So I was hoping I would get some feedback but that back fired. Well I'm continuing the story either way. Feedback would be much appreciated.

Chapter 2

Last period was math. She sat there silently doing the worksheets on algebra.

“Class in the last fifteen minutes of the period you’re going to get a tips package that you have to hand in by Thursday” Mr. Stones said to his class “ I will be assigning the partners and you have today and tomorrow to work on it”

Now the class was groaning “ Sir it’s only the second week of school!” a boy from the back yelled.

“You’re in grade 11 now, it’s time to man the hell up,”

Honestly Naia didn’t mind too much, TIPS was challenging and fun. As for the deciding partners, that wasn’t so bad either. I mean the teachers partnered them up based on their skills.

Laurie turned around to face Naia.

“I really hope I get partnered up with you! I don’t want to be stuck with someone I don’t know,” She whispered.

“Yeah me neither,” Naia agreed.

“Too bad it’s based on marks,”

“Well no. I mean our marks are like four percent away”

“Yeah that’s a lot!” She said dramatically, causing Naia to roll her eyes, “But I’m in the eighties and you’re in the nineties!”

“Yeah but that’s just luck”

“Uh huh” Laurie said sarcastically.

Laurie turned around and started to work on her math again and so did Naia.

After a little while Mr. Stones started to name the partners, “Laurie and Lawrence,”

“Crap” Laurie and Naia both whispered.

The teacher continued, “Jenny and Rachel, Arvind and Maia, Naia and Aaron, Sam and Jay”

“Who the heck is Aaron?” Naia asked Laurie.

“I think it’s that guy in the corner,” She pointed at a boy with a blue hoodie.

No way Naia thought That’s the boy from the bus.

“Who’s Lawrence?”

“It’s the guy in the green polo”

“Oo He’s cute! Holly shit, he has a piercing,” She muttered. Naia could only roll her eyes and sigh.

“Ok now go find your partner and one of you come up and get the questions” Mr. Stones commanded.

Aaron walked over to her thinking the exact same thing as she was: awkward.

“Hello” He started, “What’s your name again?”

“Naia, and yours is Aaron right?’

He nodded in confirmation.

“Ok I’m going to get the questions,” they both said in unison.

“Don’t worry I’ll get them” Naia said. She walked over to the desk with the sheets and walked back to her desk.

“Let’s see,” he said and she handed the questions to him, “Oh these aren’t so bad”

“Yeah actually they seem pretty easy”

They finished the first two questions in about twenty minutes and decided to take a break. “Hey, do you take the bus in the morning, because you seem familiar?” He asked.

“You know I was thinking the exact same thing,” she said. Things were finally getting less awkward. “Yeah I take the bus in the morning and in the afternoon. I’ve actually seen you on it a few times”

“Yeah I take the bus too, and I’ve seen you also,” he replied.

“So does this mean when we see each other at the stop we’re going to say hi to each other?”

“I guess so,”

“Sorry I’m really quite horrible at the meeting new people thing,” she gave a nervous smile.

“Don’t worry about it,” he smiled.

“Do you want to finish these like twenty questions here?” she asked.

“Well I don’t think we’re going to be able to”

“So then what do we do?”

“We could both do them separately, like you do ten and I’ll do the other ten,” he suggested.

“Are there twenty questions exactly?”

“Let me count” he opened up the booklet and flipped through the pages. “Twenty three, but we’re done two, so twenty one”

“So someone has to do the extra one,” she confirmed.

“Ye-“

“—Aaron, Naia, Adair is going to be in your group, but this means I’m giving you guys seven extra questions” She ‘dropped off the boy and the extra question sheet and walked away.

“Dude, she completely forgot I even existed just cause’ I came late, so I got to chose my group” Adair explained.

“Awesome, but why the hell do we have to do seven more question?” Aaron said.

He shrugged at the question, “Who is she,” Adair whispered gesturing to Naia.

“Oh, This is Adair, my buddy, and Adair this is,” Aaron paused whilst searching his mind for her name. “What’s your name again?” he asked stupidly.

“Naia” she provided. “Nice to meet you” she said to Adair. “How do you say your name?”

“Adair, like ‘a dare’” He said chuckling.

“Adair right?” she inquired smiling at his comparison.

“Yup, and yours is Naia right? Am I saying it right?” she nodded in response. “ Ok I’m going to go steal a chair and then I’ll be back”

He came back with a chair and placed it next to Naia’s desk: opposite Aaron, and diagonal to Naia. “So we’re just deciding who’s doing which question,” Aaron explained.

