Collision Course(29)
Author: S.C. Stephens

I sighed and bit my tongue; he wouldn’t believe my innocence, even if I tried proclaiming it. Coach was not easily swayed once he went down a path. And right now he was firmly on the ‘Lucas has gone to the dark side’ path. He tossed one hand up in the air as he shook his head. "But then you go and get high at school, and prance around my pep rally like it’s your own personal rave! What the hell was that, Lucas West?"

I swallowed my embarrassment and my pride, and bowed my head, not saying anything. Finally, he made a disgruntled noise. "Sports would have been a better outlet for you, West. It still would. It’s too late for football, but maybe you’ll consider something else. Baseball…or something."

His voice softened, just fractionally, and I glanced up at him. Some of the hard edge was gone from his face and his brows were slightly scrunched, almost like he was concerned. "Anything but drugs and alcohol, Luc." Then he dropped his head and the stern mask of adolescent disciplinarian completely fell off his face. He sniffed a bit and lightly shook his head, while a tender emotion uncharacteristically entered his voice. "I’d hate to lose another one."

Without looking at me again, he clapped my shoulder roughly and strode off down the hall, barking at a few loitering students to get to class as he did, the stern disciplinarian snapping right back into place. I found that I couldn’t move after he left. My vision swam as my eyes watered and I could just barely make out the shape of Coach leaving the building. There had been a time when his stern words meant everything to me. He could crush me or lift me with one sentence. He apparently still had that effect on me and I swallowed several times to fight back my overwhelming guilt and remorse. He was wrong about me…they all were, and sports didn’t matter much anymore. I exhaled for ten long seconds, closing my eyes. A few more months. That’s all of this that I had to take.

Sawyer’s eyes locked onto mine the second I stepped foot in the door. Her brow drew together in concern and I gave her a vague smile and a quick nod. The bell had rung on my way up the steps and Ms. Reynolds was just starting class as I walked into the room. Just like my first day here, I was disrupting things again. Ms. Reynolds seemed better equipped to deal with me this time though.

She smiled warmly as I approached her. The room was completely silent and I felt the physical heat of all those eyes staring at me. It made me shift uncomfortably as Ms. Reynolds put a friendly hand on my shoulder. A snigger went up around the room at the contact and I instantly remembered what I’d said to her, in front of a good chunk of the student body. The words ‘totally fuckable’ flashed through my head and my cheeks flushed with warmth, probably turning bright red.

The barely contained chuckles got louder, but Ms. Reynolds ignored them. "Oh good, Lucas, you’re back. Go ahead and take your seat." As she seemed to be letting my tardiness slide again, I didn’t say anything, only nodded and started my way to Sawyer.

"Oh, Luc?" Her hand touched my arm to stop me and a fresh burst of laughter hit the room. She seemed to notice it this time and scowled at some of the louder people, Will among them. "I just wanted to remind you that your appointment with the counselor starts today." Her eyes lit up at that prospect and her voice was near bubbly when she continued. "The principal is going to let you rejoin the Safe and Sound club once you complete a six week session. Isn’t that great?" She squeezed my arm for emphasis and I resisted the urge to roll my eyes and sigh. Six weeks…great.

"Uh…yeah. Thank you."

She nodded exuberantly and raised her arm toward the aisle, indicating I should sit. I met eyes with Sawyer while a soft chorus of laughs followed me down the row. She grinned and rolled her eyes for me and I chuckled softly. As I was about to pass Will, I carefully watched his feet. I didn’t need today to be a complete recap of day one.

Apparently it wasn’t. Will had other ways to embarrass me. Right as I walked by, he clutched his desk with both hands and thrust his h*ps up, making the font legs of the desk bang off the floor a couple inches provocatively. He laid his head back and softly moaned, "Oh god, Ms. Reynolds. Oh yeah, yeah, fuck…yes, teach me."

I stumbled a bit on my feet as the entire class, with the exception of Sawyer, of course, burst into loud laughing. Ms. Reynolds had been writing something on the board, carefully transcribing it from the textbook and had apparently missed Will’s display. She loudly called for quiet and gave the room stern stares, but didn’t say anything directly to Will, and I was pretty sure she would have if she’d heard that. I’m pretty sure he’d of gotten detention if she’d heard that.

With flaming cheeks, I sat in my chair and laid my head down on my desk. I wanted to crawl up in a tiny hole and never come out. But hadn’t I been in a tiny hole for the past two weeks and still been miserable? I sighed and wished I could take a nap through first period – I’d love to see Lil right now.

A soft hand on my arm made me look over at Sawyer. I laid my head to the side as quietness enveloped the classroom. She laid her head on her desk and we stared at each other while Ms. Reynolds went over the current lesson plan. Eventually looking at Sawyer brought my emotions back to level and I smiled at her. She smiled back and mouthed ‘are you okay?’

I closed my eyes and softly chuckled at her never ending concern for me. Reopening them, I nodded at her and mouthed ‘just embarrassed’.

She bit her lip and then grinned devilishly. "You should be," she whispered, "talking to a teacher like that." She raised an eyebrow at me and lightly shook her head. ‘Dirty boy,’ she mouthed.

