Tenth Grade was Fun!

2. FRUSTRATIONS AND SURPRISES

Entering the classroom, I find myself looking at mixed types of students. There were three lines of benches in the classroom and in the back of the line of benches that was farthest from the door, I see a group of boys howling in laughter, another group of boys in the first few rows of the same line of wooden benches huddled together with a quiet conversation.

The middle line of benches holds a group of both boys and girls laughing and thwacking each other. The line of benches nearest to the door has girls sitting in the first few benches reading story books or the school books and having some mild conversation occasionally and the last few benches have boys throwing erasers and small stationary items at each other.

Just before I take another step I am abruptly stopped by a boy who runs past me followed by another boy chasing him with a...small plastic ruler in his hand?

It's official. Boys are the dumbest creatures.

Shaking my head a grin appears on my face automatically as I see a vacant seat in the last bench of the middle line of benches and make my way towards it.

Let me make something really clear. I hate first bench. I mean, who would wanna sit in a bench where you would be right under the teachers' nose—quite literally—and be scrutinized very frequently, while you can sit in the last bench and be out of the teacher's radar for most of the time while you eat, sleep, talk and play games during classes? Not me for sure.

As I place my bag on the bench I notice two other bags kept there. Must be my bench mates'.

I sit down pulling out the 'Twilight' book—which I borrowed from a library because so many people recommended it and all the teens, especially girls, seem to be speaking about it—from my bag and try to read it.

Keyword: try.

I almost groan in annoyance as I read the main character swooning over the 'Edward' character's eyes for the hundredth time. I honestly don't know how people read the mushy romance genre books. A bit of romance here and there with all other aspects is fine, they would be balanced. But complete cheesiness? No thank you!

(A/N: No offence to twilight fans. But I'm not gonna apologize for that.)

Just as I was about to slam the book close in frustration, I see a shadow tower over me. Looking up, I see a familiar face that I have been with since Upper Kindergarten till sixth grade, when students were shuffled to different divisions—a.k.a. sections—smiling at me.

I know her pretty well to call her friend, but we're not too close and shit.

"Hey Vicky! I didn't know you were in the same section as me!" Says Neha, still smiling.

Offering back a smile I reply, "Hey yourself! Well, now you know about it!"

Lame joke. 

I know.

Neha takes a seat on the bench in front of mine and turns towards me and looks at the book questioningly. "You still read books?"

"Yeah I d—" Before I could give the affirmative, Harsh, an acquaintance I could say, comes towards us and plops beside me as if he owns the place.

"Hi Vicky! How're ya doin' dude?" He asks, with a shit eating grin.

"Cool." I reply with a smile, but not as enthusiastic as him.

We then start making a mild conversation on general topics like the subject teachers we expected, the teacher allotted to our section—a.k.a. class teacher—some boys who looked cute in the class—after Harsh leaves the conversation of course—some boys and girls who looked like nerds—which was started by me, but Neha ended up pointing me as one because of my glasses and decent academics history, earning herself an eye roll from me.

I flinch as I hear a squeaky voice—almost like nails scraping on board—from the group of students who were sitting and conversing in the benches in front of ours. Looking there I find a thin girl with long hair, rolling her eyes in an unnecessarily dramatic way and placing her hands on another girl's.

She isn't the Queen Bee and all, just a drama queen.

Like that makes it any better.

I make a mental note to try not to have anything to do with her.

I think the universe has planned on going against me because the drama queen herself notices me and puts a smile on her face and says, "Hi! Rithvika right? I'll call you Ritu. So Ritu, tell me which section you were in last year?"

"I was in section 'G' last year and I'd rather you call me Vicky." I reply back trying to keep my voice calm.

Don't get me wrong. I like my name but 'Ritu' for a nickname is not what I like. I hate it when people call me by that nickname. It's just too girlish and cheesy. I just hate it. Period.

"Oh that's nice to know Ritu, I was in 'F', the section before yours!" she says, completely ignoring the last part of my reply.

Before I could snap at her, the 8:00 a.m. bell for the first period rings and the students shuffle back to their benches.

Since I was already in my seat, I waited and calmed myself down when Harsh came back and placed himself beside me asking, "You okay bro?"

"Peachy. Bitch got saved by the bell." I tell him.

"Yeah, I saw what happened." he replies back, then putting up a high pitched voice to imitate drama queen, he continues, "'I was in 'F', the section before yours!'"

We both share a laugh and then Darsh—Harsh's fraternal twin—sits on the other side of Harsh. We share our greetings and 2-3 minutes later, a teacher—hopefully the class teacher, because he seems to be cool—enters the class, introduces himself as our class teacher—woohoo!—and starts with roll call procedures and syllabus discussions.

Pretty much every subject teacher did it and I waited for Physics, my favorite subject, which we had before lunch period.

I love Physics!!

***

"I fucking hate Physics." I mutter to myself after the syllabus was discussed and turns out we have the driest topics this year. The topics were so dry that they made me regret my decision of bringing just one liter of water to school. Oh joy!

The physics class comes to an end and it's lunch period, my all-time favorite period! Taking out my lunch and craving for some me-time, I avoid going out and sit in my bench and do people watching while I eat my lunch. Finishing it, I check the time to find that I still have 20 minutes for lunch period to end.

Deciding to take a walk in the open ground, I get up and make my way down to the ground floor. Walking past the throng of students walking freely in the corridors, I come across the JEE students' building that was on the way to the open ground.

The JEE building looked crowded too, with students walking about in the corridors or outside the building in the ground. Walking around I look at the students, especially boys, playing soccer, cricket, kabaddi, tag, et cetera and yelling at each other.

I snap my head towards a group of boys playing soccer when I hear a familiar—too familiar—voice yell at another boy. What the—?

Not believing my ears I squint at the group to check if I really did hear the voice.

And then I saw him.

A/N: Frustrated 'cause of cliffhanger?

Thoughts? Vote and comment, please and thank you!