Lonely Hollow

Only 67 Sophomores

"Tardy again, Mr. Williams," Mr. McDuff announced my arrival to English, my first period. "Have a seat, and get out your Notes on plagiarism."

I sat down in my desk, and set my black backpack down on the floor, unzipped it and got out my English notebook and a blue pen. I opened my notebook up to the lined page titled 'Plagiarism'. I glanced down at what I had, and frowned. All I had were a few scribbled words that I could barely read myself and a small doodle in the bottom left corner of the page of a stick figure holding an umbrella.

"Turner," A voice whispered from the desk to the right of me. I looked upward and saw Andrew leaning over to talk to me. I noticed his notebook open to a page titled with the same words, but instead of a pathetic excuse for notes, his entire page was covered in tiny, neat, and organized words, all done in his nearly perfect handwriting. It made me jealous sometimes, but only a little bit, I kind of got used to it. He was after all, my best friend.

"What?" I asked, taking my eyes off of Andrew's notes and looking at him.

"Late again?" Andrew grinned, in a playful mock. His green eyes barely showing through his long, straight, dirty blonde hair.

"Yeah, and I see you still haven't got a haircut," I grinned back. It was a bit of a joke, because he would always say he was getting a haircut himself, and then just wait until his parents made him go get one. Seeing as his hair was now long enough to cover his eyes, I guessed he would be getting one soon.

"I swear I'm gonna go get one today," Andrew replied, a tad bit louder than a whisper.

"Mr. Porter!" Mr. McDuff always called students by Mr. This or Ms. That. Whatever their last name was. Even though no other teacher did. "I see you have started off class today by talking to your friend there." he said, glaring at me through his thick glasses. "Care to talk some more and tell us how to exactly and correctly quote your sources in a paper without plagiarising?"

"Well, you see you can quote your sources without plagiarising by..." Of course Andrew knew exactly what to say and exactly the right answer. I took the opportunity I had been given and started jotting down notes based off of whatever Andrew was saying. 

After he was finished with his long, descriptive and accurate answer, Andrew leaned back in his desk and folded his arms in his green and black striped hoodie.

"Very good, Mr. Porter," Mr. McDuff admitted, his bushy mustache twitching with a hint of resentment.

"Um...Mr. McDuff? You said 'Porter' again."

"Yes. So?"

"My last name is 'Porder'. You know, with a D."

"Mr. Porter, I do believe that's what I said."

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Lunch came around quick, I barely payed any attention in Biology and Art. I was too tired to do that. Plus, Mr. McDuff is practically the only teacher that actually cares what you do in class. Mrs. Jenson, my Biology teacher, fell asleep at her desk while she was teaching, so everyone just did whatever they wanted to do until the bell rang and woke her up, but by that time second period was over. Ms. Bennett, my Art teacher, does care what you do in class. But then again, it's art. It doesn't really require that you do very much at all. So I basically just doodled, but on sketchbook paper.

As always I sat with Andrew, and we were always later joined by our other friends, Morgan, Derek, and Jenny. Besides Andrew, Jenny was probably the smartest person I knew, although she didn't like to show it. Derek was always a laugh, even if nobody else was, he was almost always laughing. Morgan was always a bit of a realist, seeing and accepting the inevitable before anyone else did. She had always been that way ever since I met her. We all got along pretty well, and we all lived in the same general area of Lonely Hollow, so we all became pretty good friends over the years.