I bit my lip to not laugh out loud and shaking my head, raised it off my desk. I marveled at Sawyer’s odd ability to always make me feel better, whether with silence or a comforting touch, or even a smartass comment. Or maybe it was just her very presence. I stretched out my hand to her across the aisle while Ms. Reynolds went over last week’s homework, homework I’d only been able to do, thanks to this beautiful godsend beside me. She lightly grabbed my hand and looped our index fingers together.

"Thank you," I whispered.

"Anytime," she whispered back.

Sawyer and I both waited around in the back of the room after class, waiting for most, if not all, of the students to leave. Ms. Reynolds watched us, but said nothing, probably used to how Sawyer and I always seemed to linger in class until we were alone. When Sawyer couldn’t wait anymore, her next class being so far away from this one, we headed out to the main doors.

Sawyer asked about what the coach had wanted and with a heavy sigh I told her. She seemed unsure how to process the conversation. On one hand, he seemed to care about me. On the other hand, he thought I was waist deep in life-altering drugs. Finally she shook her head and again encouraged me to tell a teacher about Josh, about what really happened. I gave her a faint smile but kept my mouth shut. I wasn’t narking Josh, and I didn’t much see the point in talking about it anyway. Just like the coach, people’s minds were already decided.

She twisted her lips as we parted ways, seeming to understand where my head was at. I suppose she’d handle all of this differently. Well, maybe not. It’s much easier to give advice than follow it.

History went pretty smoothly, with only a handful of stares and whispers, usually followed by light laughter. I kept my head down and did my best to ignore it all. Thanks to Sawyer’s diligence in keeping me caught up, I got back into the swing of things smoothly, and if Mr. Davis was startled by my actual presence in the room after being absent for so long, he didn’t show it. In fact, the only comments I got were from Eliza, who asked if my girlfriend was going to stop asking her for the assignments, since I was back at school. I stared at her blankly and stupidly nodded as I processed that. I never did find out how Sawyer managed to get all the work from all of my classes, even the ones we didn’t share. I must have mentioned Eliza to her at some point and she’d gone out of her way to talk to the woman. Pretty impressive. I wondered who she’d talked with in Astronomy?

I asked her about it when we met up next period and she only smiled and shrugged it off, like it was no big deal. She explained that she’d heard Eliza talking about me in computer lab one day and had deduced that we had History together. She had choir with one of the cheerleaders in Astronomy and had talked her into handing over her notes, and she’d met with my art teacher after choir, since the buildings were right next to each other. I shook my head at her and smiled, amazed at the lengths she took to help me, and also a little amazed that she’d found students in this school that would help her, knowing full well they were really helping me.

We were whispering back and forth to each other about it during Philosophy when Mr. Varner came down the aisle and stopped right in front of my desk. A soft giggle went up around the room and I remembered the gossip that had floated around about the three of us. Staring up at his narrowed eyes, I also remembered him helping my drug-riddled body out of the gym and into the main building, where he’d called my mom, freaking her out with his vague responses. He’d had a close up view of my high, and he hadn’t been too thrilled about it. He looked even less thrilled as he scowled down at me now.

"Something you’d like to share with the class, Lucas?" His voice was low and while not threatening in any way, it wasn’t friendly either.

I shook my head. "No, Mr. Varner."

He crossed his arms over his chest and half smiled. I heard a soft sigh from a student beside me and I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes. Yes, he was attractive…but he was also an a**hole. I didn’t understand why the girls around here could be so quick to overlook that fact. "Are you sure? Wouldn’t you like to enlighten us on how you spent your…break?"

The room quieted down and I heard the rustle of people turning in their seats. I didn’t remove my eyes from the teacher, but I imagined that everybody had just shifted to watch this. I bit my lip and lightly shook my head, hoping he’d drop it before I either yelled something at him or burst into tears, and really, with how my morning was going, I could do either.

He leaned in over my desk and I involuntarily leaned back. "Next time you want to get high…you do it on someone else’s watch." He glanced over at Sawyer before shifting his eyes back to me. "Now both of you – be quiet." And with that, he stood straight and walked back to the front of the room.

I swallowed and looked around. Sure enough, most people were turned to face me, some with open-mouthed, shocked faces and some with barely contained smirks. One by one they followed Mr. Varner, and turned in their seats. My cheeks felt hot to the touch as his words flashed through me. So, no ‘your life is better without drugs’ speech from Mr. Varner then. Nope, just an ‘I know you’re a messed up kid, who is just going to do it anyway, so go do it far away from me so I don’t have to pick up the pieces of your worthless life’ comment. Odd point of view for a Philosophy teacher to have. As I stared down at my desk, I started to think that maybe Mr. Varner should have picked a different major in college.

"Well, that was uncalled for," Sawyer muttered, as we huddled around her locker during break.

I looked over at her while she put some books away and got others out, stuffing them in her bag. I adjusted my heavy backpack on my shoulder as I leaned against a cool, metal locker with my other one. I never used mine. I wouldn’t even come near these lockers if Sawyer didn’t want to use Lil’s…hers. I generally avoided looking when she opened it, like somehow, a part of Lil had gotten trapped in there when she’d died, and every time the door was opened, a bit of her light shone and I couldn’t bear to watch. Ridiculous? Yes, I know, but that’s the feeling it gave me.