Chapter 1 – Detention

Kathrine

The bell rang, finally, ending the torture that was Spanish, which promised only to get worse as the school year progressed. The only good thing about the period was that I had at least one friend, a blessing that hadn’t been true of Spanish last year. At least this time around I had Scott, who had gone from acquaintance to friend last year as I got to know him in each of the five classes we had had together. He had clearly wanted to be more than friends, but after we had gotten over the awkward post-rejection thing we had gotten pretty close, and I was happy to discover that he was in three of my classes this year.

I gathered up my things, including the giant hunk of a book that was the Iliad and looked up to discover Scott waiting expectantly beside my desk. Including math and Spanish, we had Anthropology together, our last period of the day.

“Are you ready for Johnson?” he asked, sounding somewhat excited.

Mr. Johnson had only started his career here at Hanson Prep (which my brother and sister were fortunate enough to choose not to attend) last year. The school was a decent haul away from Coatesville, where I lived, stuck way down in the southeast corner of Pennsylvania, almost on the border with Maryland. It was a pretty prestigious place, with student from at least twelve states as well as a few international kids. Almost everyone was a boarder, which meant that as one of the few day kids I was left out of the loop somewhat, and it made it a little more difficult to truly belong on campus.

Johnson already had a reputation as being one of the youngest, hottest, and overall best teachers in the school. Even the boys, jealous of his popularity with the girls, had a grudging respect for him and everyone agreed he was by far the best anthropology teacher, if not the best teacher in the entire school. It was already the second day of school, but none of us had seen him yet. He had been out of town on a camping trip and had been detained, or at least that was the story the substitute had told us. But he was here today. Word was racing around campus that he was back. And Scott was clearly excited.

I threw my bag over my shoulder and rolled my eyes. I thought this amount of hype over one good-looking teacher was ridiculous. And even if he was the next Aristotle, the gossip was too much.

“Sure. Let’s go meet the living legend,” I replied, unable to entirely contain my sarcasm.

We made our way out of the language wing of the English building to the outside doors, me flinging them open in my haste to get to fresh air. I was somewhat claustrophobic, and being in a room with no windows and many people for the past hour hadn’t helped. The cool fall breeze felt amazing on my face, and I took a deep breath in through my nose, savoring the feeling of fresh air racing into my lungs.

“Kathy!” called a voice that I easily recognized. I turned and saw my best friend in the entire world, Ankita, standing in the courtyard in all her glory. Her long braid hung down her back, swinging back and forth as she made her way over. We all had Anthropology together the next period, and yesterday we had found out our paths crossed in the courtyard.

Ankita, or Kita, as I called her, quickly made her way over to us and wrapped me in a tight hug, smelling of her lotion, bath and body work’s brown sugar. Her mocha colored skin shone from the light sweat she had worked up playing field hockey in gym, chocolate eyes glowing with excitement at the thought of finally having a class with the illustrious Mr. Johnson.

“It’s not that big a deal,” I insisted to the two of them, both practically skipping on the way to the science building. “He’s just another teacher,” I tried to convince them in vain.

“You obviously haven’t seen him,” Kita said, glancing sidelong out of her eyes at Scott, as if judging how he would react. He simply rolled his eyes. Kita just shrugged and continued talking as we reached the doors to the building and I pulled the doors open. “Just wait. You’ll see. And then you’ll be swooning just like the rest of us,” she assured me as we entered the classroom.

No teacher in sight. But the classroom was almost entirely full, rare for any class on campus, especially considering that there were still around five minutes left until the bell rang (big campus=lots of passing time). Johnson really was a popular teacher. But was he popular in the right ways? A group of girls standing in the back by the lab tables was tittering, undoubtedly gossiping about ways to snag the teacher, judging by the way they were all pulling down their blouses and applying fresh makeup.

I shook my head and took a seat toward the back of the room, pulling out my book and opening to the page I had been on most recently. I had come a decent way since this morning, mostly due to the fact that in spite of it being a full day, it only being the second day of school, we did nothing in practically every class. I had still managed to muscle through almost a hundred pages of epic poetry.

I was too enthralled to notice the sudden disturbance in the classroom, and my attention was only capture when someone called my name, yanking me out of my book and back into reality.

“Kathy!” Scott stage whispered loudly. “Johnson’s here. And he doesn’t look happy,” he said.

I glanced up, and I suddenly understood what all the hype was about. And it was well deserved. The first things I saw were the eyes. A piercing ice blue, hidden behind glasses which did nothing to subtract from the intensity of his gaze. His neatly ordered brown hair was combed forward, jutting out a little over his forehead, a fashion somewhat out of date, but it worked for him. His face was chiseled, with strong features. And he was fit. Very fit. Built, even. And at his height of 6’2”, he cut quiet an impressive figure.

“Book down,” he ordered me in a deep tenor, as oxymoronic as it sounded.

“The bell hasn’t rung yet, Mr. Johnson,” I pointed out, and I will admit I was somewhat smarmy about it. Perhaps too much.

As if trying to make my life difficult, the bell rang as soon as I had finished speaking. Johnson shot me a smile and let out a chuckle while other members of the class who had overheard the exchange started laughing. I shut my book and pushed it over to the edge of the desk, hoping Johnson wouldn’t ask me to put it away. Having it on the table was a matter of security for me in an unfamiliar situation such as this.

“Ms…?” he trailed off, staring at me pointedly.

“O’Reilly. Kathrine O’Reilly.”

“Well, Katherine…”

“No. No ‘e’” I interrupted. “My name is spelled K-A-T-H-R-I-N-E. You put an ‘e’ after the ‘h’. I could hear it.”

Johnson smirked again, an expression I already hated, for all it seemed to have other girls swooning. Perhaps it was because it had other girls swooning. “Very well then, Kathrine with no ‘e’, the book can stay on the desk, and you can read after you’ve completed assignments and between lessons and such, but the first time I find you paying attention to it instead of me, I’m going to have to keep you here all afternoon to make up for the damage you will have done to my insecure self. Sounds fair?”

It did. He was being much more flexible about it than teachers I had had in the past. Or even in the present, I thought grimly as I recalled the conversation I had had with my Spanish teacher just the period before about the same subject. Something about it not being related to the curriculum. I had vowed to bring in a book written in Spanish simply so she couldn’t hassle me about it.

Johnson was like just every other teacher, going over the rule and regulations when it came to the class. But he somehow managed to make it fun. And I was starting to think that the people who thought he might be the best teacher in the school might actually know what they were talking about. He made us laugh, engaged us, and, to my amazement, was actually able to throw papers at the three person tables with some accuracy. I was quickly starting to think that Mr. Johnson could easily become my favorite teacher and anthropology my favorite class.

Until my cell-phone rang.

“Which brings me to my next point,” Mr. Johnson said, pacing his way over to behind me mid-lecture. “No electronics in class. They will be confiscated,” he said holding his hand out palm up to me. I rummaged in my bag, taking advantage of the opportunity to hide my red face for a moment as I fished out my phone. A few seconds later I handed it over before laying my head down on the desk, wishing my hair was down so I could hide in it instead of up in its usual bun. “And the offender,” he continued pocketing my phone, “will be spending the afternoon with me.”

“Detention?” I asked, disbelieving.

“Detention,” he confirmed just as the bell rang.