His Secret

Chapter 17

   The next few days were slow. My fever didn't die down until it was Friday and I refused to go to any Doctor. I didn't dare share the fact that I had a extreme fear of needles.

   Jason and I pretty much watched TV and laid around the house. My mother was in and out of the house with her hectic business meetings and Shane was doing his thing. I guess Jason was more of a dog person because he didn't pick on Trixie nearly as much as he picked on my cat. Either that or else he just liked picking on him because he was a little heavy.

   But my life was more commanding then ever before with the heaps of schoolwork and my dancing. I was silently freaking out inside while outside I kept a straight face. Or at least tried.

   And I guess Jason was just a huge stereotype based on his past, or at least from what I knew from it. Even though none of the kids at school knew that he was actually once homeless, I bet none of them were expecting him to be smart. I definitely wasn't expecting it.

   I mean, don't get me wrong, he wasn't the smartest kid in the class. He was an average learner. If the teacher asked him to answer a question, he wasn't one of those kids who had no idea. He actually had them right, sometimes, which shocked me to no end. Now, he didn't give answers in full detail, like a nerd, but he was usually spot-on with his answers.

   Maybe my mother was right and I did in fact have a rare disease from Africa and I was hallucinating during class, just imagining Jason answering all the questions.

   Yeah, that was probably it.

   Anyways, it was Friday after school when I walked into the school office. I was ready to do something that would probably leave my mother in tears but would also leave me with a lot less stress.

   "Can I help you ma'am?"  The aging lady at the desk asked me.

   "Um, yeah. I need to quit the cheer-leading team." I tried my hardest to not make it sound like a question.

   Her gray colored eyebrows shot up. "Aren't you Jennifer Devin?"

   My stomach did flips. Crap, she knew my name. "Yes."

   "You're the captain! Why are you quitting? Is something wrong?" Noisy are we? She handed me a paper to fill out. I spoke while I scribbled in the lines.

   "Yes, I'm the captain. And no nothing is wrong, I just have to focus on my major at the moment." I looked up from the paper and gave her a polite smile, but I was silently praying she would shut up and leave it at that.

   But of course, she didn't. "What is your major?" Was she seriously so bored with her life that she was this interested of mine?

   "I dance." I replied, not even bothering to look up from the paper. Just a few more lines-

   "I should have guessed. You have the body of a dancer. Believe it or not these legs right here were dancing legs once." She patted her knees. I dished out another smile that she ate up. I always tried to be nice to the elderly but I was already having a bad first day back from being sick and she wasn't really helping. Jason already beat all of the energy out from inside of me by annoying me to death in math class.

   And I thought dancing with Matt was hell.

   I soon filled out the rest of the paper and turned it in into the wired basket. On the way out the door, I thanked the older lady and left. Jason was staying behind for basketball practice and the weather was too chilly for my liking, especially since I was still recovering from being ill. And since my mother was still hopping around to all her meetings, that pretty much left me walking home alone.