Chapter One

The clock on the wall clicked away the seconds, and I watched and counted down until the end of my dismal class. I sat there and clenched my fists in my lap, and resisted the urge to rip it down and shove it down my teacher's throat. I looked at it again. It did nothing but stare back, almost mocking me, daring me to do it. I groaned and looked away.

AP Calculus. The most boring class ever conceived in the history of… well… ever. But the thing that takes the cake would be Mr. Harve. He was tall and stood hunched, resembling something along the lines of an over-grown stork. He had slightly slanted brown eyes and a somewhat beaky nose.

Moving on.

I am Marquin Brinsely, female genius extraordinaire. You can call me Mark. I am age seventeen and in my senior year of high school.

Oh, and I'm breathtakingly beautiful.

Not.

I am average looking at best. I had coarse, thick brown hair that fell to my butt, but I always wore it in a ponytail. My dad always told me that the waves that the mop fell in were breathtakingly gorgeous. I would always laugh. And then I would shrug, which usually caused him to stalk off and mutter about how the younger generation had absolutely no regard for anyone.

My face is oval-like in shape, but oddly angular in some ways. If I turned my head to the side, my nose stuck out slightly and looked much more pointed than it actually was. My brother would me about it quite often, which irked me beyond reason. My forehead isn't too long, which I suspected was a rather nice feature I had, and my mouth was average sized with average lips. I have large almond-shaped eyes that are a deep emerald green, which my mother always said was the most beautiful color in the world. Personally, I find the color exceedingly boring and dull. I always wanted eyes that were the color of the ocean or mysterious brown. My skin is kind of pale, or pallid, as one of my younger sister so blatantly put it. I have a few freckles too.

I am… sort of shapely, but definitely no as busty as some of the other girls in my grade. You know the ones who diet and work-out until they have a body that resembles something from Greek mythology.

My style consisted of two things, jeans and T-shirts. Due to my not-so-diminutive height of five-foot-nine, the majority of that being almost all leg, and my slender build, I have trouble buying jeans. When I find a pair that actually fits me decently in length and stride, the waist turns out to be large enough to fit a sumo wrestler. And then there's the pair where the waist fits, but the length of them makes me look like some washer-incompetent loser who has shrunk her clothes more than enough times over.

So what do I do?

I like to be comfortable, not smothered. I can't stand how the women of our world today flaunt their bodies with tight and skimpy tops that show you enough to where a guy wouldn't have to pay to see more.

Get my drift?

Moving on.

I am a genius. I am the highest ranked student in the school (with my brother Charlie right behind) and have a perfect four-point-oh GPA. I take all of the hardest classes that the school offers and I can quote quadratic functions and spout nuclear theories off of the top of my head.

Not to brag, or anything.

Which brings me back to my class. Did I mention that my Calculus class is boring? Beyond boring? Even, dare I say, horrendously boring? All Mr. Harve does is lecture. Lecture and then lecture some more, ask for any questions and then get mad whenever a student doesn't understand the material.

And all I ever do is sit back and wonder, to the almighty lord, why on Earth do they not get it? Is the concept of math too hard for their miniscule brains to comprehend?

I sigh.

Of course.

They're socialites. They have lives outside of school.

I'm the booker. I'd rather have my head immersed in the intricate details and equations of my Advanced Physics II book than mingle with actual… people.

Did… I mention… that I have no friends? None whatsoever? The fact that I never have and never will?

Oh, and did I mention that I am practically invisible to the naked eye? There are times that I believe one would have to use the most powerful electron microscope in the world to find me on this murky, dull planet. My teachers don't know who I am, let alone the students in any of my classes.

I am nothing but a sad and pathetic being. I waste the precious O2 molecules that we have left in the air with my mere existence.

So…

Back to the clock.

It showed two minutes until twelve-twelve. I sighed and dropped my head onto the desk. Despite the fact that the impact of my skull on the hardwood made a rather loud noise (thud if you will), no one looked up and out of their own little worlds.

See? Invisible I am.

Not to mention I was then sporting a rather bad bump on my forehead.

The clock still showed one minute.

