Never Assume To Know

Chapter One

As students are waiting for the bell to ring, there’s a racket in the parking lot as a small, dented VW Beetle is weaving through the parking lot, creating a lot of black smoke as its occupant searches for a parking space.

Oh, great...! So... The Misfit has arrived, Maria says, who has always proclaimed herself as the popular girl, then she sneers as she glances over her shoulder at the new arrival. Her boyfriend laughs at the comment, and scoffs loud enough for everyone nearby to hear him, We only have to worry if he got his hands on some guns.

That isn’t funny, Rodger, Laura snaps. She’s one of Maria’s friends, also sitting at the same table. Then a ‘random student’ - at least according to Maria - who walks past overhears the last few comments interjects with his own suggestion, Maybe report your concerns to the principal.

Rodger sneers, He likely can’t even shoot straight even if he had a gun...

Laura glares towards Maria, suggesting coldly, but also now sounding as sarcastic as possible as she speaks with someone she’d regarded as a friend until this moment. "Yeah, maybe we should report him. I’ve never trusted that idiot." She boldly imitates Maria, who now glares back fiercely.

So now Mark, who is Rodger’s friend, also laughs noisily, and now offers his own assessment. I’d say that ‘never’ is a strong term. He has been here for what, two or three months?

Well, I don’t like him, it’s something creepy about him.

"Creepy? What is creepy? That he doesn’t have the latest clothes or phone and, God forbid, a nice car?"

"Oh, hold ya horses, Louisa. You’re always trying to save every little lost animal in the world, Maria spits out venomously. Like you could make any difference?"

Louisa stops mid-motion to open a bottle of root beer. She gives Maria and her friends a once-over, then shrugs and returns the bottle back into her messenger bag from which she’d taken it moments before, then rises to her feet and walks off saying nothing to anyone, or even giving them any further glances, ignoring their questions, and their jeering at her.

"What do you mean by that?" Maria shouts after her. Louisa ignores the question and walks faster...

A VOICE, UNFAMILIAR to anyone at the table, answers from some distance the question posed by Maria instead of Louisa, who flashes him a smile. All of them stare where someone had dared to speak to them. Maybe she found someone worth saving... huh?

The person who is the subject of the speculation and ridicule since arriving at the college stood in the middle of the parking lot. The group at the table stared at someone who seemed rather self-assured in his stature. Of medium height, above average in build, but not podgy in the slightest. With brown hair, that’s long enough for the wind to make it a game of sweeping it up in all directions. He stares at the group with his vivid blue eyes. The so-called clothing, not of sufficient standard to be regarded as the latest fashion, was some scuffed sneakers, jeans, a faded wind jacket that saw better days, and a black tee-shirt.

But he’s just an average, ordinary guy really, Louisa thinks as she eyes him as much as she knows the others around the table might be doing. She can feel their eyes boring in the back of her head at the same time.

Terence, I always find the worthwhile things to save, Louisa calls out, but some around here just don’t understand how important of such endeavours are. Like them...

With Louisa in tow, Terence marches past the crowd, smirking at them, then both walk into the college through the main entrance. Neither ever casting another glance back...

OUTSIDE AT THE TABLE, the group of individuals stare at one another incredulously. No one defied the ‘pecking order’ of the college. It was an understood ‘rule’ that unless Maria accepted you into her group, you didn’t speak to the group. Now this ‘newcomer’ had defied it, but so had Louisa, seemingly...

Laura is the first to get a measure of composure back. Well fuck it, I’m going to the principal, she grunts loudly. She gets up from the bench and walks in the same direction that Terence and Louisa had walked moments before.

Laura, wait up, Maria