Jacob Matthews - 1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Here we go again, another year of monotony. It was really the same thing year after year. After every break, the excited giggles turned into raucous laughter as more and more people trickled into the school. The crisp morning wasn’t chilly enough to dampen anyone’s spirits, as most of the guys wore shorts and tees, while the girls seemed to always push the boundaries in their scantily clad low cut tops. Not that they had any effect on me. It was cringe-inducing enough the way some of them bat their eyes and threw themselves all over guys, trying to flaunt their bikini tans achieved over the summer. I honestly thought most of them should just “get a room” which I mumbled moodily.

“Not with you, you’re not exactly my type”, was the sarcastic reply to my rhetorical statement.

My head snapped up to see Sam lazily meander towards me, while some of the girls fixated on his appealing gait. I grinned at him, my mood improved instantaneously as the longhaired blond approached me. Even though I found his messy but tame mop, deep green eyes and tan face littered with a handful of freckles attractive, I could never think of him that way. Sam had decided that ‘We’re going to be best friends’ on his first day at a new school in fourth grade, and so the self-fulfilling prophecy was born. It was hard to separate us, both in school and out, where we practically lived at each other’s houses. ‘Attached at the hip’ was the way our mums described us - such a mum thing to say, I mean, I guess it was accurate enough though.

But be that as it may, we were polar opposites in almost every single way. Sam found himself living up to stereotypes by spending Sunday arvos at the beach most weeks, to ‘catch both waves and chicks’ as he put it – I rolled my eyes at that one – he was more likely to be dumped by both; the waves and the chicks. That reply had earned me a sharp smack to the back of the head at the time, his quick reflexes gave him the upper hand and he knew it. He tried to hide his smirk with an offended glare, but failed miserably as we both relaxed into chuckles, our usual playful banter saturated the memory.

Yet that was where the stereotypes stopped. No, (thankfully) Sam wouldn’t end up in a pimped out hippy van driving coast to coast finding the best swell, smoking the best weed, being a general free spirit and fucking anything with a pulse. As if his looks, personality and charm weren’t enough to get him anyone he pleased, he already had a position held for him at the top university in the country for Veterinarian Science. To say there were girls hanging off his every word would be an understatement, they were eating out of his hands. Did that make me appealing to girls? The answer to that question is a resounding yes, if by yes you mean passing crude hand written notes to Sam for girls who claimed to be too timid to do it themselves. So it was safe to say that yeah, people knew Sam and I were friends, but the note passing grew pretty old pretty fast, which had Sam chuckling as I told him exactly where he could shove the future notes received from potential suitors.

I, on the other hand, paled in comparison – literally. My body couldn’t seem to learn how to tan despite the amount of time spent outdoors. I was slightly taller than what could be considered average I guess, with medium length dark hair, and boring grey eyes according to the reflection of the car window I happened to catch my appearance in this morning. I mean who had grey eyes, for crying out loud. Whatever, I didn’t care; I told myself I wasn’t concerned with anyone who had anything to do with this dull, dreary prison sentence masquerading as a high school.

“Well look who decided to grace us with his presence early for the first time in his life” I recounted to the non-existent audience.

“Yeah, it was either that, or have to walk 5 k’s to school, Mum’s starting her new job today” He delicately explained, yawning theatrically.

“Big night huh? How was your night with Lindsay… oh sorry, Mindy… no wait, Cindy… or was it –“ I was cut off by quick jab to the ribs.

“Becky and I had an amazing time last night” he recalled, unabashed.

“Splendid…” I trailed off. And we left it there since he knew I didn’t really care, and why should I? I mean I didn’t want to have to remember a new name every week did I? And I knew he didn’t really care, I mean it was high school for Christ’s sake, why did every single girl think that a high school relationship would last the weekend or even the summer. They all seemed to hear wedding bells chiming instead of the less than committal words coming from Sam’s mouth, I’d heard and seen it happen before. They always seemed to act as if the carpet was pulled out from under them at the last possible moment, ending in a heap of disappointment and tears, when, in fact, there had been no metaphorical carpet to begin with. How naïve. Everyone knew high school relationships weren’t real, they didn’t last, and they sure as hell weren’t true love, or whatever the sappy words used to describe romance were in this day and age.

“So did you…” Sam insinuated, and wiggled his eyebrows mischievously like an old school villain. I punched his arm in what could be construed as a playful manner, but made sure to put a bit of kick behind it.

