Chapter 1: Lunch From Hell

AN: Ok now it gets good guys. A summary of my life! Read and weep…

Kat was hunched over at the lunch table, staring deep down at the food in front of her. A box of chicken fingers, a bottle of fruit punch, and a case of French fries. School lunch. It cost her three bucks.

Beside her, Kat’s friends argued loudly and obnoxiously.

“It’s an imperfect subjunctive infinitive!” Suz said.

“It is not!” Ray shot back defiantly.

“It most definitely is!”

“No it isn’t!”

“Why not?”

Kat closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead. She had no clue what an imperfect subjunctive infinitive was. However, it must have been Latin-related, because they had their textbooks opened.

“It so is!” Ray said, frustrated and flipping through the book. “I’ll show you!” She skimmed through the index with her finger, and then made frantically for a section near the middle of the book.

Suz watched as her friend scouted for unimportant information, gnawing on the end of a peanut butter granola bar.

Finally Ray seemed to arrive at an answer, but it apparently was the one she didn’t want to see, because she started to frown.

Upon seeing Ray’s new countenance, Kat dropped the French fry that she had been about to devour and stood up. Across the table, Lizzy and Jen stood up and started to turn around to walk off. “Wait!” Kat stopped them and ran around the table to them. “I’ll go with you.” If Ray was mad about something, chances are someone was going to get hurt, and it would probably be her. So she might as well make a break for it.

Lizzy made a . face and clapped her hands together. Jen shrugged and stole a French fry from Ray, who was too busy yelling at Suz to notice or care, and the three headed off to grab more grub.

Kat stood in the middle of a large bustling line of teenagers, watching the cooks behind the big metal food racks. Every time one of the giant oven doors was opened, a wave of steam and aroma punched her in the face, making her skin hot.

Lizzy came up from behind her, happily eating tater tots out of the box. The rule was not to eat the food in line, so of course, everyone ate the food in line. Another oven was opened, and this time, several pizzas were slid onto the racks: first cheese, then pepperoni, then mushroom. “Les champignons,” Kat said as she watched the grease bubble with disgust.

“The what?” Jen asked.

“Les champignons,” Kat repeated herself. “Mushrooms.” Then she turned away.

“Oh,” Jen shrugged, “Aren’t you hungry?”

“Starving,” Kat threw over her shoulder. “But I don’t feel like gaining ten pounds today.”

A girl at the counter next to them, who had just lifted up a pizza onto her tray, watched Kat walk away, then down at her food with a new expression of distaste.

Back at the Loser Lunch Table, Kat listened to Ray brag about a high score on the National Latin Exam. The noise from all the loud, obnoxious, chattery students gathered into one big room was starting to close in on Kat, going deep into her ears, slowly crushing her skull. She brought a hand up to her forehead, as if that would help in the least. A migraine was about to take over. Usually they weren’t so bad, nothing that a cool refreshing drink couldn’t take care of. But sometimes they were so horrible, they would render her practically unconscious on a cot in the nurse’s office all day, feeling like a giant blind vegetable.

Feeling another headache coming on, Kat slowly rose to her feet and trudged out of the cafeteria. The nearest water fountain was in the hallway just outside. Pushing some loose hair from her face, Kat stooped to get a drink just outside the bathrooms. She would have preferred to buy a soda at one of the nearby vending machines, but they were all locked up during the day so no one could buy anything until two thirty. It was like having someone wave a cookie in front of her face and saying “Ha ha! You can’t have it ‘cause you’re FAT!” This was one of the school’s many means of indirectly tormenting the students.

Another way was making the girl’s bathroom blue and the boys red.

Anyways, Kat was refreshing herself with the relatively cool water, when she heard footsteps approaching from the right. She straightened up and swallowed the water, savoring the chill because it was a relatively warm day, and turned around to see who was coming, just out of curiosity.

Instantly she froze. It was a reflex that she had developed over the course of the school year: triggered like the push of a button, and the finger that pushed that button belonged to Him.

