School Daze

Nicholas arrived at school the next morning expecting everything to be the same. It was not.

All anyone could talk about was the giant and its battles against the kaiju - with a lot of speculation as to whether it sacrificed itself killing the kaiju known as Lord Kao or not. On top of that, Sandra was acting kind of weird, kind of half avoiding him, half seeking him out - and just when he decided he knew which she was doing, she’d reverse course.

Even the homeroom teacher, Mister Suarez, was caught up in the “giant warrior” craze, assigning the students to choose a project - either an art project featuring this giant, a short story about it, or an argument for or against the name that most of the students had already agreed on: “Protector.” As Nick and Peter were both in the debate club, Nicholas decided to work on the latter, taking the argument for, or “Pro” the name, while hoping he would not be called upon to actually debate the subject. Sandra had opted to do a painting, and all of his other friends had chosen the short story option.

His next class was his advanced mathematics class, which was a little more sane - though the teacher did do a story problem to estimate the likely weight of the giant. Still, he found it a pleasant change of pace. Most of his friends were in the mid-level math course so he was alone here.

After math class, Nick reunited with Dan and Peter for their physical education class. Today they were continuing the unit the teacher called “football” and Dan kept calling “soccer” just to irritate Teacher Curtis. Their team, as usual, lost badly.

After that, it was time for lunch. Nicholas had brought his own lunch from home (including several slices of his birthday cake), so initially sat down alone, until Sandra and two of her female friends joined him. They were all smiling, and the other two girls kept nudging Sandra and giggling. She just glared at them and looked like she wanted to say something but was fumbling for the right words. Nick was busy trying to remember the names of the two girls; one was June or Jane - something like that, and the other started with an “R” but that was all he could come up with.

Finally, the “R”-named girl, a petite blonde with thick glasses, said: “So, did Sandy give you your birthday present?”

“Rachel!” Sandra exclaimed and giggled. Nick had to admit she was cute when she giggled.

“She took me to dinner and helped me fend off an annoying brat. Does not seem to be doing so well at that second one today,” he replied, eyeing Rachel as he said this.

“Oooh - burn!” the third girl, a long-legged brunette, said, laughing. Then she suddenly became serious: “But honestly, are you two now going out or something?”

Sandra was blushing furiously.

Nick leaned on one elbow and peered into his questioner's face: “Has she told you we are?”

“Uh, No,” the brunette replied, suddenly a little nervous.

Nick smiled, took a bite of his food, then said: “Well, then why would you expect me to tell you anything? If she can’t trust you with that information, why should I?”

“Hey! You’re not a classified project” the girl exclaimed.

“Maybe I am. Maybe I’m really the giant,” Nick said playfully.

Rachel and the brunette exchanged glances and then burst out laughing. Nick was surprised that Sandra was not laughing - though she was still blushing, so maybe that was it.

“Wow, building up a harem on us, Nicholas?” Dan asked suddenly as he approached the table with a laden tray.

Rachel suddenly became very shy, and the other girl smiled. “Just teasing the wallflower, Dan. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

He set his tray down beside Nick and smiled. The blonde seemed to melt a little as he did so. “Of course not. But you are making my friend here nervous. Why don’t you go find someone else to pester?” Dan asked both girls as sweetly as he could.

“Or you could at least move over a little and make room for Carol and me,” Peter Maxwell’s voice added.

“Why don’t you two go somewhere else for lunch,” Sandra suddenly said. “I’ll catch up with you in Social Studies next period; this is the last chance I have today to spend some time with these guys.”

The brunette sighed and stood up. Rachel seemed oblivious to anything but Dan, until the other girl clapped a hand on her shoulder. “Come on, Rach, let's leave the lovebirds alone.”

Sandra again blushed at this.

The two girls got up and left the table - with Rachel casting a few glances back at Dan until they found another table to sit at.

