Move

"Hey there, nice to meet ya, my name's Trey."

Katherine gave him a big smile, "Katherine, nice to meet you, Trey."

"Uhm yeah, so" here it was, he hadn't thought about what to do after introducing himself. I wanted to look away but I couldn't, the cringe kept my attention. "the rain, ya like it? Or I mean do you like it, the rain? Yeah, uhm it's raining." He began to shrink in his seat but I turned with a big smile to Matthew who was pulling a five from his wallet.

"Nicely played." He smiled as the teacher walked in and the bell rang.

"I do like the rain, you're cute." Katherine quickly said before turning her attention forward. Trey had his mouth open and his eyes in shock. I raised my eyes and tried to hide my smile. She really just said that! He turned to look at me and I gave him a quick thumbs-up.

"Alright, class today is the test for the last unit. Our new students can opt-out if you'd like, but I encourage you to try so I can see where you were in your last school." The teacher turned his attention to the Tennisons.

"I'm up to try." Matthew said first, that smirk that I was learning meant he was planning something spread on his face.

"Why not?" Marcus said with a similar smile.

"May as well give it a shot." Katherine said, and she was the only one who sounded legitimately nonchalant about it. I knew her though, she was never nonchalant. What were they up to? I shot a quick look at Matthew who just shrugged his shoulders.

"Very well, the tests are coming around, grab yours and pass the pile around to the next student beside you." He handed the person on the end of each row a stack of tests.

I felt ready for this, it was over the Civil War and I had been studying at least a little every day for the last week. I knew all the names, dates, number of survivors and dead. I looked at the test and began to quickly fill in the multiple choice ones.

The last question was always an essay one. We were expected to write a minimum of three paragraphs about the topic. I planned to address the conflicts that led up to the war. I was on my first sentence of the essay question when Matthew, Marcus, and Katherine all held their papers up. Our teacher looked surprised, but got up and went to gather them. "Now I know you wouldn't have cheated on your first day!"

I rolled my eyes, he always accused people of cheating. "Never sir." Matthew said as he handed over his test.

The teacher gathered all three and looked them over for a moment. "Well, your essays are about different things. Did you learn about the Civil War already?"

"Yep, we already tested over it before we came here too." Marcus said with his smile. I tried to hide my own smile and stifle a laugh.

"Well, you can put your head down or do something quiet at your seat, but no phones or technology allowed during the test." He turned back to the front and headed to his desk. I kept my head down, knowing he'd say I was trying to cheat if I looked up to laugh at Matthew and his siblings.

I held up my test next, Lilly putting hers up right after. The rest of the class trickled at different times, a few going up here and there. It was the last three minutes before the bell and Trey hadn't held his up yet. He was the last person, and I saw him on his essay. He was clearly well past the three paragraph minimum, lost in his essay again. This happened with any test that included writing. He would go on about everything he knew related to the topic. "Alright, pencils down. Trey, your essay is fine, stop where you are."

"Come on teach, I'm so close! One more paragraph!"

"No need, I'm sure what you have is sufficient." Trey let out a sigh and put his pencil down before raising his paper up. The teacher grabbed it just as the bell rang.

"Biology next?" I asked, already knowing he'd have my class. Matthew nodded, as did Marcus and Katherine.

"Let's go, maybe I can join your group or team, whatever they call it here!" Katherine grabbed my arm and pulled me to the hallway. How did she even know where the room was? We walked in and she led the way to the teacher. "Can I join Liz's group please?" She batted her eyes and put a strong emphasis on the, please. It made me smile, she was trying so hard.

"Well, I don't see why not. There's room for you there and the other two, I'm assuming your brothers, will be with Trey. I had to separate him from their group last week." She had caught him sleeping while we did the assignment and said he clearly needed to be by himself or with a group that wouldn't let him just put his name on the work anymore. We didn't bother to argue, he had been working alone since then, but I still helped him in study hall, although he still tried to turn the helping into just cheating. History, he was set, biology, not so much.

"They'll live. Matthew gets History, I get you this time!" Katherine said as she turned back to me.

"Come on, we are partnered with Lilly." I led the way to our table. Trey and the guys were at the table directly beside us.

"You stole my seat sis!" Matthew called across to us before the teacher called the room to attention. Katherine just smiled and pulled me into a big hug. I couldn't help but laugh, she knew what she was doing.

