I walk into school, with my head high, contrasting my spirits. I clutch the strap of my backpack and walk towards my AP chemistry class so I can just get this day done with. I've got my game plan set, with no one to stop me at this point. I know what I want, and how I want it. I'm ready to take on anything that comes in my path. 

When I get to school, I walk to Sonia's first period class, because I know she always heads to there first to see if there's anything new. When I get to her class, surely enough, she's waiting there. I almost immediately recognize her through her very distinct blonde hair and by the jacket she's wearing. A light coat is hugging her torso, with jeans accentuating her lean legs. 

I walk over to her, and her green eyes shift up from her phone and to me. I give a small smile, and she returns it. "Doing okay? I can still beat his ass if you want to," she says, as she turns off her phone. I shake my head. 

"You're sweet, but no. I don't want that to happen, and more importantly, I don't want you to get expelled. Also, how can you take a first degree black belt take on a fourth degree black belt?" 

She cracks her knuckles and smirks. "Come on. It's happened before. I've taken on a lot of third degree black belts, and I usually win. Don't you worry." 

I scoff. Everyone in the school knows that Sonia can take on anything and anyone with ease. She's beat up the quarterback on the junior varsity team before. If she does want to beat up Ray, which I will never allow, she is going to pound him to dust. 

Eventually, the sound of the bell rings throughout the school, signifying our cue to go to class. Sonia slings her backpack over her shoulder, and walks into her classroom, while I walk towards my AP chemistry class. 

When I get inside, not many people are there yet. It's rather empty, with people probably taking their sweet time talking to their friends before they go bore themselves to death for several hours. I take my things, and sit down on the lab stools. 

While I get out my lab notebook and pencil pouch, I hear someone come up behind me. "Hey, how was your weekend, Sophia?" a somewhat deep voice asks me. I turn around, and Pete is standing there, looking as casual as possible. It's his typical Monday look that basically screams, "I really don't care anymore."

"It was fine. How about yours?"

He shrugs. "Eh, it wasn't too bad. I didn't cry myself to sleep, so that's always a good thing! Plus, my abuela and abuelo are both coming to town next weekend, so I'm kinda excited! Also, is there anything you want? I already asked Ray what he wants my grandparents to bring. You want anything?" He leans against the lab table. 

I smile at him. "You're so sweet. Just get some tajin, duvalín, and gansitos, and that'll be perfect. Thanks a bunch."  I push the top of my mechanical pencil so that some lead shoots out from the bottom.

He chuckles with a nod. "No problem. Say, I'll talk to you in a bit. Later," he says, as he goes to his respective lab table. I open up my notebook, and the next thing you know, my friends Zara, Rosemary, and Amy are Nina are sitting down next to me. 

"You seem down. What's the matter?" Rosemary tells me, as she sets her things down. 

I raise an eyebrow at her. "Is it that noticeable?" I ask, as I sweep a strand of hair out of my face. 

Nina raises an eyebrow. "Well, you're not smiling like someone proposed to you, and your voice isn't as optimistic today. Spill. What's going on?" she asks. I let out a sigh, and then lean in. 

"Lean in. I don't want this to become a huge scene," I whisper, which they do. After telling them the whole story, they lean out, with their jaws dropping to the floor. 

"Oh, he did not," Zara tells me. I nod.

 "He did," I say, and before we can continue our conversation, our teacher, Mr. Donaldson, walks up to the front of the class. 

"Okay, class, today we are going to be partnering up, and I've already picked your partners for this lab. And no complaining! You will be working on this lab with your partner for the rest of the week," he announces, and while he's blabbering about other random things, I turn back to my friends. 

"Yeah. I plan on keeping things at a simple level. Not too much contact today," I say, and with that, Mr. Donaldson reads off, "Pete, and Sophia." I shrug, grab my things, and prepare for moving.