“For your information, no, I did not.” I nonchalantly responded while Sam tried to keep the wicked grin plastered on his face through my ‘accidentally too-hard’ punch. But he already knew that. He knew I did not see anyone, have not seen anyone, will not see anyone, at least until I get out of this hell hole I told myself. But I appreciated the effort. We knew each other well enough that he knew by trying to include me in his playful albeit highly invasive banter, it was his way of showing that he cared, and wanted me to feel included. It was his way of showing that even though he knew I was gay, it didn’t matter to him in the slightest. It was the fierce loyalty of our friendship in the first place that allowed me to feel comfortable enough to tell him. The significance of him asking, however crudely, if I got lucky on my summer break, was a doorway for me to further discuss anything personal with him. He knew he was the only person I’d told, and he wasn’t fazed by it in the slightest.

“But you wouldn’t even tell me if you did, you prude” He teased back light-heartedly.

That struck a bit of a nerve, I faltered in my step slightly and he noticed. I wasn’t a prude, nor was I being noble and ‘saving myself’ whatever that meant, but I just wasn’t as liberal as Sam was about this kind of thing, and he knew that, and liked to capitalise on it. It’s alright though, I knew how to shut him up.

“Oh so you’d like to know all the details like when I decide to stick my dick right in hi–“

“Aww shit Nick, I don’t need all the details man.” He interrupted quickly. His hands hovered near his ears as if he were about to cover them and start yelling to drown out my overly descriptive phantom lay. I smirked viciously at him knowing I had won this round and we both relaxed into an easy laughter.

We split up as the bell rang to go to our separate classes, Sam to Biology, while I wandered in the opposite direction to Modern History. I was more into the humanities side of things, but history could be just as uninteresting as this school was – even more so in some cases. I hoped today was not one of those cases. I mean, how could history even be modern? That’s an oxymoron in and of itself, and we hadn’t even made it to English class.

I waded through the sea of bodies and desks to make my way to the back of the class, where I could zone out and not have to think. Now, I know what you’re thinking, and yes, I know it’s the first day of class but seriously, I mean history with Mr Sanders was probably the one thing worse than death itself. He was probably old enough to have experienced and written the whole course on his own and had clearly won first prize in the country’s most monotonous voice contest. It was almost as if he aimed to see how many students he could put to sleep each week, then go home proud that he had a high score. On Mondays in particular, he knew he could get a few bonus points due to the big weekends the night before, and first day of the year was like Christmas to him, since clearly nobody was in the mood to learn and were all still dreaming about summer spent at the beach.

Oh no, he just got that twinkle in his eye, the one that appears when he thinks he says something exciting or that we should take more notice of. I used this moment to silently slam my head into the desk a few times, under the presumption that if I was concussed, surely I couldn’t be allowed to stay in class right? As I lifted my gaze I saw the reason for his excitement: another addition to the class. Great. This would be the first time something new happened in history. Surely he would attribute this to his clearly superior teaching methods of referring to his cat Mr Snuggles, I shuddered internally, as if it were an autonomous state, where his other cats, God forbid I didn’t give a shit what their names were, frequently made cameo appearances as Russia, China and USA. Simply fantastic. My eyes traced the path made by the newcomer. It was clear the black haired figure was a meathead, with shoulders like that I’m surprised he could fit through the doorway. I snorted at my own joke, which drew a few looks from my neighbours. The ever-gaudy sorry excuse for a school shirt pulled tight against his wide frame as he took his seat gracefully in the second row. Gracefully? How did someone who clearly had the IQ of a piece of toast move gracefully? More importantly, how did someone with a frame like that fit between the chair and the desk.

Oh well, time to return to my post wake stupor. I pondered thoughtfully and rehashed my morning arrival here, where I didn’t notice any other unfamiliar faces. It would be unusual to have any people arriving for the final year of classes before venturing out into the real world, simply due to the hassle of a move which would affect studying. Which made sense I guess in his case since there wouldn’t be much studying done at all, unless it was standing in front of a full-length mirror in the gym, I thought sourly. Now that would be a funny conundrum. I wonder how he would read the books? Would he have to turn the book to face the mirror so he could still look at himself the whole time while ‘studying’.

An irritated noise jarred my conjured image momentarily.

But then surely he would have to read the words backwards right? I mean everything was reversed in a mirror.

A not so quiet cough interrupted me once more. Couldn’t they keep it down?

The image of this meathead standing in front of a full length mirror, book in hand and eyebrows crushed at an impressive angle in an attempt to read backwards had me chuckling to myself.

