away. Not wanting to scare him, I cleared my throat first before saying "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle? Nice choice!"
He looked up at me timidly, then at the cover of his book. He looked like a lost puppy, he had a chubby, pale face with black glasses perched on the bridge of his nose, and a mop of shaggy blonde hair. "I didn't r-realise anyone at this school had even h-heard of him." He stuttered.
I raised a questionning eyebrow at him, making his week smile fade away, only for it to come back again once I had said "wow really, is not on the syllabus?" He laughed quietly and shook his head, and I noticed the teacher had just come through the door. "Do you mind if I...?" I trailed off, nodding at the seat next to him.
He quickly realised what I was asking and nodded frantically and then turning to me, "I'm Patrick Stump, by the way," he smiled.
"Alexander Gaskarth."
Patrick and I flew through the next hour, this was AP math and Mrs Frith was giving us equations I learnt in grade 5. As it turns out, I quickly made friends with the blonde boy to my right, we just seemed to understand one another and clicked, we liked the same books, had similar grades and wasn't loud like everyone else in this place seemed to be.
Lunch rolled around faster than it had yesterday, but maybe that was because of the built up excitement of not eating my lunch alone today. Patrick met me outside of the cafeteria and sat with me at a small table and I was telling him about how this guy was running laps around everyone else in gym, and then offering to do extra. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not bad at sport and nor do I hate it, I just excel in the academic subjects.
As soon as lunch had started it was over and I was on my way to music class, where Mr Armstrong had his feet propped on his desk and a guitar in his lap, mindlessly strumming away.
I knocked on the door three times and stepped inside. No one else was here yet excluding two girls in the back row. I walked up to the teacher's desk as he placed the acoustic on the stand behind him.
"Sir?" I started, "about the assignment, I've already written the music, but I was wondering if lyrics were essential?"
Mr Armstrong opened his mouth about to speak, when an unfamiliar voice came from beside me, "you've already finnished?" The voice asked in a tone of disbelief.
I looked over to see none other than the skunk-haired smoker, who was sharpening his pencil in the trash can below him. "Uh, yes."
Mr Armstrong walked away at this point to talk to another student, leaving the two of us stood at the front of the class as people filed in.
"You must be Alex, right?" He asked, putting his pencil in the pocket of his black hoodie. "The church boy everyone's been talking about?"
I physically rolled my eyes at this, it was the second day and already people were labelling me. I sighed and admitted defeat, "no one calls me that, it's Alexander, but yeah."
He stepped back for a second before looking at my shirt, then my pants and shoes, then worked his gaze back up to my eyes and he smiled. "You should come and sit with me and my friends," he offered, "I'm Jack by the way."
Wanting to gain my second friend of the day and not wanting to sit by myself, I follwed him over to a small group of guys who he introduced and I immediately forgot the names of.
I took the seat mext to Jack and pretended to listen to what the teacher was saying to the class. My mind was elsewhere, maybe these guys are the wrong sort of people to hang around, I mean, they smoke underage for crying out loud, and the reaction my dad would have if he even knew that I had conversed with people like this wouldn't be good.
Snapping out of it, I tried to focus on the lesson as much as I could without these thoughts flipping through my mind, but Jack burning holes in my back as he watched me out of the corner of his eye made that a whole lot more difficult.
Notes
I'm loving the reponse to this so far, when we're only a few chapters in! So thank you thank you THANK YOU!
-BringMeBarakat
Still miss this story so much :(
5/25/18