9I froze. Not because of the comment, oh no, I got that a lot with brown hair below my hips. I froze because of the voice. I never really believed in "love at first sight", but I do believe in two soul mates seeing other for the first time and having a rush of new emotion. I had never, however, even thought about love at first sound. I have to say, the second I heard that voice, I fell in love.
Don't get me wrong- I'm not shallow, nor do I fall in love often. In fact, I only had once in my life before that. Kind of…in a little girlish sort of way, I suppose. But now I had to turn around to look at the person whose voice I'd fallen in love with. Taking a small, deep breath, I turned around slowly. And almost fainted. I've only ever fainted once, when I'd been overexerted and overheated and dehydrated.
I'm picky. I can say that. I don't go for labels, or clothing or hair styles. The person I fall for has to be really special, has to be my type exactly. I never really had fallen out of "love" with my crush until this point. Now someone else, someone completely different, had taken their place.
The colors of his features could catch anyone's attention. At least, that's what I thought.
His hair was such a dark brown that it looked black, and his bright eyes were such a light brown that they shown golden. His beautiful hair was a bit shaggy, not shaved to his head, nor all in his face. His nose wasn't tiny nor large, it was straight and noble. His mouth was just…delicious. A vaguely thin face, with small lensed glasses that looked like they were just there for reading. A small amused quirk was at the corner of his delicious mouth, but he looked a little awed at my copious amounts of hair.
My eyes quickly flicked down to his shirt. I was all ready to glance back up and give him my usual answer (which was "yeah, I know") when something awful caught my eye. A teacher's lanyard.
Ohshit.
Do NOT tell me I just spontaneously fell for a teacher!
Trying furiously to keep my facial expression under control (it was trying to contort because I'd just fallen in love, and then found out I had fallen in love with a teacher) I looked back up to meet his eyes. His beautiful eyes…. I nearly let out a dreamy sigh, but caught myself just in time to say,
"Yeah, I know. It can be annoying."
I didn't want him to think me rude, so I added a little comment just for him. He nodded.
"Well, I was just commenting, but I suppose I should introduce myself now. Mr. Dawayne Greenfield. I'm new this year, so would you mind pointing me to the twelfth grade A team English classroom?"
That was my classroom!
"Oh, sure. Go the rest of the way down this hall, take a right, past the trailers outside, into the grey building, first classroom to the left. You must be really lost to be all the way over here! I'm Bella Cloud, by the way. I'll be in your class."
He smiled. I melted. His lips were even more delicious like that.
"I'll see you there then! But I'd better be going if I want to get there before the students. Thank you for helping me out, Bella. Nice meeting you!"
He held out his hand, and not thinking, just acting out of instinct, I shook it. Bad move. Tingles spread from my hand throughout my entire body. I know this sounds so stereotypical, but if you have ever experienced something like this, you know what I'm talking about. His hand was warm, with a firm but not too firm grip. I could feel the blood slowly rushing up to my face. He smiled once more, released my hand, and walked down the hallway.
Nice one there, Bella. I thought. At least you didn't make a complete fool of yourself.
I rolled my eyes at myself. Who cares about that, I just managed to fall in love with my new teacher on my first day of twelfth grade before classes have even started! I touched my cheeks. I could practically feel them burning. But how could he be a teacher? He looked so young! At the oldest twenty- three or twenty-four. Maybe he went straight into studying to be a teacher when he graduated? But still, teaching high school when he looked like he could still be attending it? Well, not quite. He had an air of authority and intelligence about him, or else it was just the teacher's lanyard.
I cursed the teacher's lanyard. If it hadn't existed, I'd have been free to pursue him. But now, I thought, the question is, will you still?
I snorted. Hell would freeze over the day he was romantically interested in one of his students. But I could still dream.
I turned back to my locker, which had been the source of my attention until my new love had stolen it. I stuck my last picture on the door, and slammed it closed with still shaking hands. I swung my book bag onto one shoulder and walked down the hall to first period, Chemistry. Gods, I couldn't wait for second period English.
Chemistry had been alright. Mostly we just filled out student info forms, and then the teacher had told us the definition of Chemistry and what we would be covering this year. But now I was heading towards English, the class I'd been waiting for every second of first period. I was practically trotting along, dodging past people in the full hallway, eager to get to English class. Not only was it being taught by the most delicious man I'd ever seen, it was also my favorite subject in school.
