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Mary-Go-Round
by Razor To Rosary
Chapter 1 - He’s not Lewis!
Sitting in a Philosophy class in the beginning of the afternoon – a very hot afternoon – is not exactly one of my favorite things to do. I mean, I don’t dislike Philosophy (I would be murdered if I said that out loud), but it’s much more enjoyable when you can hear the rain pouring outside.
I felt a finger poking me in the back. I looked at the professor, who had given us a task and was currently very concentrated on some papers that lay on his desk, before I looked back.
“Have you noticed the guy’s shirt is longer in the front than in the back?”
“Nora!”
She giggled. “Seriously, Mare! Look at it.”
I turned and looked at the professor’s shirt as discreetly as possible. I didn’t see nothing wrong with it, though. I frowned and turned back again.
“Shut up and work.” I told Nora.
“Actually, that’s another one.” She said, before I had the chance to turn to my own desk again. “I have a doubt in some questions.”
I looked at the professor again. He usually didn’t mind me helping classmates.
“What questions?” I asked, looking back at Nora.
“Out of the four, and by order, numbers 1, 2, 3 and 4.”
I emitted a noise that some would call a groan, picking up my pencil from my table.
“Number one is in this paragraph.” I said, underlining said paragraph in the page in from of her, even though it was upside down to me.
“You’re an angel.” She said.
“Yeah...”
I turned back to my own textbook, and started underlining a couple of sentences to answer question number 3. About ten minutes later I had finished my task, underlined two more paragraphs for Nora and had nothing else to do. As usually I doodled on the last page of my notebook.
“Professor, it’s time!” Fred said from the back of the room.
This meant there were ten minutes left till the end of the class. After half a year in school, Fred still did that, hoping one day some professor would actually fall for it. Everyone ignored him. I decided to do questions 5 and 6 as well and finished them with two minutes left.
“Your homework is what you haven’t finished, plus questions 5 and 6.” The professor said as I was looking at my watch. “You can leave now.”
An avalanche of people precipitated towards the door (avalanche... such a nice metaphor with this unbearable heat). I took my time, as always, and had to pack my things with Nora tugging at my shirt, as always.
“Come on, come on!” she said impatiently. I took one last look at the professor to say goodbye, and this time I noticed: his shirt was shorter in the front than in the back. I smiled to myself. As soon as we were out of the classroom and walking (or in Nora’s case, jumping) down the stairs, she sighed loudly. “I can’t believe we have three more to do...”
“I finished all of mine.” I said, calmly.
“You’re too smart for your own good.” She said. By that time we were leaving the building into the school outdoor premises. “Damn! I think my brain is going to get fried.”
She pulled her bang of black hair out of her forehead as much as she could, but it always went back, reaching her eyebrows. Her long sleek hair was tied up in a pony tail, as usually. She was wearing her favourite jeans (plain blue, ripped on the knees) and a pair of Nike sneakers. Today’s t-shirt read: ‘You lost me at hello.’
My own top had no funny sayings. It was a tank top that looked like a worn out Argentina National Soccer team shirt. My jeans were darker than hers and just a little ripped in a few places, not completely though. I wore my dark blue All Stars (can’t live without them).
I searched mine and her wrists for an elastic band I could use on my hair, but found none. Why didn’t I remember to bring one this morning? I had to do a pony tail with my hands and rest my wavy dark brown hair on my right shoulder. When it felt too hot, I’d have to change sides.
“Let’s go get something to eat, Sophia’s probably there already.” Nora said. I agreed and followed her. By there, she meant the school bar, where we would usually find Sophia, our other best friend, watching her boyfriend gobble down 90 per cent of the food available. And he didn’t look a pound overweight, which annoyed me profusely. It might have something to do with the fact that he’s in the school soccer and track teams, and trains his ass off, but I don’t care. It’s still not fair. But what the hay – I was not the type to worry about my weight. I wasn’t skinny, and I tried to eat healthy (most of the times), but it wasn’t my number one concern. Not even it top ten, really.
When we reached the bar we were greeted by Sophia’s gleaming smile and a grunt from Johnny, who was currently very focused on a ketchup bottle.
“Hey, guys!” she said after we sat. They were on the same side of the table, while we sat opposite. “Philosophy, right?”
“What tipped you off, the boredom in my face or that special expression that I keep for homework?” Nora said. I giggled.
“I don’t have any homework.”
“Hip, hip, hurray.” Nora replied, with the most dispirited tone she could find.
“For me, you talk-” Sophia started, only to be immediately cut off by Nora.
“AND I DON’T LISTEN, because I have My Chemical Romance lyrics pouring out of my ears by now!” She said, covering her ears with both of her index fingers.
