Teen Ink

Misti Hailberry

The bell rang and I smirked, what better way to start your first day of school than being fashionably late? I walked through the empty hallways until I finally found my room right across from the cafeteria. With Simple Plan blasting into my right ear, I stepped into the classroom and looked around. It was a decent sized room that had an open seat in the far back. Perfect. A woman (most likely the teacher) tapped me on the arm and asked me something, but I just shrugged already distracted by something, or rather, someone. The girl in the back looked like a shy bookworm type, maybe I could get her to do most of my schoolwork for me so that I could just relax this school year. Smirking I made my way to the back thinking that I could flirt with her and gain a nerdy assistant. While I was walking around the corner of the table, I knocked over her pile of binders and books…Oops. It wasn’t a big deal or anything just a few scattered books and papers I shrugged it off and took the seat next to her, propping my feet up on the table. The feeling of everyone watching really made me happy, of course, I wouldn’t show that, but I just loved attention.
“What the hell is your friggin’ problem?!” The girl screamed at me as she stood up dramatically. One of my eyebrows rose, was this a challenge? Did she like attention too? Her hands curled into fists. If she swung at me, I’d have to believe she’s a lunatic.
“Chill, just a few books.” I tried to keep my voice even and calm, not really wanting to start my first day with a fight.
“I’d like to see you pick them up and find the exact word I left off at!” The girl sneered. So this was a type of challenge then? Either way I really didn’t like her attitude and she was really starting to annoy me.
“I’ll crush you into a pulp if you don’t get off my back.” The words came out of my throat in the form of a loud growl. Her hazel eyes narrowed. Well she wasn’t pleased.
“And I’ll beat you senseless! Who the hell do you think you are? Waltzing into the classroom acting like you own the place and ruining my stuff!!!” She glowered at me, her honey brown hair had loosened from behind her left ear and cascaded around the side of her face. If she made an effort she could be pretty. The girl pulled out her worksheet from under my muddy converse shoes…Oops, guess I should really pay attention to things. I gaped at her, she was really something else. “So let me teach you a lesson and pick up my books and notes you so kindly pushed to the floor.”
“Or else what?” I chuckled.
“Or else I’ll give you an actual black eye to show off, instead of all that make up you wear.” She hissed. I felt a bit offended; did she just insult my eyeliner? “Or should I pluck off all of your piercings one by one? Is that what I need to do to get some respect from you?” The girl was staring straight into my eyes. It felt like she could see into my soul. Narrowing my eyes I stood, accidentally pushing my chair to the floor.
“I don’t know who you think you are, but you aren’t the queen of the school or anything so back off!!” I jeered and then realized how corny that sounded. What I should’ve done was ignore her, but she just got under my skin.
“I’m Misti-F***ing-Hailberry! And with that said and done, Pick up my books now!” I widened my eyes in shock, this short, book lover was telling me off? Not really sure how to respond to that, I hesitantly started shuffling the papers into a pile. “I did have them ordered by date before you ruined them.” She scoffed.
“Are you serious? You should be happy I’m even picking them up for you.” I grumbled as I took her binder and her notes to my seat and started organizing them. Why? Why was I giving in to a girl? I always won fights. So why didn’t I win this one? Basically I spent the whole period organizing her notes in the most confusing way. All even numbered pages first, and then the pages with no numbers, and following that were the pages with odd numbers. In the three different numbered sections I organized it by date. October then September, then October again. Smirking, I shut the binder and handed it to her. A smart remark was about to burst through my mouth but she left before I could say anything.
Shrugging, I sat back and put my feet back on the table. This was going to be a long school year. Soon, the bell rang and I went to my newly assigned locker. Looking up I noticed that my locker was right next to Misti’s. Great. “Oh come on!” I muttered in complaint as I walked up beside her and opened my locker. Quickly I grabbed my leather bound sketchbook and shut my locker heading off to my drawing class in room 125. If I had another class with that girl again I’d remember to keep my distance.