"Hey!" I felt a telltale tug on my long braid. "Bell-la! Why are you going so fast?"
Snatching my braid back, I answered,
"That's a long story, Sav. I'll save it for later."
It was my best friend, Savannah Fisher, whose preferred method of greeting me was tugging on my hair, which she was obsessed with. It was certainly not my favorite, but I liked it in so as much that it was part of our secret language thingy-majiger. We'd met in sixth grade, and had been best friends since. If something important or life-altering happened to one of us, the other was the first to know. Over the years, we'd created a sort of talking without saying anything. It was mostly just normal body language, but it was fun.
She caught up to me and was striding along beside me when I started twirling my braid over one finger. That meant that something big romantically had happened to me. I made sure she saw my gesture. First, she looked quite surprised, since she was the one who used that more often, but it settled into a mischievous smile.
By pure luck, we were in the same English class. We sat beside each other in the center of the second row, just where I was comfortable looking at Mr. Greenfield, but not right under his nose. Sav kept throwing me impatient glances, which I ignored. I wasn't going to risk telling her until we were in private.
"Alright kids, I'm Mr. Greenfield. I'm going to be your English teacher for your twelfth grade year. Any questions?"
One red haired guy raised his hand. "Yeah, how old are you?"
Mr. Greenfield gave a low chuckle (I melt again) and replied,
"Twenty-three. Only six years older than most of you!"
The class had no more questions, so we set down to business. Which meant more student info forms. Hopefully we'd get more done than in Chemistry, because I couldn't wait to see what type of assignments Mr. Greenfield would give us. He didn't seem like a busywork type of guy. He began passing the forms out to all the students. He gave me a small, nearly unnoticeable smile when he gave me mine, and my mouth twitched up in return, though I was glowing inside.
Thanks to my quick penning skills (my handwriting is cramped and messy because of them) I finished before any of the other students. I leaned back and looked around the classroom. It was pretty bare, except a few posters hung up here and there. The board had the schedule on it, as well as Mr. Greenfield written up in the corner. The actual Mr. Greenfield was sitting behind a typical teacher's desk, with a small box for storing writing utensils, a name plaque, a filing tray, and a couple papers scattered about on it. He was writing what looked like a lesson plan.
I just stared at him. He looked perfect. I admired the way his hand held his pencil (he was right handed, as I was) and the way it skittered across the page. I used the time to examine exactly what he looked like. He was quite a bit taller than me, but I already knew that, and his torso was covered by a perfectly sensible white button up shirt. He was thin but not quite lanky, and his fingers were lovely. I always noticed hands and fingers. I think that they tell part of your personality. His tapered off, and were slightly pale, but still looked like he got out a lot.
Maybe I sound stalkerish, but I couldn't help it. He was gorgeous! I'll bet he'll get a lot more girls checking him out than me. Just to prove my point to my guilty conscience, I glanced around at the females in the room. Sure enough, a couple were at least stealing a look at him now and again.
I sighed and leaned back again. This could only end in heart ache. My only other crush had been nine years older than me, my older brother's best friend. I thought that was kind of funny- Mr. Greenfield was three years younger than him, but so much more unreachable.
I closed my eyes to mull over my situation. I thought I was in love. Not just with his looks (which were smashing) but all the personality I'd seen so far. He was laid back, had a sense of humor, was kind, and so many other things that I can't think of off the top of my head. I also loved the way he moved, his expressions, and especially his voice.
I couldn't really find the adjectives to describe it. It lit tingles in me and made my heart flutter. It wasn't extremely deep (he wasn't a really big guy after all) but it was smooth and light and yes, deep enough to pull my girlish heartstrings.
My situation was kind of funny. I said that I didn't fall in love a lot, and hey, I'm seventeen, I thought, I haven't had too many chances yet, but when I do, it's instantaneous. That's why I kind of believed in love at first sight.
"Okay, class, pass your forms to the front now."
The very voice I'd been thinking about broke into my thoughts. I opened my eyes and saw Sav looking at me a little curiously. I guessed that she could guess what I'd been thinking about.
