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Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
There are 4 types of high schools in Japan: private, public, technical college, and national schools, all requiring exams to enter high school. We’ll discuss the differences between them, which is which, and more.
There are 2 exams. The practical exam, and a written test typically consisting of the main 5 subjects: Japanese, math, science, English, and social studies. Private schools have custom-made tests to enter their school, and some private school tests only consist of 3 subjects. Almost all of them always consist of English and Japanese. Most add math as their 3rd subject, but some schools leave the 3rd subject as an option between the remaining math, science, and social
Private schools in Japan are the same as in the West; they operate outside of government funding and were founded by someone a while ago. To get money without help from government funding, they typically cost a lot to attend. Putting aside the cost of lessons alone, things like uniforms, club activities, and textbooks all cost a ridiculous amount of money to pay for the school.
Public schools, or 県立 (kenritsu) in Japanese, are much cheaper than private schools. Receiving government funds to operate lowers the prices significantly. To get into a public school, you still have to take the exam, and each prefecture has its own exam. It occurs on the same day, and everybody takes the same tests. Each test is 45 minutes; cheating means an immediate 0 points. Though they are public schools, public schools can offer a wide range of courses, from general studies to nursing, woodworking, mechanical degrees, graphic design, electrician, plumbing, and more. So despite being the most basic school, they’re not to be underestimated.
Technical colleges are a mix of high school and college, lasting up to 5 years for the main course, or plus 2 years for the advanced course, totaling seven years, whereas a typical high school lasts 3 years. The reason these schools take so long to graduate from is that they offer courses that include college curriculum and degrees. If you choose the longer, more difficult courses that the school offers. Technical colleges receive large amounts of government funding and are usually heavily focused on science and math, though they’re technically not high schools.
National schools
National schools, like those listed above, are the same thing as technical colleges. Almost all technical colleges are national schools; out of the 58 in the country, 51 are national schools. Hence, they get such large amounts of funding. But there are national schools that aren’t technical colleges. There are only 15 in the entirety of Japan (most recent data 2024), and their full name is something different from the national technical colleges. These schools are referred to as schools affiliated with national universities and are even more difficult to get into. National schools and technical colleges, like every other high school, require a test to get into Japan’s high schools. For every prefecture, tests for all technical colleges and national schools occur on the same day and use the same test, the only variation being the prefecture.
High school entrance exams
As stated above, all high schools in Japan require an exam to enter. Each type of school gets a different allocated test and exam day depending on the prefecture. Private schools have privately made tests, while all public schools (national and technical colleges included) receive the same test, depending on the prefecture. Public school is this test, technical college is this test, national school is this test. These tests vary from prefecture to prefecture. For example, my prefecture is notorious for having extremely long word problems for every subject, regardless, making you read and think and using difficult terminology to throw you off. Apparently, it’s been like this for decades. These tests are all written exams, while the English test has a 10–15 minute listening part. Any sound made on purpose results in failure. Accidental sounds such as bodily noises, gas, sneezing, etc., will be let go, and they’ll replay the recording.There are also other types of high school exams besides the written 5-subject exam.
These are the special entrance exam and recommendation exam.
Special entrance exams.
People who excel in extracurricular or club activities during their middle school years can receive offers from high schools or have their middle school recommend them for special entrance exams. These entrance exams vary from school to school, but all schools will evaluate your practical ability based on the recommendation you received, whether it be arts, music, or sports like basketball. If you truly excel to the best of the best, extremely famous high school sports teams may even reach out, offering you a spot. One of my classmates transferred to an extremely famous soccer team in Hiroshima after being offered a spot as a goalie. His clips are now on YouTube, and he’s doing amazing.Special high school entrance exams are not limited to extracurriculars only, either, as any high school can offer these exams, from general course recommendations to things like nursing course recommendations. Getting a recommendation or offer means that if you take it and pass whatever test they give, you must attend that school. In most cases, it’s easier than passing the traditional entrance exam, with many tests being writing an essay on a given theme.
You do not need recommendations to apply for special entrance exams; however, most high schools offer the special entrance exams outside of that. These are exclusive to extracurriculars. These exams will always have a technical/practical exam where you show off your skills. If it were music, it might be playing a piece or a scale. The high school I was thinking about needed a scale and a song piece. The teacher there stated that you do not need to play an instrument to apply and pass the rest; singing with all your might will do fine, as what he’s looking for is passion in music. That was just that school, as that teacher is famous in my prefecture, and his brass band shows up on TV often and goes to nationals every year. Though his greatness comes at a cost, as he’s known for being extremely strict, scary, and doesn’t tolerate any bullshit. Enough of that, though, back to the point. That was just an example; not all schools are that lenient. All of them will require a practical test.
The second test, however, will vary from school to school: some lessen the subjects of the original entrance exams, others just have an essay, some schools have an interview, maybe all and more, depending on the school.
Bare in mind, applying for these extracurricular, sports, or arts exams does not guarantee you’ll become a professional in that area. Most proceed to do ordinary jobs in the future or go to university. Typically, only 1 person every few years go on to become professionals.
The second part of the high school entrance exams is the interview. Regardless of what school you attend, you will have to go through an interview where they ask various questions. One thing they will ask, regardless of school, is, “Why did you choose our school?” Other questions may include personal questions, strengths and weaknesses, best memories from middle school, what you tried in middle school club activities, and much more. These questions vary heavily by high school and course. The ones listed above are common examples you’d find in high school interview preparation books. When you reach your 3rd year of middle school, they start doing mock interviews nearly daily at school to help you prepare.The timing of all these exams may also vary. Special exams and national school exams can go as far back as late November to December, while most private and technical college exams are usually in January, and public school exams in February to March.
Online school
There is also a type of school I left out: online school. Online schooling doesn’t require any entrance exams and costs significantly less, while still giving you a graduation certification. Beyond that, it makes it extremely hard to attend any form of college, university, or vocational school. While not impossible, it is hard. These schools look at thousands of applicants—why choose someone from an online school when you have an applicant from a national school? You’re at the bottom of the ranking. Because, in typical Japanese fashion, image is everything. Online schools are recommended for people with medical illnesses, typically mental, or those who struggle with busy places like classrooms and schools etc. Many people who do not attend middle school apply for these, too. While an ordinary person may attend, it isn’t recommended.
College/university
Speaking of colleges, like high schools, universities, colleges, and vocational schools also require entrance exams and are considered 100 times harder than high school entrance exams. You can also receive recommendations to a university, but they only accept a small number from each school, and you need top grades, a clean slate, and to be perfect to receive these. Tests vary by college, with the most difficult in the country obviously being the University of Tokyo.
Highschools have ranks
This is another thing I didn’t mention above: among the different types of schools and varying test difficulty, there are also different passing scores for each high school based on ranking in your area. For example, if you want to be a doctor, you must attend the best general course in your city to have the background to apply or receive recommendations. So yes, your career path is decided by what school you attend and graduate from.
Transferrinng
Unlike in anime, you cannot transfer high schools. The only exception is moving very, very far. And even then, you don’t transfer—take the fucking train. Some people commute from Tokyo to attend the high school I mentioned earlier with the music program because of how elite and famous it is. And FYI, Tokyo is 770 km away. He takes the train every day and shows up on time for morning practice. So there’s pretty much no excuse to transfer high schools unless you’re moving off Honshu to places like Hokkaido or Kyushu, which are a little too far for a train ride.
Dropping out
If you don’t meet the right attendance marks, basic grades, or other criteria, you’ll be given the option to redo the grade or drop out. Though rare, dropping out is more common.
Now a dire question: what happens if you drop out? In Japan, what high school you graduate from determines your career path. Public school = ordinary job or the vocational degree you receive if you choose to use it. Private school varies by school. Some are elite, some are basic. National/technical schools, depending on rank, typically lead to higher-ranking colleges. Online school = ordinary job, or if you can’t work due to reasons listed earlier, you stay at home. And if you drop out? You can’t even get a basic job, not even something like a grocery store worker or delivery driver. So not attending high school is worse than suicide in some ways. In my prefecture, about 5 percent of students who graduate middle school choose to skip high school, and less than 1 percent of them land a job. That’s how bad it is. Go to school, folks.
MHA
Now, with all that information, you may be curious what high school UA High is. I have an answer for you. UA High is a national high school. In the alternate reality MHA is set in, it would be added to the small pool of national high schools that aren’t technical colleges.
National high schools, as the name suggests, are the hardest high schools to get into test-wise, but some can offer a recommendation to the University of Tokyo, making it all worthwhile. The test Midoriya and Bakugo took was the standard special entrance exam, whereas Shoto and Momo took the recommendation entrance exam.
Hatsune Mei is in a robotics course, where she can receive her vocational license or use her robotics grades for a recommendation into an elite robotics university course to further boost her resume and background check. Hatsune had it good.So now you know more about Japan’s high school system, the entrance exams Midoriya took at the start, and how UA hasn’t gone broke with the amount of robots and other things they burn through.
The Rise and Fall of Jenny Hopkins, aged 15 - Chapter 4, Part 1: Under Pressure.
Well this is embarrassing. It's been awhile, life happened and I also procrastinated. But I've got it done so here you go!
A bit of a slow chapter, it's mainly set up for part 2 besides the introduction to some of the original female characters meant to expand the female cast since there were very few girls at the Academy in the original game.
Word Count: 8,284
Some Content warnings that may apply:
-Jenny's got a bit of a case of internalized misogyny. I sorta hinted at it in earlier chapters but I tried to make it apparent here.
-Some foul language. I think I might've been too frivolous with it here, though considering the first chapter had the c-word in it I guess that's to be expected at this point.
I'll admit, I had a pretty nice day with Gary yesterday. Yeah, I didn't think I'd admit that to myself either, but I really did. Since I'm basically talking to myself, it's fine if I do. Not like anybody else is ever gonna read this.
Well… unless my dream of becoming a successful rockstar ends up panning out, and I decide to publish this diary, claiming it as my autobiography that I totally didn't just put out as an easy money grab. That isn't like me at all, I don't even like money that much!