Naia’s cheeks were getting pink because of what an annoying predicament she’d gotten into. ‘Why couldn’t I have just been with Laurie?! Why God why? Plus, like one guy wasn’t enough: now there are two, this is so awkward’. However, neither Aaron nor Adair felt like this.

Naia wasn’t very used to guys; the last male acquaintance she had was a boy named Alex in grade three. She drew a stick figure holding a gun to his head, on her sheet of questions.

Aaron and Adair couldn’t see what she was drawing but they were curious as hell, “What are you drawing?” Adair inquired.

She quickly pulled the sheet off of her desk then onto her lap and bashfully replied “Nothing”.

The two males chuckled, and then Aaron spoke up “Okay well we’ll deal with that later, but for now -”.

“- Naia do you think your parents would let you come to my house to finish this assignment?” Adair voiced.

“Uh...” She had never been to a guy’s house before, so she didn’t know what to say. Then again her father wouldn’t care – he was in a different country - and her stepmother probably trusted her enough.

“Probably not right?” Aaron asked, knowing that by her reaction that, that was the likely answer.

“Well I could ask like right after school, and I’ll just tell you then,” She suggested.

“You got a cell phone?” Aaron asked

“Good point: No, so I don’t know how this is going to work out”

“I have one so don’t worry, you could use mine after school,” Adair offered.

“You sure?” she asked politely.

“Yeah,” he answered

“So then everyone is going to do 10 or should we all do them all and then compare answers?” Aaron said.

“We’ll each do 10 and then rotate and check each others’ answers” Adair said.

“Why don’t we just do them all?” Aaron replied.

“That would waste time”

“No it wouldn’t, that way we’d use all our time effectively and we could also check them all”

“We’re doing that anyway though, because say Naia does question seven and you check it and you see something wrong you’re going to change it right? And it will be checked three times so it’ll be triple checked”

“Fine” What Aaron really wanted to do was continue the argument and say his way they wouldn’t have to re-copy the answers off of each other either and they’d each get more practice, but he let it go.

Naia stayed quiet and observed that every time Aaron would rebuttal he wouldn’t make eye contact.

“Let’s see what we can finish now,” Aaron said.

They worked in silence for the next thirty minutes. Each of them getting two more questions done. There were several moments where Naia wanted to suggest they go to a Library instead of his house, but she didn’t know how to propose it.

The bell rang indicating the period was over.

“Do you need to go to your locker?” Adair asked.

“Yeah,” she lied. She had everything she needed and only said yes to get a break from the two guys and the awkwardness.

“Okay then when you’re done their come to my locker to use my phone,” he said “ You too” he said to Aaron.

“Huh?” He wasn’t listening.

“Come to my locker after you’re done at yours” Adair repeated.

Adair explained where his locker was to Naia and they all dispersed to different places in the school: their lockers.

***

Aaron

He walked to his locker swiftly. When he got there he put away a few things and got his folder out from his locker.

Lawrence walked towards him, “How’s your group?” he asked without a greeting.

“Decent,” he replied, “ The girl is nice. She doesn’t speak much, but whatever. She probably just feels a little awkward,” after a thoughtful pause he started again, “Yo, did you see? Adair is in our group too,”

“Yeah I know but that’s so unfair, you guys have three people to do all the work but the rest have two” Lawrence complained

“Yeah but we have seven extra questions” he defended.

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah. Anyways how’s your group?”

“Partner,” he corrected.

“Partner, sorry”

“She’s cool. Actually she’s really cool. She’s sweet and smart,” he professed, “Which reminds me you know how we’re going to the movies tomorrow?” he started a little unsure.

“You want to invite her don’t you?” Aaron stated more than asked.

“Kind of: I already did” He rubbed the back of his neck nervously.

“Well that’s chill with me, but you’re going to have to ask Adair” he said as they both started walking towards the stairs.

“Wait,” he said stopping right before the first step “she said she’d come but she’d have to bring a friend” he continued, “Is that ok?”

“Yeah man I don’t really care” he reassured.

“Cool,” Aaron started to walk in the direction of Adair’s locker, when he was stopped by Lawrence “Yo could you ask Adair?”

“Sure,” he said, and finally walked away.

***

Naia

She practically skipped to her locker, so evidently happy to escape the unintentional oppression caused by the two boys.

