The hallway girl

Carlton's POV

After I bumped into that girl in the hallway I wasn't in a good mood at all. I hadn't been in a good mood all morning. The pressure from my dad, from my whole family, and the pressure of being captain of the hockey team, it was all sitting on my chest like a weight I couldn't put down. I don't even know when I snapped at her. It just happened. And by the time I realized what I'd done, it was already too late, because Freya had already dragged me off to go watch her show off in front of her friends like she always does.

Then I saw the girl again in the cafeteria.

I couldn't stop staring at her. I don't know what was wrong with me, I just kept looking, and for a second I actually thought about getting up and going over there to say something, even if it was just to be nice, even if it was just to say sorry for how I acted earlier. But before I could get up, Freya leaned over and started talking to me about a gala we were to attend together, and by the time I looked back over, the moment was gone.

I still didn't even know her name.

After lunch I had a free period before my next class, and I tried to catch up to her so I could actually talk to her this time. But you can trust Freya to never give me any room to breathe. She was stuck to my side the whole way, talking about something, I don't even remember what, and by the time I got to class she was still right there next to me like glue.

There was an empty seat beside me. I noticed the hallway girl walked in a little late, probably because she had to sort out some paperwork, since I could tell she was a new . I figured that had to be it. When she walked in, I was about to wave her over, to point at the empty seat and let her know she could sit there. I really was. But right as I opened my mouth, Freya jumped up from her own seat across the room and dropped her bag on the seat next to me before I could even get a word out.

"Save me a seat, right?" Freya said, laughing like it was nothing, like she hadn't just taken the one thing I was trying to do right that day.

I looked over at the girl and I saw it on her face. That flash of disappointment, gone almost as fast as it showed up, but I saw it. I wanted to say something to Freya. I wanted to tell her to move her bag, that the seat was already meant for someone else. But the words just wouldn't come out. I don't know why. I just sat there instead, watching the new girl walk further back in the room and take a seat by herself near the back.

Another chance gone. Another thing I didn't fix.

I really didn't want her thinking that was just who I was. I'm not usually like that. Everyone on the team, anyone in this school, would tell you I'm about as calm as it gets. I don't snap at people. I don't ignore people who deserve better than that. So it bothered me more than I wanted to admit, sitting there in class, knowing I had two chances that day to make things right and I let both of them slide right through my fingers.

Mrs. Alvarez walked in a few minutes later, right on time like always, her arms full of folders and a stack of papers she dropped on her desk with a thud.

"Alright, settle down, settle down," she said, waiting for the room to quiet. "Before we get into today's lesson, I want to tell you about something coming up."

The room went quiet enough for her to keep going.

"Starting next class, you'll be working in pairs on a project for the rest of the unit," she said. "And before anyone gets ahead of themselves, no, you will not be choosing your partners."

A few groans went around the room. Someone near the back muttered something about how unfair that was, and Mrs. Alvarez just raised an eyebrow like she'd heard that complaint a hundred times before, because she probably had.

"The groups will be random," she said. "Not by alphabetical order, not by who you sit next to, completely random. I'll have the list ready for you tomorrow."

Freya leaned over toward me the second Mrs. Alvarez turned back to the board. "We're always grouped together anyway," she whispered. "It's basically a formality at this point."

"I guess," I said, though I wasn't really thinking about her at all. I was thinking about the girl sitting alone in the back of the room, the one whose name I still didn't know, the one I'd managed to disappoint twice in one day without even trying.

"You guess?" Freya said, nudging my arm. "Come on, when has it ever not been us? Mrs. Alvarez probably has our names stapled together in that folder of hers."

I gave her a small laugh, mostly just to get her to stop talking, and turned my attention back to the front of the room where Mrs. Alvarez had already started writing something on the board about the lesson for the day. I tried to focus. I really did. But my mind kept drifting back to that seat next to me, the one that should have had someone else in it, the one Freya filled up without even asking if it was already taken.

By the time class ended, I told myself I would find a way to talk to the new girl before the day was over. Introduce myself properly this time, maybe even get her name, maybe even get the chance to say I was sorry for how I acted in the hallway. That was the plan anyway.

I had no idea that the random pairing Mrs. Alvarez was talking about was going to change a lot more than I thought it would. I figured Freya and I would end up together again like we always did, and honestly, part of me wasn't even thinking about that yet. I was still stuck on the girl in the back row, the disappointment on her face, and the seat that was never supposed to be Freya's in the first place.

Tomorrow, I told myself. Tomorrow I'll fix this.

I just didn't know yet how wrong I was about how things were going to go.