When Mr. Greenfield had all the forms, he told us what we'd be doing for the rest of the class. It was a writing assignment. I perked up and threw my romantic troubles out of the window (metaphorically, of course…) I loved writing. It was a prompted short story, thankfully not an essay. He passed out the sheets with the prompts on them and we got out notebook paper. There were a lot of different prompts on the sheets, but mine was 'You are sitting around your house on a Saturday, all alone, and bored. What do you do to liven up your evening?' We had fifty minutes to write a narrative story for our prompts. I grinned.
Forty-five minutes later, I had two and a half sides of a page done. I think I'd surprised Mr. Greenfield at how fast I was writing. I hoped he'd been trained in reading students' handwriting. I'd brainstormed for a bit, thinking about realistic stuff, but decided to go for the wacky side instead. He HAD said it could be fiction… I smirked semi- evilly to myself and tucked my long bangs behind my ears.
And when I looked up, I was staring straight into Mr. Greenfield's golden brown eyes. My own green ones widened a bit. Had he been looking at me all along, or was it a coincidence? His eyes were squinted a bit in amusement, I think from my evil smirk. He somehow incorporated a bit of mock fear as well. I acknowledged his look with a professional quirk of my eyebrow, which seemed to impress him. It did most people.
I looked down at my story again, heart beating a bit quicker than usual. I'd just had what seemed like a full conversation with him without anyone else seeing. It was kind of fun. I reread my story for any mistakes until Mr. Greenfield said,
"Time's up, kids. Pass your stories to the front whether you're finished or not. It won't count against you unless you've put forth no effort at all."
I merrily passed forward my story. I was actually quite proud of it, and was happy that Mr. Greenfield would have this first impression of my writing skills. Mr. Greenfield collected the papers and looked through them quickly. He smiled at us.
"Good job, class. Now, you might want to be packing up. The bell should ring any minute now for third period." He turned and put the stories in the bottom slot of his filing trays. Meanwhile, I watched him and Sav was poking me. She leaned over and whispered in my ear,
"Don't tell me it has something to do with h-"
I cut her off by calmly placing my free hand over her mouth. (The other hand was putting my pencil away.) She didn't continue her sentence but she continued to look at me expectantly. I shook my head and signaled private to her. She stuck out her tongue at me, and I tried to stifle my giggles at her behavior. The bell rung, a high, shrill sound. All the kids eagerly got up, ready to continue on their path towards home. I swung my book bag across my chest and stood up with Sav.
I threw one last glance back at Mr. Greenfield, and to my extreme embarassment, he was looking straight back at me again. I smiled and turned around before the rush of blood reached my face. Sav flicked her red hair away from her neck and looked at my flushed profile. She hadn't seen me look back, so she was still clueless.
We walked out of the door to third period, electives, which we also shared- it was Drama. We didn't have to fill out forms in this class, thankfully. We started out with a kind of odd activity- the entire class stood in a circle, facing the back of the person in front of them and gave them a back massage. Sav stood behind me, thankfully, and I was massaging the shoulders of a random guy with short brown hair. Drama turned out to actually be quite a bit of fun. The teacher was a short, good natured woman who followed the required curriculum as loosely as possible. Our first assignment was a short paragraph telling what we thought drama was. Then we discussed.
Our second assignment was to get into groups of four to act out a skit. Once we were all in groups (me and Sav were with our friend David and a shy looking girl in a green sweater) she handed out the topics for our skits. It was all great fun, at least for my group. We had made a new friend in Rachael, the shy, green sweatered girl.
The last period for the day, Calculus, breezed by. It was a lot like Chemistry, fillling out forms and going over what we would do during the year. I was relieved when the final bell rung, because I really wanted to go home. Who doesn't, after a day at school?
I saw Sav getting onto her bus as I headed off down the sidewalk (I walked to school because it was so close) and she made the most obvious signal of them all- the "call me" sign. I nodded. She sure was intent on figuring out who had captured my romantic attention. I couldn't blame her though. I'd never had a boyfriend at seventeen, and only one crush with whom nothing happened. I was caught in my own musings and staring at the sidewalk when I walked into someone, very hard.
"Ouch…Oh, I'm sorry!" It was Mr. Greenfield! Fancy that. For the hundreth time that day it felt like, a blush was creeping up my neck. "I wasn't watching were I was going."