Anyway, enough lying off my ass, I'm sure you're wondering what Gary and I got up to.
After we left Burgers right after Gary called me… pretty… he talked me into stealing a bike with him, and we rode through Old Bullworth Vale, specifically the neighborhood where all the Preps lived. It was some weirdly laid out cul-de-sac, rather than some kind of gated community like I would've expected. Many of the houses did have a large metal fence and gate surrounding them though, with Tad Spencer's even having an extra fence just to enclose the garage.
Gary pointed out Derby, Tad's and Pinky's house, as well as Petey's house since he apparently lived in the area too. For some reason he felt the need to point out how Petey's house was only one story, and how the only reason they lived there was because Pete's mom is an obese whale who'd fall through the floor of any building higher than ground level. I had to wonder what that kid even did to Gary to make him feel the need to insult him all the time, even when he wasn't around, and if Pete was even aware of the reason.
“So, where's your house then?” I asked out of curiosity, just casually peddling beside Gary on the side of the road as we made our way to Bullworth Town. “I noticed you didn't point it out, do you live out of town or are you from a different state and just familiar with the area from attending the Academy for so long?”
Gary didn't answer my question immediately, despite staring at me the entire time.
It was really starting to annoy me. It was bad enough that he felt the need to call me pretty (If he hadn't bought me lunch, I probably would've slugged him in the face right after he'd said it.) but now with the staring?
“Gary, could you quit staring at me like that? It's weirding me out.”
The guy looked like he'd been caught red-handed committing a crime, his eyes widening as we stopped by the entrance to the park not too far from the fast food place we'd eaten at earlier. He tried to give a response, eyes darting around as he clearly didn't have a good explanation, and only managed to blurt out:
“I wasn't staring at you.”
I rolled my eyes, instead changing the subject back to asking where he lived.
“So? Where do you actually live?” I asked once more, my tone a bit bitchier than I intended it to come out. Understandable given his behavior.
Just… God, why did he have to call me pretty? That's the last thing I ever wanted to be. I didn't want to look attractive to anyone, that would make me more of a target than I already was just for being born a girl at all.
I bet ugly guys don't have to deal with bullcrap like this. Dammit, why couldn't I have just been born a dude!
Then again, I guess it could be worse. He could've said something stupid like, oh I don't know, I love you or something. I didn't trust anyone except my mother to say that to me… even though I really couldn't remember the last time my mother had told me she loved me…
Whatever.
If Gary really had said that to me, I would've ditched him at Burgers and probably ditched school altogether.
I knew I could never, ever trust a man to say he loved me and actually mean it without some kind of catch.
It wasn't completely impossible for me to avoid going back to the Academy anyway, I'd once ran away from home for about a month and a half about two years ago in a really really dumb attempt to find my biological father. During that time, I'd taught myself how to drive, drank my first beer, and even realized that I was a little bit of a dyke. Good times.
Gary's demeanor flipped like a switch, and suddenly that nervousness from earlier was gone. He'd gone back to his usual confident self, it was almost like he hadn't been nervous at all.
How the hell did he even do that? First Gary's angry then chill the next second, then he's nervous and now he seems like he has everything under control? Man, I wish I could do that, maybe I'd be considered less of a bitch.
“Oh, me? My place is out of town and pretty isolated, it's about 30 miles North of Bullworth. Not really walking or biking distance. It's a manor, way bigger than Derby's mansion too… You know, I could invite you over sometime…” Gary said, leaning on his (stolen) bike in what I can only describe as… seductive… yet weirdly pitiful. Like he was trying to charm me, except he didn't seem confident about it. It kind of reminded me of Pete a little, though only the latter part. Pete was only charming in a pitiful way, like a kitten with a cold.
“I'm good, thanks,” I replied.
I expected Gary to try and push the topic, but he thankfully took the hint. Instead we headed into this place called “Old Bullworth Gardens” for a bit. It was just some park, there wasn't even any sort of garden around at all. Why even call it a garden if there wasn't anything besides trees around?
Gary got the idea of practicing my aim more with the slingshot by hiding in a tree and slinging pebbles at random passerby. I went through with it, because the idea sounded funny.
And you know what? It was.
He’d point out someone, and I'd aim at them and shoot. Didn’t matter if it was some old lady or a guy wearing shorts 2 sizes too small for him going out on a late mid-day run: either way, they got the gift of a pebble getting launched at their head. I tried to avoid hitting anyone in the eyes, but that was about it. It's not like a little pebble could kill anyone after all… It's a bit stupid to die from getting hit by a pebble.
…
Gary stood behind the tree I was in, letting out a quiet chuckle with every hit I managed to get.
Now that I think about it, describing his laughter as a chuckle didn't seem right, it was more comparable to a giggle. It was boyish and sweet, and it caught me off guard hearing it come out of the mouth of a guy like Gary. Especially since all I was doing was beaming people in the head with small pebbles. Maybe I was missing something, could it be something else that was causing it?
Maybe not, Gary was a bit of a weirdo. I knew that from the first time I'd ever spoken to him.
I wasn't exaggerating when I said Gary's weird giggling caught me off guard. A guy with crutches and a cast on his leg wobbled by, and, to my surprise, I accidentally released the slingshot’s flimsy rubber band. Instead of hitting the guy with the crutches, it hit a nearby wasp nest in a tree about a few feet away from the one I was in. The nest fell, and unfortunately for the couple having a picnic right underneath that same tree, it landed right between the two of them.
Gary's giggling turned into full on hysterical laughter as the couple screamed in terror and fled the gardens, trailed by a swarm of angry wasps.
Unfortunately, Gary's loud ass laugh got the attention of a nearby cop.
“Hey! What are you two doing out of school?! Don't think for a second about acting stupid, I see those uniforms!”
Gary seemingly didn't think twice about making a run for it without helping me out of the tree, but truthfully? I hardly blamed him.
I would've done the same thing really. A dick move, sure, but not one that I wouldn’t have done.
I scrambled down the tree and barely avoided the officer grabbing me as I sprinted off in the same direction as Gary, the cop still on my ass. As I shoved my slingshot back in my bag, I was stumped on how to get this guy off me… until I remembered something.
Behind the junk bus, just before I smashed its windows in, I spotted a plastic bag of marbles and shoved them in my purse as a keepsake. I wasn't sure why they were there, maybe some other student had dropped the bag or just stashed them there for who knows what reason.
I undid the tie on the bag and tossed it behind me without looking back, hearing the contents rattle out on the gravel crosswalk loudly. Next thing I heard was the even louder sound of a body hitting concrete, followed by a string of agonized curses. I didn't look back, but I still ended up barely holding back a laugh.
Just my luck, I actually ended up losing track of Gary. I briefly wondered if he and Davis were in the same Track team or something as I decided to run down toward the beach as the sun began to set on the horizon, turning the ocean from its natural blue color to a warm, saturated orange.
Looking at the water, I almost felt the temptation to dive in for some reason. It was stupid, I mean, it was October, and it was the beginning of Fall, the water was freezing… besides, I didn't even like swimming that much.
…Didn't help that one-piece swimsuits typically made for girls my size tended to be pretty ugly… and there was no way I was ever swimming in a bikini…
I stood at the top of the steps at the entrance to the beach, and as I made my way down to the sandbank below, I felt an odd sense of apprehension come over me. I looked around, but besides some of the townsfolk walking around town clearly minding their own business, there wasn't anything or anyone around that could've been the cause of the weird feeling.
Shaking my head, I stepped onto the beach and walked right, my gaze fixated on the light house.
I’d… never seen one of those so close up before. It seemed to be abandoned, the light at the very top unlit and the mechanism that made it spin wasn’t on either. Underneath it was a small building, connected to the main pier with a ramp leading up to what I assumed was the entrance to the place.
I’ll admit, I got a bit curious. Before I could actually satiate that curiosity however, I felt a pair of hands grab me from behind. One hand was on my mouth, while the other had a firm grip on my right shoulder.
I didn't waste any time reacting, slamming my elbow into whoever was grabbing me. He grunted, I could tell it was a guy from how deep the sound of it was. Before he could do anything I whipped around and grabbed his throat.
I didn't apply any pressure though… because I realized it was Gary. Even though my hands were wrapped firmly around his throat, the motherfucker was grinning. He let out this throaty, mild and short chuckle as he stared at me with his head lifted up.
My hands left his throat and I stared at him completely baffled. What the fuck was wrong with this guy?
Scratch that, I should've been asking a different question, something along the lines of what wasn't wrong with this guy. That would've been easier to answer…
…Like… I dunno, his tooth gap was kind of cute? I guess?
…
…Maybe seeing the school counselor wasn’t such a bad idea from Crabblesnitch after all. Seriously Jenny-girl, what the fuck is wrong with you? What the actual fuck? First you date a guy 5 years older than you back in 7th grade that ended up stabbing his aunt with a sharpened candy cane on the 4th of July, and now this shit?
You seriously need to get better taste in men.
Gary let out that weird giggle again, and I switched from being baffled to being pissed off.
“What’s so funny you moron? What were you thinking?!”
He kept chuckling, and I seriously considered actually strangling him when he finally spoke. What he said next only reinforced the thought.
“Awww… Did I scare you Jane? I was just trying to be funny, didn't think you'd try to strangle me like that. A bit of a psychotic response don't you think?” he spoke, smirking briefly with a short ‘heh’ before continuing, “Anyway… you wanna watch the sunset with me? I saw you looking at it beforehand so…”
What the hell was-
…
…Oh what the Hell, I was just repeating myself at this point.
It's like his constant weird behavior was tiring me out. Just one thing right after the other. None of it was enough to make me leave, instead, I found myself tolerating it.
For what reason? I didn't know, still don't.
So what did I do?
“...Sure Gary…”
I watched the sunset with him. Yes, seriously. It was pretty nice actually, he didn't even do anything weird for the rest of the day afterwards… Thankfully.
Aside from a comment he made about the sunset reminding him of my eyes. I rolled my eyes at that, giving him a firm and final “whatever.”