"Okay class, today we are continuing our work on mammal anatomy. Next week is our pig dissections, and I want all of you ready to identify each organ and body part before then. So, get your notebooks and draw a rough diagram. Remember, you are not graded on your art skills." Thankfully because I could not draw even a rough sketch of a pig well.

I was on my third full erase when Katherine looked over. She didn't say anything, just grabbed my notebook and began a new sketch. Hers was done in about a minute and it seemed almost perfect. She had even added lines for me to label the various sections.

"Thanks." I said with a slight smile.

"Don't mention it." She said as she turned back to her own notebook and began to label the parts of her pig sketch.

"Okay class, now I want you to put where you expect to find the main organs listed on the board. Discuss it with your team and we will check it as a class in a moment. I'll be coming around to help." I looked down at my notebook. Surely the heart and stomach were where you would expect them to be in the middle of the pig, the heart a little higher. However, where would the liver go? Didn't the large and small intestines connect to one another?

"Well, I think the heart would be 'tween the shoulders, the lungs 'round it maybe?" Lilly was showing us the label locations in her notebook as she motioned.

"I agree." I started, "Won't the stomach be beneath that? The liver is my mystery. I can't decide if it would be above or below the stomach."

"Above, and to the side of it. Like this." Katherine began to label her diagram. "See how the liver is a bit to the left of the stomach, then the small intestine connects the stomach to the large intestines."

"That makes sense, yeah I think we should go with that. The kidney could fit 'neath the small intestines, kinda to the right." I nodded to Lilly, that was a better idea than any I had. We set to work labeling and discussing what was connected to which other organ. Just as the teacher reached our table we were putting the last label in place.

"Very nicely done girls. Katherine, I wanted to check and make sure this wasn't too far ahead of where you came from. Was this the same unit your last school was on or did you cover it earlier in the year by chance?"

"It was the one we were on, maybe a lesson or two behind though. Don't worry about me though, I'm a quick study." She smiled and shrugged her shoulders. Quick study seemed like an understatement to me.

"Okay dear, well if you ever feel a bit lost just come let me know." With that, she turned to keep rotating to the next table with Matthew.

"Now that we have a minute…" Katherine pushed her notebook up on the desk and looked back and forth between Lilly and me. "Tell me all about Trey!" I couldn't help but laugh, and Lilly's mouth had fallen open in shared surprise.

"Trey? Like Trey Trey? From History class?" Lilly asked, shaking her head as she did.

"Yes! He seems so sweet and funny. Is he single or known for any trouble? Tell me everything!" Oh, everything about Trey? Where to start?

"Okay, well he is single for starters. Hasn't had a girlfriend this year. I heard that last year his breakup ended pretty badly. Apparently after he ended things, the girl threw a huge fit about it in the middle of school. It was a mess." I ended with a nod to Lilly.

"Yeah, I remember that. The poor girl was escorted to the counselors and didn't come back. Rumor is she moved to home schoolin'. She just kept saying she was fine." I smiled a bit at the accent Lilly put on her I's when she talked. It made whatever she said sound sweet, even when it was an insult. "Girl was not fine okay, girl was losin' it! Anyways, he is a funny one. Always with the jokes. He's kind of hit or miss in school though."

"Yeah," I picked up, "History is where he shines. Here, he struggles. When he does struggle, he never tries to get better, just to find ways around it. That's why he was moved from our group."

"He was cheating off your work?" Katherine asked her tone one of curiosity rather than judgment.

"Pretty much. It is his hardest class for sure, the one where he is usually a bit lost. He's a great guy though." I added, not wanting to make him seem like a bad guy just because he wanted to cheat on biology homework.

"Oh yeah, an absolute peach. He likes to make people laugh. Just a darlin'."

"That's what I thought. Thanks, guys!" Katherine said with a big smile as she turned to a blank page in her notebook and began writing something very quickly. She tore out the page and then got up and began to walk to the table with Trey and Matthew.

"Since the topic is on boys." Lilly started with a smile, "Is Marcus single? Nothing hidin' in his notebook of big secrets or anything like that?" Was everyone on the hunt for a new relationship? Although she and Marcus would be a gorgeous pair.

"Honestly he's probably the one Tennison I know the least about, other than their father. I am pretty sure he's single. He's a bit of a show-off, but nice when it counts. Always polite, at least openly. Sarcastic as hell away from adult ears though."

"Ohhh maybe a few southern manners? Respecting his elders. I love it. He's so hot! Is he an inside one though, always avoiding the outdoors?"