"It's okay. No lasting damage!" he said cheerfully. "Do you walk home then, Bella?"
I shivered at the way he said my name, like it was honey sliding off of his tongue, but somehow also raspy.
"Yeah. Do you as well?"
"I do. Perhaps I could walk you home then?"
His question caught me off guard. Walk me home? How lucky was I?!
"Oh…!Well, sure!" I smiled a bit. He smiled back, a little larger, and I was doing my best not to drool or squee with happiness. We began walking along the sidewalk again, this time with someone to accompany each other. I became very aware of my book bag, which was slung across my chest again, clanking as it hit my thigh when I walked. I pulled my braid around and started fiddling with it to let loose some nervous energy.
"So where do you live, Bella?"
I jumped a little. "Oh! Um…Smallcreek Lane."
"That's only a few streets away from where I live! Does your street really have a creek in it?" he asked.
"Yeah, it does. And it really is small! The bullfrogs are nice though."
Mr. Greenfield chuckled a bit. We walked in silence a while longer until he asked another question.
"How was your first day?"
"Well, Chemistry and Calculus were extremely boring, but Drama was pretty exciting. We performed a skit. And English was fun too…You know, I love to write." I said shyly.
He looked down at me in surprise. "Do you? I thought you seemed like the type of person who would. Especially after seeing how well you worked on that story today. What do you normally like to write about?"
"Fiction, mostly. All types, but I seem to prefer fantasy over anything else. How about you?"
"Poetry, actually. I write it in all topics."
I surprised myself with my next question. It was much too bold. "Could I read one of your poems one day?"
He smiled warmly at me. "If you would like to." We fell into a more comfortable silence after that. Our sidewalk was very narrow, and my heart was beating insanely from being in such close proximity to him. He wasn't quite foot taller than me, and he was thin but looked strong enough to pick someone my size up and twirl them (me) around without much effort. His scent was of soap and a spice I couldn't name. His choice of clothes was simple- white button down shirt and regular black slacks. Thank goodness he wasn't wearing a tie, though.
His long sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, and he carried a closable folder in the crook of the arm farthest from me. Once, our hands brushed, and I let my bangs fall from behind my ears to cover my blush. In what seemed like a much shorter time than usual, we were at the corner of my street.
"Well, Miss Bella, would you like to make this a habit?"
"Huh?" I blurted. He had interrupted my thoughts again.
"Would you like me to continue walking you home after school?"
"If you would like to, sure. It's nice to have someone to talk to on the way home."
"I agree. And also someone to point me in the right direction if I get lost!"
We both laughed a Mr. Greenfield said,
"Till tomorrow then." I nodded and we both smiled once more before going our separate ways. I took off running towards my own house, eager to call up Sav and tell her about everything. I imagined him watching me go, admiring my long braid flicking back and forth as I ran. Thinking it foolish, I turned just a little to see if he was, and when he wasn't, laugh at myself. But I did see him, still walking, but his eyes were certainly on me. When I turned, he also did, to stare straight in front of himself. I blushed like crazy, glad that he wouldn't see me doing so.
I whipped back around and ran the rest of the way to my house. I burst through the front door quite noisily, announcing my arrival to my mother. My father had died when I was very young, which had been a huge burden on my mother to raise three children while coping with the grief. But she was okay nowadays, me being the only one still at home, and very independent. We were very close all the same.
I wondered if I should tell her about falling in love that day…I decided in the end to get Sav's opinion first.
"Hello dear!" she shouted from her bedroom, over the noise of her sewing machine. She had the day off from work, and sewing was her favorite leisure activity. I shouted a hello back, grabbed the phone, and raced to my room. I could talk about my first day later, right now I had to talk to Sav about a certain delicious man…
beepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeep. I punched in Sav's number as quickly as I could.
The phone picked up on the first ring. "Hello?" Sav's voice came through the earpiece.
"Hey, it's Bella-" she cut me off with a sound akin to a screech.
"Bella! Who IS it?! You have to tell me!"
"I know, I know. I just kind of wanted to see your expression when I tell you. Do you think we could meet up someplace in private?" We had almost no homework, so it would be easy enough to get out of the house for a bit.
"Fine, fine. As long as you DO tell me…How about the corner by the health grocery store? I'll be able to get there in fifteen minutes."
"Sure. Promise not to hyperventilate though!"