By the time we were ready to go, it was past curfew, so Gary and I headed back to the school. The Prefects that were patrolling around the school grounds for curfew dodgers were hardly an issue, not noticing as we slipped through a huge hole in the outer fence wall…
…Which we could've gone through earlier rather than hopping the fence…
Why didn’t we go through there earlier? I didn’t think to ask at the time since… well I was tired as hell at that point from all the action and Gary in general and just didn’t think about it at the time. I figure I should ask Gary about it later, but knowing me, I'll probably forget to do it. It's not like it's that much of a big deal anyways.
I did learn something new from Gary before we split up to go back to our respective Dorms for the night. The front doors of the dorms were locked up after curfew, so entering from there wasn't an option. Instead, there was a window that led straight into the attic of the girl's dorm, which for whatever reason was never closed. Aside from having to climb a lattice wall covered in overgrown vines just to get up to the window, I didn't have any issue sneaking back into the dorm, and back into my room.
No, I don't know why Gary knows about that entrance. Again… I was too tired to ask. To be honest, I don’t remember much else from that night, safe to say I was pretty checked out by that point. Weirdly, the last thing I remember that night before passing out was the sound of somebody puking their guts out, coming from the area where the bathroom was. Not sure what was up with that.
I woke up still wearing my school uniform. I even still had that origami flower Gary tied to my hair, which I'd figured would have fallen out with how loose I'd tied it, but apparently not.
Trisha was the one who woke me up by the way, not because she wanted to be annoying, but because if she hadn’t, I would’ve been late for class otherwise. Pretty cool of her, but I still ended up giving her shit for it anyway because I'm an absolute bitch with a capital b in the morning. Next chance I get I should probably apologize… If I remember to do it.
Didn't help that she asked about the flower, wondering where I'd gotten it and why I was wearing it in my hair. I practically ripped it out and shoved it into my section of the closet.
Despite all that, I think I was starting to tolerate Trisha at this point. It helps that she’s only mildly annoying, and not on purpose. Trisha's just… like that. Trisha doesn't go out of her way to be a dick, unlike pretty much everybody in this God forsaken school. Namely this one brunette - Mandy I think her name was? - who tripped Trisha on her way out of the Dormitory. I helped the fallen girl up and yelled at the girl in the cheerleader outfit, but Mandy just laughed and walked off. What a friggin bitch.
Trisha thanked me and we parted ways, and that was that.
I barely made it in time for Biology. It was… normal I guess? I already knew the teacher's name was Dr. Slaughter, and boy did his personality certainly match his name. He complimented me on my delicate knife work, but instead of feeling pretty good about the praise, it just weirded me out. I feel like he and that creepy janitor I've seen around campus who mumbles a lot hide dead bodies together after school.
I just so happened to be partnered up with Eunice for the whole thing, but she wasn't much help. She was pretty sensitive about seeing the frog's innards, and the most I could get her to do was pass the tools I needed and label the drawings of the organs on the sheet we were given. We did chat for a bit, mainly about the other girls at the school. Turns out Eunice was a bit of a gossip with a little bit of nudging.
I did get some info on the more prominent girls around the campus, since Gary neglected to actually fill me in on any of them earlier.
First of all, there was Marian Abbott, the Head Girl. Her family was British, but she was born in America so that meant pretty much nothing really. She's basically an American. She was in her senior year and admitted that she was aiming to go to Harvard, which Eunice thought was pretty believable given how seriously she took her studies… along with the fact that her dad was a billionaire who could easily afford the tuition. She didn't go out of her way to talk to people, but that didn't matter since people would go out of their way to talk to her. She was also technically a part of the Jocks clique since she was Head of the swim team, but there was another girl in the clique who was far more important than her.
Mandy Wyles, the head cheerleader. Why was she so important? Besides the fact that she was the head cheerleader? It was because her boyfriend, Ted Thompson, was the Captain of Bullworth's football team. Yeah, her popularity was solely because of a man, a boy really. That was what gave her status. She was otherwise a vapid bully, and constantly had her eyes on the Greasers clique leader rather than her actual boyfriend. She ruled the Girl's dorm with an iron fist, since she pretty much had Mrs. Peabody wrapped around her perfectly manicured finger. If a girl did something she personally didn't approve of or inconvenienced her in some way, she'd go crying to Peabody about it and the old hag would go out of her way to find something to punish the offending girl for.
Hearing that, I thought back to what Dr. Lamb said about Mrs. Peabody looking after the girls. Was she lying about that or delusional? I'd believe that second one, seems like a lot of people in this place have their heads up their asses or something, it'd explain everybody's crappy mood.
Heh.
Oh, and she apparently has an eating disorder or something like that, and she hid it by throwing up in either the Girl’s Dorms or gym bathrooms late at night or whenever there wasn’t anyone around. I guess that explained the puking I'd heard from the night before. Personally, I don’t think it could’ve happened to a nicer girl.
I’m sure if I said that aloud, you’d be able to hear the condescension in my tone.
Then there was Lola Lombardi, the top girl of the Greasers. Two guesses as to why that is.
That's right, It's because she's dating the leader of the Greasers, Johnny Vincent. Granted, she does have a bit of a girl posse going on with some of the other Greaser's girlfriends. Their little sub-group is pretty identical to their male counterparts, but a lot more subtle when it comes to their harassment, mainly because of Mrs. Peabody. Apparently Lola really, really hated any girl that admitted to wanting to hook up with her boyfriend. It probably would've been understandable, if it wasn't for the fact that Lola herself was a serial cheater. Every year since they'd first gotten together, Lola would cheat on Johnny with multiple guys, and her little gang would try to cover it up and make sure Johnny didn't find out about it. Except they must've been pretty bad at doing it, since Johnny would always end up finding out about his girlfriend playing hot potato with her and another dude's lips at least once, and it'd end pretty badly for whatever guy was smoochin’ Lola. Last year, one of those stupid and unlucky boys even ended up in a 3 month coma, but when the cops tried asking him how it happened and who did it, the kid couldn't even remember who had beaten him up to begin with, so Johnny and his boys got off scott free.
Oh, and despite the Greasers and Preps being rivals with one another, Lola has issues with Mandy Wyles rather than the main Prep girl, Pinky Gauthier. Mandy's been pretty upfront with wanting to get together with Johnny for a long time, but because of how close she is with Mrs. Peabody, Lola and her crew basically can't touch her, nevermind breathe the same air.
Speaking of Pinky, she's the main Prep girl. She's… pretty unremarkable. According to Eunice, she's not even mean to anyone, at least in comparison to the others at the Academy; At worst, she complains a lot and loudly about her ridiculously young step-mother, either because the other womans been borrowing her clothes or makeup or whatever without asking; apparently the last complaint was about the step-mom taking her limited edition Nintendogs metallic rose colored Nintendo DS. Initially, it seemed like she was pretty inoffensive, I thought I could’ve found some common ground with her by complaining about the annoying things my mom does… then I remembered she was dating her cousin, Derby Harrington. I dunno if I'd even want to associate with somebody like that.
While Pinky was the most prominent and popular girl of the Preps, there was another significant girl to be aware of.
Annette Caldwell.
Annette, as far as what Eunice has told me, is a ticking time bomb. She acts like she's all calm and collected, but if you were to wrong her in some way you'd never hear the end of it, at least these days. In the past, she used to be just kind of two-faced, speaking kindly of people only to talk shit about them behind their back; A coward basically.
But then her family started getting into financial trouble, the kind you couldn't easily get out of. Recently she's been trying to get Derby to date her, in what Eunice assumed was a way to get her family some financial security. Not that Annette getting with Derby was any better than him dating his cousin, because Annette was also his cousin; The rich of Bullworth seemed to be real connected with each other, which made me wonder why the Harrington's weren't already helping the Caldwell's out of their financial woes.
By the day, it seemed like she's been getting worse and worse, and I'm pretty sure it was her I'd heard yelling at the top of her lungs at someone from halfway across the main school building yesterday.
Could've just been some random girl, but the voice sounded like it belonged to some high-class snooty teenage girl that was having a mental breakdown, so I just assumed.
At the very bottom of relevancy was Beatrice Trudeau, main girl of the Nerds. I was sort of familiar with her… though, mainly her smell. I'm pretty sure I'd hurried past her on my way to Biology this morning, and that was enough to make me dislike her immediately. Seriously, has that girl ever heard of deodorant?
She was probably one of the few Nerds that actually seemed to care about her future beyond swearing that they'll be their bullies boss someday. She could often be found in the library after school like the rest of the nerds, but rather than playing Grottos and Gremlins, she'd have her face shoved in some kind of book along with a few of the other Nerd girls she got along with.
Even though I probably didn't really need the info, I ended up asking Eunice about Trisha and what her whole deal was. Mainly how she was even in the Bullies clique in the first place. Sure, Trent was her brother and that probably answered my question, but it still seemed strange that somebody like Russell would just allow her in given her… quirks...
Well, I was sort of right, but it was a bit more complicated.
See, Trisha Northwick considered herself… a witch. Seriously, she was 100% convinced she was some kind of magic girl in some book she liked, though she was pretty inconsistent about how her magic worked. Last year she got in trouble for taking all the salt from the cafeteria kitchen along with a shit ton of glitter from the art room and spreading it in a ring around the Boy's Dorm at 3 in the morning. When she got caught, she claimed that she was trying to cleanse the demons and evil spirits out of the Dorm, only to be told by Crabblesnitch that there weren't any demons in the Dorm, only the male students. She then tried arguing that the demons were obviously separate beings from the students that lived there, but that the salt circle would probably do them some good anyway by cleansing their souls and making them act nicer.
I kinda figured Trisha had a few screws loose, but this was something else. At least it seemed like her delusions were meant to be helpful, if still bafflingly ridiculous.
As for the whole Russell thing? Well, he was convinced of her whole witch delusion, and the only reason she was in his clique was because Trent told him that if he didn't let her join, Trisha would get upset and put a curse on him. It was kind of screwed up actually, Russell was obviously “slow”, and you could probably make the argument that the two were taking advantage of that.
