Chapter 1: The Boy who Smiled

I stared quietly at the sign. It told me I was in the right place. My map told me I was in the right place. The teacher walking over to me said I was in the right place. So why did it feel so wrong?

This place was supposed to be a new start for me. Away from my old so-called friends, away from the drama. I wanted to move to begin a new adventure somewhere else but there's a difference between wanting something and the actual doing something.

I didn't expect that I would actually have to move here with my mum and sister all the way to Scotland! I also didn't expect to move all the way from Elderfields School to St Hearts, one of the schools I actually had picked out when I was told I was moving here.

As I took a deep breath and stepped into the school, I saw chaos. People ran around hallways and people slammed and opened doors everywhere. It was insane. There were people everywhere! I noticed that everyone was stood in groups, not really associating with anyone else but the few around them. They all knew each other from last year and the years before. I didn't know anyone. Again, I was alone.

I wandered down an empty hallway looking for my class when a group of four kids walked past me. There was a girl with bright red hair, a pale face and green eyes. There was another girl with dark skin, brown eyes and black hair. There was a boy with blonde hair and blue eyes. The last boy in the group had dark brown hair and brown eyes. He had a smart, sarcastic sort of walk. You can tell a lot about a person from how they walk…

It was him who smiled at me as I watched them go past. He had a gorgeous smile. As they turned the corner, I sat down outside my class, verging on tears. Everyone had a friend, or more than one friend and I had no-one. I felt alone, truly alone, for the first time in months. It was fine in the summer holidays, between the old school year and the new one as I had things to do to keep me busy. Here, I had nothing to do but schoolwork and even a lesson ends eventually.

Suddenly, I heard the bell signal that class was about to begin. I stood back up and walked into class as other students ran towards my room. The group I had seen earlier were walking casually towards the classroom too. I grabbed a seat that was right at the back of the room so I could be hidden away. The boy that smiled at me sat one seat in front of me and one to the left. His friends sat on his left.

The lesson was maths so I wouldn't have to put too much effort in. Maths was what I was good at. Maths was easy. Just as I thought this, the teacher walked in. I recognized him as being Mr Flatly, the head teacher of the school. The hair that was left on his head was grey and he had kind, old eyes. He wore glasses and looked a little… clueless.

"Right class, my name is Mr Flatly but most of you know that, and this is your first lesson of the year!" he said excitedly with a giddy, almost childlike look on his face. The class groaned, as expected. The only person who didn't groan was the boy who smiled at me. In fact, he looked pleased.

"And probably our last with all the work we do!" he whispered quietly to his friends. They silently giggled before turning back to the teacher, who had begun explaining that we were going to have a mini test. I didn't exactly know what the boy meant but I assumed he meant that we get a lot of homework, a good thing for people like me.

"Preston, could you hand out the maths quizzes for me," Mr Flatly asked a student in the first row. Preston got up and began to complain about putting quizzes on paper instead of something else. I didn't really listen to Preston or what he was saying. I was too busy looking at the boy who smiled at me. He was staring at his pencil with a bored expression. He was waiting for something, I could tell, only what? The boy turned his head to the right and I looked away. Hopefully, he hadn't seen me looking at him as Preston had just blocked him from seeing me to give me my test.

I looked at the paper that was on my desk with disbelief. There were questions about the foil method and Pythagoras' theorem! It was things I could have done when I was ten! I heard a laugh come from the boy as he looked over his paper. Perhaps I wasn't the only one who thought that the paper was shockingly easy.

I answered every question on the test within five minutes. I didn't know who to give my paper to or what to do next so I decided to ask someone what to do. The boy had finished his paper a little while after I did so I decided to ask him. I tapped him on the shoulder and he turned around to look at me.

"Hey, what do we do after we finish the test?" I asked him very quietly, so I didn't disturb Mr Flatly. He looked at me in a kind way, with another smile, I noticed.
"Don't worry about it until you have finished," he whispered before turning back around.
"I have finished," I told him with one of my own smiles. He looked at me questioningly so I lifted up my paper to show him. He grabbed the paper, still with a look of surprise, skimmed over it before passing it back to me.

"My name's Tom," he said, "What's your name?"
"Jessica, but people call me Jess," I said quietly with a smile. Tom smiled back.
"Well, Jess, you would wait to have your test marked as a group but you just had your test marked by me," he said seriously before smiling that gorgeous smile.
"And what did I get?" I asked, even though I knew the answer.
"Full marks, as long as I also got full marks!" he replied. He turned back around to his friends, who were still doing their work.

I had noticed, during my conversation with Tom, that his friends were carefully watching us from the corner of their eyes. It was barely noticeable but I saw it. The pale girl with red hair turned to him with a faint smile tugging at her lips.
"Finally," she started, "Someone just as nerdy as you!"