The War Between Us : Chapter 12

A/N: Sorry, I know it's been a LONG time since I posted - but I haven't had time for anything else lately. I couldn't even come online for even HALF an hour. No time, like I said. HOMEWORK. EXAMS. TESTS.
Ugh, it's killing me.
Anyways, lemme spare you the gory details, (and I've also got a huge exam on Sunday, BTW!) and read ahead, folks! Thanks, too! I wouldn't be anything if you guys didn't give me comments! :D

P.S.: The next chapter will include the details of what exactly happened- so hold on there and thank you once again!

Chapter 12:

“Excuse me?” I say, raising my eyebrows in what I hope is incredulous manner.

My partner shoots me a look. “You’re excused”, he says simply, pouring sulfur particles into the test-tube we were sharing.

He said it mockingly, of course.

Oorgh.

I groan inwardly. Why?
Everything was going so perfectly.
And then – this dude had to step in.
And dampen my plan… noticing what I had done.
How ‘un-saintly’ I was being.

Oorgh.

“I didn’t ask to be excused”, I point out rudely.
Hey, he was being rude to me, why shouldn’t I be rude back?

He shoots me a look, again, as though I was being dense on purpose.

I roll my eyes. Mr. Hudgen’s was walking down the rows, I notice.
He’s checking out our progress. Though I hardly call what me and my lab partner are doing ‘progress’.
Because we’ve barely passed the first set of instructions.

Couldn’t my lab partner be like any other lab partner and be not interested in the personal life of their lab partner?
Okay, that is plain confusing.
Never mind.

“Look-“, he sighs, turning his murky-chocolate eyes at me, looking at me straight in the eyes.
This, I note, is the first time he has ever looked at me properly.
What a pathetic pair of lab partners we two make.

He continues, “You’re really gonna be in trouble. Are you short of brain cells or something?”

I scoffed, “I don’t need your advice. I can handle myself on my own, you know.”
I added quickly, “And FYI, I’m not short of brain cells. Besides, no one would catch me. I wouldn’t be in trouble”. I shrugged as though I didn’t care what he had to say.

But his serious expression never faded as he went, “You look”.

That’s all he said. ‘You look’.
What’s that supposed to mean anyway?
Look where?

And then I notice him gazing slightly right to my face, not at me; so I turn my head around and look in his direction.
And then I see it.

Mr. Hudgen’s back.

And guess where he was?
Mr. Hudgens was standing directly over Mark Wilcox’s and ‘Miss Curly-haired’’s test-tube, inspecting it for any errors. Wilcox and the nerd were obviously asking him whether their solutions had any snag to it.

I am so doomed.

Because if the fizz bomb blasted just when Mr. Hudgens’s spotty face was suspended over it – Mr. Hudgen would kill me.
No – the school board will kill me.

“Ooops”, I whispered quietly, finally understanding the flaw of my well-thought-out plan.
And it’s amazing that this flaw was pointed out to me by none other than a stranger.

Not even Livvie had warned me this could happen.

“’Ooops’ is right”, my lab partner replied, quietly, too.

And then I turned around to him again, refusing to believe that the bomb might explode at any second into Mr. Hudgens’s blemished mug. Don’t burst, don’t burst, don’t burst…, I prayed silently to myself…

And then he spoke. My lab partner that is.
“Well?”

“Well, what?” I replied fidgeting.
I had to listen to someone after all.
Why not him? This is a condition in which I would never want to be alone.

Even Alex Bedingfield would be a reassurance.

No- wait. On second thought, throw Bedingfield out of the picture. Eww.

“Aren’t you going to throw Mr. Hudgen’s out of the picture?”, he continues impatiently.

Woah, how freaky is that? He mirrored almost exactly my previous thoughts. Way freaky.

“Huh?” I answer. I’m not trying to be obtuse – I just don’t know what he’s emphasizing.

He rolls his eyes, this time. And then he does something very unexpected.

”Stand up”, he orders me – and my eyes widen.
I glare at him. “What for?”

“Just do it, Varde. The clock’s ticking, you know” he replies, rather annoyingly.
I know what he is implying by the statement ‘the clock’s ticking’ and I furrow my eyebrows at him, giving in hesitatingly. I stand up.

I’m not sure where this is leading to – but he stands up, too.
Is he gonna help me or something?