Not that I cared really. That huge idiot gave me a bloody nose on my first day here, could've broken it too with how hard he'd hit me, so why should I be concerned with a nutcase and her bully of a brother taking advantage of his retardation?
Yeah, that's right. It's none of my damn business.
Plus, actually trying to do something to make the students around here act less like assholes, even if it is utterly delusional and wouldn't have actually worked, isn't a completely terrible idea. Obviously, though, there were… better ways to go about it.
Did I know of any specific one? Not really, but I assumed there was. Best I could think of doing was smacking anybody harassing me for something stupid. Gary probably had some ideas though.
After biology was lunch, but rather than stop by the lunchroom to get a whiff of whatever unholy dish that ogre was cooking up, I instead went straight towards the school counselor's office. I was told I could either visit during lunch or after the second class was over, and since I really just wanted to get this over with I decided lunch would be fine.
As of now, I’m sitting by Dr. Lamb’s office door with this dumb diary in hand, more or less stalling; My pen rolling in between my fingers as I press the tip to the paper, jotting down one last sentence.
Just get it over with Jen.
***
I shut the diary loudly and stuffed it back into my purse along with my pen. Usually I would've kept the holy grail of all my secrets and insecurities and secret insecurities somewhere more private than my purse, like burying it in the closet, but I didn't fully trust Trisha not to snoop around and find it. It was nothing personal, truthfully I'd do the same thing with pretty much any girl in this school. I’ve gotten my diary stolen before back at the third school I'd attended, the one in San Andreas.
Admittedly, the only reason it even happened was because I'd brought it to school in the first place, but since just leaving it at home wasn't an option here, keeping it in my purse was arguably safer; Especially since nowadays I could just beat up anybody stupid enough to run off with my bag.
My hand met the stainless steel door handle into Dr. Lamb's office and opened it, peeking inside to see her typing at her computer. She noticed me and waved with a warm smile.
“Oh! Hello Jane, nice of you to drop by!” Dr. Lamb said, her voice a bit weary. It didn't match her appearance, which was noticeably better than yesterday. I swear, it was like she'd gotten done having some kind of mental breakdown right before catching Gary and I jumping the fence. I'd ask, but I figured she'd ignore me or change the topic. It's what my mom would do, well, actually, mom tended to get mad more often than the other two, but Dr. Lamb didn't seem like that type of person.
I scanned the room itself. It was pretty boring, the only sense of Dr. Lamb’s touch seemed to be mostly restricted to her desk.
“Yeah, I kinda just wanted to get this over with. Gives me an excuse to skip lunch too,” I said, sitting in one of the office chairs set not too far from the front of her desk. I let my purse dangle on one of the chairs’ arms. I Continued with, “So, how are ya doing?”
Dr. Lamb gave me a look of concern.
“You mean you haven't eaten anything today? Did you at least eat something for breakfast?”
“Nothing besides a Beam cola. I'm not really interested in getting food poisoning on my first week of school.”
She sighed, in a way that sounded like she understood the terrible state of the food in the cafeteria but was still disappointed that I'd choose going hungry over just risking it and eating whatever looked the most edible thing on the menu.
“Well I can't just let you go hungry. Hold on, let me just get this out,” before I could tell her it was fine and that I was used to going hungry, she was already rummaging through her desk.
Dr. Lamb ducked down in her chair and I heard a drawer from behind her desk being opened up. As she rummaged through from wherever, I noticed the photo frames on her desk. She had a good number of photos but one stood out to me for whatever reason.
It was Dr. Lamb with a butch looking woman and a young girl, probably kindergarten age. The three were at some kind of beach, and the butch woman and Lamb were building a sandcastle with the girl, who I could guess was probably Dr. Lamb's daughter with how similar they looked.
My focus left the pictures and went back to Dr. Lamb, who set a fairly large black canvas lunch bag on her desk. She unzipped the top, and it turned out to have several baggies full of what appeared to be sandwiches wrapped up in napkins.
“I've noticed that a lot of the students around here seem to avoid eating the food in the cafeteria, so I figured I'd get permission to have the students in my afternoon Home Economics class make these sandwiches as a warmup while I get their assignment ready and hand them out. They're basically just PB and J sandwiches with banana slices in them, though I did make sure to include a few that's just jelly and banana, for the students that have a peanut allergy. Feel free to take one!”
My gaze shifted from the bag back to Dr. Lamb, and for some reason I couldn't help but to think back to what Gary had said about her.
"I mean, Lamb just seems like she's hiding something to me. She's a new hire, and I feel like she's just putting on this act of being all sweet and kind until she reveals who she really is…”
It's not like I hadn't been screwed over by a “nice” teacher before. I was still going to be careful, but I was kind of hungry, so…
“Thanks ma'am,” I replied, taking one of the bags and unwrapping the sandwich inside of it. Sure enough, it was just a plain, white bread PBJ, one of the banana slices peeking out between the two bread slices. Not like I was expecting anything spectacular, “It's better than nothing.”
Dr. Lamb smiled and zipped the bag up, putting it back where she'd pulled it out.
“Yes, it's far better than skipping a meal. Listen Jenny, that’s not the kind of habit you want to repeat, it could lead to an eating disorder. Teen girls around your age are particularly susceptible to developing them.”
“So I've heard,” I said. It's not like I was at risk of it. I just needed to cut back on the Beam colas, which I could do at any time. Y'know, if I ever felt like it.
Which wasn't anytime soon I don't think. Didn't mean I had a problem though obviously.
“I'm serious Jane,” Dr. Lamb replied, her tone sounding more like a stern parent than her usual soft spoken way of talking. Which didn't seem too out of place oddly enough, “Just try and eat the most edible thing on the menu, at least until after Halloween when they finally let you students roam the town.”
I groaned. I wasn't gonna be too mean, but I knew I had to be blunt.
“Listen, Lamb, there's nothin’ edible comin’ out of that lunchroom. It's like the food's being made by a lunch lady that's deliberately tryin’ to poison people. And given the amount of kids I've seen runnin’ out of the lunchroom just to puke their guts out in the garbage cans out in the hallway cause the ones in the lunchroom are occupied? She's doin’ a great job. Seriously, I think that Edna woman needs to be fired. Her cooking could probably be considered a war crime.”
Dr. Lamb gave me a look that outright said, ‘You're right, but you shouldn't say it,’ which meant she was definitely gonna get on my case about saying it in the first place.
Except she didn't. She changed the topic instead, and somehow that ended up being worse than her reprimanding me for just being honest.
“So I'd like to talk about what happened yesterday…”
“What the fight or Gary and I skipping school?”
“About - Waitaminute w-what fight?”
Shit, did I just tell on myself? I guess that explains why I hadn’t gotten called in for it. I guess getting beat up for the second time in a row by the new girl on her second day left them too embarrassed to say anything about it. Since I've already blabbed and it could get that asshole Davis into trouble, I decided to just tell her. It’d whittle their number down a bit more… Or I could get in trouble again…
“Uh, yeah. That Davis White kid shot a pebble at me and lured me into the Shop class area where the rest of his buddies were, and so I had to beat the crap out of them again. They did it cause they were mad about Trent and Russell getting in trouble.”
“Oh for fu-BUCK’S sake.”
I kinda just stared at the blonde woman as Lamb held her head in her hands, pressing her thin hands into her face. She mumbled up a storm and the few bits I could make out among the jumbled mess of words were: “Second day” “2 months” and “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph”. I wondered briefly if I should interrupt but figured that, with how run ragged she seemed to be yesterday, this school's craziness was starting to get to her. Gary had said she was new, and that was pretty obvious when compared to the other faculty who were either just another part of the school's madness or completely numb to it.
It'd be terrible to see that kind of thing happen to her, even if what Gary said about her was true.
The blonde woman grumbled a bit more before scratching her head and glancing at me again.
“I-it's fine… Though I will have to inform Dr. Crabblesnitch of this… But what I actually meant to talk about was the other incident. Concerning you and Gary hopping the main gate.”
I already figured that one was coming.
“Yes ma'am? What about it? I thought it was kinda weird how I didn’t get called into the office for it, figured you would've told Crabblesnitch by now. I wouldn't even really blame you for doing it, protocol and all that nonsense,” I said, finally opening up the bagged PBJ I'd been offered to dig into.
“I did, at least as soon as I could do it. I actually did it this morning.”
I raised an eyebrow at that.
“This morning?” I said, the surprise in my tone apparent, “You mean you didn’t do it right after you caught us?”
She shook her head.
“No, I'd planned on it but I kept running into distractions throughout the day. It was my turn to patrol the school grounds along with Mr. Galloway, but unfortunately he seemed to be preoccupied with… something else… so it was just me and one of the Prefects at the time. It's why I was out there to see you two climbing the gate. It was just one thing after another; I needed to attend my afternoon Home Economics class. One boy shoved a firecracker down another boy's pants during shop class and it triggered the shop class teacher's PTSD. A fight broke out in front of the Boy's Dorm…” The blonde’s eyes unconsciously landed on me, and I had to hold back an eye roll so she wouldn't notice. “Again…” Lamb just kept going and going with all the stuff that went down while Gary and I were out on the town yesterday, and I briefly wondered if stuff like this happened on the regular. Did the school board or whoever was in charge of monitoring schools know about any of it?
Eventually Dr. Lamb got to the point, “I did catch you two going back to the school grounds later on in the day on my way home, but I still made sure to inform Dr. Crabblesnitch of the incident this morning...”
“Wait, if you told him then how come I wasn't called up to the office for it?” I replied with a mouthful of PBJ.
“Because he had already been informed of the incident by Gary.”
I blinked, swallowing the bit of sandwich I had so I could ask clearly. But I found it a bit hard to speak. Gary had said something? He'd admitted it? I mean, I guess he'd have to since we'd been caught but I hadn't taken him for being such a casual snitch.
Given we seemingly hadn't gotten in trouble for it though… maybe he'd had the right idea.
