Tuesday morning, second period of the day, Biology.
Chelsea sat with her friends, waiting for their teacher Mr Knot to arrive. There was the murmur of students talking, nobody in the least concerned that he hadn’t arrived yet. If they had their way, they’d all quite happily sit there talking the entire period.
Tucker and his two new enforcers entered the room. Chelsea’s friends watched in disdain as Tucker ordered one of his classmates off his stool even though there were plenty of other places to sit. The unfortunate student, who had to vacate his stool, didn’t dare argue, as Colin and Joe were standing right behind Tucker, giving him the evils.
Tucker clipped him across the shoulder to get him moving and then took his seat, his two goons taking a spot either side of him. Nobody made any comments and all was quiet until Mr Knot entered the room. He appeared flustered, walked stiffly over to his desk, and placed his briefcase down. He opened it up, pulled out his logbook and turned to the class. ‘Good morning. I’ll call the roll before we start. We have a new boy starting with us today.’ He paused to glance around the room and frowned. ‘He doesn’t appear to be here.’ He gave what sounded like a sigh of relief and appeared a lot more relaxed.
Holly leant over and whispered to Chelsea, ‘I hope he’s cute.’
Mr Knot began to call the roll in a formal tone of voice and each student answered when called. He then checked his watch. ‘The new boy was supposed to be here this period. I don’t see why he should be late. I met him briefly in the principal’s office this morning.’
‘What’s his name?’ one of the girls asked.
‘Rex...’
‘Cassidy.’ A voice emanated from the doorway.
Everybody turned their attention to the door to see a tall, smiling, powerfully built teen leaning against the doorway. For a moment, there was silence. Everybody stared at him stunned, not because he was late for class, nor because he was acting so casual about it, but because of his sheer presence. Chelsea couldn’t help but marvel. His bright blue eyes sparkled and his smile was extremely alluring. He also had an impressive tall physique with his muscular arms, chest and legs. She could only sum him up as drop-dead gorgeous. It was almost impossible to shake her gaze, but when she did, she noticed all the other girls staring at him the way she had.
‘Rex!’ Mr Knot snorted. ‘Why are you late?’
‘Late? Me late?’ Rex moseyed on into the class.
‘Ten minutes late!’
‘Ten minutes? Ah, but what is time Mr Nut? Isn’t time really just a figment of our imagination?’
‘The name’s Knot. Not Nut!’
‘Mr Notnut. Sorry about that.’
Chelsea tried not to laugh. Muffled laughter came from the students, many trying their best to hold it back. Chelsea couldn’t help but think this boy must sure have some nerve to talk like that to a teacher, particularly a tenacious one like Mr Knot. Then again, perhaps it was simply ignorance. He had no idea what this teacher would tolerate.
Mr Knot frowned deeply. ‘Look you, I’m not going to put up with any of your nonsense. There are rules in this school about turning up to class on time. I expect you to adhere to them.’
‘Well, in that case, we can’t have me being late then, can we?’
‘Damn right!’
With that, Rex took a stool and used it to get up to the classroom clock. Mr Knot’s jaw dropped as he reached up and adjusted the time of the clock by turning it back ten minutes. ‘There,’ Rex smiled and climbed back down. ‘I’m right on time.’
Mr Knot’s nostrils flared and he breathed heavily. Chelsea scanned the class. All the girls’ eyes were fixed on Rex as he chose a seat. Even when Mr Knot began to speak, the girls continued to gaze at Rex. Holly’s gaze, in particular, was transfixed.
‘Excuse me!’ Mr Knot rapped on his desk loudly. ‘I would like all attention over here please. There’s plenty of time for you girls to ogle the new boy after class.’
All eyes diverted back to Mr Knot, but not for long. Knot decided to get right down to business and started to talk about the theory of evolution, and one by one, eyes began to return to Rex - Chelsea’s included.
Rex seemed to be lapping it up, delivering smiles to many of the girls and getting big ones in return. He didn’t even glance Chelsea’s way, but that was ok, she was used to being overlooked.
Mr Knot fumed at the lack of attention to his lesson, but he kept on talking. Chelsea noticed that Rex had ceased exchanging smiles with the other girls and his attention was now on Mr Knot and his eyes seemed glazed over. He started drumming his fingers lightly on the desk.