Mr. Harve sat straight-backed in his chair, typing on his computer keyboard with blinding speed. This implied that he must have been late on giving his editor his latest short story for the next issue of the Sci-Fi magazine, The Wooz-World. Surprisingly, he was a decent writer.

Suddenly, the shrill of the class bell shot through the air, and I smiled. I don't think I had ever been happier to hear the bell.

In short, my lunch period was my salvation— food makes everything better.

But I had to make it there first.

I must say, the mere task of trying to navigate the hallways during the passing periods was like trying to nail your hands to the walls— a painful and rather bothersome experience.

I ducked out of the way of Mrs. Carrie, who is still trying to recruit me for upcoming UIL competitions, and came to a roadblock in the slowly passing traffic of people. I stood on my toes so I could see over the heads of the students around me and see what was causing the stupid blockade.

And then I saw.

Two people were making out in the hallway.

Scratch that, they were making out in the middle of the hallway.

In front of the teachers.

They are so involved in themselves that they didn't seem to notice that they were a major problem in the flow of life (or rather, my lunch). They just stood there and played tonsil hockey, leaving the rest of us to somehow find away around them, because they couldn't, god forbid, go do… whatever it was … in the bathroom.

What were we supposed to do? Climb up the walls and walk on the ceiling?

So I like so many other people, dodged and squeezed and pushed my way around them and any other couples.

I finally made my way to the double doors that led out into the main courtyard of my school. I stepped through and met with warm spring air and the dry, vapid wasteland that I call my home (which was Arizona). I headed in the direction where I usually ate my lunch.

The main courtyard was always too busy to sit in. It was normally filled with people and those said people where always screaming and shouting or being loud. I liked to eat in a quiet and healthy atmosphere.

I could have gone off campus to eat lunch in some secluded café that never had customers, but I lacked the one necessity that made that possible:

A car.

The area that I chose was a garden on the east side of the campus that was home to a few blooming flowers and one lonesome tree. There was a bricked pathway, but it was heavily overgrown with weeds that had been there for what looked like decades.

The lonesome tree was a cherry blossom tree, which is very odd because I lived in Arizona, not Japan. It was kind of big and provided a lot a shade and a sturdy trunk that I could lean my back on. It was said that the original headmaster of our school planted it there (for he was from Japan), and that it had thrived there for many years.

On what, I don't know.

So, I came across my spot, finally. I dropped my bag to the ground and followed it, leaning my back on the tree.

---

I was sitting in my usual spot beneath the tree eating my lunch, when fate decided that it was going to toy around a bit with my life. I had packed a lunch that consisted of a roast beef sandwich, a small bag of chips and a large ginger cookie. Yea, nutritious, I know. Now normally I would buy my daily meal at the school cafeteria, but I just didn't feel like having some unknown slop made with who-knows-what kind of meat. And overcooked vegetables and spoiled milk. The day's brew looked absolutely horrendous.

Anyways, I was more than content with my little sandwich, and when I bit into my bread filled with roast-beefy goodness, fate decided that is was the opportune time to slap me in the face. Hard.

I was in heaven, complete bliss. Until I heard a cough. And then the shuffling of feet followed by another cough. Tearing away from my sandwich, I glanced up to meet a pair of stone-grey eyes. I jumped slightly, not expecting someone to be so close to me. Too close. The eyes belonged to a boy who looked to be around my age who was tall with a thin build. He was wearing a pair of charcoal colored jeans and a fitted concert T-shirt. His black hair was long with the bangs swept over his eyes and I couldn't help but notice that he had an ear and an eyebrow pierced. Oh, and there was eyeliner too. How cliché.

Without another glance, I looked back down and focused on my lunch. Sure, the would have probably been more interesting than my sandwich, but let's get this straight— no one, I mean no one interrupted my lunch. My salvation. My only time of peace in the torrent that we call high school. It's like asking Mount St. Helen's to blow. So, I went back to eating.

He coughed again. And I ignored him again.

"Hey." He finally said when he figured that I was going to completely blow him off. "Hey!" he repeated when I only glanced.

"A simple 'excuse me' would have sufficed." I replied, taking a bite of my sandwich.

He snorted. "Well, aren't we all up on manners?" His voice had a rich tenor ring to it. Oh no, I did not just analyze his voice. Stupid me.

