After embarrassing myself so badly that even my own mother wasn't going to want to look me in the eyes, I shower and run to catch the end of first period and the beginning of second period.
Even if I didn't have any homework, pencils, or anything, I figured my presence would suffice for Mr. Smith, and if that didn't work, I could always bribe him with twenty dollars and a Bigmac to get him off my back.
Unfortunately, I'm not so lucky when I open the door and find everyone locked in the middle of a huge, fat-ass pop quiz that's taking everyone's attention until I walk in like a dork.
"Tennyson! At long last, you've graced us with your presence during the final fifteen minutes of class!" The teacher at the front of the room announces loudly, and everyone looks up at me.
Mr. Smith had always been odd-looking, with thinning hair and plaid suits that looked like they were from the 1970s. A kid even spread a rumor that he had once been a gangster or a criminal. But he was a pushover too, so it was easy to get away with not showing up to class as long as homework was turned in on time.
"Um..." I glance over at my desk, and then just so happen to lock eyes with the boy from the pool. The one who I'd made an idiot of myself in front of.
What the heck was he doing here?
"Here, take a quizzlet packet and have a seat, Mr. Tennyson," Smith tells me, and then he sighs. "God, I don't know why I decided to teach Consumer Math. Half the students don't show up to this class anyway. Maybe I should consider moving states again. "
I hurry to my seat and sit down, glancing over at the boy...Fish, who was busy staring out one of the many windows, obviously having no interest in Smith's quizzlet or anything else for that matter.
I hesitate, and then I take a seat beside him, but he doesn't acknowledge me.
"Now, since Carter decided to show up late, I'm subtracting another ten minutes from your time to complete the quiz!" Smith announces, and everyone groans. "That leaves five minutes for you to complete it before the bell rings, and five minutes for me to reject a hoard of degenerates on Tinder!"
"Hey, Tennyson!" Nelson Mitchell whispers from two seats down. Are you going to the party on the beach after school? "
"What party?" I whisper back, and I start looking for a pencil to try to fill out at least some of the quiz in front of me.
"You know, the party!" Nelson whispers a little louder. "Victoria Diaz is hosting it at her beach house. Are you going to be there? You're one of the coolest kids in school. You have to come! "
I roll my eyes and then turn to face Fish, who had now turned to face me.
Holy shit. It was literally like staring into the ocean. His eyes were this crazy shade of blue, and he was so calm...so unbothered by everything around him that it was almost unsettling.
"Hi," I say quietly, and casually extend my hand to shake his. "My name's Carter. But you already knew that, didn't you? " I laugh a little, but he doesn't respond or take my hand, so I end up blushing profusely, mortified by the long pause between us.
Maybe he hated my stinking guts.
Maybe he was the type of kid who was so stuck up that he thought he was too good for this school. We got those types of people sometimes, whose parents owned huge houses and fancy cars and figured that our cute seaside town was the perfect place to get away from the city.
"Don't bother talking to him," Nelson informs me from over my shoulder. "Smith said he's deaf, or mute. Something like that. Nobody can get him to say anything, not even the lady who's fostering him. Anyway, how about that party? "
The bell rings over our heads, and suddenly, everyone's getting out of their seats, except for Fish and me, of course.
I watch him reach into his backpack a second later and pull out a card. The type that little kids used when they were studying the alphabet or how to multiply, only this one seemed to be some kind of communication card.
"Pineapple." It shows a pineapple on the front of it, and then he slides it over to me.
I take the card and study it, and then I glance back up at him, squinting a little in confusion.
Fish passes me another card, but this time there's an orange goldfish on the front of it.
"Fish."
"I see you two are getting along nicely!" Mr. Smith's shadow suddenly falls over our desks, and I look up, my heart pounding like crazy. I'd been so focused on Fish that I hadn't realized that the rest of the class had emptied out and we were the only ones left.
"Er... not really?" I reply, and I hand Fish his cards back before standing up. "I should probably get going. Sorry about missing your quiz, Mr. Smith," I say, and then I start to move past him.
"Oh, that's quite alright," Smith blocks me with one arm, a sly smile stretching across his face and furry mustache. "How would you like to earn a free A+ and we'll throw this incident under the bus?" He questions.
"That sounds great, but my schedule's kind of tight, and I--"
"All you have to do is escort Theodore around school and help him communicate with the rest of the students!" Smith blurts out. "Please, for the love of God! They asked me to do it, but I have a soap opera to watch after work with my mother. She hates it when I'm late. "
I look back at Fish, who stands up and stares at us, lips pursed a little, like he was thinking really hard about what we were saying.
And I couldn't help myself.
I wanted to know more about him, and I liked the idea of getting a free grade, especially since Coach Henderson was always grilling us about being straight A students if we were going to be on his team. So what do I do but say yes?
Fish passes me another two cards as we step into the hallway, and I take them from him, turning them over.
"Fish. Party."
"Man," I look over at him, studying his expression. "We really need to get you some better cards, or an iPad. Actually, I might have an iPad that you can borrow back at home. Maybe you should come over after swim practice, if that's okay with your parents?"
Fish smiles at me for the first time since I met him.
And just like that, we form a weird little friendship in the first five minutes of talking.
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