Paint by Numbers -0- Fill in the Empty Spaces of My Heart

Chapter Five: So my choices are inflicting capital punishment or experiencing cruel and unusual treatment?

I had woken up early the morning I was at Mimi’s and took another quick shower before starting to get ready.

My hair and makeup didn’t take too long and I managed to finish in the bathroom just as Mimi was ready to get in. She yawned a good morning at me as I started down the hallway to the kitchen to grab a bowl for cereal. Her parents wouldn’t be awake for another few hours and they weren’t a big breakfast food family so the most Mimi and I managed to scrounge up in the morning with Captain Crunch or Count Chocula. Breakfast was pretty much silent and so was the drive to school, neither of us liking to talk in the mornings.

“Everyone to your stations, we have a lab today!” my science teacher announced and a chorus of groans and protests immediately retaliated. “I know you’re all very excited, today we’re going to be working with batteries, motors, generators, and electricity!” I prayed to god that my lab partner was absent, or at least late enough that I would be paired enough with someone else by the time they got here. But just as I sat down on the bar stool at Lab Station 13 my partner’s black, messy, perfectly styled head of hair slid smoothly into the room’s back door.

“Mr. Burns, I’m sure Ms. Burke is very relieved you showed up today, but next time, try arriving at or even before the bell.” The teacher’s voice was tight and slightly annoyed but Jase just smirked as he slid into the seat across from me. I sighed looked back down at the lab’s outline and started to do all of the work like always.

“So what’s this one about?” Jase’s hand appeared in my line of vision and he moved to take the paper from me, not pulling at it until I fully relinquished my grasp. I didn’t answer as I just let him read over the sheet. “Seems kinky,” with that quick comment he shot me a wink and a smirk over the top of the paper.

“Good, then have fun with it.” I sighed and slid off the stool and walked to the front of the room, pulling a hall pass off the black board before exiting into the hallway. I wasn’t in any mood to put up with Jase, his mood swings, or his stupid comments so I decided diplomatically to leave him with the work for once.

I shuffled my feet as I wandered through the hallways, my heels clanking against the cheap tile floor and my fingertips grazing the wall of lockers. It was roughly 15 minutes into my loitering that I realized that I wasn’t good at skipping classes. I get bored easily and my mind starts to wander from memory to memory to counting tiles then to the number of clicks my heels made in a minute. I had made it to 34 tiles for 37 clicks when I noticed I had made it back to my science room. I could hear the teacher shouting at someone and only had to wait a moment before Jase was thrown into the hallway before me hastily.

“Ah, Ms. Burke, welcome back to your high school education. Would you like to pick up where your partner left off in electrocuting fellow students or just walk with him down to the office for skipping class?” The teacher’s vehemence was now directed at me as he pulled the pass from my hand and waited for my explanation.

“So my choices are inflicting capital punishment or experiencing cruel and unusual treatment myself? Was that meant as a rhetorical question?” I asked earnestly. My teacher growled and slammed the door to his room in my face. I sighed opened the door to the classroom again.

“Burke, office, now!”

“Need. Stuff. First.” I replied in the same tight slow tone before going to my assigned seat and picking up my book bag. As soon as I had gathered my things I left the room and went back to the hallway.

“Way to handle that situation smoothly.” Jase scoffed at me from his position against the lockers across the hall from me.

“Says the one who got caught trying to electrocute kids,” I retorted and started to walk away. I could hear the heavier shuffles of his feet echoing my clicking as I wandered down the empty hallway.

“What do you expect when you leave me alone with that shit?” His voice was light and playful and was driving me crazy.

“Me?! This is my fault?! Maybe if you did one thing expected of you, you wouldn’t get kicked out of every class!” I hissed, whirling around to face him. “Actually I should have expected you to pull some stupid shit that exempts you from responsibility; it’s what you’ve done in every class we have ever had together since kindergarten! Try doing something asked of you for once, without half assing or insulting it!” I wasn’t screaming but Jase looked surprised by my outburst none the less.

“Joey, I was just kidding. Fuck, calm down, it’s not a big deal. Or are you just still moody from yesterday?” His tone was no longer playful, it was just patronizing. And for a moment I just stared at him in pure disbelief of what he had just said.

Some lines you never expect people to cross. Other lines were drawn just because they are so much fun to cross. This is where Jase and I differed: lines that I never thought he would cross; thought that he would never be idiotic enough to cross; he would gleefully jump over them just to see what I would do in response. I think he wanted to see if he could make me cry again.

I didn’t cry though.

I just slapped him and walked away. This time my clacks didn’t have an echo.

[[bonus: Jase’s POV]]

I don’t really know what I expected after that comment but I definitely did not expect her to slap me.

And hard too.

Joey’s usually reasonable, collected, almost stoic, but lately she seems like a bomb going off in slow motion. I shouldn’t have provoked her; I should have known she’d want to kill me. The look in her eyes said it all though. Somehow she managed to look at me as though I was a complete stranger and like her closest friend stabbed her in the throat at the same time.

I felt drawn to go after her but decided against it, not wanting a dramatic reunion of her hand and my cheek. We would be forced back together soon enough, alphabetically speaking anyway; Burns and Burke were always coupled in classes together since kindergarten.

Me versus a bomb round two. Fun.