High School Stories
By Christy Morrison
Copyright 2011 Christy Morrison
Smashwords Edition
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
* * * * *
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 - Freshman Year: Nosepicker
Chapter 2 - Sophomore Year: Truly Glorious
Chapter 4 - Senior Year: Endless Days
NOSEPICKER
I stare at myself in my bathroom mirror. “Whaddya say, Punk?” I do my best Eastwood-Willis-Stallone kick-ass hero impression. “I'd say it's your lucky day.”
This year will be different.
This year has to be different. My hair, my stupid brown hair, is sticking up in every direction. I grab my Yankees baseball cap and shove it over the brown shoots sticking out of my head.
It is my first day of my first year of high school. Everyone reinvents themselves for high school. This year will be different. It has to be.
I imagine walking into school. The kids greet me, and no one calls me Nosepicker or Noz, like they have for the past ten years. This year it’s different; they call me by my name.
Even the walk to school is different this year. Cars drive past - the upperclassmen in their shiny new rides. I don't care. This is a new year, a new me. I visualize the scene again. In my mind, I'm the tough guy, entering school. “You got a problem with me?” I say to the nearest bully. He cowers. Someone says Nosepicker and I whip around. Now I'm Pacino. Nobody messes with Tony Montana and his little friend.
After my math class I already have three textbooks to shove into my locker.
“Gotcha.” A hand reaches over and slams my locker door shut. The textbooks I am trying to put away fall to the floor.
“Hey, man.” The locker-slammer is my best friend since first grade, Miles Winnow. Miles is the classic dork. Not a geek, not a nerd, but the typical high school dork. But who am I to talk? I am the ultimate reject.
Miles loves video games and he plays the drums in the band. Two years ago he decided he wanted to dress up for school, so he started wearing a suit and tie everyday. It stuck.
“Nice suit,” I say. Today, Miles wears a pinstripe black suit with a gray tie. He looks like a gangster from the 1940s.
“Stay smart, stay cool,” Miles says, straightening his tie. Like I said, he's a dork. But he's also the only guy who refers to me by my name.
I reopen my locker and shove the math books in. We walk down the hall together.
“What'd you have so far, Kaz?” he asks.
“Math. You?”
“Gym. Can you believe it? Gym, first thing in the morning. I'll be dead by Wednesday.”
I laugh. “Where are you going now?”
“History.”
“I have English. I'm here.” I stop at a doorway. Miles waves as he walks off.
“Catch you at lunch.”
I turn and look into the room, my stomach dropping as I spot some of the familiar faces. Math had been okay because I placed out of freshman algebra. The older kids don't know my reputation. But freshman English - these kids were the worst. I see Jeremy Dowd, the only freshman to try out for varsity football, most popular kid in our grade and an all-around bully. He is the manufacturer of my torment. He is the king of all of the idiots. Every numbskull in our class follows his lead.
I take a seat in the front row, head down, hat pulled over my eyes. Jeremy sees me.
“Hey, Noz,” Jeremy calls. “How was your breakfast? Did you pick something good on the way to school this morning?”
Laughter.
I feel my face heat with anger, but I stay facing forward. It's true, I pick my nose. It is a nervous habit. Often I realize it's happening only after hearing the whispers around me. To me, the nosepicking is just as harmless as when people bite their nails or clear their throats or twirl their hair. Well, maybe not as innocuous as when girls twirl their hair. That's the most annoying habit I've ever seen. Only the dumbest girls twirl their hair.
So yeah, maybe the nickname is justified in a sense. But I never – NEVER – pick my nose and then put my finger in my mouth. I scratch the inside of my nose with my thumb. Anything that happens to be on my finger after gets disposed of on a tissue or a paper towel. The problem is that I scratch my nose often, in plain sight of everyone else.
This year will be different, I tell myself as the teacher enters. It's my mantra.
The teacher, Mrs. Stitch, takes the class attendance.
“Jeremy Dowd,” she calls.
“Present,” he responds, acting the model student.
“Aubrey Hughes,” is the next name that jumps out at me.
“Here,” sings a voice from the back of the room. I turn around.
I hadn't seen Aubrey enter the room. Of course, she is sitting next to Jeremy. Aubrey is the cutest girl in the freshman class. She has been class president for the past three years and she is a cheerleader. Unlike the other drones in her clique, Aubrey has never laughed at me for my habit. Not even once. I keep track.
I'm still turned around, staring at Aubrey when my name is called.
