CHAPTER 1/ THE EXPLODING MEATLOAF
Today was going to be a
bad day.
I
had gone to bed the night before, officially deciding that I was going to ask
Emma Reece to the upcoming school dance. She was one of the nicest girls at my
school; not the prettiest, but definitely the sweetest. She had short auburn
hair and glasses, with a nose slightly too big for her face.
Alex
had finally convinced me to try, telling me that if I didn’t, I would forever
be labeled a coward. Considering my pride was coming into question, I accepted
the challenge.
And
I really hoped that I wouldn’t regret it.
When
I woke up for school twenty minutes late, I jumped out of bed, yanking out the
plug in my alarm clock. I was surprised I didn’t hear it going off as I slept.
After
pulling on a hopefully clean shirt and pair of jeans, I hastily combed through
my short dirty blonde hair with my fingers as I ran outside. I just barely had
time to grab a bagel and swallow my daily pill. My uncle made sure I shoved it
down every morning before he left for work.
I
barely made it to the bus, climbing on. There was only one seat open, and it
was next to a small sickly looking kid. He was huddled as close to the window
as his body would allow. His face was pressed into a thick, heavy book. I
looked at the cover and read ATLAS.
Oh
boy.
“Can
I sit here?” I asked him, the bus starting to move, making me sway slightly.
The kid ignored me, bringing his book closer to his face. Sighing, I sat down
at the edge of the seat, trying to disturb him as little as possible.
The
whole ride to the school I sat in an awkward silence, just starring out the
window opposite my seat. I was relieved when we reached the school, but then remembered
that I was going to ask Emma to the dance today. An uneasy sick feeling came
over me as I walked up to the high school.
I reached my locker, which was conveniently across
the hall from Emma’s. I leaned against it, trying to comb my hair with my
fingers as I waited for her to get to school. Looking down at myself, I
realized I had put on the shirt I had stained at the barbeque last Saturday. I
opened my locker, quickly pulling out a jacket to cover up the barbecue.
Emma
showed up five minutes later, walking with three of her friends. Why can’t they ever be alone? I silently
asked myself. I stayed there waiting for her friends to walk away. When they
didn’t leave, I swallowed my fear and sauntered over to her, trying not to feel
too awkward.
Her
friends giggled when they saw me approaching. Emma smiled nicely at me, making
me feel a little more comfortable. I squared my shoulders, trying to get some
confidence.
“Hey
Emma,” I squeaked, and then cleared my throat. Real manly voice there Carson, I thought. “Can I talk to you for a
minute?”
“Sure.”
She
made no attempt to move away from her friends, as I had hoped she would.
“Well,”
I started, taking a deep breath, trying to relax myself. “Would you want to go
to the dance with me this Friday?”
Complete
silence. Her friends weren’t giggling anymore. In fact, they were studying
their toenail polish, refusing to look up at me. My stomach churned suddenly as
her face fell. Oh no, I thought
silently.
Emma
cleared her throat, “Actually, Carson,” She said giving me a half hearted
smile, “I’ve already told Drake I’d go with him. I’m really sorry.”
I
stood there for a second, a dumb look on my face. Her friends fidgeted with
their clothes, obviously feeling the awkward tension. It took me a second
before my brain could get my mouth to move, “Oh,” I said stupidly, “That’s
great... I guess I’ll see you later then.”
And
I walked away, my face flushed deep red in embarrassment.
From
there, my day was destined to be a bad one.
To
top off my normally bad luck, I wasn’t very good at staying out of trouble. No
matter who did it, I was always the one
that ended up taking the blame for it.
They say “the wrong place at the wrong time”, but that might as well have been
my life motto. I didn’t try to make people mad on purpose; but I was constantly
blamed for things that went wrong and was continually picked on. When people
picked fights with me, I did my best to ignore it and walk away. But I had a
short temper and walking away proved to be much more difficult than it sounded.
Somehow, fate had decided that I was
to be its enemy.
And now, I was sitting in the school office,
having been blamed for the current disaster of the day. Somebody had put a
firework into the cafeteria meatloaf, and… well, you can guess what happened
from there.
When the principal asked who did it,
everyone began shouting “Carson Storm!”
“Yeah!
I saw him do it!”
Then
a high squeaky voice would shout, “I did too!”
This
did not help my already bad mood.
For
heaven’s sake, I hadn’t even gone into the cafeteria that day! I had been
avoiding Alex like the plague because I didn’t want to tell him about my
humiliating rejection by Emma. So instead I sat outside on the grass and when
the bell rang, Whoosh! I could hear
my name being yelled by every student at my school.
I guess my appearance didn’t help my
situation; my dirty blonde hair was always messy and I had an incredibly
sarcastic smile. In ninth grade I had been gangly, awkward and quiet, but then
in tenth grade, my uncle decided I needed a confidence boost and figured the
best way to do that was to get me interested in boxing. By doing this, my
muscles filled in and then I hit my growth spurt.
You
think this would’ve made me a bit more popular, like those kids on the movies,
but there was no such luck. This only seemed to make people dislike me more.
They saw me as a silent trouble maker, when in reality I’m really just a quiet
mellow guy.
And because of my horrible people skills and
bad luck, I had been hauled into the office. I waited to talk to the principal,
feeling uncomfortable as the receptionist watched at me with huge eyes, and I
grew more uncomfortable by the minute.
I was almost relieved when I heard
my name called, “Carson Storm!”
I stood, and shuffled to where the
principal was standing, hands stuffed in my pockets. I walked past him, into
his small office. It smelled like dust and wild animals. The huge head of a
bear hung on the wall, almost looking like it was about to chomp down on whoever
sat in the chair beneath it.