“Would you care to share with the class what you find so amusing about not answering during roll call Mr Hunter?” Mr Sanders’ voice cut harshly through my dream state reality.

I had enough shame to be abashed enough to stutter back a hurried “Nothing Sir”, yet in the brief moment where my eyes flickered between the general direction of the whiteboard back down to my table, I saw the bright blue gaze pierce my dull grey one, and I could have sworn I saw a shadow of a smirk on the new guy’s face.

Great. Simply fantastic. Now I’d gone and made an ass of myself in front of the class, and the new guy noticed too. Not that I cared though, I took pride in not giving a flying fuck about what people though about me, yet it was still mildly irritating.

Since I was now at least feigning paying attention to the class, I noticed the name that stood out from the others that I was already familiar with.

“Jacob Matthews?” murmured the old geyser

“Here” came the confident reply.

Confident? Well of course you’re confident you dumb idiot, anyone would be if they could run head first into a brick wall where the wall would be the one coming off second best. I don’t know why I felt justified in being annoyed, but I felt like I was being rubbed the wrong way.

The rest of the class continued without incident, meaning that it was back to analysing Mr Snuggles’ reign over eastern Europe while my eyes glazed over as I assumed one of my favourite upright sleeping positions. For the uninitiated, it involves propping your elbow onto the table, your hand under your chin, with your palm cupping your cheek, where the downward force of your jaw locks your elbow in place. This is known as what I like to call the least effort paying attention pose, it has close to no drawbacks, unless you accidentally do drift off for a bit, and you’re sitting next to your idiot friend Sam, who decides to quickly shove your elbow off the desk, resulting in you face-desking yourself, leaving you with a nosebleed. Speaking of which, I still hadn’t got him back for that one…

The end of class meant that my one hour of undiluted misery was up for the day with more promises of Mr Snuggles’ adventures in the next lesson. Since I was one of the last people to file out into the corridor, it meant that it was already teeming with students everywhere. I wove my way intricately through, giving an occasional nod or a ‘hey’ where deemed appropriate as I saw familiar faces pass me in the congested hall. Soon enough I was at my locker, absent-mindedly twisting the combination lock, which had stuck with me through 5 years of high school so far. It’s battered face spun easily in my practiced hands, after memorising the combination on the first day all those years ago, it was almost perfect muscle memory which got the sturdy lock open for me today. I could probably do it with my eyes closed by now I thought, as I reached into my uncharacteristically tidy locker to grab my books for whatever torture I had to endure next. I relished the moment gazing into the neat space, knowing that in about one week it would be packed full of crap, with mess spilling out of it at every possible chance.

By the time I was done with my locker, the halls had emptied significantly which made me one of the few people left remaining milling about before class. I strode quickly towards the other side of the school not wanting to be slapped with a detention on the first day of class. While scanning quickly down one of the adjacent corridors I saw that familiar blond mop, a sorry excuse of a haircut if you ask me, and with the recent memory of the aforementioned face-desking I had payback on my mind. I switched into stealth mode and I slowly slunk towards him. This was perfect. His back was to me, he was walking leisurely while I was gaining pace, my typically echoing footsteps muted by my lithe but careful strides. As I grew close my pace increased in tandem with my sense of impending justice and I smiled inwardly. When I was a few steps away, I dropped my shoulder and sprung, arcing ever so majesti–

WHACK. Maybe it was more of a thump but that’s the sound my face made as I hit the solid surface and literally bounced backwards landing on my ass. Could this day get any worse? Yes. Yes it could. I heard a deep chuckle and my eyes snapped up to meet those piercing blue ones, which were becoming irritatingly familiar. I guessed that the throaty laughter probably had something to do with the palate of appalled, shocked and surprised looks painted on my face simultaneously. I ignored the proffered hand to help me up as I scrambled to my feet. His eyebrows rose at that, as if he were offended at my rudeness. My rudeness? He was the one who just made me make a fool out of myself. He was the one who wasn’t watching where he was going and he has the nerve to look slightly offended? I mean who in their right mind doesn’t pay attention when they come around a blind corner in this shitty excuse of a corridor. Where the hell did he get the idea of being offended from? If anything that was my right! I brushed my hands down my clothes once to straighten out my now creased shirt, as he shrugged non-committedly and waltzed away with a Cheshire cat-like smile plastered on his face and laughter echoing in his eyes, as if he were about to explode into hysterics.