As soon as they were out of earshot, Sandra said: “I’m sorry about them, Nick. They saw us together at the factory and then at Servo Shakes and made some assumptions. Even wondered if you were taking me to the dance tomorrow…”

“Tomorrow! Um… There’s a dance tomorrow?” Nick asked, surprised at the direction this was going.

“Of course - the Harvest Dance! They’ve been talking about it for two weeks now - June is on the planning committee, even," Sandra informed him.

“Oh, that dance. Well, I had not planned to go,” Nick replied. “But I guess if you’d like to, I could take you.  Oh, unless mom and dad have something planned. Mom comes back tomorrow so we are celebrating my birthday then instead of yesterday. Well, except for the cake, which came yesterday," he added, realizing he was rambling.  Then he smiled: "Oh, speaking of the cake, I  brought some extra pieces if anyone wants some?”

Sandra’s eyes went wide. The other three at the table exchanged surprised looks as well, but then they all asked for cake, and Nick handed pieces out.

“Did … uh… did you just ask me to the dance, Nick?” Sandra said, suddenly.

“Well, again, unless my parents have something planned, I’d be happy to take you. Or you can come along with us, I’m sure. They like you,” he replied.

She shook her head as if to clear it, then her smile returned: “I’d love to go with you, to the dance or … whatever your parents want to do. Sure.”

“I’ll call you tonight and let you know which it is, OK?”

“Of course it is! I … did not expect this. Sure!” Sandra replied, surprised both that he asked, and at how happy it made her feel.

He then returned his attention to his food. After a few bites, he very quietly said: “And now you can tell them, yes, we are going out. At least once.”

Sandra barely heard him, and laughed, but was almost afraid to say anything lest he change his mind.

After lunch, Carol (Peter’s girlfriend) and Sandra left together, as they had the same Social Studies class, along with Rachel, while the boys headed off to their Language Arts program - Peter was studying Spanish while the other two were taking Chinese lessons.

“Are you going out with her now?” Dan asked as soon as Sandra left the table.

“I kind of guess we are, though not really sure I know what that means,” Nicholas admitted with a laugh.

Teacher Parker, the lead teacher for their section, led the Language Arts program. She opened every session with a greeting in a different language, expecting those studying that language to respond in the same tongue, and the rest of the class to write down what language they thought it was; those who got it right would get an extra credit point for the day. She would then recite the day’s assignments in English and send the students off to the Tutors - a row of soundproofed rooms with computers specialized in teaching languages. Most students were in pairs, but some of the more popular languages, like Spanish or Japanese, had three students per Tutor, while some of the rare ones like Bantu only had a single student (in this particular case, Sandra's friend June).

Today’s assignment was to describe their experiences on the Artifact Hunt Field Trip in the language they were studying.

Nick went first, describing the door he found, the sign and the tools. Dan, however, only briefly mentioned finding an old, non-functioning computer, and then veered off to talk about the kaiju attack instead of the other three items that he’d turned in.

During the session, the teacher wandered between the Tutors, listening in on the students’ reports, and occasionally making comments. Nick was a little amused at how tired she seemed to be of hearing about the kaiju fight rather than the exploration of the factory. He actually got a higher mark than usual because he actually talked about most of what he found!

The day ended with their history class. Nicholas always had mixed feelings about this class - he found the subject matter fascinating, but just could not keep names and dates together and in order in his head, no matter how much he tried. This was at least partly because he tried to focus more on the underlying causes of historical events, as the psychology and background were more interesting to him than what actually happened or when. Today the subject was the founding of the Confederation of American States and how the capital cities were chosen. Other than the fact that a military coalition led the Southern section of the Confederation until the Charter of Confederation was ratified, mandating leadership elections, it was nothing new, and Nick found it took all of his concentration to stay awake as the teacher droned on.

Then the final bell for the day rang. He was the last student to gather up his books and head out of the room.

He had just stashed the books he would not need for homework and exchanged his school jacket for a light outdoors jacket when Sandra walked up to his locker. “Hey, Nick, can we talk?”

“Uh, sure,” he replied, unsure of why he suddenly felt more afraid than he had fighting kaiju.