"What do you want?" I looked him straight in the eye. Yes, his eyes were very nice looking… oh, no, no, NO!

He raised his eyebrows. "You're in my spot."

I narrowed my eyes at him. "Excuse me?" I hadn't meant to sound so acidic, but he was threatening my space. And I liked my space. And needed my space!

"You're in my spot." He replied easily. "I always sit under this tree at lunch." He was being completely nonchalant, which I found rather aggravating.

"No you don't." I scoffed. "I do."

"Um…no." he replied.

"Yes." I said simply.

"Are you sure?" he asked in a slightly amused tone.

"Yes."

His face dropped slightly. "Okay, let's look at this situation another way." He trailed off his voice in what he thought was an intimidating fashion. I refused to fall for it. "I sit here everyday during second lunch. The authorities shifted my schedule, but it still is my lunch."

I only stared.

"The authorities are the principal and his cronies." He said to fill the silence. When I didn't make a sound he decided to go on. "Cronies are—"

"I know what a 'crony' is." I told him sharply.

He shrugged. "Regardless, it is still my spot."

"Is it now?" I recounted. I did not like this guy. "Says you."

And then he laughed. Laughed! He was acting so childish! I was going to blow a gasket very soon.

"Oh, I get it." He said between breathes. "You have no idea who I am, do you?"

Um…no, I didn't. I had never seen him before in my life. So now I knew that he had an ego the size of Alaska. Great, I was dealing with a complete and pompous ass.

"Should I?" I retorted. All I wanted to do was eat my lunch in peace. So far, it looked like I wasn't going to get my way.

"Are you new here?" he asked suddenly. "Because new kids have a spot right over there in the—"

"This has been my spot for four years." I cut in venomously. He so did not just bunch me in with the new students. But he did. So I decided— he was going to die. He looked at me as though I had grown a fourth head. What? Was there something on my face? Why on earth is he staring incredulously at me like that?

"What?!" I demanded. So maybe my tone hadn't been so great, but that doesn't give him the right to stare outright at me like that. It made me only slightly uncomfortable.

"You're a senior?" he asked warily. Ah good, now he's afraid of me. I just might be able to win this battle after all.

"Yes…" My patience was beginning to grow very thin.

"And you've been here since you were a freshman?" He continued, very surprised. What was so hard to comprehend about this? Is it so hard to believe that I had been at this school for that long? What the hell was his problem?

"Yes." I managed to bite out. My dentist won't be happy at my next visit, with all the teeth grinding I've been doing. Just leave me alone damn it!

"I've never seen you!" He exclaimed. "And I know everyone in this school. Well, at least by face." He looked like he had just discovered the lost city of gold.

"Apparently not." I replied, finally returning to my roast beef sandwich. Ah, sweet salvation. It'd go perfectly with a serving of his head on a platter. I just wanted him to leave.

But he didn't. Instead, he plopped down right next to me with his lunch tray in his lap. I glanced at him and shook my head. The second that I start to think that it possibly couldn't get worse, I am proven wrong. My luck just sucks. He was depriving me of my peace and quiet.

That's it, I can't take any more. This meant war.

I looked back at him, aggravated. "What now?" I forced between gritted teeth.

"Woah, take a chill pill." He said. "Since this is apparently both our spot, we might as well both sit here." He paused. "I won't bother you, promise." He turned away and started cutting into his burrito.

I sighed and turned back to my own lunch. I had to admit, his point was reasonable. Damn him and his logic. It only made me more pissed. I liked my quiet. I used it to think. Semi-Goth-Guy was currently preventing this. Ugh. Trust me of all people to have to deal with this. I hate my life.

Just as I was about to take another bite of my sandwich, he turned to me again. "My name's Zell."

What? Zell? Okay…so I had heard of him. Zell Landers. He was the supposed 'musical genius' of our school. And the resident smoker and junky. Supposedly. Great.

"Zell?" I repeated carefully.

"Yea, it's a nickname." He said. No duh.

"I figured. What kind of parent would name their kid that." I replied. Bam. One point for moi.