“Come on”, he beckons, and he walks towards Mr. Hudgens (rather, Mr. Hudgens’s huge behind) and I follow incredulously.

Hmm. I guess he is.

I hope he’s not expecting an ‘oh-thank-you-my-dear-savior’ kind of sentence from me if this scheme does pull through, though. Because I normally don’t give statements like that. I never would.

As we reach Mr. Hudgens (technically, Wilcox’s table), my lab partner taps our Chemistry teacher on the back.
“Mmh?” he replies, his nose almost touching the surface of the solution, not bothering to turn around to see who even tapped him. Don’t burst, don’t burst, don’t burst…, I thought continuously, rapidly.

Don’t burst, don’t burst, don’t burst…

“Um, sir,” my dark-haired lab partner improvised, rather nervously, “We –er- need help. Something’s wrong with our potion”.

“Mhm, okay, will get there in a sec, Mr.-um-”, Mr. Hudgens answers, still eyeing Wilcox’s solution and my lab partner fills out the paused sentence hurriedly, “Ryder, sir. Harvey Ryder”.

Harvey Ryder, eh? , I think, Not a bad name. Not like mine.

Cinderelle Varde. Yuck. I wish my mom didn’t have such a wild imagination…

“Yes, yes- I’m coming – go back to your seats for the moment”, Hudgens replies irritatingly.

Uh, oh. This is NOT going at planned.

By the side of Mr. Hudgens’s head, I notice Wilcox, and he was looking at me with leveled raised eyebrows as though to ask, “What are you doing here?”. Beside him, sits ‘Miss Curly-haired’, occupying her time staring at my lab partner (I think we should start calling him Harvey Ryder, now). What does she think she is? The police officer of a Staring-at-good-looking-boys department in the C.I.A headquarters? Sheesh.

As a reply to Wilcox’s unspoken question, I smile mockingly slightly at him and he sneers back – and I realize suddenly that Harvey was talking again, hurriedly.

“But-“ he answers, crossing his arms across his dark tee (I can tell that he’s definitely not growing increasingly worried, like I am - by his expression, I can tell – as cool as a cucumber, baby.), “But- but, sir, Varde needs to-“ I raise my eyebrows at him, surprised at my being mentioned, but he ignores me, “Um, Varde needs to go to the restroom, too!”.

Excuse me?!

Did I hear that right, or was I suddenly transported to a parallel universe where people could publicly humiliate other people by mentioning that the latter needed to go to restrooms, as though the former thought the latter couldn’t speak for herself or even wanted to go to restrooms?!

Okay, wait- that is just plain confusing. Urgh.

At this, Hudgens answers, (rather mockingly for a teacher, if I do say so myself), “Well, she doesn’t need my help for that, does she, Mr. Ryder?”
And I couldn’t help it, I yelled at the two of them (my annoying lab partner and the irritating Chem teacher), “Hello- I’m right here you know!”.
Apparently, throughout this whole exchange, Wilcox was trying to surpress his laughter so hard that he was bent over double, and the nerd beside him was also smiling vaguely to herself, and those two kids behind Wilcox’s table weren’t even tryinghiding their ridiculous peals of laughter.

“Miss Varde-“, the Chem teacher finally stands up and faces me sternly, “If – “, but before he could finish, I interrupt him loudly – because I noticed the test-tubes contents frothing up, rather weirdly.

I’m not gonna take chances. I’m gonna do what I can do to avoid expulsion or even worse.

So, I drag his arm (his eyes were wide with astonishment – I can tell that he has never experienced students grabbing him and pulling him, for any reason), “Yes, -erm- yeah, sir! I dunno where the toilet is – could you show me?”

And this caused even more laughter. In fact, even Ryder was smirking! How could he?

He’s the one who started the whole ‘toilet’ idea in the first -

Uh. oh.

I’m broken completely out of my frantic thoughts, because – guess what, no surprise – the bomb blasts.

Terrifyingly, you could say.
Amazingly, maybe.
Shooting up into the air like that – I must say – the producers of this item are very talented. Or rather- the workers under the producers who managed to create this ‘thing’ so efficiently, so properly.

Because, however high it must have shot up, it still managed to get itself on a human being.
Oh, no, it didn’t go as planned.

It hit the wrong ‘human being’.

Sigh.

This is probably the first time I’m going to feel pity for anyone truly- and I think all I have to say is this:

Poor Ryder.

Poor, poor him..