Olivia’s POV
“Welcome to your last year at Makenzie High, how do you feel?” Jeany my best friend in the whole world held her hand out to me pretending it was a microphone
“What are you doing? We’re seniors now, we don’t wanna look like dorks”
“Come on, think about it, today marks the beginning of the end, the countdown starts today, don’t you have any comment?” She held the invisible mic to my mouth again, I looked at her hand, and back at her as she urged me to answer
“Sean, Jeany has a very important question for you”, he rushed over to join us
“Welcome to your last year at Makenzie High, how do you feel?” Jeany began her interview and I slowly inched away rushing to the blue double doors leading into the school, yes it was a face brick building with blue doors and brown aluminium windows, what can I say, that’s public-school design at its best
The hairs on the back of my neck began to rise as my spidey sense tingled, I honed this skill in the era of Zack Knight, my middle school bully, I lived in fear of him all the time, that is until the goddess graciously answered my prayers and he suddenly moved away, I went from terrified to happy in a matter of seconds.
I haven’t felt this way since he left, I feel dread, my whole body is on alert, I feel menacing eyes staring me down, I feel myself crashing down under their weight. I followed their stare, and it led me to the roof of the main school building, as soon as I looked at him he turned around
“Who is that? That dark brown hair looks kind of familiar” the man wore a black leather jacket and blue jeans, “must be a janitor”, I shook it off and rushed inside, and went to my first period, English lit, which was my favourite class.
“Julius Caesar”, Mr Hart held the book above his head and beamed, “I trust that you all read the assigned pages over the holidays”, he questioned the class and we all nodded, “good, then let's pick it up from Mark Anthony’s speech”, the rustling of pages turning filled the air “friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears”, he continued to read the passage out loud
I’ve always loved literature and Mr Hart taught me last year as well, and I was thrilled to have him as my teacher again this year, he had a way of making the text come alive
“Miss Whitlock”
“Huh?” my head shot up at the sound of my name
“Are you with us?”
“Mhm”, I nodded, as my cheeks flushed from the embarrassment of being called out
“Then I guess you wouldn’t mind continuing from where I left off”
“Yes, Sir" I started to read. “You all did see that on the Lupercal, I thrice presented him a kingly crown, which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition? Yet Brutus says he was ambitious; and, sure, he is an honourable man”
“Thank you Miss Whitlock, now before we go on, tell me Miss Whitlock, what do you think Brutus and the other so called honourable men felt about our dear Mark Anthony’s speech?”
I consider myself a nerd, I’ve always done well at school, I’ve always gotten good grades, but I wasn’t one of those nerds that sat in the front and were the teacher’s pet, I preferred to sit at the back, and keep to myself, quietly observing everyone, so naturally everyone shifted in their seats and turned their gaze fixing it on me
I cleared my throat and took a deep breath, “they felt betrayed, they trusted Mark Anthony to keep up the status quo but he pulled the rug up from under them, turning everyone in the audience against them”
“Yes”, he beamed, “he blindsided them; they didn’t know what was coming until it was too late, a lesson to all of you”, his words brought a shiver down my spine like my body knew something I didn’t
***
“Come on, Melody and Sean gave me great content, just tell me what you expect from this year”, Jeany pressed me for a response as we sat in the cafeteria,
“What’s up with you, why do you need to know so badly?” She played with her golden hair as she pouted giving me puppy dog eyes
“It’s too early for goldilocks isn’t it?” Melody smirked at Jeany, and Jeany threw her pen at her, she hated being called goldilocks, but with her golden hair and blue eyes it was only logical, we chuckled
“Don’t laugh, I'm being serious”, Jeany whined
“Okay, tell you what, I’ll answer your questions only if you tell me why this is so important to you”
“I signed up for the….”, she mumbled the last words
“What?” I leaned in, trying to hear, “did you guys get that?” I looked at Melody and Sean. They shook their heads back at me
“I heard nothing”, Melody mocked