Chapter 1

Tapping sounds come from my pencil as I repeatedly lift and drop it onto my desk. I rest my head on my free hand with my elbow pressed against the table as support. The teacher continues to bore the class with her lecture about our bad behavior last Friday with the substitute teacher. Papers begin floating across the classroom, one being placed on each students desk including mine. I look down at my paper and the class erupts into chaos.

"A test?!"

"Not all of us were bad!"

"This isnt fair!"

They were all yelling at the teacher. She shushed them before heading behind her desk and sitting down.

"This test will count as 60% of your grade. If you fail it, your grade will suffer." With that, the teacher started a timer on the powerpoint reading one hour. I look down at the test and flip through the stapled papers. 105 questions in an hour.

I begin to fill in the bubbles on the scantron pacing myself on each question. The few sounds coming from my classmates I block out as I focus on the test. My head begins to ache so I reach into my backpack grabbing a pack of gum and throwing a piece into my mouth.

"Mind if i have one?" Someone whispers into my right ear. I raise my head to look at them annoyed.

"Mind shutting up?" I ask while rolling my eyes and looking back down at my test.

"Bitch much. . ." They mumble under their breath. She brushes her hair off her shoulder and looks back down at her test. The name sends a chill through my spine. I aggresively set my pencil down and turn my whole body towards her. I smirk before placing my foot on her chair and shoving it to the side making her legs flail into the air.

The whole class erupts into laughter as the girl looks up at me flustered.

"Bitch much." I say mockingly while watching her stand up and grab her chair.

"Hazel Ruth!" I hear my teacher yell from the front of the classroom.

"Ive already warned you once today about your behavior. I will not tolerate it anymore, go to the principals office." I shrug my shoulders as the whole class begins murmuring. I grab my test, pencil, and backpack heading down the ramp in the center of the class. I look back at my teacher with a smirk before leaving and making my way to the principals office.

"Hazel, please take a seat." She says while pushing her glasses further on her pale white face. Her blonde hair is tied back into a bun being held by a pen. She is wearing a white button up shirt and a tight black knee long skirt. I sit across from her setting my stuff down and resume my test. When i finish, I shove it into my backpack and she looks up at me from her computer.

"Hazel, do you know your test scores from your freshman year?" I scoff and place my shoes up on the desk.

"No, I dont pay attention to them." She pushes my shoes off her desk with her pen and turns her computer screen to me highlighting numbers.

"For ELA you got a 2789, and for math a 2978. These are college scores, you do understand that, correct?" I shrug my shoulders and slouch back into the seat.

"But your grades are all horrible, why is that?" She asks while turning her computer screen back to herself while presenting a paper filled with my grades in front of me.

"I dont do what I know." I explain blandly. I only do the tests to top my classmates scores but it isnt enough to keep my grades up.

"Hazel, colleges look at all of this. You cant get into college if you dont do the work." She says while circling all the missing assignments on the paper with her red pen.

"I never said I wanted to go to college." I say while grabbing the pen from her hand and setting it down. She grabs my hands and makes me look her in the eyes.

"Hazel, you are such a smart child and your talent needs to be nurtured. What are you gonna do when you are out of school? How are you going to make an income and live comfortable?" She says, her eyes pleading for an answer. I pull my hands back.

"Ill think about it when i get to that point." She sits back into her seat and sighs while pulling her glasses off and setting them down.

"Your brother was a straight A student and a hero-" She starts.

"And guess where he is now. No where to be seen. He worked so hard for it not to matter in the end. So, if your gonna keep trying to use him as an example to me, at least make it valid or dont ever mention him." I say. My blood boils at the thought of my brother and it coming from this hags mouth. She sighs before handing me a paper.

"I need your mother to read and sign this before the end of the week. You can go to your next class." She says just before the bell rings. I shove the paper into my backpack and sling my backpack on. I leave the office without a single glance back at her. Just one more period and I can go home. I walk into the artroom taking my seat and pulling out my sketchbook. The bell rings once more and the teacher takes his place at the front of the classroom.

"Goodafternoon class, today you will be turning in your old projects and recieve a new one. This time though, we will be doing a unique gallery walk. As you know, only certain people participated in this project so far, the rest will be going up to the piece of art they like the most and will put a tally mark on a seperate piece of paper that I will place by the artwork. The persons art who has the most tally marks in the end will have there art displayed in the glass shelves at the front of the school." I flip my sketchbook to my piece of art as he begins to put a piece of paper by everyones art.

He stares at my artwork for a while before placing the paper down next to it and moving to the next person. Only about a quarter of the class participated in drawing so this should go by fast.

"Alright, everyone go look around. If you have artwork, please stay seated." Everyone who doesnt have art leaves there seats searching for people still seated to look at their art. It seems as though everyone gravitated to the other side of the classroom asking about other peoples art. I look down at mine and look at it closely. The prompt was life and i feel I displayed it wonderfully.

I have a line across the middle of the paper and at the top, a realistic sketch of little kids playing with each other. At the bottom half of the paper, it shows one of the kids as an adult drowning while reaching out for the ghost of the other. My art shows that life when your a little kid is entirely different than when you are an adult. Its not always gonna be a field of flowers but a vast ocean. If you dive too deep, youll drown.