“Gary admitted it?” I asked, as if for some reason I needed to confirm what Dr. Lamb just told me barely a second ago, “What exactly did he tell Dr. Crabblesnitch then besides that? Because, well, I don't take the Headmaster as somebody who would let something as serious as leaving campus without telling anybody very lightly…”
“Oh he took it quite well actually. Gary had approached him earlier in the morning right as he left his car. Gary’s reasoning for it was because he got a little impatient and since you were new, he'd wanted to just show you around town before they finally opened up the gates after Halloween. I'd assume since Gary is the current Head Boy and meant well enough, Dr. Crabblesnitch decided to let it go, especially since there hadn't been any incidents reported by the police as a result of you two. He told me he let Gary off with a warning and wanted me to tell you the same.”
I guess that means I'm off the hook and that the cop I'd tripped up with marbles hadn’t bothered to report us either… Or he’d hit his head hard enough on the pavement to forget about it entirely. Either way, it meant I wasn't gonna get in trouble for once, so I was fine with brushing it off entirely and keeping my mouth shut about that.
“Alright then. I actually wasn’t fully ok with the idea of leaving campus to be honest. I only went along with it cause I didn’t want to eat lunch in the cafeteria.”
Dr. Lamb smiled and responded with:
“Ok, just don't do it again. If you really do get hungry, then please don't hesitate to just ask me for a sandwich. At the end of the day I usually end up having extras anyway.”
“Yeah… Sure, I'll remember to ask,” I replied. My eyes shifted over to the wall clock, but unfortunately I still had about 15 minutes before the bell rang and I could finally get outta here. Why can't the hours fly by when you want them to?
“Jenny?”
My attention focused back on Dr. Lamb.
“Yes ma'am?”
“I'd like to just ask something. On your first day, when Trent and his friends were trying to take money from you, you know you could've-”
Ugh, here we go.
“Could've what? Run off to find faculty or a prefect instead of hitting Trent? I ran to the office right after anyway, the Bullies decided to escalate things, not me. I actually gave him a warning before I actually got physical too! He decided to ignore it,” I knew exactly where Lamb had been going with her sentence because I'd heard the same thing a million times, from men and women of all kinds. From the people that were supposed to stop this kind of crap before it happened. It's bullshit, it's always been grade A bullshit. I didn't want to think Gary was right about her, but this definitely wasn't helping.
Hey God! If you're real, why do you keep pulling this stuff on me? Give me a friggin’ break! What the hell did I ever do to you anyway?
Lamb frowned, and her response felt the same as my rant about the lunchroom from earlier, except this time I was the one who decided to change the topic.
My thoughts went back to the framed photo on her desk, and curiosity got a hold of me.
“Who's that woman in the photo with you and your daughter? Is that a family friend or something?”
She looked at the photo as well.
“Oh her? That’s my girl-” Dr.Lamb suddenly stammered a bit, seemingly correcting herself, “R-roommate! She’s my roommate. W-we co-parent.”
A few awkward minutes passed before I nodded and said:
“Whatever you say ma'am,” I told her with a bored tone in my voice.
I figured that was the only way to sort of brush off the fact that I actually knew what she meant. It was clearly a secret she wanted to keep to herself, I guess to keep her job, which was a reason I could understand. Not sure why she even wanted to work at Bullworth though, given its reputation. Maybe it was the only work she could get?
But even if she was a jerk, I don’t think I'd tell anybody about it, even out of spite.
Mercifully, the bell finally rang and with only a wave I left the room.
Not exactly polite, but I wasn’t in the mood to stay around.
As I made my way out into the hallway of the second floor, a familiar voice called out.
“Hey, Jenny!”
I turned my head in the direction of the voice, and it turned out to be Pete, walking over to me with what looked like a book bag slung over his shoulder. As he got a bit closer I noticed his hair was slightly damp, like he’d taken a shower recently. Either that, or he’d been on the receiving end of a swirly. Gary mentioned that happening to Pete a lot.
“Hey Pete, what up?” I replied back as he stopped in front of me, barely looking eye-to-eye - I was a bit shorter than him, which certainly said something about my height since Pete barely stood taller than some of the younger kids around here - as he picked at his right ear. Must've been a bit waterlogged.
“Gary wanted me to tell you that after the next class is over, he wants you to go to the library and meet up with Algie. Apparently he needs to get to his locker in order to return some library books.”
“He can't do it himself? Also, why did Gary send you off to tell me, couldn't he have told me this himself?”
OK, right after saying that, I realized it sounded a bit rude, like I would've preferred talking to Gary instead of Pete. But instead of mulling over it I just waited for Pete to answer.
Pete sighed before explaining.
“Algie is terrified of going into the main school building after dinner is over. The Prefects start patrolling the school grounds since that’s where everybody else is while the rest of the faculty either hang out in the Teacher’s lounge, stay in their classrooms to work on whatever or they leave campus for the day. It basically means the Bullies have free reign of the building until about 8 PM when the janitor locks the building up.”
“Ok, yeah that makes sense, but why couldn't he just tell me this? I mean, he did tell me about Algie needing help when we were in town the other day…” Granted, I could only vaguely remember that. It's a good idea that I'd been reminded at all. But again, why couldn't Gary do it?
Pete looked at me in confusion.
“Y-you guys went into town? Did… anyone else tag along with you two or..?”
“Uh, no. It was just me and him, why?” Pete looked at me weirdly, and suddenly I realized where his thoughts were going, “Get your head out of the gutter Pete.”
Pete put his hands up defensively.
“Hold up, I didn't mean to imply you guys were doing anything like that, I just thought- Oh forget it,” he went to the back of his head, only to suddenly jerk his hand away with a look of disgust.
Ah, ok it definitely was a swirly then. Poor guy.
…Hopefully he remembers to flush his ears out, toilet water induced ear infections weren't pleasant to deal with…
…So I've heard anyway, typically from the people whose heads I'd shoved in the toilet. Not without reason, of course.
Pete continued talking, changing the topic and giving me the answer to my question.
“Anyway… the reason Gary couldn't just tell you in person is because the school elections are finishing up, so he's a bit busy with that. Head Boy responsibilities basically.”
I shrugged. I suppose that made sense. He certainly hadn't shut up about how he was the Head Boy and all that jazz during the tour around the school. In my opinion, it was one of those dumb school titles that people overstated the importance of.
…I guess it did have the benefit of avoiding serious repercussions for playing hooky, though. Especially if you were already brown-nosing the Headmaster beforehand.
“Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Anyway, I gotta get to class, see you around,” I turned to leave, already checked out of all the noise going on around me.
I thought I could hear Pete say something else, like he was trying to get my attention again.
But to me? He might as well not have been there at all.
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- The rivalry between Derby and Johnny is one-sided. Johnny is mainly the aggressor while Derby could care less. Occasionally though, Derby would try to piss off Johnny by convincing one of the Preps to ask Lola out on a date, specifically to either watch Johnny lose it or as an attempt to get him kicked out of the Academy and leave the Greasers without a leader. Gord was an example of him doing this, but due to Jimmy's interference, he had to stop doing it out of the little concern he had for his clique members' wellbeing. (Chad genuinely tried to get with Lola without Derby convincing him into it and the Preps made fun of him relentlessly for it afterwards.) It's partly why he chooses to completely brush Jimmy off when he's tried to give evidence of the Townies being the ones who took their trophies. All because Jimmy ruined his free entertainment.
- In general, Derby doesn't seem to care about the school heriarchy. In game, he rolls his eyes at the idea of there being a "King of the school" since it obviously wasn't an actual thing, just something Gary made up. It's mentioned that the Preps would prefer Bullworth only being a rich kids school. Well, after the riot broke out at the end of the game, what do the Preps do? Haul themselves up in Harrington House, presumably as an easy way to claim that they had no real involvement in the riot or any of the bullying, unlike the "poors".
- Gary has an obsession with Real-Time-Strategy video games, particularly the Age of Empires series. He also has a secret love of TableTop RPGs since they're pretty much a looser RTS to him. Due to the reputation of them being ruined by the Nerds, though, he'd never actually admit to it. If he ever got the chance to play, he'd only choose to be a DM since he's a control freak.
On his medication, he'd be a fairly rough DM, with maybe a bit too many combat encounters, but he'd at least try and have some kind of plot until he inserts his OP DMPC into the party that looks suspiciously similar to him in his Halloween costume from the Halloween mission. But with the physique of a body builder. It's totally not him though.
Unmedicated, the first dungeon the players encounter would be similar to DnD's Tomb of Horrors, regardless of what level they were. His OP DMPC is the boss of the dungeon. He doesn't expect the PCs to survive the dungeon at all.
That last one is kind of a joke but I think it lines up with Gary's personality so...
The Rise and Fall of Jenny Hopkins, aged 15 - Chapter 3: Gary the Unreliable Narrator. BullyAU.
Alright so instead of a chapter taking me an entire month to write+edit, instead it took me almost an entire month to write+edit.
Progress!
So first of all, this is a chapter in Gary's POV compared to the past two which were in Jenny's. I figure that every now and then I'll drop a chapter in Gary's POV if it'll benefit the story. Otherwise, it's mainly Jenny's POV.
This chapter is less about forwarding the plot and more just a bit of "bonding" for Jenny and Gary, and a little bit of a character study for Gary and a little world building added in, like a mention of Bullworth Academy's background.
Anyway, content warning for the following:
-Gary POV (He's gross.)
-Derogatory language towards women.
-Harsh language.
-Questionable relationships.
If I missed anything, let me know.
Word Count: 6728
The pebble flew from Jenny's slingshot well enough, only to disappointingly strike the metal of the hallowed out junk heap of a bus and bounce back with a pitiful little
I rolled my eyes at Jenny, and rudely, she didn't even acknowledge it!
*'Ugh. I don't know how long I can stand pretending to like this moron.'*
"Do you need me to aim it for you? C'mon Jane, it's not that difficult!" I said, pointing towards the bus' windows. "Just aim for the glass!"
She finally acknowledged me, even if it was only to glance at me and then back to the bus. At least she actually said something other than grunting dismissively.
