Beauty and the Outcast (New Hope)

“I’ll move.” I start to grab my things, planning to go to the front row. I’ll take all the space I can get when it comes to him.

“You’ll stay. Charles get up.”

“The fuck,” Charles says back.

“Up before I tell Tiffany about you letting Mindy suck you off in the parking lot this morning.”

Charles actually pales. I scrunch my nose. Is Knox always this crude? It only takes a few seconds before Charles gets up and moves towards the front. Knox drops down in the seat next to me. I tilt my head, letting my hair fan out, trying to block him out. The last thing I want is his attention.

“Whitney.” He says my name softly. He must have heard me tell it to Charles. Can I ignore him? Pretend I don’t hear him? “I know you can hear me.” I tuck my hair behind my ear to turn and glance his way.

Being this close to him, I can really see how handsome he is. He has full lips and a strong jaw. His eyes are what draw me in, though. They are the same shade as Faith’s, but they are more intense. His eyes are where his and Faith’s similarities end. Especially in the personality department. She’s a kind-hearted angel, and he’s a jerk and a bit of a bully.

I’ve seen him three times at this point, and in each and every one of them he was saying something crude. First about someone’s mom, then to the girl in the hallway before I ran into him, and now to that Charles guy.

“About the hallway.”

“Don’t worry about it.” I cut him off, going back to pretending he’s not there.

“I’m gonna worry about it.”

“Does everyone have their textbooks?” the teacher asks, saving me thankfully. He rolls right into European history. Most everyone pulls out their laptop, taking their notes. A few others only lean back and listen. They actually might be zoning out. I write mine down. It helps me to remember the information.

“Where is your computer?” I keep writing, pretending I can’t hear him. I don’t know why I’m ignoring him. It didn’t work the last time. I let out a small gasp when my chair suddenly begins to slide over closer to him. “You want to use mine?” Faith must have really laid into her brother for him to be going out of his way to be this nice to me.

“Knox,” Mr. Smith calls from the front of the room.

“What?”

“Are you paying attention?”

“Paying attention to something.” I hear a few people chuckle. I duck my head, trying to hide my blush.

“Okay then. The sinking of which ship is considered the greatest maritime disaster of all time?” the teacher tosses out. I don’t even know that one. That hasn't been mentioned yet.

“Wilhelm Gustloff,” he answers, not missing a beat.

“Which Roman emperor built the Segovia aqueduct?”

“Trajan.” Knox sounds bored. They keep going back and forth a few rounds.

“It’s nice to see I can get you to participate this year, but let's be mindful not everyone has a brain like yours,” he says before he rolls back into the lesson.

My hair starts to sway. When I peek over, Knox has the ends of a piece of my hair in his hand. He’s staring at it and running his fingers over it like he’s giving it a thorough inspection. I wrap my hand around my hair, pulling it back and tossing it over to the other side. What is this guy's deal?

All through the rest of the class, I fight to pay attention to the teacher and not Knox. I know he is watching everything that I do. As the time ticks by, getting closer to the day being over, I know he’s going to have something to say to me.

I lift my head at the sound of the classroom door opening. A girl strides in and goes right over to Mr. Smith, handing him a piece of paper.

“Whitney. You’re wanted in the office,” Mr. Smith says after reading it.

“New girl is already in trouble?” A pretty girl a few seats up turns around to look my way as I pack up my stuff. She’s not wearing the same uniform everyone else is. She’s in a cheerleading one. I’ve seen a few other girls in them today. “Where did you even come from?” She scrunches her nose like I smell.

Her eyes drop to my shoes and then go to my backpack, her nose scrunching up in disgust. My face starts to heat with embarrassment. I know everyone is staring at me now.

“Hey, Jennifer. Did you ever figure out who was giving the cheer team chlamydia? My money was on Steven. What’s with cheerleaders and quarterbacks? Is it a rule that you all have to sleep with him or…”

“You’re a dick.” The pretty cheer girl glares at Knox.