That was twice now in the period of an hour I’d been laughed at, and by no less than the new kid. New guy I should say, he could hardly be considered a kid. It seemed Sam had escaped his karma payout for now, or rather I’d subbed in for him to take a strong dose of instant karma, for no apparent reason. Life was so unfair.

I sighed as I opened the door, definitely late this time.

“Hurry up and take a seat we’ve alre – Oh my god Nicholas are you alright?” was shot at me.

I followed the eyes pinned on me by the whole class down to my chest, half expecting the have a knife sticking out from my stomach the way some of their eyes were bugging out. Wondering what on earth could have got that reaction I saw that it indeed did look as if I had been stabbed, there was blood, lots of it. I lifted my hand to my mouth in a silent exclamation only to notice my hand was now bloodied from a consistent river of blood flowing out from my nose. Bloody nosebleeds. I used to get them all the time. Not this shit again. See, I have this thing with luck. I have the worst luck ever. You know Murphy’s law right? Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong. Yeah. Well that law was made to recount my whole life. I was the sole reason that that saying existed in the first place. So I’m not sure why I didn’t suspect something like this happening, I mean it was the first day of school and clearly I hadn’t got my full dose of first day bad luck yet. You think I’d be immunised by now, but apparently not.

“What happened?!”

“He probably ran head first into a brick wall to save us from having to put up with his presence” snickered Tiffany from the front to her friends. Well, she was half right about running into the brick wall at least, but I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. Let’s just say Tiffany was still bitter about losing Sam and had made it her life goal to take it out on me for some reason. In that messed up mind of hers she thinks that Sam didn’t want to be with her because his best friend, yours truly, wasn’t too fond of her. Well I guess she was kind of right about that as well, but she deserved it. I mean she was just a miserable bitch who ordered everyone around to do her bidding. A clear case of Princess Bitchface Syndrome. No I’m not joking, it’s a real thing, Google it. If Murphy’s law was loosely based on my life, then Princess Bitchface Syndrome was her autobiography. She thought that having a pretty face, big tits and a flaunting her dad’s money meant that everyone had to be instantly attracted to her. She may have also taken offence at the fact that I never really expressed any interest towards wanting her while she was with Sam. Yeah, I know. She was the kind of girl who even when she had a boyfriend or whatever she still needed people to want her, if they were guys; or to be jealous of her if they were girls. So in other words your typical high school self entitled ‘popular’ girl. I mean we all knew where she would end up right? Clear daddy issues, a ‘look-at-me-I’m-a-princess’ attitude and with a name like Tiffany, Candy, or Brittney she was heading straight to the life of being a stripper, no stage name needed. I do concede that she would probably make a lot of money, since it seems to be directly proportional to the size of your tits in that business, but I’d settle for that knowing that I’d been right about her dull future.

“Uhh, I’m not sure” I responded to the teacher who, in her concern for me didn’t hear Tiffany’s crude remark.

“If you’re alright to walk then, make your way up to the office to get cleaned up. Do you need someone to help you?”

I briefly schemed about taking Tiffany to ‘help’ me and ‘accidentally’ bleeding all over her what I was sure was meant to be designer outfit, but even the satisfaction I would get out of that wouldn’t be worth having to put up with her miserable company for the 2 minute walk.

“I’ll manage” I called over my shoulder as I shuffled from the class, hearing Tiffany and her posse laugh at me on the way out. Whatever, I got some satisfaction from the fact that while my bleeding was a spontaneous event, hers was a once a month occurrence.

I managed to wash most of the blood from my face and waited until the bleeding stopped while at the bubblers, then grudgingly made my way to the office. I got the same shocked expressions and words as before, as I mumbled out some crappy generic excuse, while they fetched me a shirt to wear in place of the one that more accurately represented a CSI crime scene. Of course it was too big, and smelt bad, but I donned it nevertheless thinking of the argument I’d get at home from mum for ruining a shirt on my first day back. I know she’d attempt to salvage it with bucket loads of bleach, as we couldn’t afford to buy another one, and I’d get chewed out for not taking more care, but secretly she’d just be glad I was ok.

The look Sam gave me as we met at lunch was confused, but turned entertained as I explained why I was wearing a shirt about 3 sizes too big for me that reeked of old socks. He ended up snorting milk out his nose in a fit of laughter as I recounted the sequence of events once more and I found myself chuckling slightly too.

Could you have a worse first day back at school? No. But at least it was still bringing amusement to some people. Would it get worse? No. I mean it couldn’t get worse than this, right? Wrong.