"Oh shut up Gary, it's been a while since I've used a slingshot. Mom banned me from them after I shot out the right eye of one of her crappy boyfriends 5 years ago. I'm a bit rusty."
I admit, hearing her say that got a chuckle out of me. Jenny's casual admittance to partially blinding a man who used to date her mom reminded me exactly why I even bothered with her in the first place. She was clearly screwed up in the head, and that kind of thing appealed to me in a way I couldn't describe. On one hand, she wasn't clever or smart, so she'd never be able to undermine a genius like me... but on the other hand? Jenny was psychotic, a real violent headcase. Even if she'd probably feel offended by being called that, it was true.
I'd looked over Jenny's permanent record after a bit of snooping around the office during the start of the school year, about a month before the girl had actually arrived. That hopeless ditz of a secretary, Danvers was none the wiser, too caught up in her lust for that old windbag of a Headmaster to notice all my digging. Lots of juicy info in there.
I saw the joy Jenny got out of hurting people. Even if she might've tried to deny it, it was obvious. Much like the rest of the school, I'd watched how she gleefully beat the crap out of those losers on her first day here as well as the ear-to-ear smile she had as she walked out of the Shop area earlier. She might try to hide it under the excuse of just trying to brute force them to leave her alone, but I knew better. Because I was smarter than her, smarter than anyone in this stupid sinkhole of a town.
And in the end, I'd make sure they'd all know it. Every single one of these *morons*.
"I'll shut up when you actually break a window, now aim," I pointed towards the windows again, taking the opportunity to lightly brush her on the shoulder.
Jenny glared at me and took aim once more. I grinned as she shot another pebble and hit the second window on the right dead on. The glass shattered, and the resulting shards fell into the inside of the bus.
I couldn't help but snicker, and internally I'd hoped the Hobo who lived behind the bus would make the mistake of forgetting to wear shoes the next time he drunkenly stumbled through the broken down bus' aisle after a few too many drinks.
"Finally... now hit the other windows."
"Yeah, yeah..."
After about 6 pebbles later, the last bus window shattered at the impact of the small rock.
I slowly clapped as a response.
"Great job, Jenny... Though I'd compare your aim to that of a guy with no arms... Who also went blind from an "accident" involving a slingshot and his girlfriend's angry daughter."
She gave me a rude grunt in response. She didn't even turn her head to *look* at me.
I guess this is what I get for trying to be a little humorous? Hmph. If I was an idiot, I would've smacked her across the face for that, but I let it go. Honestly, the amount of generosity I show idiots like her is astounding. If anybody knew just how much I held back, I don't think these morons would ever look at me the same way... not even that sissy Petey. Jenny, too... and for some reason, that bothered me a little.
The girls in Bullworth were terrible, all cagey, and stuck up. Jenny was sort of like that, but just like with her seemingly internal denial of her violent tendencies, I knew it was an act. With time, I'd rip that mask off of her much like I'd ripped my own off of myself all those years ago.
"Well, if you're done insulting me for my bad aiming, then I'll just be going. See you whenever."
I was nearly so caught up in my endless, maddening thoughts that I hadn't noticed Jenny had shoved the slingshot into her purse and began to walk off.
*'Ugh! No, not yet! Get back here! How dare you walk away from me?!'*
I was tempted to run to her and grab her, but that probably would've just made her angry. No, that wouldn't do at all, I could just-
"Hey, hold on a minute, Jenny. You didn't eat lunch, did you? I know you didn't even eat dinner yesterday, and I don't think you came to breakfast today. You weren't even in the cafeteria!"
She stopped and turned to me, a bit annoyed but still clearly caring enough to hear me out.
"Yeah? So?"
"Soooo let's get the hell out of here and get something from town. You've basically skipped out on 3 meals, that can't be healthy, y'know?" I couldn't resist adding in a little jab, nothing too bad, "Even if the weight loss might be a bit beneficial..."
She frowned and rolled her eyes at me. I felt my eye twitch, fists clenching.
*'You'll know your place soon, bitch. Just like the other morons.'*
Thankfully, Jenny didn't notice my irritation, and she responded back with an actual answer.
"Sure, I guess... But how are we even supposed to go into town? I was told we couldn't leave campus, and they keep the front gates shut and locked 24/7. You got some kind of way out of this dump?" Jenny said with a bit of suspicion in her tone, "I don't think it's a good idea anyway, I could get in trouble for skipping class."
I smirked and smoothed my hair out.
"Of course I do Jen, I know this place top to bottom, heck, I could probably draw the whole layout of the school by memory," I bragged, walking up to her side. My hand hovered over her shoulder a bit, but I decided to pull it back. Best not to agitate her more, I was being a little too fast about all this. In time Gary... In time... "There's plenty of exits to the outside, and the teacher's around here are too uncaring enough to even bother. Every student around here sneaks out all the time, trust me."
Jenny's whole demeanor seemed uncertain, even though she still had that resting bitchface going on. I couldn't say she ever looked ugly with it, though, even though I'd never admit that to her.
I had to tear her self-esteem down gradually. Sure, I liked her violent streak, but she was too proud, too stubborn. I had to rip that out of her and shape it into something I could use. My own personal attack dog.
She seemed to relent, nodding.
"Fine... Show me the way then."
"Gladly."
I waved to her as we headed over to the main gate, the familiar, faint sound of the school bell ringing to announce the end of lunch. I looked back at Jenny, who wasn't running as quick as she should have been.
"C'mon Jenny, pick up the pace! Russell likes to hang around the main gate after lunch, and I really wouldn't want him catching us there!" I said, turning a corner.
Jenny snapped back at me a bit angrily.
"Ok, fine! Look, I've got short legs so..."
"So? Just hurry up!"
I smirked as I got to the side of the Academy's main gate, leaning against the red brick as I waited for Jenny to catch up. She did, though she appeared to be confused by the fact that we were at the front gate.
Yes... Be confused idiot. It makes me feel smarter just by standing next to you.
"And we're here... why?.."
"Simple. We're climbing over the front gate."
I pointed to the top of the side of the stone archway that was fairly easy to just climb over and jump down from. The only obstacle was the black metal gate on the areas we'd have to climb to get to it. Black spikes lined the first gray stone foundation that we would have to climb on.
I yearned for the day one of the idiots of Bullworth took an unfortunate fall while taking this route. I wanted to see the life fade out of them as their stupidity and ego cost them their pointless and sad existence. It almost happened to that dumb jock Kirby last Halloween. I'd seen him lose his balance and nearly take one of the fence's spikes to the back. Guaranteed paralysis, or he dies, either way I was gonna *enjoy* watching it happen. But then that insecure idiot *Dan* just had to help him and the Jocks managed to sneak out to town during last Halloween without any issue.
It made me so upset that I tried to skip out on doing anything for that Halloween, much to Petey's confusion. *"But isn't Halloween your favorite holiday?"* I recall that proofofhisdad'sshitpullouttechnique saying while wearing that dumb Han Solo costume his mother helped make for him. It was bad enough that my parents were making me escort some of my younger cousins trick or treating with him, but hearing that little bitch question me about it was enough to cause me to swing for his face. He ducked, and my fist met the solid brickwork of my house. That's how I ended up with a broken hand that school year, and now that Petey was old enough to attend Bullworth this year, I'd spend the entire school year paying it back.
Now that I thought about it, did that mean I was at risk of losing Jenny? She was pretty stupid after all. She could easily end up hurt or dead by her own idiocy. It was a wonder we'd ever met at all.
I decided that I wouldn't let that happen. She was *my* useful idiot, I wasn't going to let her go so easily.
"That looks... pretty unsafe."
I'd already climbed up onto the first foundation at that point. I turned to her, giving her an unamused look.
"What's wrong? Don't tell me you're scared! Quit acting like a little girl, Jenny! I won't let you fall!"
Jenny shook her head, sighing, and I helped her up, pulling her up to the knee height wall along with me. Jenny and I just stood there for a moment, my hands gripping her forearm and looking deeply at her honey-brown eyes.
Did she know how distracting her damn eyes were? I wanted to rip them out and preserve them, I didn't want her looking at anyone else with those things. Anybody else would sully them, *ruin* them, not me. I'd keep them perfect forever.
Jenny's mouth was moving as if she was saying something, but I couldn't hear her for whatever reason. I was still caught up in her eyes. I wish my eyes looked as good as hers. The only thing cool about mine was that if the light hit them in a certain way, the pupils almost looked red. It fit me so well.
A voice, not Jenny's, broke me from my trance.
"You two! Jenny, Gary! What do you think you're doing?! Don't climb on that! You two could get hurt!"
That *slutwhorebitchcunt* *Miss* Lamb stood in the middle of the circle pathway leading to the Dorms, the Main school building and the front gate. She wasn't looking as prim and proper as she did on her first day here, her pinned up blond hair part way out of the bun it used to be styled in, and her eyeliner streaking down her face as if she'd been crying earlier. Considering the state she was in now, I held out hope that the bitch would crack and get run out by the end of the month like most of the new teachers this school would get.
Honestly, even if she looked perfect, I saw how she really was on the inside, even though everyone else seemed to be blind to it. Blind to the real demon she truly was.
I didn't believe in God or the devil or any nonsensical deity imagined up by the many morons polluting this dumb blue sphere, but just from her existence, I knew I couldn't rule out the existence of demons.
It was bad enough that she had to force her way into my life again after abandoning me all those years ago, now she had to try and get me in trouble?! Why did she hate me so much?!
"Crap, it's Dr. Lamb, let's hurry up and-"
Without a word I forced Jenny up to the second foundation, following along with her as we got to the slope of the archway and climbed onto it.
That blond bitch below kept yelling at us to get down, but I blocked out her screeching voice.
Jenny and I slipped down the archway and to the outside below. That blond bitch ran to the gate to out at us more, sounding like a raving demon watching us escape from the pits of Hell.
A small smile curled at the edge of my lips as she watched us run off to the left. I turned my head to look back at Jenny as we moved.