“Come, on! How could I pass on ‘Hip, hip, hurray’?” She asked, looking mockingly outraged.
“Yeah, you should know better, Nore.” Johnny said, holding a french fry on the way to his mouth.
“No one asked you anything.” Nora said, raising her hand as to cover his face.
“Come on.” I finally intervened, addressing Sophia. She got up and walked with me to the line. “Have you already eaten?” I asked as I picked up mine and Nora’s lunch (which consisted in two sandwiches, a bag of chips, a coke for her and an Ice Tea for me) and placed it on a food tray.
“Yep. Mrs. Porter let us leave a bit early.” She said, as I gave the cashier my school card. “I snagged a few fries from Johnny’s tray too.”
We both smiled. I took my card back and we walked to the table, where Nora and Johnny were still arguing, apparently over their own music tastes. I put Nora’s sandwich right under her nose, and it still took her about five seconds to realise it was there. After another five seconds of looking at it – rather dumbly, I should say – she picked it up and started to unwrap it.
“So stupid, bless her.” I said as I opened her can of coke.
“I don’t think they even noticed we were gone!” Sophia stated.
“Of course I noticed!” Johnny took the opening – Nora can’t yell with her mouth full – and put his arm around Sophia’s shoulders. “You know I can’t be away from you for more than one second!”
She shook her head at his innocent expression. I took a bite of my sandwich as they kept looking at each other.
Sophia was wearing her baggy worn out jeans and that black spaghetti strap top with a grey skull that she loves so much. When we were in line I noticed she was wearing black flip flops. Her dirty blonde hair was currently streaked a lighter blond, brown and black and she had a simple black head band in the middle of her head – it wasn’t so much to keep her hair back as to simply decorate. Her blue-green irises were linked to Johnny’s brown ones. His dark hair was spiked up in his usual fauxhawk (Sophia had once told me he looked a lot like Mikey Way, and I nodded, even though I had no idea who Mikey Way was) and he was also wearing worn out jeans and a T-shirt of a band I didn’t know.
When Nora and I finished eating we still had fifteen minutes left of our lunch break.
“Do you guys have an elastic band?” Sophia asked us. “I can’t stand this heat!”
“No, I wish I had one for myself!” I answered. I gathered my hair in my hands again, this time laying it on my left shoulder.
“Hey, we still have loads of time until our next class.” Nora said, looking at her watch. “Let’s go do something.”
“Yeah, let’s go.” Sophia said. She leaned to give Johnny a peck in the cheek. “See ya.”
“Bye!” He told us all as we got up. He wouldn’t be alone for too long though; as we left the bar we saw a bunch of his friends coming in smelling strongly like cigarettes. Johnny had stopped going on their visits to the nearby park when Sophia asked him to. This only happened at the beginning of this school year though – Sophia and Johnny had started going out last year.
We walked silent for a while. Us three were a pretty close group: me and Sophia had known each other since kindergarten and we met Nora on the third grade. We have a lot of acquaintances – Sophia and Nora mostly, since I’m kinda shy – but true friends, it’s just us three. Johnny had fitted nicely into the group: Sophia’s head over heels, Nora has someone to argue with (it’s a sport to her) and I find it nice to talk to him.
“There’s that guy again!” Nora suddenly said.
“What guy?” I asked, looking at where she seemed to be looking.
“That guy!” she said, as it was very obvious. Then she sighed at mine and Sophia’s confused expressions. “The guy we saw, like, two days ago.” Still nothing. “That looked like Lewis Gavin!”
“Oh!” I said, rather loudly. Sophia looked at us like we were freaks. I laughed. “She wasn’t with us, remember?”
“Oh, that’s right.” Nora admitted. “It’s just this guy that really, really looks like that soccer player Mary likes, Lewis Gavin.” Sophia’s expression changed from confused to more confused, then to slight recognition, and then-
“Oh! Oh, yeah.” She turned to where we were looking, rummaging through all the people there to find the so called guy. As she did, she ran her fingers over her somewhat bushy eyebrows – it was an old tic.
“I don’t see him.” She finally said. I hadn’t seen him myself.
“Nora, he didn’t look that much like Lewis.” I said. “And I don’t see him anywhere.”
“He’s right there!” Nora insisted. “And he looks just like him, too. You didn’t get a proper look”
“That one?” Sophia asked all of a sudden, squinting at a group of boys.
“Yes!” Nora raised her arms in victory.
“The one with the blue shirt?”
“What?” Nora frowned. “No! Who are you talking about?”
“Yeah, I can see that...” I said, looking at said guy.
