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< First Day Back Before the Bell | HighSchoolOfShadows | In Memoriam >

<Mese> Homeroom.

<Mese> Individual desks sit in quiet ranks, facing the false altar of knowledge.

<Mese> Rigt now it's quiet; sepulchral, even. There's the hint of massed voices outside, buzzing meaninglessly, a sussurus on the edge of hearing.

<Mese> But in here, something is waiting to begin.

<Mese> Helena sits at the desk on the far right, back row/

<Mese> The door opens and Ping is framed in the doorway.

Helena perks up somewhat at the entrance of a new kid, then tries to slouch and play it off casually.

|Ping| shoots a sidelong glance at Helena, sees her slouch, shrugs, and then walks over to the center desk near the window. Once there, she plops down suddenly, with a touch of grace and a more than hint of implusiveness.

Cole looks from her notebook and awkwardly offers a half-wave hello.

<Cole> *looks up from

|Ping| smiles back and gives a large, around the world wave. The kind that bad tourists make.

<Mese> Sarah muscles through the door. She's pretty huge, a broad-chested bear of a girl with a loud voice to match. She's gabbling loudly at Laetitia as she comes in.

<Mese> "...so I was just bursting through the midfield, you know, like BAM!"

Laetitia is contrastingly slight, hourglass-shaped and soft-spoken. She is decked out in full winter uniform, jacket, scarf, and all, despite the contraindicating weather. "You think you're making varsity this year?"

<Mese> "Hell yeah, bitch, and I'm dragging you in with me, right?"

Laetitia suppresses a shake of her head. "I guess we'll see at tryouts." She places herself as close to the center of the room as possible, and neatly arrays a line of writing instruments across her desk.

<Mese> "Positive mental attitude, Tish. S'what it's all about."

<Mese> Sarah plonks herself on the desk to the right of Laetitia.

Laetitia carefully stacks her textbooks at the other side of the desk.

<Mese> More students start to slope in as the bell nears. Ophelia comes in just behind the squirrely girl with the glasses, Cassidy her name is, and just after Veronica, with the dark eye make up.

<Mese> Cassidy looks around and blinks at seeing Cole near the front. She walks past Cole's desk with a frown and then seats herself at the desk to the left of Cole.

Cole smiles drily as she drums her fingers on Cassidy's old desk.

<opheeeelia> Ophelia stops near Cole, "Hey, why the new spot?" she asks with a little worry. /is she abandoning me?/

<Mese> Cassidy is kid of pointedly NOT looking at Cole, because it is just a desk and not a big deal, right?

<Mese> But she is kind of fuming anyway, you can tell by the way she is blushing.

<Mese> Veronica sighs heavily as she looks around, and slinks into the corner behind Ping and next to Ophelia.

Cole hesitates for a moment. "Just thought I'd be able to pay better attention in front." After a slight pause, "You can move up here too. That seat's free," gesturing to the seat to the right.

<Cole> (Somebody was sitting in that seat last year, but they're not there now, and Cole is obviously not too concerned about it.)

<opheeeelia> She brightens, as much as she ever does these days, and nods. "Yeah, maybe I will." She looks back at her old desk, safely in the back and then shrugs and slides into the new seat. /How bad can the front be?/

Cole smiles, a little, then leans over and shows Ophelia what she's working on, a sketch for a campaign poster.

<opheeeelia> "Nice. I think you should use some red, here," she points

<Mese> Julie flutters in, plus a minion, what's her name, Ashley? Julie is loudly talking on her mobile phone, all: "I know, right? So then I was like, WHATEVER, you totally did him whatever you say, we all saw you at Hannah's party with that one guy, you know? And she TOTALLY BLEW UP AT ME. *Pause* I KNOW!"

<Mese> Julie plonks herself on the front desk, far right, like she isn;t too bothered where. Ashley scuttles in behind, in front of Helena.

|Ping| looks over the window at the dreary weather, kind of in a daze

Cole speculatively adds a little red.

Laetitia looks over Cole's shoulder. Cole for class president? Wtf?

<Mese> Julie is still prattling away, although she gives kind of a half-wave and smile to the whole room. Ashley turns and smiles shyly at Helena, holding the gaze for just like, slightly too long.

<Laetitia> After registering that odd detail, Laetitia turns to her algebra homework. "Find and plot f(x)=x^2+6x+3 for integer values of x from -10 to 25." She starts making neat columns of numbers.

Helena gives Ashley half of a jerky, weird, large wave.

<Mese> Ashley smiles and is all "Hey Helena! How was your summer? You look great."

<Helena> Hell yeah, bitch. Nothing like summertime, right?

<Mese> Ashley has bangs, brown eyes and clearly wants to be just a little skinnier than she is.

<Mese> She giggles nervously, and says "Yeah! My family all went down to Florida for two weeks, it was goorgeous. You go anywhere fun?"

<Laetitia> q

<Mese> Julie completes her phone call and seems to look around her for the first time. She looks over at Ophleia, fiddling with the campaign poster...

<Helena> "Oh, you know... normal vacation stuff."

Helena looks away uncomfortably.

<Mese> Ashley is like, "Right, cool." She seems vaguely dissapointed.

<Mese> Julie: "Oh you have GOT to be joking."