"C'mon, we're going to Old Bullworth Vale. There's a fast food place there that I'm sure you'll like. You look like you've got cheap taste so it's perfect," I said, my run turning into a light jog as we crossed the bridge
"We're gonna be in big trouble when we get back. I doubt Dr. Lamb is gonna keep quiet to Crabblesnitch about us ditching school."
I stopped in place and turned to Jenny, noticing that she seemed a bit startled by how quick I'd spun on a dime.
"You think I give a *fuck* Jenny? I'm the Head Boy! A bit of buttering up to that moron and I'll be let off easy!" I said enthusiastically, trying to take off again.
"But what about- Hey!"
I didn't bother with a reply before jogging off again and expecting Jenny to follow me, which she did.
She was already into me, I could tell.
After about 15 minutes we stood in front of Burgers, the fast food place that was the primary hangout spot for many of the children of Bullworth, where even the cliques somehow got along with one another... aside from the Preps, since they deemed themselves "too good" to be seen walking into this Grease pit.
There was an unwritten agreement with the past and present managers there with the students: as long as no one caused any trouble *inside* of the joint, any student would be welcome to eat there despite the Academy's reputation. It had been that way since the opening of the building back in the late 50s, when Bullworth Academy was still a reformatory school/borderline borstal for boys before being remade into a regular, co-ed private school in the late 70s.
"Why is it called 'Burgers?' I've never even heard of this restaurant before, is this an east coast thing i'm not getting?" Jenny asked, looking up at the sign in confusion, "I mean, wouldn't that make advertising the place pretty difficult? Who's gonna remember a fast food place just called 'Burgers?' At least Cluck n' Bell sounds funny."
"Well the original franchise creator was involuntarily committed to an Asylum if that answers your question."
"It really doesn't."
"Huh. Guess you'll just have to keep wondering then, now c'mon. I'll be paying by the way."
Jenny immediately tried to stop me, and I heard her digging into her purse.
"What? No, it's fine, I can pay for my own-"
I whipped around, catching her off guard. I propped my hand up on the building, pressing against glass and relaxing on it.
"Oh c'mon Jenny, just let me pay for it. I come from a pretty wealthy family, y'know? It's not a big deal."
Jenny still seemed pretty reluctant, and admittedly, it was pissing me off. I've been nothing but polite to her, at least compared to the other troglodytes infesting this place, so why was she still so cagey?!
"I just... I don't wanna owe you anything that you can hold over my head later. It's happened before, and we've barely even known each other for a full day..."
"Yeah well, I wouldn't *do* that to you. I'll repeat this since it's clearly not getting through to that thick skull of yours... I'm from a very... wealthy family Jane..." I said quietly, though with how close we were, Jenny would be able to hear me just fine. "...There's nothing I could possibly want from you that I can't already get myself, alright? So quit with the cagey attitude, will you? I'm genuinely just trying to be polite, and you're really making me feel like crap by talking to you like this."
I added in that last bit of guilt-tripping just to seal the deal. I knew women were particularly susceptible to it, partially due to societal factors and just from what I've seen from the natural social behavior of women throughout the years. I had plenty of examples to go off of, from my absurd amount of female "cousins", to my "mother", to the various, uptight girls from the Academy... and... well, that bitch that I didn't want to think about unless I had easy access to a small animal I could strangle the life out of.
Sure, Jenny was a little different from other women, more like a man in a way... but I didn't think it made much of a difference. It's not like guys couldn't be susceptible to guilt-tripping themselves, otherwise it wouldn't work so well on Petey!
Then again, I'd hardly call Petey a guy, or a man for that matter. I barely considered him a male. I sometimes wondered if I could somehow gaslight him into going through with getting a sex change just because of how funny it'd be.
Jenny looked at me for a moment before eyeing her purse. She rolled her eyes and took her hand out of her purse.
"Well, if you're really not going to try and hold it over me, then fine," she zipped her purse back up and slung it on her shoulder.
"See, was that so hard?" I held the front door of Burgers open, "After you."
"Gee Gary, you're such a gentleman," Jenny said as she walked past me and into the restaurant.
If I lacked self control, I would've slammed the door in her face right then and there, but I was better than that.
"Yeah, you're welcome Jane..." I replied back, trying hard to hide my bitter tone. If Jenny had noticed, she chose not to comment on it.
We ordered and sat down at a booth near the back of the building. I could barely tolerate more than one person at a time, so I felt it was necessary. Jenny was nice, or just didn't care enough, to question it.
The place was just as dingy and rundown as I remembered it. Sure, it was colorful like any other fast food place, but it still had that familiar stink of Bullworth all over it.
"So, you wanna hear about my plan for us to take over the school?" I said, grabbing a few napkins.
Jenny raised an eyebrow, seemingly both confused and interested in what I said.
"Take over the school? Why would I want to do that?" Jenny said, not so subtly watching as I began folding up the napkins in a, I'm sure in her eyes, really bizarre way. I tried to keep her from seeing too much of what I was doing since I didn't want to ruin the surprise. "I doubt that's even possible, I mean, who would even let us do that? It just sounds stupid."
I wanted to stab her eyes out. I wanted to take the cheap plastic cutlery I'd grabbed from near the soda machine and jab it right into her *lovely honey brown* optics and ruin her life. Stupid... Stupid?! It's not... *i'm* not stupid, you fat pig! You moronic whore! How dare you! You're lucky I even acknowledge you!
My hands clenched my work-in-progress napkin creation, threatening to ruin the work I'd already put into it. Instead, I let out a deep sigh and continued.
"No, no. See, I've got a plan, Jane. Ever since my first day here, I've dreamt of nothing but finally ending this cycle of bullying that's infected this horrible school since the beginning..." I whispered in a tired tone. That wasn't a lie, I hardly ever really lied... perhaps left out some information once or twice? Yes, and it was no different here. Once, when I was a stupid moron that thought these... *creatures* considered me an equal to them, I did hold hope that I could change things for the better and maybe find friends...
But I realized the truth.
These animals didn't *want* change. They just wanted to keep stabbing each other in the back over and over. Generation after generation, grandfather to father to son. It didn't stop even after they started letting girls in. Instead, it was just like the boys, grandmother to mother to daughter.
So why not join in? Except I wouldn't play along, no, of course not. I'd never join a clique and be a lackey to some pompous incestuous nepo baby, a psychotic cuck, a hormone driven weakling, or have to choose between the two dumbest students at the Academy. No, I would be on top. It's what I deserved after everything this dumb rock's put me through in my 16 years.
The girls had their own way of backstabbery that I gleefully took for myself. Their psychological warfare was far more foul than any physical force the boys could muster, and I couldn't resist adopting it for myself. It suited my intelligence far more than the brute force approach anyway.
Though I still hated the girls the most because of it. The only reason I took a liking to Jenny was because she clearly wasn't capable of any of that. She was too stupid. *She* couldn't hurt me in a way that mattered. She was... simple... If a bit brutal in her ways...
...
...I didn't feel threatened when I was around her.
...
But I couldn't let her know that, and I would never willingly say it out loud. Not even on my dying breath.
I refused to give that to her. She'd never deserve to hear that from me. Jenny was just another moron after all, and she always would be.
"Don't you want that? To end the bullying? It's not like it wouldn't benefit you. You told me on your first day here that all you wanted was to be left alone, and if we pull this off..." I chuckled, continuing to fold the napkins, almost done with my cheap napkin origami creation, "Well, you'll get just that. You get to spend the rest of your school tenure living it up like a queen, and I get to graduate this year knowing I made a real difference here."
Jenny hadn't responded immediately, which I expected. I'm sure her smooth brain needed a bit to really take in what that all meant.
Before I'd get a response, one of the workers came by with our food. A young woman who looked like she hadn't had a good night's rest in over a decade set a tray down at our table with the grace of a limbless ballerina, and it clattered loudly as it hit the table.
As she walked away, I continued speaking to Jenny:
"Hmph, how rude. I bet she has the gall to wonder why she only gets paid 7 dollars an hour. Isn't that right, Jenny?"
Jenny was already digging into her food, having popped a handful of fries into her mouth with the piece of burger she'd bitten into along with a sip of that Beam cola soda she seemed really fond of for some reason.
She noticed me trying to keep the conversation going and just nodded, and with her mouth *thankfully* empty, she replied.
"Yeah, sure whatever," Jenny took another sip of her soda and seemed to look down at the table for a bit before replying again. "So... can we talk about this taking over the school plan of yours?"
"Oh of course, ask away Jenny! You're one of the most important parts of all this, after all. The queen on the chess board, so to speak."
The comparison to chess was deliberate, genius even. You couldn't win a game of chess if the king was taken out... but you could without a queen.
Oh, but that sweet little psychotic moron could barely hide it as the natural blush on her face grew brighter from my comment. Hook, line, and sinker. My little puppet. *She really is head over heels, and for me! That moron. She's making this so easy.*
"I'm really that important to your plan? I feel like you're just trying to butter me up," Jenny put up her guard, staring me down mid-chew. I chuckled, dipping a greasy onion ring into my ketchup packet.
"Can friends not compliment each other, Jenny? That's what we are aren't we? Don't tell me you can't take a compliment, c'mon now," I gave her a hurt look as I set down my origami to take a sip of my own drink.
*Ah, nothing better than some good old diet Sprunk.*
For some reason, me looking hurt at her ticked her off a little, but she seemed to accept my response, albeit with a little attitude.
"Yeah, ok, whatever, just..." She took another quick sip. "What *is* it exactly? Your plan? How are we doing this?"
"Ah, yeah right. Well first off, we gotta get the Nerds on our side. Those guys are basically targeted by every clique, *especially* the Jocks. But they're sneaky bastards, and it's probably best to get them on our side considering all that weaponry they've got."
"The Nerds?" Jenny asked. "...Doesn't that include that fat blond kid with the open zipper we ran past yesterday?"
Algie?
"You mean Algie?" I replied.
"Yeah, that kid."
"Well? What about him?"
"He stinks, the guy smells like piss for some reason. I dunno if I wanna even associate with a kid like that."