Like a UD god, He strolled slowly down the hallway. He looked so casual, so sure of Himself, like He belonged there. This was something that Kat’s particularly low self-esteem refused to let her believe. If he were to stand up in the cafeteria and announce that he was leaving for his next class, everyone would shout goodbye, or at least that’s what Kat thought would happen. It wasn’t because he had enough confidence and self-reliability to cover everyone in the school. He didn’t have the best grades but, hey, He seemed to know what he was doing.

Kat stood there gaping for a couple seconds before she realized what she was doing. She quickly grabbed at the button on the water fountain and stuck her face in the arch of water, while at the same time watching Him out of the corner of her eyes. He stopped right next to the school store, and crouched down, placing his bottle of Snapple on the floor next to Him as He tied his shoe. In the five seconds that He was doing this, Kat had partially turned her back to Him and pretended to be interested in a poster on the wall advertising a bake sale, possibly the five thousandth one to happen at the high school. While staring at a picture of a colorful cupcake made out of construction paper, Kat found her heart rate increasing as He took a drink from the water fountain two feet to her left. She tried to calm herself, but to no avail. He crossed over to her right and now stood five feet from her, looking at a poster listing next years sports with the most dignified air, as if to say, “I’m me, I’m here, move.”

Kat started to cross her arms, but then suddenly realized that crossed arms often represented a desire to be left alone, and she didn’t want to give Him that message. She settled for taking a braid of her hair and twirling it around. Over at her side, He leaned toward the poster, running a finger down the list and mumbling quietly to Himself.

She took another drink from the fountain and looked at a Spanish Club poster next, even though she understood little of it because she took French. Instead, Kat wondered if it would be a good idea to talk to Him. Lots of other girls did. They flirted with Him like it was a sport and they were at the Olympics trying to win a gold medal. She could never see herself doing that, mostly because she was too shy. When was the last time she had flirted with a guy?

Never mind. She would walk past Him on the way back to the cafeteria. She’d smile at Him, maybe toss her hair a little and say, “Hey, what’s up?” What His reaction would be, she didn’t know. That was up to Him. However, Kat planned to just keep walking and not look back. Hopefully that would make her look less desperate. If she kept glancing back, He might suspect something and maybe correctly guess her feelings. Maybe.

Slowly, Kat turned around to carry out those plans before her sane personality could protest. If she dedicated too much thought to it, she would get nervous and chicken out at the last second. She turned around and started to walk in His direction. Then she stopped.

He was gone.

“Shit,” Kat muttered under her breath. “Aw, shit!” She ran a hand over the back of her head, then down one of her braids. Things like this always happened to her. An unexpected turn of events. But Kat found that she couldn’t be angry. Maybe it was for the better. It could have saved her from humiliation. Nevertheless, it was a missed chance, and it disappointed her. She stomped back into the cafeteria.

“God, you look thrilled,” said Cherry monotonously, popping a tater tot into her mouth as Kat flopped down at the table.

“Do I?” Kat pushed a braid behind her ear and sighed exasperatedly.

Cherry stared at her, "...yeah.”

"Long story," she looked at Lizzy, "But I think you know the reason."

Her friend's face twisted up in puzzlement. "I do?"

Kat's eyes drifted across the cafeteria, past Lizzy's shoulder. Lizzy twisted around in her seat and followed Kat's gaze to see Him standing near the table of sauce dispensers, talking to a few of his buddies. Both girls watched Him for a minute, then Lizzy turned around and rolled her eyes. "Did he ignore you again?"

Kat nodded slowly and depressedly while sipping from a box of Hi-C, like one of the girl's whose hearts had been broken on a soap opera.

"Oh no!" Lizzy frowned, her eyes full of sympathy. "Did you talk to him?"

Kat dropped the juice box in front of her and folded her hands across her knees. She leaned against the table and shook her head quickly.

"Do you want me to go talk to him for you?" Lizzy prompted.

Another shake.

"Why not?"

Kat took another drink of juice, then looked at the clock on the wall, "Because if He finds out I sent you, He'll just think I'm a stupid little preteen who can't talk to a member of the opposite sex without blushing!"