"Quite the opposite. The entire family has regular camping and hunting trips." I saw her eyes light up as a smile was pasted to her face and her eyes found Marcus. I turned and saw him and Matthew chatting, clearly doing their best to pretend their sister hadn't just walked up and handed what is probably a flirty note to Trey who was beaming as happy as can be.

"That is definitely interesting." The teacher called for everyone's attention back to the board and my eyes shot back in her direction. She began to fill in the labels with the correct answers and told us to correct our paper if we had any mistakes.

Katherine was back at our table and didn't even look to compare her results. I followed closely, but we had put them all in the correct location. I was ecstatic, if I studied this before the dissection next week I would be much more likely to get a good grade and boost my grade in the class before the end of the quarter.

The rest of the class was pretty quick since the teacher discussed a bit about the organs we had labeled. When the bell rang I grabbed my stuff and headed to the door, meeting Matthew and Marcus as I did. "Let me guess, English next?"

"You bet," Marcus said with a smirk and tone that made me even more sure it was not a coincidence we had the same schedule, "then we have Gym, study hall, lunch, and end the day with Statistics. Why is lunch so late in the day by the way? I'll be starved by then."

I led the way to our next class with a shrug of my shoulders, "They keep the lunch shifts short, but there's pretty much one per period from period three to five and we just got ours after fifth. Although the study hall teacher usually brings in snacks for us to have if we need them." Which was beyond nice in my opinion. No other teacher had ever provided snacks just because of late lunch shifts.

"Well, they need to scoot those up a bit if you ask me." Marcus reached for the door and opened it as we all walked in.

"Add it to a complaint box somewhere brother." Matthew said with a smile and a slight shove of his brother. I went straight to my group table where I sat with Lucy and Lilly. This class consisted of five tables each with five seats. My table had Lilly, Lucy, and myself. Meaning we had two openings. The brothers both came and sat at the empty seats right as Katherine walked into the room.

"Not this time sister. Enjoy a table of random people. Oh, look, that one is available." He pointed to the table at the front of the class. Katherine rolled her eyes but took the last remaining seat anyways.

"Okay class, now we were discussing Pride and Prejudice. The first test is next week and will cover the first six chapters. If you are behind you are in luck. Today will be a reading day but with a short assignment to complete while you read. Everyone send up one person from your table for the paper please." I walked up from my table. "Oh Liz, quick question. I saw the three new students, and I wanted to check their names. Who is the one that sat next to you?"

"Next to me is Matthew, next to Lilly is Marcus, and Katherine is the one who joined the front table."

"Thank you very much." She turned to her computer and began to move something around. "Will my new students come up to get a copy of the book please?" I grabbed the five papers and went back to my seat.

"Thanks, Liz." Lucy said as I handed the papers out. Matthew and Marcus were grabbing their books while I finished setting out the papers. I got my book and turned to where my bookmark was. It was incredibly lucky today was reading catch-up day. I was way behind. I looked down at the assignment and it was pretty simple. She wanted us to name the main characters and give them a brief description. From there it was a short answer question to summarize the chapter we read today or most recently. I filled out the character descriptions and then turned back to my book.

I felt a nudge on my foot and looked up to see Matthew smiling. "I read this one already." he whispered while his pencil moved to fill out the paper.

"Lucky you!" I whispered back. Then he nudged my foot again before pointing across from us, where Marcus and Lilly were. The two of them were whispering. Lilly twirled her hair in her fingers with a big grin on her face. I smiled, the girl worked faster than Trey did. "You three have the entire school caught up in a unified goal of dating one of you." I shook my head with a chuckle.

"Well, no one has tried with me yet." I felt a ping of worry hit me. Would someone try? I had no reason to hold him or anyone back if they did. He was just my friend after all. He was allowed to date, although I had never seen him even try. Marcus, he'd dated at least one girl in each school. Katherine was less than that but it still wasn't unusual for her to find a local boy and get some type of relationship growing from it.

"Maybe they are waiting for you to make the first move." Like I am. The words finished in my mind but thankfully that was where they stayed. Although by the heat in my cheeks, I knew they were giving me away.

"Could be, guess I should get a move on then." My heart began to race and I covered my face with my hair the best I could to hide my warming cheeks as I put my full attention back on my book. I stayed that way for the rest of class and when the bell rang I sat my worksheet on the teacher's desk and headed to the door.