Locks and Keys

"H-h-hey," I stuttered out, blushing. I glanced at Brook and Amanda who were still sitting there in shock, almost as much as I was. What on earth was happening? 

"Key, right, I'm Oliver, well Ollie, I'm in your form class." 

"Um, yeah, I think I saw you this morning." 

"Cool. so you just moved here from the States? That's awesome, I've always wanted to go there." Was it me or did he look wistful at that thought? 

"We lived there for three years in Texas on a small horse ranch. My whole family loves animals, so we all had fun with all the ranch stuff." 

"Three years? I'm surprised you didn't pick up an accent." 

"Yeah, our younger siblings did, but Lock and I stayed strong. Never bow to conformity and all that jazz." I waved my 'jazz hands' in front of me, a lot more confident now than I was a little bit ago. But that didn't stop my mind from fantasizing about Ollie's hot self. 

 "You have siblings, other than Lock of course, how many?" He was interested in my family? What kind of a guy was this? 

"Yup, another brother who is fifteen and two sisters who are ten and three." 

"Wow, that's quite an age gap."

 "Oh, we aren't related, we adopted Jamie, our brother, five years ago from Nepal. Lucy joined us four years ago when her parents died in a car accident and we adopted Jo-Jo in the states when we first moved there." 

"I see, that must be quite a house then."

 Before I could reply, our teacher silenced the class and began the whole 'beginning of the year' stuff that happens on the first days back. I sat there fidgeting with my pen and new note book as Mrs Parker went through this years curriculum. I was all to aware of Ollie sitting next to me, drumming his fingers against the edge of the table. I sent a double-chin, tongue out face to Brook and Amanda to ease the tension in the air and they broke into a fit of giggles. Mrs Parker sent a glare their way. 

"Anything you'd like to share girls?" 

"Yes actually, Key can you repeat what you just did?" Brook says, sniggering. 

"Of course not, I have a feeling Miss or the rest of the class would appreciate it. It's not something you want to see, Miss, trust me, it will give you nightmares." 

"It certainly would," Amanda said, "I think I just had a heart attack just looking at her face!" 

"Oi, now that's just rude! My face is wonderful."We burst into giggles, leaving the whole class in bewilderment as to what actually happened. 

"Don't worry, Miss, I got a picture, I can show you if you really want to see." Oliver cut in. That stopped me in my tracks of hysterics and the blood drained from my face.

 "You wouldn't."

 "Oh, I would, be prepared, Key, Facebook has been waiting for this picture in earnest. There's no escaping it."

 "This is blackmail, Miss, make him delete it! Please, I beg you!" I got out my chair and fell to my knees, clasping my hands together. She just looked at me bemused as to what had just unravelled in front of her, to be honest, I hadn't meant that one face to go spiraling out of control to such a proportion. But who cares, it's just banter. 

"I have a feeling this years going to be very entertaining, Miss Carroll." Mrs Parker stated, shaking her head, before carrying on wherever she had left off. 

After class, Brook and I walked to the opposite end of the school to the maths corridor and perched against the wall next to the door of our class, waiting to be let in.

 "What the hell happened back there?" Brooklyn questioned.

 "Uh, I pulled a face that caused an uproar?" 

"No! Not that. Oliver, he sat next to you, instead of in the middle of the class surrounded by his harem of girls! Didn't you notice the absent chair in the middle of the room that had all the girls surrounding it?" 

"Nope, I guess I was too busy pulling faces at you!" 

"More like too busy staring at Mr. Hottie." She nudged me with her arm, grinning at me. 

"Oh yeah, 'cause I'm so enamored by this guy." I rolled my eyes at her. 

"Well, I think you a-are'" she sang.

 "Oh, stop it! You're making me blush," I said sarcastically.

 "Say whatever you want, but I know. Key has a crushh! Ollie and key sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-" 

"Stop, Stop! That's so not true, I only just met the guy!" 

 Brook began to make kissy faces at me, so I hit her lightly on the arm. She pouted and began to rub her arm, causing me to laugh at her. 

"Aw baby, did I hurt you? You still love me," 

 "Yes, I do, now lets go in, the maths syllabus awaits!" 

We enter class and take some seats at the edge of the room and waited for our teacher to turn up. We sat and chatted during that remaining time, just getting to know each other, like how her favourite colour was maroon, and she had two cats called Blocks and Socks. Our Maths teacher, Mr Hayden, turned up in the middle of our conversation about favourite disney films (mine being Tangled and her's being Aristocats). 

 "Well, hello class, back for another year of my delightful knowledge of the Mathematical Sciences I know, I know, you're all questioning your life decisions as to why you chose to torture yourselves for one more year, but I have the answer, you just all love me and my teaching, obviously! Well, apart from you, new girl, I have no idea why you took maths, but good choice! You were lucky you got me as a teacher, because as everyone else knows, I'm an awesome teacher." 

Um, ok, this was going to get interesting. He went over the plan for the year in detail, up to the point of our final A Level exams, which was pretty straight forward, just loads of content to get through and revise. He then handed a printed version of what he explained. 

"Now do whatever you want with these, stick them on your fridge, throw darts at it, write how much you love me all over it, I don't care, though I would recommend you keep it in case you want to impress me and read ahead. Remember the rewards I have in this top draw right here, guys, you might be seventeen, eighteen years old, but I know better than to judge you by your ages. I know you guys will do anything for lollipops, don't deny it, especially you, Brooklyn, I know all about your little lollipop craving."

 At that, Brook turned bright red like a tomato, I'm not surprised, I would as well to be honest, if I had be picked on in front of the whole class like that. 

 "I'm sorry, Sir, that was only one time! I didn't have any lunch, I knew about your secret supply and I was hungry! I only had two, that doesn't mean I have a craving." 

"The first stage to recovery, Miss Ostra, is acceptance. You need to accept your addiction in order to recover from it."

 "Then shouldn't you be taking your own advice and be trying to get over your addiction to maths?" The class chuckled at that, including me and I don't even know the guy. 

"Ah, well there's a difference, my addiction is rational, it's part of my job. Your addiction is irrational, it will only make you fat." 

"Well that escalated quickly." She stated, making Mr Hayden laugh. 

"Yes, it did. So lets put it behind us and never talk about it again any time soon. I don't want your parents to sew me for calling you fat, which isn't what I was saying, please don't make a complaint about me, just remember how much of an awesome teacher I am." 

"Whatever you say, Sir." Brook said, just as the bell rang. 

"And that concludes our first lesson of the year folks, see you tomorrow, have a great day." 

Everyone gathered their bags started to stream out the class and head to break, one of the best parts of the day, aside from lunch and the end of school, obviously. Firstly, Brook and I went back to our form class to meet up with Amanda and Lock, then we made our way down to the cafeteria. Into the belly of the beast, one small step for man and all that.