His eyes suddenly turned icy and a chill ran down my back. "Well, what kind of parent would name you…you…" His chilly glare suddenly dropped and he looked slightly embarrassed. Hah, his plan backfired. "What's your name?" he finally muttered.

"Marquin." I replied tartly. I continued to down my sandwich. I swear, I had been trying to down my lunch forever.

"Really?" he asked. "That's an interesting name. Equally odd as mine…" he was about to say something else, but I cut in.

"I go by Mark."

He raised an eyebrow. The one with the piercing. I couldn't help but look. "Oh, really now?" he said. "So you have a nickname too, and it's a guy name to boot!"

"What is that supposed to mean?" I asked.

"Hey, hey! It was an observation, no need to get all… snarky." He paused. "Are you a lesbian?"

My jaw dropped and an impossible degree. "Excuse me?"

He shrugged. "Well, as I already pointed out, Mark is a male name—"

"It's a shortened version of a female name!" I interrupted.

"You have no friends—"

"That's definitely not my fault. Besides, I have my brothers!"

"You dress like a college guy at a frat party—"

"Just because I prefer jeans to skirts does not mean I dress like a guy!" His cavalier tone was really revving my nerves. Didn't he get that he was insulting my very being? Not that he cared.

"Well, that shirt—"

"Belongs to my brother!" I yelled at him.

"You don't see me wearing my little sister's clothes!" he recounted.

I blinked. "You have a sister?"

He snorted. "No, but that's beside the point. Maybe you'd have friends if you acted more like a girl."

"You don't even know me! You've never even seen me before today!" I was starting to think that he was trying to get me mad. What purpose would that serve?

"Ah, but I'm good at reading people." He said, thrusting his pointer finger in the air. He probably thought it made him look intelligent. I thought it made him look unbearably stupid.

"You're basing all of that on what you 'read' about me? At least put some thought into it or something!" I replied. He could have at least made it sound somewhat convincing.

"How can I put thought into it when I hardly know you?" he asked slightly miffed.

"Well, if you hardly know me, don't try to make assumptions about me!" I angrily looked at my sandwich that was sitting in my lap. It stared back at me, begging me to finish it. If only I could.

"Fine then." He slumped back against the tree next to me and continued with his own lunch.

"Don't you have someone else you can bother?" I asked with a little edge.

He blinked and smirked. "But I'm bothering you!"

I gaped at him. No way! How could he— ugh! This guy was proving to be more aggravating than mold on cheese. Not to mention arrogant— the two worst possible combinations that a man could have. Man?! What was I smoking? Sure, he was plenty good looking but he acted like a child. A selfish child.

"Don't you have any friends that you could go bother?" I practically screamed. Well, almost. This was by far the worst lunch in the history of my life. What little life I had.

He shrugged casually. "They were all in my last lunch." He glanced back at me. "I could ask the same about you." I didn't say anything, so he kept talking. "Friends. Don't you have any friends that you could go bother?"

"You're the one doing the bothering." I retorted.

"Well, you're in my spot." He muttered back.

I snorted. "I thought that we agreed that this was both our spot." I said with a triumphant smirk on my face. "Besides, I was here first."

"Ah, but I had to go get my lunch. You brought yours. They cancel each other out." I wanted to wipe the smug grin he had right off of his face.

I glared. "It was my lunch to begin with." I grumbled.

"Just answer my darn question!" He practically growled back. Woah, suddenly testy.

"What darn question?" I growled back.

He eased of, surprised by my vivaciousness. "Friends. Where are your friends?" It was a rather simple question, so why did it hit be like a ton of bricks. Oh, wait. I have no friends.

"My brother isn't at this lunch." I replied.

"Your brother? Are you serious?" So I liked my brother, big deal.

"Yes." I said. I had finally finished my sandwich and I had just cracked open my bag of chips. Ah, sweet Sun-chippy goodness. Pure salvation.

"Older or younger?" He asked.

"Both." I replied almost immediately.

He raised an eyebrow. The pierced one. I found it really distracting. I tried to focus on my chips but I found it somewhat difficult.

"Both?" He said incredulously. "How can it be both? That's… physically impossible!" Hah, score two for me.

I rolled my eyes. "I have two of them."