“No, it’s the one standing next to him!”
I raised my eyebrows at her. ‘Blue-shirt’ was surrounded by six or seven boys. “Can you be a little more specific?”
She sighed impatiently. “The one with the orange shirt.”
Me and Sophia exchanged an irritated look.
“The one with his back to us?” I asked, gloomily.
“Yeah.” Nora said, rather matter-of-factly.
It was my turn to sigh. “Let’s just go. People are starting to look.”
It wasn’t very rare that we had to rush out of a crowded place because people were starting to look. Nora can be a little loud, and it’s up to me and Sophia to make sure she calms down. People who know her are used to it, but strangers often stare. She doesn’t care though – but us two don’t really like having everyone looking at us like we were freaks.
We just walked around the school, talking, like we usually did. While the girls were again absorbed into a talk about My Chemical Romance, I just looked around at the people around us, thinking. It would be pretty nice if there actually was a boy who looked like Lewis Gavin. What I called a crush, Nora called an obsession – but I’m not really obsessed! I just like the guy. He’s a player in my soccer team – a very cute player. And I had only one poster of him on my bedroom walls, unlike some people who had covered their own walls with posters of Daniel Radcliffe and a guy I supposed to be the lead singer of My Chemical Romance.
As I was wondering if that was the so called Mikey Way, I heard someone call my name in the distance.
“Mary! Mary, Sophia!”
I turned back and the girls turned back with me, only to see mine and Sophia’s Biology teacher running behind us, carrying little short of what seemed to be a hundred things, as she usually did.
“Hi, Mrs. Ollinder.” I greeted. “Do you need help with those?”
“Oh, you didn’t need to... Well, I suppose I could use a little help...”
She quickly deposited two sacs in mine and Sophia’s hands, clearly intending to so from the very beginning. Then she looked at Nora.
“Would you mind taking some too, sweetheart? You’re in Helena’s class, aren’t you? Lovely teacher. She told me you’re already in chapter seven! We’re still starting the sixth. But Helena does know how to keep her class disciplined-”
While she talked she gave Nora two sacs identical to ours without even giving her time to answer. She looked at us quizzically. We just smirked. She kept talking during the whole exchange.
“-but Ruben isn’t experimenting on leaves either.”
“Professor?” Sophia interrupted, cautiously.
“Yes?” She asked, seeming to come out of a trance.
“Do you need us to take these somewhere?”
“Oh, yes, yes.” She started walking and we followed her. “These are some plants I picked up from my garden for our lab experiments. In the 8th grade, you know? Darling little things, always so excited about classes in the lab...”
She kept talking the whole way. I walked beside her, nodding when I thought it was suited – Sophia and Nora followed a little behind. We passed Johnny and his friends. He laughed at us, careful enough not to let the teacher notice. Sophia sticked her tongue out at him.
“Well, here we are!” she said when we reached the building in which the practical classes took place. I had some classes there myself and I liked it, it was light blue and much better illuminated than the rest of the buildings in the school. “Thank you for your help, girls!”
“You’re welcome.” We responded at the same time, right after we left the bags on her desk. We then left to the sunny outdoors again. It was still awfully hot, so we stood at the doorway, partially in the shadow.
“What was that?” Nora asked, looking somewhat traumatized.
“Our Biology teacher.” Sophia said. Nora was obviously going to make a less than nice remark, but I didn’t give her time to.
“She’s a little ADD, but she’s the nicest teacher we’ve got.” I stated. Sophia nodded.
“ADD? I’d say G-A-G-A’s a bit more like it.” She looked at her watch. “We’d better get going, we’ve got two minutes ‘til our classes start.”
“I got English.” Sophia said.
“That’s my way – Spanish.” Nora replied.
“I have Math right across the street.” I said, slightly swinging my head at the building opposite to the one we were in. “See you next break!”
They rushed the way we had come. I pulled my hair to my right shoulder while I watched them go and started walking towards the building. I glanced sideways for a second and my eyes were caught by a boy standing there – I could swear I was staring at Lewis Gavin’s younger brother. He was talking to one of his friends, and then he looked at the place I was standing in. I quickly looked away, but not before registering the fact that he was wearing an orange t-shirt. Damn! I can’t let Nora find him again.
Math was rather uneventful – a practice class. I finished everything I had to do early and allowed myself to stare dreamily out the window. That boy did look an awful lot like Lewis – for once, Nora hadn’t exaggerated.
“Mary, have you finished?” The professor took me away from my musings.
“Hum? Oh, yes I have.”
“Would you mind going to the blackboard and write the correction?” she asked.
“No, not at all.”