She hung up. I grinned at my mouthpiece. Now all I had to do is convince my mother to let me go. She's lenient enough, but she would certainly want to talk about my day at school. I set the phone back down to charge and went to her bedroom. When she saw me, she took her foot off of the pedal that worked the machine to stop the noise.
"Um, Mom, I know you wanted to talk about my day at school, but do you think I could go out and meet Sav at the grocery corner really quickly? We have something we really need to talk about and we didn't get the chance at school. I should be back in twenty minutes."
"Well, if you're careful. But do hurry back, I'm going to start dinner soon."
"Oh?" I said "What will it be?"
"Tri-colored rotini, just for your first day back." she smiled at me.
"Yes! Thank you so much, Mom! I'll be back in a few!" And with that, I ran out of the house again as noisily as I had entered. Tri- colored rotini was a pasta dish where the actual tri-colored rotini (spiral shaped noodles in the colors green, white, and red) is boiled to softness, then cooked with chicken broth and pepperoni. Delicious, no? I thought so.
I ran all the way to the grocery corner, this time with no book bag to slow me down. WhenI got there, Sav was already waiting.
"Geesh! How did you get here so fast?" I panted.
"Nevermind. Now who is it?"
I scowled a bit at her. "I said private, right? We're not exactly in private." True enough, there were people milling all around us on the sidewalk.
Rolling her eyes at me, Sav grabbed my wrist and pulled me down the sidewalk aways to a deserted bench. She pushed me down on it and plopped down next to me.
"Alright, spill."
I gulped and looked down at my hands. "Fine…I think I fell in love today…with the most delicious man I've ever seen. "
Sav was looking more and more excited. "And…? Go on, what's the name?"
I mumbled, "Mr. Dawayne Greenfield…"
"Ah HA! I knew it! I knew it! But I have to agree with you, he is pretty hot!"
"But Sav! I fell in love with a teacher!"
Her face fell a bit. "Oh, right." It brightened again. "But when do you turn eighteen? November twelfth, right? Not too long…"
I gaped at her. I gaped some more. And some more. Then I realized my jaw was hanging open, and quickly shut it.
"What?" she asked innocently. "He's only six years older than you."
"That's not it! Isn't a teacher-student relationship still illegal even if the student is of legal age?"
"I don't see why it would be. Anyway, who said it couldn't be a secret?" Her eyes sparkled.
"Gods, Sav, you're forgetting something- one, he might have a wife or a girlfriend already, and two, he's probably never going to be attracted to me!"
"Once again, I don't see why not. You're beautiful, smart, kind, and fun to hang around."
I pointed to myself, amazed and said, "Who, me?"
"No, my invisible friend that is standing right behind you." Sav answered rolling her eyes. "But enough of that. Did you just fall in love with him in English class or what?"
I launched into an explanation of what had happened throughout the day. Ten minutes, many events, and lots of details later, I finished off with "-and when I turned around, he was looking at me! But when he saw me looking, he turned looked away."
"He offered to walk you home every day?! You are so lucky! David would never be so sweet!"
Sav currently had a crush on our friend David, who had been in our group for the skit that day in Drama. It was true that he wasn't the most charming. I didn't think that Mr. Greenfield was really being sweet, for one because he didn't even know I liked him, but just being kind. It really was very lucky for me though.
I really wanted to stick around and dicuss Mr. Greenfield with Sav for a while more, but I had told my mother that I would get home soon. Anyway, I had tri-colored rotini waiting for me!Sav and I walked down the sidewalk together until we had to go our separate ways. We lived a sizable amount of blocks away from each other, but we could still walk to each other's houses.
Her last comment was "I really think you two would make a great couple!" She grinned mischievously at me and took off running before I could answer. I wouldn't have answered anyway- I couldn't think of a response. Did she really think so? I took a right and headed down my street. Maybe, with loads of luck, this wouldn't just become a constant heart ache like my old crush had been. Maybe…
I mentally hit myself upside the head to clear my thoughts. Right now, I was just going to eat dinner and wait for tomorrow.
A.N. Well! The first chapter of my debut work on ! I would very much appreciate reviews. No flames though, if you don't mind- I prefer constructive criticism. If you did like it, please stick around after reviewing, because a new chapter should be up very soon!