Zell's mouth formed an 'o'. "Well… that would explain it."

I rolled my eyes again. "Typically." I ate another chip. There was a minute of silence between us. I was finally able to finish my bag of chips and move on to my cookie. Almost done! Then I could leave the moron alone and go do something productive. Like map out an atom smasher.

"So, you have two brothers?" he said, breaking the silence. He leaned back against the tree trunk next to me and stretched his legs out.

"Five." I replied.

"Oh wow, that's nice—" There was a pause. "Five?!" He immediately went into a coughing fit. I wished that he had been chewing on something, because if he can choke on air, imagine if he had actual food in his mouth. He gained some air and looked at me with the strangest look, something between amazement and flabbergast-ment. It was so priceless that I wished I had had a camera.

" Unfortunately." was all I said.

He crinkled his brow in cutest way. Wait, no! He can't be cute! He is arrogant, annoying, depriving, aggravating, very handsome… Screw it. It was cute. Even on him.

"Please tell me that you don't have any sisters." He pleaded.

"Three." was my reply.

And I thought that that strange look couldn't get any stranger. Now it was amazement, amusement, flabbergast-ment and astonishment. Now that was priceless. I had never seen anything like it.

"You have eight siblings?" He looked I had just told him that I was Einstein's great-granddaughter.

I sighed. "Guilty as charged. They range from six to seventeen."

"That's quite a range… wait." He looked at me carefully. "Aren't you a senior?"

"Yes." Where was he leading with this?

"I thought you said that you had an older brother?" he said confused.

"I do…" I was just as confused as he was. I know my family huge, but I didn't think that this would be so hard for him to grasp.

"But you said your siblings range to seventeen."

Oh. I know where he's heading with this.

"I did." I said.

"But…" he paused. "Do you have a twin?"

"Triplet."

He raised his brow. "Really?! That's so cool!" Wow, he's rather giddy isn't he?

"It sucks actually. Being the middle one, I never get my way." I rolled my eyes when he shrugged. I took a bit of my cookie. Ah, Ginger, my favorite. Nice texture and a reddish-brown with a crisp flavor. I always savored it.

"Who are they?" He suddenly asked. Ugh. I was actually beginning to somewhat tolerate his presence.

"Who are who?" I asked, sounding like an owl.

"Your brothers." He looked at me and I stared back.

"Why?" I asked.

"I'm curious." He said with a shrug. I stared him down and he didn't even flinch.

"Torin." I finally said. "Torin Brinsely."

"No way!" he exclaimed. "I know him well!"

I wouldn't doubt it; Torin hung out in his kind of crowd.

"He never mentioned he had a sister though…" he paused. "Or several, come to think of it. I always assumed he was an only child."

He looked back at me and stared me down. I felt like he was undressing with his eyes. I couldn't imagine why, there's nothing very special about me underneath the clothes. I'm not exactly 'gorgeous' either. I'm just a Plain-Jane.

"Yeah…" he paused and turned his head sideways and looked at me from that angle. "I see it now, you do look like him. Same nose and cheekbones. But your eyes are different."

"He has brown eyes and I have green. Two completely different colors. Who would have guessed?" I said sarcastically.

"Yeah, he does have brow eyes." He repeated. "Brown and boring."

"Boring? His eyes are so cool! When the sun hits them just right, you can see all of these little amber specks…" I stopped when I saw Zell looking at me with an amused smile on his face. "What?" I snapped. I lose my concentration for one second and I find him staring at me again! Trust me, I'm not that interesting!

He leaned over to me all of a sudden, his face close to mine. His eyes looked straight into mine and I swallowed uncomfortably.

"Um Zell…" Almost immediately, he snapped back, as if I had burned him. He looked away with seemed like a slight blush on his face. Great. He's sensitive too. This guy was unbelievable.

"Your eyes are the most pure emerald green that I've ever seen." He said slowly. "They are much prettier than your brother's." He still refused to look at me. I suppose that he was kind of embarrassed. It was… different, maybe he wasn't so bad…

"But as far as I am concerned, that's the only nice looking thing about you." He said with a smirk.