As I finished writing, the professor gave the homework and dismissed the class. I quickly rubbed my right palm with my left to get rid of the chalk and took note of the homework in my notebook. As I left, a bunch of students were coming in – it wasn’t rare to see students enter classrooms in the beginning of the break, as they often used it to deliver papers or clarify doubts with teachers. I had the impression someone in orange passed me by, but shrugged it off and attributed it to self-suggestion.
Nora was already waiting for me outside the building.
“Why am I the only one leaving classes on time today?” I asked.
“Ha ha. It’s a privilege of us dummies.” She answered cheerfully.
“Where’s Sophia?”
“Out in the sports field – Johnny’s playing.”
She didn’t have to add that last bit. Sophia loved to watch Johnny play and took every chance she had to do it. When we got to the field, she was yelling her lungs out. As he was waiting for us, as soon as we sat down next to her, he scored a magnificent goal. Very Lewis Gavin like, I’d say. As he always did, even in afternoon-ten-minute-break games like this, he pointed at Sophia, dedicating the goal to her. She beamed and cheered louder.
“Do you realise how corny that is?” Nora asked.
“Shut up!” Sophia said, slapping her in the arm without even looking. Her smile never faltered. Nora looked at me and shrugged, putting her index finger against her temple and rolling it. I chuckled.
The next class we had was Chemistry – the only class we all had together. Today it was going to be practical class so it was in the big blue building we had been to earlier.
It was a fun class. In groups of four, we had to use what we had learned in the previous class to separate several mixtures. A really nice girl called Ines joined us. As soon as the teacher gave us our mixtures and left, Nora looked at me gingerly.
“Well... do your thing.” She said, pointing at the materials.
“You are so lazy.” Sophia said, frowning at her, but still smiling. “What do we do?” She asked, turning back at me.
I explained them what we had to do and we did pretty well, since they did what I said and Ines wasn’t a bad student either. We finished just in time, ten minutes before the class ended – the professor wanted us to clean everything afterwards.
When we were leaving the building, Nora, who was between me and Sophia, suddenly pulled us together.
“There he is!” she said, in her best conspiracy tone. “Lewis!”
“He’s not Lewis!” I said, frowning slightly.
“He might as well be. They’re exactly alike!”
“No, they’re-”
“Actually,” Sophia started, looking at the boy with the orange shirt Nora had spotted, “they are!”
“What if he was actually called Lewis?” Nora asked, sounding very excited.
“He’s not called Lewis.” I retorted.
“You don’t know that!” she insisted. “For what we know, he could be.”
“Let’s drop the subject, shall we?” I was getting rather impatient – Nora could be pestering at times.
“But I’m curious-”
“Let’s go!”
“I thought you liked him!”
“Yeah, I thought I was the one who liked him!”
“Oh, for cryin’ out loud!” Sophia suddenly bursted. “Do you want to know his name?”
“No!” I said pleadingly, but Nora’s voice overpowered mine. “YES!”
“Fine. I’ll go there and ask him!” Sophia said. And she started walking towards him and his friends, leaving me behind with my jaw inches away from the floor and Nora looking expectant.
I watched her approaching, and as soon as she reached them, I shrieked and hid behind Nora.
“Very mature.”
“Shut up!” I was still looking, over Nora’s shoulder. “I can’t believe she’s doing this!” I wasn’t definitely the type to do something spontaneous like this – the idea of just approaching a boy and asking his name like that, out of the blue, made me shiver.
A few moments later Sophia started walking back to us. When arrived, Nora looked at her impatiently. “So?” she asked.
“Rick.” Sophia simply said.
“There!” I said, a bit more loud than needed. “Happy now?” I didn’t give her time to answer as I just started pushing them both to the opposite direction. “Let’s go!”
They were a bit startled, but I didn’t stop pushing until we had passed the corner the building I had had Math in earlier and were out of sight.
Before you ask, I do know who Mikey Way is - you're talking to a MCR fan here! And Lewis Gavin is not a real soccer player, he was invented by me (although I took inspiration from an actual player...) Also, the title has a reason to be that will be revealed later - besides the fact that Mary is obviously the main female character. Oops - did I say main female character? I meant main character period. Eh he.
Any questions, comments or suggestions? All are welcome, including some constructive criticism.
Oh, would you be ever so kind as to check out my one-shot, Look at me? It hasn't had many readers...
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the brands mentioned in this story, I just own my characters and the plot! I don't own Mikey Way or any other members of My Chemical Romance (unfortunately!) or their songs either.
Hope you liked this chapter! I'll post the second one soon, hopefully! Don't forget to review.
Barbara