<Mese> Julie is grabbing at the poster in Ophelia's hand. "Cole for president? Really?"

Cole reaches over, VERY quickly, and grabs Julie's arm so that the page doesn't tear.

Cole is surprisingly strong.

<Mese> "Woah, okaaaay.." says Julie, letting go. "You realzise this is like a position with responsibilities, Cole."

<opheeelia> "I'm surprised you know that, Julie," Ophelia snipes

Mese rolls the full force of her eyes over to Ophelia. "...ohhh, I get it, you two are fucking."

<Mese> *Julie rolls

opheeelia blushes. "Are not!"

<Mese> "Well you're gonna have to screw a lot more dykes to win this vote, Cole!"

<Mese> Ashley laughs, in a forced and cyncial way.

Cole still has a grip on Julie's arm. "At least I won't have to put out for Mr. Webster," she says evenly. "Isn't that how you got Cassidy disqualified last year?"

Cole 's real message, though, is in her grip. Only Ophelia can clearly see Cole's muscles tighten until Julie's arm turns a pale white between her fingers, then calmly release as she steps back over to her desk. Cole's eyes don't leave Julie's during this process.

|Ping| turns and watches the show, wondering what is really going on besides the obvious

<Mese> Julie gets all wide eyed, and everyone sees it. "How... what... oh whatever, fuck you, DYKE." But there's a tremble in her voice that wasn't there with Ophelia.

<Mese> She sits back down, and types furiously into her phone, shooting sharp looks at Cole every few seconds.

Cole sinks back into her seat. "I don't know if this red really works. Maybe orange."

<Mese> Ashley isn't sure where to look exactly. Sarah seems to be enjoying the show, sprawled espansively around her seat with a big grin.

<Mese> Veronica nudges Ping. Very quietly, she says: "I hate it when people shout, it makes me jumpy."

<Mese> She bats her eyes up shyly and then looks down again, almost as if she hadn't said anything.

|Ping| turns and looks at Veronica, 'That wasn't shouting. You should hear my parents sometimes.' She smiles warmly.

<opheeelia> "That was cool. You'd be a good president."

<Mese> The last few students slink in. Priti is quiet as she takes her seat primly by the window in front of Ping. She immediately takes out a book and starts reading - not a school book, though.

<Cole> "I hope so."

<Mese> Priti turns to Ping. "Hey, you're the new girl, right? I'm Priti, nice to meet you." She extends a hand. She's weirdly formal.

|Ping| takes it formally and responds similar, 'A pleasure. I'm Ping.' She offers a practised fake smile this time.

Ping "So Priti, is that girl *points at Jessica* always such a B I T C H?"

<Mese> Carmela rolls in, late as always. She notes that Cole's seat is unoccupied, seems pleased, and rolls casually toward it. Having taken her place she calls to Cole: "Collllee! What;s with the front seat action? That's dorkzone over there."

<Mese> Priti smiles thinly. "Julie? Huh, yeah, that's her. She throws all the best parties because her dad is stupid with his money." She seems somehow smug about this. "She's trash. Why, what'd I miss?

Ping "She was just throwing Dyke around like it was the f-bomb, totally without class. I was wondering if she was Italian."

Cole gives a slightly rueful grin. "College apps coming up, mija. I've gotta do better this year."

<Mese> Carmela: "Coooole, you're already better. Come baaack, I gotta tell you about this gig I went to last night."

<Mese> Priti, to Ping: "Italian? I don't know, they all look the same to me. She's just, you know... new money." She wrinkles her nose.

|Ping| shrugs

<Cole> "Tell me all about it at lunch, okay? Then you'll have time to do it justice."

<Mese> "Boooring, Cole. Don't get all booooring."

Ping Ping to Priti: "I meant all the vulgarity and lack of class, you've seen The Sopranos right? Its a stereotype?"

Cole shrugs sheepishly to Carmela, still smiling.

<Mese> Priti: "My father says that white people all feel they own the world and so feel entitled to act as they please."

<Mese> "But he is an old man."

<Mese> She frowns slightly, as if she thinks she said something she shouldn't.

<Mese> Ashley's been looking kind of shaken since the whole confrontation between Cole and Julie, and so perhaps doesnlt realise how much she's staring at Helena. But, she is.

Helena stares back shyly.

<Mese> The last student in before the teacher, no-one recognises. They must be new? But they don't seem to be much in the mood for conversation - she, whoever she is, has cropped hair, large eyes, short, svelte, and make a direct beeline for the chair on the middle row, next to Ping.

<Mese> That leaves two empty desks: Abrielle's accustomed place, back row on the right - and Ophelia's old seat, which no-one has claimed. There's no sign of Abrielle yet, but that's not too unusual - she has problems at home, she;s often late.

<Mese> But there's no sign at all of the last classmate.

<Mese> Ms. Harley takes home room and strides in as the bell rings, looking solemn.

<Mese> "Settle down, class, I have an announcement."

<Mese> She looks a little shaken. "We've only just ourselves her and got permission to inform you, but her parents wanted you all to know..."

<Mese> "Aubrey Lake died last night."

<Mese> There are a few gasps around the room.

|Ping| doesn't know how to react so just sits still and silent

Cole raises an eyebrow.

< First Day Back Before the Bell | HighSchoolOfShadows | In Memoriam >