 When he finishes reading off the partner list, he says, "alright, move around and start on the lab!" With that, I take my things and move to Pete's table. I set them down, and then he gives me a shy smile. 

"Coincidence, huh?" he asks. I nod, with a little chuckle, and he opens his lab notebook. 

"I'll get the goggles and the beakers," he says, as I get up. 

"I'll get the ingredients," I say, and we make our way to the back table to grab some ingredients. 

When I get there, I feel Ray come up behind me. "How was your weekend, Sophia?" he asks. 

I turn around, with a neutral look on my face, and say, "it was good." I turn back around, and gather the necessary ingredients. 

I feel him scrunch his eyebrows in confusion, and then I hear him ask, "I didn't see you after the masquerade ball. Everything okay?"

I squeeze my eyes shut, in an attempt to keep my self control together, look at him, and say, "yeah. Everything's fine." I head back to the lab table with Pete, and lay out the ingredients. 

Pete comes back, with glass beakers in his hand, and sets them down. "You okay? You seem kind of off today," he tells me, as I slide the goggles over my eyes. 

"No, everything's fine. Why do you say that?" I ask him. 

Pete raises an eyebrow at me. "Sophia, I know when you're lying. You're easily the worst liar that I know. Tell me, what's going on? You know I don't bite," he tells me, right when the chatter amongst the class starts to intensify. 

I let out a slight sigh, while pouring a liquid in a beaker. I lean in, and reduce my voice to a whisper. "Okay, I'll tell you. But you have to promise not to tell anyone. Especially Ray." He leans in as well. 

He nods, as he plugs the Bunsen burner into the gas, which he turns on. "You know you can trust me. Go ahead. Spill."  he lights a match to turn on the Bunsen burner. 

I let out a sigh, and I just tell him everything that went down at the masquerade ball. We're kind of multitasking at this point, as we're doing our experiment while I rant to him about everything that happened. Pete, being the great friend that he is, just listens like a psychologist, as we continue with our experiment. 

When I finish explaining, Pete has the sarcastic, "wow," look on his face. "Wow. Just wow. I applaud Ray. I guess he had a few asshole pills to take that night,:" Pete groans, as I snicker. 

"But, even I'm not sure if the semi-silent treatment is good enough. What do you think?" I ask, as I turn the flame for the Bunsen burner down. 

He sighs. "Well, I actually disagree with that. Ray hates the silent treatment. Mrs. Richards gives it to him after chewing him out in Czech, with some Estonian thrown in there as well, and he hates it. He knows he's done something wrong when someone's avoiding him. So it won't take long for him to start asking what he's doing wrong. Also, side note, he does really stupid things, and I've noticed this, when he likes someone. I know. Because when he liked Adalyn Connor in the 5th grade- don't ask me how I remember this- he would act like a total idiot. He would pick on her, and just tease her. He's cleaned up his act a little bit, but it still doesn't excuse him from being a douche on Friday. Especially since he knows that your weight is such a touchy subject for you." 

I pinch the bridge of my nose with two of my fingers, and Pete turns off the Bunsen burner. "That should be good," he says, as he writes down the observation, "but anyways, give it some time. I may slyly hint it to him so that he's not left in the dark forever, but I won't tell him upfront. That okay?"

I close the notebook, and with the tongs, take the beaker off of the Bunsen burner so that I don't get a burn that's the shape of Nicaragua on a map. "Thanks for listening to what I had to say. And that's fine. Just don't tell him upfront. Also, is it bad that I feel kind of evil doing this?" 

He chuckles a little bit, as we observe the results of the experiment we just did. "Hey, it's no problem. You're my friend, so you don't have to thank me. And nah. We're all evil in our own ways."  

I raise an eyebrow. "How are you evil?"

Pete smirks a little bit, and then leans in a bit more. "Remember how Ray had two glittery butterfly tattoos on his cheeks for a week?" 

I nod, and raise an eyebrow. "What about it? I know we all teased him for that week, but what's so special?"

