PART 2
**Detention class**
I walk in, Damian raises his eyebrows,
“Bad habit you’re starting there.”
“If I tell you it wasn’t my fault, BOTH times, would you believe me?”
He raises his eyebrows again, come on, don’t I look convincing with my innocent face. I guess NOT… NYC… No one is innocent here, right? Anyway I turn around, she’s here, not looking at me. Guess she really didn’t like me getting in her business. Anyway.
I sit on the last row cause there’s a bunch of guys on the first rows, heard there was a huge general fight during the lunch break, they must be the trouble makers.
She is looking at me, and as I turn around she’s not anymore, but I know she was. I’m a slayer! I know these things… Hey Buffy, remember; no more slayer crap ok? No more slayer, period. And I know she’s looking at me again, damn she looked away again. What’s her game?
I think she’s moving, she, wow, sits beside me, I look there; she’s staring at me, I don’t know what to say, should I apologize for interfering or
“Where are you from?”
I can do this one easy.
“L.A.”
“I see, west coast, sun and everything.”
“Yes, see, surf, sun and-”
“Sex” She says abruptly.
“What?”
“What what?”
She actually looks surprised that I flinched about what she said.
“Like you haven’t done it already.”
She continued.
“I,” Relax, calm Buffy,
“I don’t think this is any of your business.”
Good Buffy, good.
“Fine”
She says and sits back in her chair. Fine by me, if that’s all she’s got to say then I have school work to do. She’s lightly tapping her fingernails on her chair, she’s moving an arm then another. She seems like she wants to say something but she doesn’t. She bugs me but I want to talk more. There’s more to her than… this. She’s still not talking, can’t help it, gotta help with the talking thing.
“Is he your boyfriend?”
“Mark? No way. I just danced and hung out with him a little last night, you know, and now he thinks he owns me… Screw him. How did you learn to do that?”
“Do what? Oh, the hold on him earlier, well, err, hum, I-I, yes I took some karate lessons in LA.”
“Would you show me some of those moves one of these days?”
It’s strange but she actually sounds serious, like she really wants to.
“I- err, well why not. One of these days, yes.”
“Why are you in New York?”
“Well, I got desperate every time winter was coming so I was sent here cause the doctors thought it’d be a good thing since we can never see the sky here I’ll never know what time the sun sets, therefore I’ll never know what season it is and then I don’t get depressed.”
She smiles at my sarcasm, good thing.
“Believe me, with the change of weather, you will know when winter is here.”
We both smile, I know winter can be very cold here. She looks more serious now.
“I get it. You don’t like New York very much do you?”
“It’s not, it’s… Well, ok, not that much, No. In fact it’s just, my parents are getting divorced, actually I think the papers are signed already, my dad moved here and by I don’t know what law I had to go with him. My mom wasn’t working when they were still together, so she has to find a job, a house and get everything set before we can make a new request.”
“They’re fighting for your custody?”
“Not really, honestly I don’t think my dad’s too happy about me being here. He had to find me a school that accepted me despite some… trouble I had, and he kind of… well, I just can’t say I’ve seen him a lot since I've been here. Anyway I don’t care, I have my mom on the phone every day, she’s doing her best, and I know that I’ll soon go back to be with her.”
She nods, she almost looks disappointed, Damian is coming towards us, I hope he won’t separate us, I like talking to her, oh it’s ok, he just brings us the detention attendance register.
“You both didn’t sign in.”
I prefer that, I smile and sign, she signs too, wait wait, check it Buffy, great. He leaves.
“Faith” I say, she turns around with surprise.
“So, that’s your name?” I add.
“Believe me, gonna change that one as soon as I can.”
“Why? I like it.”
“It’s a little too religious to my taste. My mom was in her religious era, didn’t last long believe me, she was probably dating some guru guy at that time.”
She makes me smile.
“Do you think you can change it?”
“No luck so far, but one of these days…”
“Anyway, what about you, do you like this town?”
“Actually I do, it is a little wild and free but then there’s a certain order in everything in some way, but there’s a sort of cultural mixing that is, to me, inspiring. And there’s a lot of cool stuff to do. But I liked Boston better.”
“Boston? That’s where you’re from? When did you come here?”
“Not so long, about a year ago, a little more.”
“Did your parents move here? For work?”
Her gaze turns slightly darker,
“No.”
Now I feel bad, what did I say?
“I’m sorry did I?”
“No, no” she looks bright again,
“Everything’s cool. My mom and I, well, we don’t really get along, I moved here with my aunt. Mom’s still in Boston, for all I know. As for my dad… I wouldn’t know. I’m not sure my mom even knows who it is, you know what I mean.”
“It mustn’t be easy for you.”
“Everything’s five by five for me. My aunt is cool. I have better grades. I know I’m supposed to, since I’m redoing this year but still, what I mean is, everything’s working out for me.”
It is strange this feeling I have that it’s not. I don’t know why, but I feel somewhat close to her though we have different stories, something makes me wanna know more. Hey she’s smiling at me.
“Daydreaming?” She asks, I nod,
“I do that sometimes.”
“Me too.”
We both smile at each other. I feel a little stupid but I can’t help it.
“Don’t take it bad but I heard yesterday you had some math trouble. I happen to not suck too bad on math so maybe I could give you a hand, if you wanted to that is?”
Something tells me that if someone else would have asked her that she would have thrown them away but she doesn’t.
“Well, I have these exercises for tomorrow, and I’m stuck on one thing actually, do you want to check it out, I mean, really?”
“Yes” I say with a huge smile.
The bell rings, too bad, we were doing some good work. Never thought I could teach anyone anything, but she’s been learning carefully and she got some stuff I believe, I hope that’ll help her. Damian looks at us and smiles. I feel glad about myself, glad that I could help her, and it made me happy. See, I don’t need to be all slayergirl to help people. I know it, I’m gonna be just fine with my life, the way it was before this crap and “What?” I ask her, with a slight laugh at her gaze, I kind of did not realize she was staring at me and now she’s smiling.
“I don’t know, you look… well, do you like teaching that much?”
“Not really, I mean, school thing, usually not my thing but… I guess you’re a good student.”
“Me?!”
There, I offended the bad girl in her, as long as she keeps smiling that’s ok.
“School thing not my thing either so you must be the good teacher.”
I smile at what she said. I don’t know why I’m smiling so much at her. She’s nice, I finally made a friend here, wasn’t so hard finally. She’s special…
“Hey girls, wanna spend the night here?” Damian says as he’s waiting for us to leave the room. He smiles as we pass him by.
We’re silent, why are we silent now? We were talking so great before, I don’t know, I wanna talk but I don’t know what to say. Damn we’re exiting the building now, but she hasn’t put her rollerblades on yet, that’s a good thing, I can keep talking to her while she puts them on, if I can manage to open my mouth, that is.
She looks hesitant, yes I think she’s gonna say something, no, yes, no,
“Do you…”
Yes, more, come on.
“Yes?” I say nicely. Trying to help here, now come on, talk.
“Well you know, sometimes New York is… when you are new. Do you want me to walk you home? It would be more careful with the two of us.”
“It’s daylight, it’s fine” What am I saying? "Yes ok. Sure.” That’s better. She smiles. She doesn’t need to know I can handle myself, right? I wish I didn’t know it myself. She keeps smiling as we start moving.