Naia had always surrounded herself with girls and was often called the ‘man’ of the girls. At first she was a little offended by her nickname, because although she wasn’t into make-up, jewelry, shopping, long agonizing phone calls and the things that people usually associate with being girly, she was in fact a girl. At first she argued that not all girls had to be like that, however it soon struck her that in her group of friends, they were mostly all like that.

Eventually she grew fond of her nickname; it made her feel good that she was different.

Her two best friends had girly factors in their personalities. Colette Maunier, her other best friend, was a girl slightly shorter than Naia, and really skinny. Her style often consisted light cardigans and dark blue jeans.

She was the sort of person you would do practically anything with.

She had naturally straight black hair (a color that not a lot of people in her school naturally had) that she frequently kept down and dark green eyes. Colette had a birthmark under the outer tip of her left eye that was more than enough to emphasize her eyes.

Lauren O’Brien (A.K.A. Laurie) was a boy crazy, fashion nerd: she practically studied teen magazines. Her style would change from time to time, but her closet was full of three hundred shades of purple it would seem - as she’d refuse to wear any other color.

She had blonde locks, with purple highlights, she typically made a ‘poof’ with her hair at the top, and Laurie’s eyes were a really light grey. Laurie usually wore purple shirts and denim skirts.

They both came from wealthy and ‘functional’ families. Colette’s mother had passed away when she was really little. She had admitted before that it didn’t really mean anything to her; she was apparently too small to remember anyway. Although this seemed heartless, it only demonstrated how honest she was. Laurie’s life was great, she had money and an amazing family, and she also got along with just about anybody.

Naia tried to open her locker four times before she gave up and waited for Laurie to get there. Naia was horrible at opening locks, not that it was a world-class skill, no, it was just her lock hated her. Laurie on the other hand was quite talented at opening locks.

Laurie came to the locker quicker than usual and she looked sort of flushed.

“Hey” Laurie greeted her best friend.

“ Hey,” she replied, “Oye, could you open my retardo locker please?”

“Yeah, just hold this for me,” Laurie handed her two binders then worked her magic. The lock opened with a soft ‘click’ and Laurie took it off the hook, opened the locker, and then put the lock back onto the hook. She scooped the binders out of Naia’s hands.

“Thanks,” Naia said, “Where’s Colette?”

“Detention”

“Predictable as always” they exchanged playful smiles.

Naia threw her backpack onto the floor and crouched down next to it. She didn’t really need anything, but she put in her folder full of art in anyway. “How’s your partner?” she said whilst getting back on her feet and closing the locker.

“He’s so cool,” by the speed and enthusiasm she said the three words, it seemed like she had contained that for as long as possible. “I mean I know he’s amazing looking but he’s really sweet and funny too. Actually,” she paused, “he invited me to watch a movie with him and his friends this weekend”

“Wow, you guys are moving fast,” Naia simpered playfully.

Laurie slapped Naia’s arm, “Shut up”

“You said yes right?” They’d started walking to the stairs by now.

“Kind of,” she grinned.

“What do you mean kind of?”

“I told him I’d bring a friend,” she laughed a nervous smile, “You’re the friend”

“What?” she practically yelled, “Do they all have dates?”

“No,” she paused realizing Naia said ‘date’ “It’s not a date, smart one, it’s just a ‘friendly excursion’, plus two of his friends are coming”

“Call it what you will, a date is a date,”

“Ok whatever, are you coming then?” Laurie asked hopeful.

“You’re going to leave me with his friends though,” she whined. They were paused at the stairs now.

“Naia how many times have I done things for you? There was the time you got a splinter from a popsicle stick, who got that out I wonder,” she put a finger to her chin in mock thought, “the time you locked yourself out of your house and I let you sleep over, the countless times I provide you with a lunch, the time I had to hold yo-“ she was cut short by Naia putting a hand over her mouth.

“I get it,” she removed her hand and sighed, “Why didn’t you tell me from the start I had no choice” she groaned.

“Thanks!” she lunged forward and stopped the hug before touching Naia.

Naia was a little hug-a-phobic. After a little thinking Naia said, “Wait just a minuet here,” with a southern accent, “Why don’t you ask Colette?” she asked switching accents to an Australian accent.

“If Colette was able to go I’d ask her instead of taking time after school to convince you,” Naia gasped in faux shock, “She has to go visit her aunt in Alberta on Friday”

“I’ll call you and see what mom says about the movie on Friday” Naia called her stepmother mom, “Well I must go now, so bye,” she said.

“Bye” Laurie turned left and went home and Naia walked to where Adair said his locker was.