Scratch that, he's an ass. He's about as bad as they come! Arrogant and snake-like and aggravating… I swear this man was going to be the death of me. Man? Damn, I called him that again! Boy! He is nothing but an immature and selfish little boy. Playing with my emotions like that!

"You…!" I let an exaggerated groan and hit my head on my knees.

"Whoa, no need to give yourself a concussion." He told me. I shook my head and groaned again.

"So…one brother down. Who's the other?" He asked, seeming somewhat interested.

"Charlie." was what I said back. My face was still on my knees, so my voice was a little muffled.

"Charlie?" He repeated. "He's an artistic kid. Again, I had no idea he had a sister." There was a pause. "I had no idea that he was related to Torin! He never told me…"

I pulled my head up from my knees. "You know Charlie too?"

"Yeah, in passing." He said with a shrug. "We've hung out a few times in the art room. He's a pretty cool guy, really laid back and down to earth." He glanced at me. "Unlike you. You're so straight-laced that I have to wonder what crawled up your butt and died."

I stared at him, astonished. Where on earth did he get that saying? Not only was it insulting, it was vulgar! I couldn't help but hide my disgust and he snickered. I shook my head and looked away. Why was this guy getting to me? Never before had I ever let someone bother me so much…

"I'm sorry if I'm a little anti-social." I replied, throwing my cookie wrapper back into my sack. I was finally done with my lunch, but I hardly felt satisfied. Just being near the guy made my stomach go sour.

"Being anti-social isn't an excuse." He said with a smirk. "Anti-social implies that you just aren't social, not that you lack the ability to be so."

I stared at him. He had just out-witted me. Never once, in the history of ever had I been outsmarted. And he just did it with a snap. Damn it, I must be losing my touch.

"How did you—" I managed to mutter before he interrupted.

"I do take English class, you know." He told me in a matter-of-fact voice. I gave him an odd stare which caused him to continue talking. "What?"

"I just thought that you'd be the type to skip class." I said, shaking my head.

He snorted. "I don't skip. It's pointless, you might as well just go." He paused. "But… if my new classes are filled with crap-ass people, then I might start to skip." He sighed.

I raised an eyebrow. "New classes?"

He glanced at me. "I got my schedule changed, remember?"

I rolled my eyes. "Right. I forgot that that was the entire reason that we've been going at it for the past," I glanced at my watch. "Forty-five minutes."

Zell laughed. There he went again, completely disregarding my personal feelings in the matter. Perhaps I don't like to be laughed at, mister! Mister? What was happening to me?

"What?" I managed to bite out.

He shook his head. "Nothing, nothing. It's just that I finally got you to talk!"

"What?" I asked again.

He calmed down and looked back at me. "When I first spoke to you, it seemed like you'd rather go drown yourself than say anything more than one-worded sentences. But now," he paused for a breath. " You're actually have a some-what civilized conversation with me."

I glared. He glanced.

"Even if it is a bit strained." He added.

I held my glare and reached out and grabbed my backpack. I stood up and slung it over my shoulder. "I don't like you." I said shortly. There was no reason in not being truthful. Perhaps if I straight out told him that I despised his guts, maybe he would never, ever speak to me ever again. Point for my sheer brilliance. "I don't like you at all."

Too bad I couldn't force the words out of my mouth.

"I don't like you either. Jade." He replied.

What? I cocked my head to the side. "Jade? Who's Jade?" Wow Marl, that sounded intelligent.

"It's the nickname that I gave you." He said with a shrug. How many shrugs can one man do in the span of an hour? I had lost count.

"Nickname? You gave me a nickname?" I said, and then I paused. "Why Jade?"

"It's the color of your eyes." He said simply. I blinked. "Besides," he continued. "Every time I call you Mark, I'll think of you as a guy. That's like an insult. Besides, you're not a guy."

I snorted. "I'm leaving."

"But—"

"Leaving." I pressed. He snapped his mouth shut and shrugged. Once more. Damn him, that was one more! I turned and started to walk away. I would go to the library. Or my physics class. I would have loved to go see Mr. Zhu, but he had a class at the moment… Yes. The library would be best.

"See you tomorrow!"

I rolled my eyes at his voice. What an aggravating guy.

"I will!"

Not likely. And then I smirked.