I took my seat underneath the jaws
of the stuffed bear. The principal walked around behind his desk, and sat down,
so slowly that he looked like the villain in a cartoon.
He
stared at me for a few seconds. He raised his eyes slowly, so high, that if he
had hair, they probably would’ve disappeared by now.
“Carson Storm,” he said slowly, “You
are…aware…of your situation?”
“Yes,” I sighed, “I was falsely
accused for putting a firecracker in the cafeteria meatloaf.”
His eyebrows shot higher, “Falsely?”
“Well it wasn’t me,” I said, “So
yeah; that’s what falsely means right?”
He scowled, “I don’t like your
attitude, Storm. Two weeks of detention. You may leave my office.”
Accepting my fate, I got up, careful
not to hit my head on the bear’s teeth. I walked out quickly, the receptionist
glaring at me as I walked back to class.
The
bell rang, announcing school was over. Fourth period had dragged on forever,
and looking at the clock every thirty seconds had not helped the time pass. I
was so happy to go home, until I realized I had an hour of detention.
Groaning, I grabbed my stuff and
left the classroom. The hall smelled funny, and I was unsure why until I passed
the cafeteria doors. The windows had meatloaf splattered all over them, and I
remembered that’s what had gotten me in trouble.
I walked slower, wishing that I
didn’t have to stay after school for something I didn’t do. I reached the room
detention was held in and yanked open the door with more force than was necessary.
I was a frequent visitor, so Mr. Payne didn’t look too surprised when I walked
in.
I sat down in the front, praying that Drake
hadn’t gotten detention.
My hopes were crushed a second
later.
“Yo
man!” Drake brought his hand up in a greeting. He had a huge afro; bright yellow
pants, a foam finger, and was wearing a bright green t shirt that said GO ORGANIC! Emma said yes to this guy? I
thought to myself, feeling my self-esteem taking a hit.
“Dude!
You’re in detention too?” He asked sitting next to me, “What’d you get busted
for?”
“Blowing
up the meatloaf in the cafeteria.” I didn’t even bother to try to explain that
I wasn’t the one that did it.
“That’s
so cool man! That’s like, off the chain.” He said leaning back in his chair,
his afro bouncing. His chair started to rock, and he toppled backwards. I
looked over my shoulder to see if he was okay, but he popped up, a huge smile
on his face.
“Yeah, why are you in here?” I asked him, not
really interested.
“For
smashing a teacher’s mailbox,” He said. Then he went into an excessively long
story about how he single-handedly took on the mission for his environment
group to destroy the science teacher’s mailbox for not teaching about global
warming properly.
“I
mean, he was totally not cool, Storm. He gave me detention and like-" He
continued on, talking about how he had gotten in trouble. I almost told him
that the teacher could’ve pressed charges for vandalism, and that would’ve been
a lot worse than detention, but I kept the thought to myself.
The
teacher leaned back and began looking at sports illustrated, swimsuit edition
as he chugged his Gatorade. Detention went hectic, kids throwing toilet paper
and yelling. One guy was drawing a mustache in permanent marker on a sleeping
student’s face. He snored and shifted, smacking his lips as the kid holding the
marker sniggered.
I
quietly stood, and walked out of the class. Mr. Payne was too absorbed in his
magazine to care that I was leaving, not that he had even cared if I showed up.
I just came to the beginning, just in case a different teacher was in charge.
I
walked out of the school and down the street, towards my house. I lived just
about a mile from the school (I only ride the bus in the morning because I’m
too lazy to walk), so I didn’t really have to worry about finding a ride
home. My neighborhood was quiet, except
the usual booms that came from my uncle’s shop.
I
wasn’t ever allowed in the shop, though I don’t know why. It was right next to
my uncle’s house, and it always smelled like burnt marshmallows. It was large
and grey and looked like a mix of a metal bomb shelter and a shed.
I’d
lived with my uncle since I was four. I don’t really remember my parents, and
whenever I asked how they died, my uncle would quickly say that they got sick.
He always got really weird when I talked about them, so I quickly realized I’d
avoid the subject as much as I possibly could.
I
slammed the door, feeling the house shake as I jumped onto my couch. I heard a
loud BOOM! and felt the house shake a
little. I got up of the couch and looked out my window. The shop looked normal,
but green was muck dripping off the towering windows, much too high to see when
standing. I walked outside to make sure he was okay.
“Jim?”
I yelled, pounding my fist against the door.
There
were a few clatters and my uncle slipped out of the door, too quickly for me to
see anything. He held his arm up as he coughed, his eyes watering. After
choking for a minute, I pounded him on the back.
“Hey
Carson!” he said, his eyes watering “What’s up?”
I
raised my eyebrows, “Just making sure you weren't dead.”
He
chuckled, “Oh it’d take a lot more to kill me! So how was school?”
“I
got sent to the principal’s office again.” I said, deciding to come clean and
tell him.
He
tried to look stern but failed miserably. He gave me a sheepish grin, “What’d
you do?”
“I
was blamed for putting a firecracker in the cafeteria in the meatloaf, but it wasn't me.”
“Well of course it wasn’t you!” Jim said
indignantly, “If it had been, you wouldn't have gotten caught.” He winked at
me. “Besides, that’s amateur stuff! You would've come up with something much
cooler than a lousy firework!”
Jim
was more of a friend than a parent. He didn’t care what the school board said
about me, and he let them know it! I think that’s why they stopped calling him
in when I got in trouble.
“Come on,” He grinned, putting his arm around my
shoulders, “Let’s get some take out.”
Authors Note:
If you didn't like it, tell me why. If you did, tell me why! This is a sample from my book and I hope you enjoyed it!