I chuckled, taking a bite out of a chicken nugget.
"Well, you're gonna have to. An easy way to get the nerds on our good side is for you to help escort him to the bathroom. See, the Bullies banned him from using the boys' dorms and Main school buildings bathrooms. The gym bathroom is basically out of the question thanks to the Jocks, and the Preps aren't going to let Algie into their private bathrooms inside their special little incest nepo baby Dorm," I went back to working on my origami, I'd already eaten half my food anyway. "It'll send a message to the rest of the cliques to back off the nerds a little if you're seen helping them. You've already got a little bit of rep for beating up most of the Bullies by yourself on your first day, and I'm sure word will go around that you did it again earlier."
Jenny still seemed reluctant, and to be honest? I couldn't blame her. Those nerds were a couple of creepy losers, Earnest especially. But unfortunately, playing nice with those degenerates was smarter than antagonizing them.
"Ugh, seriously? Do I have to?"
I gave her a serious look.
"Yeah, seriously. C'mon Jen, you only have to do it one time, I promise. Algie's pretty much their third man. You do that favor for him, *heh*, the rest will warm up to you quickly."
I could see Jenny juggle the thought in her head a bit before answering.
"Well, I guess if I'll only have to do it one time... then fine, but I'm definitely gonna haggle him for money for it."
"I wouldn't take anything less personally. Really, I mean, if you're gonna do a favor for anybody here, you really ought to ask for money to do it. The Preps might act like everybody else here is destitute just because their parents don't own a yacht, but that doesn't really mean anything. Even the Greasers can pay you a good amount for helping them out with anything."
"Good to know."
"Of course, now..." I propped my elbow on the table, leaning my head on my hand. "How's your Bullworth experience been so far? I realize it's just your second day here, but uh, how would you rate it anyway?"
I hid my creation underneath the table as I held it with my other hand, waiting for the right time to present it.
Jenny took another sip of cola.
"2/10 so far. Dr. Crabblesnitch is making me see the school guidance counselor tomorrow. I guess he thinks talking to her'll make me into a 'proper lady' or whatever."
"Oh great, you gotta deal with Miss Lamb. I pity you. I can't *stand* that woman."
"Why? I mean, I'm not exactly happy about having to go to counseling, but Dr. Lamb doesn't seem so bad. Did you have some kind of bad experience with her?"
Oh great, I've said too much. Now I'd have to make up some kind of bullshit reason to avoid the *real* truth. Using Jenny's distrust of adults (aside from her mother for some, presumably stupid reason) seemed like an easy and quick way to do that.
"I mean, Lamb just seems like she's hiding something to me. She's a new hire, and I feel like she's just putting on this act of being all sweet and kind until she reveals who she *really* is..."
Jenny looked at me weirdly, and I was starting to get nervous. How could I get through to her about Lamb without her knowing about all my irrelevant baggage?
"I don't know, man. She seemed pretty genuine to me..."
I frowned. I couldn't think of a good reply that wouldn't just be me repeating the last thing I said.
Instead, I chuckled and tried to move the topic along in a different direction.
"Well Jenny... When it comes down to it, You'll learn who your real allies and friends are around here..." I pulled out the origami flower and presented it to Jenny. "Like me."
She looked down at the paper flower for a bit with her typical resting bitchface before casually taking it out of my hands and looking over it.
"...So this is what you were doing with those napkins?"
"Yeah. You like it?" I asked, genuinely curious to hear her answer. It wasn't like I *needed* to hear her compliment my napkin masterpiece... but it wouldn't hurt anything if she did. I could never get enough of my ego getting a little more stroked once and awhile.
When it seemed like she would reject it, Jenny did something that had me fuming. She fiddled with the bottom of the flower as if she was trying to undo the folds, but before I could angrily ask her why she was trying to ruin the gift I'd worked so hard on, I was caught off guard by what she did next.
She tied the loosened napkin folds into the strands of her poorly styled short copper hair, and there it sat on the right side of her head. I just stared at it as it hung there loosely on her hair.
Why had she done that? Did that mean she liked it? She didn't have to-
"Is something wrong? I just had this weird thought about pinning it to my hair, I can take it out if-"
"N-No!" I stood up and reached out to Jenny, only to immediately realize how stupid I looked and sat back down, laying my hand on the table. "It's... it's fine. I'm glad you like it, seriously."
I probably had the dumbest look on my face, I knew I was grinning like an idiot, but I couldn't help it. It was like she had me under some sort of hypnotism that was making me feel giddy by just looking at her.
Ugh, *she* was the one who was supposed to be all flustered and caught up in her emotions, not me!
Why was I acting like this? I didn't even like this pig!
Then she had this damn smile on her face... ugh! I shouldn't have complimented her, what was I thinking!
While I was scrambling to change the topic, Jenny seemingly decided to do it for me.
"This was nice, but I dunno if it's worth it to have to sneak out all the time, do they ever open the school gates and let us walk around town?" Jenny asked as she piled her garbage on the tray, tossing a napkin she had just cleaned her face with on top of the pile. "The one private school I went to let us go into town as long as we were back by curfew.
I internally sighed with relief, regaining my composure and clasping my hands together.
"Yeah, they open the gates back up the day after Halloween. That was the compromise over keeping them shut for the entire school year, which was what the citizens of Bullworth originally wanted, but I guess Mayor Higginbottom and Dr. Crabblesnitch worked something out," I shrugged. "It's not really surprising, Crabblesnitch and the Mayor are childhood friends."
"Wait, how do you know that?" Jenny asked, genuine curiosity in her voice.
"You gotta know your enemies like you know your friends Jane. That's how you *win*," I jabbed at the table with my index finger to emphasize my point.
I didn't feel shy about giving her that bit of advice, since I doubted she was even smart enough to make use of it. Oh Jenny, so stupid, yet so violent...
...Almost the perfect woman...
"I guess that makes sense..."
"Well of course it does," I gathered up my half-eaten food/garbage on the tray and stood up from the booth with my drink in hand. "Now c'mon, let's leave this dump, I've got other places in mind we can visit."
Jenny stood up as well, grabbing her drink and the tray of garbage. She replied to me as she dumped the contents of the tray in a nearby garbage can and set the tray on top of a nearby stack of them.
"Other places? We're not just going back to the Academy?"
"Psh, no, that'd be stupid," I held the front door open for Jenny to walk through. "We'll wait till after curfew, maybe around 12:30. Less people that'll be wandering around, you know?"
"What about the cops? Man, it's my second day, I'm starting to think this was a bad idea..."
I closed the door and turned to her as we walked to the side of the restaurant, my tone betraying a bit of irritation with the copper haired girls nitpicking.
"Who cares? Don't tell me you're some kind of law-abiding citizen *Jane*, quit being lame!" I shook my head, chuckling a bit. "Honestly, I thought you were supposed to be some kind of juvenile delinquent, not some goody-two-shoes..."
Now *that* had clearly ticked her off, but rather than it backfiring on me as I had partly feared, instead it got Jenny to actually go along with what I wanted.
"Oh shut up Gary. Just show me where you wanna go. If we get in trouble with the cops I'm 100% pinning it on you."
"Ah, a snitch then?" I replied, and I could see Jenny's temperament begin to reach a boiling point.
Alright, I'd had enough by that point. As fun as it was to push Jenny's buttons, it was time to take the pot off the stove top.
"I'm just joking Jen, chill out. Don't take it so seriously. Now, c'mon, let's get going."
I began walking, and Jenny followed alongside me like a stubborn but loyal mutt. Hm, maybe not a mutt, that was a bit generous. No, actually, her face was similar to one of those horribly inbred pitbulls. It was fitting since she clearly had the brain of one of those genetic dead-ends.
I took a look at her. She was still a bit mad clearly, so I figured I ought to say something to make her a little happier.
I was walking to the right of Jenny, and my eyes caught the origami napkin flower I'd folded, still tied into her hair. That led to her copper hair, and the way the reddening yellow mid-day sun shone on it. It was dangerously close to the color of rose gold metal, and I struggled to even tear my eyes away from it to concentrate on her face.
Now, I know I just compared Jenny's face to an inbred pitbull about a minute ago, but that was only because she was visibly angry at the time and the look on her face wasn't doing her any favors. Now, since she was relaxing a bit, she actually looked...
...Kind of pretty...
Did I ever mention those eyes of hers? Like... fresh pools of honey harvested straight from the honeycomb. It was a shame her eyes were squinted most of the time, you could barely notice just how good they looked when the sun hit them at just the right angle. Part of why I liked to provoke her was because she'd open her eyes real wide when she got upset, and I could actually get a good look at them.
"Gary? What are you looking at?"
The sound of Jenny's voice broke me out of my stupor. When I took another look at her, she looked confused, weirded out even.
Ugh, way to ruin my fun. Alright, what should I tell her?
...Hm...
"You know..." I said. I wanted to just insult her again or tell her to mind her own business and laugh at her for thinking I could even stand to stare at someone as ugly as her.
But... I didn't. For once, I just told the truth.
"You're really pretty you know."
I expected Jenny to get flustered, maybe look surprised just so I could get a good look at her eyes again. Something like that could have been entertaining and at least make up for that little bit of vulnerability I'd exposed just from telling her that.
Instead, she had the gall to just frown at me and look *away*.
"Don't tell me that. I don't want to hear it."
Why? It was a compliment! Maybe I missed something? Misread her body language? Why would calling her pretty upset her?
*'Some women just don't know how to take compliments.'*
It's not like I wasn't attractive, I mean, c'mon! I was rich and handsome, not to mention smarter than everybody in this stupid town combined! I was doing *her* a favor even!
It's not like I actually meant it anyway! I was lying when I said I was telling the truth. That should've been obvious!
"Yeah? Well... I meant it, so I'm not taking it back. Get over it Jenny."
I decided to double down on it since I figured it would just make her mad, but instead, she shied away from me like I was some kind of vermin. Ugh, *women*.
Rather than backing out, instead Jenny *thankfully* relented, and we could just go ahead and move on.
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