Lizzy rolled her eyes, "Oh come on! You don't really think that's the way his mind works, do you?"

A couple spots down the table, Jen piped up. "He's a high school guy. They don't follow any set thinking patterns."

Lizzy made a happy anime face . "I'm sure they say the same about us females."

"Oh believe me, they do," Jen stood up and picked up her tray and empty fry container. She left to throw out her trash, then drifted over to another table to socialize with other friends.

Lizzy watched her go, mouth open in a position as if she were about to say something, then shrugged slightly and dipped a fry into a container of ketchup. "Don't ask me what she means by that, cause I don't know." Kat nodded slowly as if she only half understood.

At that moment, a shadow fell across the table and over Kat. She slowly turned around and looked up, coming face to face with Suz. The energetic girl/teen held a piece of paper in her hand and had a gigantic smile plastered across her face. Kat felt herself almost blinded by the shiny metal of the braces. "Suz!" Kat clapped her hands together. "Whadda ya want?"

Suz gave her a big smile. Then she shoved the piece of paper into Kat's chest. "Read read read read read!" she chanted.

"Ok, ok...what is this?" Kat unfolded the paper.

"Read, read, read-"

"Alright already!!!!" Kat yelled, frustrated. "I heard you the first time! Not the eighth!"

"Sorry!" Suz clamped her hands behind her back and grinned. "Read it! Read it!"

Kat flew to her feet and chased Suz across the cafeteria, fists clenched. "Shut up!" she shouted.

Suz disappeared into a crowd of people, presumably the lunch line. Sorry that she had been so bitchy, Kat stood scanning the cafeteria for her little friend for a few seconds, then gave up and turned on her heels to go back to the table-

-and walked smack dab into Him. He was standing by the vending machine, having just purchased another Snapple iced tea, and was taking a good long swig. When she walked into Him, she didn't know who it was until He started to gag on the drink. When realization hit, she was horrified. All she could do was stand there and watch Him cough while one of his friends slapped him on the back. She was about to start apologizing, when she instead clamped a hand over her mouth and ran away, seeking retreat amongst the rest of her friends. She tried to conceal it, but she knew her face was bright red. Kat melted into her seat and buried her head in her arms, not daring to look back up and assess the scene from which she had just emerged.

The reason she hadn’t said anything was because she had hoped that He wouldn’t notice her. Kat didn’t want to reveal herself as the one who had caused her lover boy to start choking on his Snapple in the middle of the lunch room. Hopefully, no one had noticed either. Kat could just imagine lifting her head off the table and being met with a cold stare from everyone in the room, while He stood there, leaning on his friend for support and pointing a trembling accusing finger her way, shouting “It was her! The murderer!” His voice would probably still be weak from having just recovered from a bad coughing fit.

“Are you alright?” Cherry and Leigh were giving her concerned looks.

Kat slowly sat up and pushed her braids behind her shoulders. She had to start getting control over herself. “Do I really want to end up like one of those preppy girls who winds up getting pregnant at seventeen because they don’t know what they’re doing?” She thought. “No I don’t. I’ll wait until I’m eighteen.” A little humor never hurt. “Yeah, I’m fine,” she mumbled.

Cherry shrugged. Leigh stood up, accidentally knocked Meg’s purse off the table, and got into a mini catfight. “Thou shalt not tamper with the Holy Duck Tape Bag!” Meg exclaimed, referring to the bag that she had made, supposedly, out of half a roll of duck tape. At that time, the bell rang, and the chaos of the lunchroom doubled as people got to their feet. The pushing and shoving fits of the immature adolescents, who were famous at UD, officially began here.

Kat’s eyes slowly scanned the crowds, looking for a certain somebody. When she finally found Him, He was moving across the other side of the room with His friends. She poked Lizzy and said goodbye, then grabbed her bag and ran towards the hallway, hoping to catch up with Him. Unfortunately, Suz followed her, which really wasn’t part of the plan. Maybe she could still keep herself from getting into another sticky situation with the guy, like the Snapple incident. If so, then she might have a life after all.

AN: No I definitely have no life mutters about being obsessed Review folks! D