“Theodore … Kaz…rinski?” The teacher stumbles over my name.
I watch Aubrey. She's whispering something to her friend. She sees me staring at her and winks. I almost choke.
“Theodore Kazrinski? Like the Unibomber?” Mrs. Stitch is still tripping over my name.
“Here,” I say, quickly, to shut her up. “It’s KazRINski, not Kazinski. I go by Kaz.”
Mrs. Stitch raises her eyebrows and makes a note.
“Interesting nickname,” she murmurs.
“Everyone calls him Nosepicker,” Jeremy mutters from the back of the classroom. People around me snicker.
“Theo,” I say, trying to drown out the sound. “People call me Theo.”
Mrs. Stitch finishes the roster and starts going over the syllabus. She talks about the books we're going to read this year. Lord of the Flies. Animal Farm. All that good stuff about societies and leaders and followers.
I peek back at Aubrey. Her hair got longer over the summer. It's shinier, too, like sunlight. Her foot is tapping against the leg of her desk – another nervous habit. I glance at her ankles. Her skin is creamy white, like she hadn't ventured outside all summer. I wonder about the sunblock she uses. I imagine her sitting by a pool, putting on her sunblock. How does her skin stay so white? She must use SPF 750.
A ball of paper smacks me on the side of my head and I hear Jeremy chuckling. I open the note. It says Nosepicker. I look at Jeremy and he mimics putting his pointer finger up his nose. I hear the hushed laughter ripple across the room, and I hear someone, maybe Julia whisper “Gross.”
It's happened again. In my daydreaming, my thumb has found its way to the inside of my nose. I pull it out, but the damage is done. Everyone saw. It's not even halfway into my first day and my dream of transformation is destroyed. There would be no reformation; only a return to the norm. I am the Nosepicker.
The bell graciously rings and everyone hustles out the door. I stay seated, letting everyone rush around me.
“Hi, Theo.” It's Aubrey, and it's just a quick greeting on her way out of the room, but it's amazing nonetheless. It almost redeems the day. Almost.
“Find anything good?” Jeremy is right behind her. He pretends to pick his nose, violently jamming his finger into the skin right under his eye. “Oh! Oh, I think I got something.” He examines his finger. “Looks delicious,” he says, licking it.
I stand and push past him, storming out of the room. At my locker, I throw the stack of novels from Mrs. Stitch's class onto the top shelf and slam the door shut.
“Die, Milkface,” a voice says.
It's Miles.
“The Jerk, Steve Martin,” I say.
“Apropos?” he wonders, looking at my angry face.
I shake my head.
“I heard about English class,” he says. Like a good friend, he sounds sympathetic, but we both know this conversation. We have it every school day.
“You heard already? It just happened!”
“You know how news travels,” he shrugs. He throws an arm around my shoulder and directs me to the cafeteria. “Let's eat lunch. Something will undoubtedly happen, I don't know. Maybe someone will get knocked up, and everyone will be talking about that by the end of the day.”
I buy a sandwich and we find empty seats at a table. The other kids ignore us. I tell Miles about the books Mrs. Stitch gave us, books we both read long ago.
“How was history?” I say.
Miles takes an enormous bite of his turkey sandwich. “We don't discuss business at the table,” he says through mouthfuls.
“The Godfather,” I respond, automatically. It's like a game: he recites a line, I guess the movie. It's easy since we usually watch the movies over and over on Friday nights.
“Who's your teacher?” I say, making any conversation to avoid the stares in the cafeteria. News does travel fast.
“Graham,” Miles answers. “I heard she’s hard, but ... oh ... my ... God.”
Miles is staring at something behind me. I turn. It's her, Aubrey Hughes. She is walking toward our table.
“Holy crap,” Miles breathes. “What the hell was she doing this summer - taking gorgeous pills?”
“Yeah,” I say. “I thought she looked good in English.”
We're silent as she walks by. She waves at me.
“Hi, Theo,” she says.
I just stare, unable to react. In an instant, she's gone. It's over.
Miles’ mouth falls open in a mixture of astonishment and horror.
“Why didn’t you say something? Or do something? Aubrey Hughes just spoke to you,” he says. “What the hell was that? Why the hell did she just talk to you?”
I shrug. “I dunno.” This year will be different.
“Women weaken legs,” Miles quotes.
“I like her ankles,” I say.
“What?”
“They’re so white, like half and half or something.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Miles says. “Are you seriously talking about her ankles?”