Tough Shit (Rejects Paradise 1)

My stomach starts swirling with nerves.

I hate this.

I don’t want to be the new girl. I want to fit straight in, endure my classes, and get my ass back home. Preferably to the pool house.

I reach the gates and despite the school not starting yet, there aren’t any students lingering around, only the ones who are just arriving. They all must hang out somewhere together. Maybe inside by their lockers or in the cafeteria. At my old school, everyone would loiter around the front of the school, not bothering to walk through the gates until the very last moment. Though I have to admit, not walking through a metal detector first thing in the morning is kind of nice.

I walk under the massive archway that has ‘Bellevue Springs Academy’ in massive gold-plated, metal letters and the school crest on either side. I find myself studying it. It’s kind of cool for a school crest. You know, it’s got all the usual things but instead of the usual letters or school motto in the center, it’s a lion who looks scary as fuck. Not to mention the crown on top kind of gives it a badass feeling.

Maybe I’ll like this school after all. I can get down with a bit of badass.

Colton disappears up ahead and I realize that I’m left to navigate this massive school on my own. I keep walking straight, hoping I’m going in somewhat of the right direction. A student starts coming my way, dressed perfectly in his uniform, complete with his blazer and looking like the arrogant fuck that I’m assuming this school is littered with.

As he gets closer, his brows pull down and I roll my eyes. No doubt this is the look I’ll be getting all day. It’s the new girl look, the one where they assume they can work me out in a matter of seconds, the one where he’s racking his brain trying to recall what inner circles he might know me from. It’s the one where he assumes he’s superior and silently reminding me that I don’t belong.

“Excuse me,” I say before he passes.

The guy stops and I have no doubt that it’s the manners that his parents would have hammered into him that pulls him up. “Yes?” he questions, his eyes cold and irritated to be disturbed.

“Could you point me toward the student office.”

“Student?” he questions with a grunt that puts me on edge. “Don’t you think you’re in the wrong place?”

My impatience gets the best of me and I reel in my hands that are getting twitchy by my sides. “Can you tell me where the student office is or not?”

The guy chuckles to himself and shrugs his shoulders before pointing back from where he just came. “Third door on the left.”

With that, he’s gone.

I start making my way down to the office and make quick work of introducing myself to the woman behind the counter. I hand over my documents that Charles had made sure I filled out last night and after quickly scanning through them, she puts a big red stamp at the top and staples them together.

“Here’s your school handbook. You are to read that and memorize the school code. You will be asked at random to recite the code and there will be consequences for students who fail to do so,” she says, sliding a handbook across the counter with the letters BSA printed on the front of the expensive leather. “Your class schedule is inside with a map of the school. Now, I’ll let Milo take it from here.”

Milo? Who the fuck is Milo? Did I miss something? I swear, I was listening the whole time.

“Milo,” the woman calls out. “New student orientation, please. A full tour of the school grounds and directions to morning classes.”

“Got it,” comes a voice from behind her.

A student appears from behind her and she hands him over all of my paperwork. He scans over it as he starts striding toward me and I can’t help but notice his impeccable manicure. I wonder if he bats for the other team?

Milo steps out from behind the counter. “Hey, man, I’m … FUCK.” His eyes bug out of his face. “You’re a chick.”

The fuck? Surely he’s seen the opposite sex before. What’s his deal? My brows furrow in confusion as I watch him take me in. “Congratulations. You’re a dude.”

“I … ummm. I’m sorry. It’s just … you can understand my confusion, right?”

I glance back at the woman behind the counter but apparently she couldn’t give two shits about helping out my confusion as she dives back into her work. I look back up at Milo. “Help me out here. What’s going on?”

“You realize where you are, right? Bellevue Springs Academy.”

“Yeah … so?”

“Bellevue Springs Academy for boys.”

What the fuck? My eyes drop down to my uniform, remembering just how different it was from the girls at Bellevue Springs Private earlier this morning. This isn’t a mistake.