When I finish examining my piece of art, I look up to see a man with short jet black wavy hair that falls to the top of his ears, staring at me. He has two vertical beauty marks above his eyebrow and smiles at me while pointing down at my art.

"What do you want?" I ask, entirely forgetting the situation.

"I voted for yours, its the most accurate." He says while pointing over at my paper. The one tick mark sits lonely on the blank paper.

"Okay." I say while looking at the clock at the front of the classroom. They have 2 more minutes to look at the artwork.

"So, the children grow older and one looses the other. When the one in the water feels they cant take anymore of life, they reach out for their loved one but to no prevail as they arent there to save them. This drawing is about depending on yourself solely. Isnt it?" He says while scrunching his brows together. I keep an emotionless face but I become curious as to how he figured out the meaning of the drawing without me having to say anything.

"Though it is captured almost perfectly, you can flip the drawing around." He grabs my sketchbook and flips it over. In the drawing now, it shows the person drowning at the top. It now looks like the kids are trying to pull the person out of the water.

"Life has different sides to it." He smiles. I flip my sketch back over.

"Not in this drawing." I say while holding my sketchbook still as he tries flipping it back over.

"But you subconsciously drew it so there were two outcomes. You have been through a lot and are trying to ignore it, arent you?" I flinch at how he reads me and bluntly says it. I snatch my sketchbook out of his grasp leaving it on the table.

"You dont know anything about me." I say with an annoyed tone. I just want him to leave already. These two minutes are taking way too long.

"I know that you are smart and just decide not to do your work because its a waste of time. I also know you distance yourself from people on purpose. You are-" He starts and i let out a groan.

"Oh, shut up!" I say to his face cutting him off.

"Stop stalking me and leave me alone." I say while rolling my eyes and glaring at him. His smile just grows even more making it seem painful. How can someone smile so widely and freely??

I realize the crowd thats formed on the other side of the room as they stare at us. Some flinch when I set my eyes on them. He stands up and pushes his chair in. He brushes his hand through his wavy jet black hair and looks at me.

"Names Reggie by the way." He says while holding out his hand. I smack his hand down.

"I dont remember asking." He shrugs his shoulders at my comment.

"Just thought youd be curious who this handsome fellow is." He says while smirking at me and winking.

"Damn, two false accusations in one sentence. You are one to remember." I scoff. He lets out a light chuckle before turning around and heading back to his seat.

"See you around, Hazel." He pronounces my name seperate from the other part of his sentence. I hate guys like him. I roll my eyes as the clock begins ringing. The teacher has us all sit down and grabs our sketches and our paper of tally marks. He begins showing the sketches one by one asking for us to put our heads down and vote for which one should win. By the end, he reveals which art got how many votes on the paper compared to the votes when we looked at them together. Mine was shown last and got the most votes.

"So, class, why was Hazels drawing getting the most votes when you didnt know it was hers compared to when you were allowed to freely walk to everyones moments ago?" The teacher asks making the class fall into silence.

"Okay, if you guys wont answer, who was the one who put the single tally mark?" He asks looking around the classroom. Reggie raises his hand proudly.

"Then can you explain why you feel this one should have won." Reggie nods his head and turns to look at the class. I sink down into my seat trying to avoid any extra attention.

"Her art shows the two views we can take on life. With it 'upright' in the top image, you see two children having the time of their life in a field of flowers whereas in the bottom drawing, you see one of the children as an adult drowning while reaching out for someone who isnt there. If you flip the image around, it is like the man drowning is being saved. Maybe from his past." The teacher nods his head and has one person who voted on each of the other pieces of art explain why they chose it. Their rambling goes in one ear and out the other.

When the class finally ends, the teacher announces my art is the one going up in the gallery at the front of school making the class erupt with anger.

"She didnt get the most tallies!" People yell out. In response, the teacher points to the board where I have the most tallies.

"The tallies on the paper dont count. I never said which ones counted." He says. The class begins to burn holes in the back of my head as I begin packing my stuff. I sling my backpack and make my way out of the building. I pull my phone out while walking down the sidewalk and hook up my airpods before sticking them in my ear and turning on some music. I stroll down the street shoving my hands in the front pocket of my sweater. Everytime i breathe out, a white cloud apoears in front of my face. My body shiver slightly as the coldness seeps through my jacket. I need to buy a new one.

A person appears on the screen across the street signaling for me to start walking across. As im walking across, I hear loud screaching sounds coming from my right. I look to my side to see a car hurdling towards me. It flips over and over and im stuck in place like a deer in headlights. Come on legs! I scream to myself in my head but my body is overcome with fear. I feel a cold gush of wind press against my body aggresively as a sharp pain is sent to my back.

I flail to the ground out of the way of the car as it flips past me. My body shivers even more as I look behind me to see Reggie breathing heavily racing towards me. He grabs my arm and pulls me up.

"Are you okay?!" He asks sounding genuinely worried. I yank my arm back and make my way to the car which has slammed into a light pole. I try looking into the window to check if anyone is inside but i can't see through the foggy glass. I clench my fist tightly and punch the glass shattering it into multiple pieces. The person sits upside down in the flipped over car unconscious. Blood drips from their forehead and mouth.

"Hey!" I yell while shaking them to wake them.