Chapter 2
I stroll into the classroom, my classroom, and take a seat in the chair at the front of the room. It’s about a quarter till eight, so I have fifteen minutes to get ready for my first class of the day. Technically, I should be finding the calculus text books and those annoying sheets that everyone fills out to tell how decrepit and decimated their books are. It seems, however, that someone has already done this and all of the text books and sheet are stacked nicely in front of my desk. Since everything is already done for me, I indulge in spinning around in the chair until I’m extremely dizzy. I haven’t done this since I was in high school myself, but it feels nice to act like a kid again. As I’m leaning back with my feet up on my desk, the school bell rings and students start to enter the room.
I quickly get my feet off the desk and write my name up on the chalk board while using my peripheral vision to scan the students for Emily Bryer. I’ve memorized what she looks like, but I hadn’t of needed to. Nearly every girl in this class, school too if I had to guess, has blond hair so Emily sticks out with her auburn hair. Sighing, I sit down in my chair and wait for the bell to ring. Once the bell signals that it’s time to start class, I stand up and start my first time teaching ever.
“Hello class. My names Mr. Smith and today we’ll be doing the awful paperwork that comes with the first day of school. As I take roll for today you can all grab a book and grab a green sheet of paper and a syllabus. Once everyone is done with the green sheet you can turn it into the tray and then I’ll explain the syllabus. After all that’s done we can relax until class is over. Any questions?” I finish.
I scan the room and find only one hand up. For a moment I wonder what Emily might ask. Doing what I usually do, I’m prepared for any question. Something about being around twenty-five teenagers terrifies me though. Taking a steadying breath, I nod my head in the direction of Emily and her raised hand.
“What happened to Mr. Gray?” Emily asks.
“I’m not sure.” I reply honestly.
“Did he die?” A boy questions.
“Did he get fired?” A girl asks.
“I don’t know what happened to Mr. Gray. Now if you could just say ‘here’ when I call you name.” I say.
I start scrolling down the list. No one is absent so I don’t have to worry about not knowing anyone’s face on the first day. Sitting down in my chair, I turn to the computer and fill out the electronic attendance sheet. After a few minutes I turn around and see that everyone has completed their green ‘my book is awful and falling apart’ sheets. Great, now I have to talk again.
“Alright. If you could all look at your syllabuses you’ll see that we’ll have a quiz every other week and that we’ll be doing two projects this year.” I say not wanting to read the whole syllabus to a bunch of high school seniors.
Everyone stares at me and I stare back. I wonder if they know that I’m new at this. For a moment I have a sinking suspicion that they can smell fear. It’s strange that I’m perfectly calm when twenty drug lords have semi-automatic rifles pointed at me, but I’m positively terrified of twenty-five high school students. Right now I think I’d rather deal with the drug lords.
“What are we going to do until class is over?” Emily asks her voice all too familiar by now.
“Whatever you want.” I say though the idea sends chills down my spine.
The class doesn’t explode like I expected it to. Instead most of the students just pull out their cell phones and start texting, listening to music or playing games. Emily, unlike everyone else, walks around my desk and sits in the extra chair. I don’t know what she’s doing, but for some reason she makes me uncomfortable. Maybe I should tell Steel to put someone else on this case. It hasn’t even been half an hour and I’m squirming like a hormonal teenager.