"I put it on his face when he was fast asleep, and he never found out. I swear, that kid could sleep through a tsunami."

My jaw drops and I snicker. To be honest, I'm not shocked at that. Pete is like your local circus clown in a 17 year old's body. But putting glittery tattoos on his best friend's face is on another level. "You're serious? I thought Randy did that!" 

His face turns into an evil smirk. "That's what he believes. He'll kill me if he finds out, so this is between you and me, okay?" 

I nod. "Deal," I say, adding a wink on the end of it.

************

"I swear to whoever is watching me, if I calculate the standard deviation of one more thing, I will dig a hole to hell myself and move in with Satan," Sonia groans, as we walk towards the lunch tables. I roll my eyes. 

"Hey, it's not my fault you chose to take AP statistics. I swear, trying to pass the class is like trying to fish with dental floss," I tell her. 

Sonia's eyes narrow. "And yet you took AP calculus with arguably the hardest teacher in the school. Tell me, how's that working out with you? What did you get on the first test, huh?" 

I shudder a little bit at the 57% I got on the first test, which caused my grade to plunge 15%. She does have a point. AP calculus gives me an actual headache sometimes. 

"My point has been made," Sonia tells me, as I scoff. 

"Fine, fine, you win. Also, if you're going to hell, can I come with you? I know it won't be any different from Mrs. Sanders' class." 

She snickers. "Yeah sure. I can sneak you in," she assures me, while eyeing me and giving me a little nudge. We both start to laugh uncontrollably, as we reach the lunch tables. 

When we get there, Pete comes just in time, and sets his things down. "Ray's asking his English teacher for help on something. Give it another minute, and he'll be here," he tells me, as he opens his lunch bag. 

I nod, and take out my lunch. "Good. Oh, and can you and Sonia not argue for 30 minutes? I'm really not in the mood to break up your guys' cat fight," I groan. 

Sonia gives Pete the stink eye, which Pete returns with a raised eyebrow. They both sigh, and say, "fine," in unison. Sonia brings out her lunch, and we all start to eat. 

When I take the first bite of my sandwich, Ray comes hurdling into the area, and he almost throws his belongings down. "Sorry I'm late. Had to ask Mrs. Diaz about an essay. Anyways, what's going on?" he asks, as he opens up his lunch bag. 

I shrug, as I turn to Sonia to start a conversation. For the rest of lunch, although it's hard, I have minimal conversation with Ray. I mostly talk to Sonia and Pete throughout lunch, with only a few words spoken between Ray and I. 

It's not easy to give him the limited conversation treatment, but it wasn't easy for me to hear him help his friends poke at such a sensitive topic. I can see Pete giving him the slight stink eye, with Sonia giving him a straight up stink eye. 

I just keep a neutral look on my face as I continue to eat my lunch. Eventually, I finish up, and pack away my things. Time to go to my locker and get some books for my last classes before boring myself to death for another two hours. 

While I'm taking my books out of the locker, I remember Ray's somewhat confused look on his face. Maybe Pete is going to hint at it. I'm not sure. For the time being, this is going to be like a mini version of Sherlock Holmes. 

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Oh boy. I'm actually curious myself. Does Ray deserve the somewhat silent treatment? Let me know your answer in the comments. 

Hello again, my dears! It's me again! How did you like this chapter? I love the slight cliffhanger I left at the end. It makes me feel a little bit evil. I also wanted to say something. If you didn't see my message I sent, I'm #1 in the "hot" category for the tag #threefriends! I'm also ranked #635 in the tag #imagination! I am over the moon right now, and I'm so thankful for each and every one of you who have read my story. You guys are the absolute best. I can't thank you guys enough. So, THANK YOU!!!!!!! I hope you guys loved this chapter!

Please vote/comment/follow/share/message if you like my work!  I'll be back next Sunday, again, with another chapter of I Never Imagined. Have a great week!

Love you guys,

S.V.T.S