After a few seconds of that, he spoke so the entire class could hear. ‘Do we really have to learn this stuff?’
‘What?’ Mr Knot stared at Rex.
Rex quit this drumming and leaned nonchalantly back in his chair. 'It may not be the case for you, but exactly what benefit will this have when we're out there searching for a job? I can just imagine handing over my CV and my potential boss saying, "Well, Mr Cassidy, I see you have some great customer services experience having worked in McDonalds for twenty years, but I don't think your degree in natural selection or your expertise on dark matter is really what we're looking for. Oh, but I hear there's an opening at Te Arawa College for a new Biology teacher. Maybe you should try there?"'
Chelsea couldn’t help but laugh at the put on voice he used for his potential employer. Her classmates were equally as amused, snickering and cackling away. The dumbfounded look on Mr Knot’s face made Chelsea want to laugh even more.
Mr Knot straightened up. ‘Well, it is in the Biology curriculum and so we have to learn it.’
‘The school should get their act together and remove it from the syllabus. Anyone would think that the curriculum had been designed by a bunch of monkeys.’
Knot had a wry smile on his face. ‘Well, in a sense it is.’
'Shame on you, shame on you, Mr Nut. Evolutionists have been trying to drum it in it for a long time now that humans are not evolved from monkeys, but just share a common ancestry.'
Chelsea marvelled at his words. He was very smart. Intelligent as well as gorgeous. He was beginning to look very dreamy indeed.
Mr Knot delivered an uncharacteristic smirk. 'Well, Rex, it's great to see you know something about this.'
'Yeah, well, I filed it away under useless information that I will never need to use unless I'm debating with a creationist.' Rex smiled wryly.
‘I take it you don't subscribe to Intelligent Design either?'
'Intelligent Design? No. It’s more like incompetent or even malevolent design if you ask me.'
'Well we won't go there.'
'I'm glad.'
'But we will continue on with our current topic without any further interruptions from you. I’m not going to have you come into this class and disrupt it. You may have been able to get away with it at your old school, but not here. If you’re not careful, I just might assign you an essay to write on the subject.’
‘Sure, why not? I’ll leave a sheet of paper on a desk and let the words evolve themselves, shall I?’
They class burst out laughing again.
Mr Knot’s face turned sour and wrinkles spread across his brow.
Rex continued, 'Oh, but if you don't want to wait a million years for that to happen, how about we just say that a miracle occurred and the words just appeared there out of thin air. Oh and that the ink is undetectable, which is why you can't actually see it. Yeah, I think that will keep the creationists happy.'
‘That’s enough!’ Knot snarled, his face turning red. ‘Detention. Lunch time!’
‘We’ll have to see, won’t we?’ Rex said with a smirk.
‘What do you mean by that?’
‘Well, with the laws of natural selection, I may just evolve some new immunity or ability to avoid detentions. Either that or God will come to me in a vision and tell me that I no longer need to attend.'
‘Funny Ha Ha!’
Rex
didn’t make any comments after that. He spent the rest of the period drawing sketches in his folder and exchanging smiles with female students. Just as before, he didn’t seem to notice Chelsea.
Later, outside the classroom, Chelsea and her friends joined the welcoming committee that had surrounded Rex. They were all eager to find out more about him.
‘I can’t believe the way you spoke to Mr Knot,’ Holly said.
‘Are you going to his detention?’ asked one of the boys.
‘Nah.’ Rex grinned. ‘If that assclown thinks I’m going to turn up, he’s kidding himself.’
‘You a real wise-ass, are ya?’ Ben stepped up.
Rex eyed him expressionless. ‘Do you have some kind of a problem with me, eejit?’
Ben pushed his way through the girls. Chelsea could see from a mile off that he wanted to stamp his dominance over the new guy and at the same time probably try to impress the girls. ‘Yeah, I got a problem, scumbag. I don’t appreciate some jerk coming to my school trying to make a name for himself.’
‘A bit like you, Tamati,’ someone commented.
‘Oh yeah, you’re a real man too,’ added someone else.
Laughter rang out from those around them.
Rex towered over Ben, but the bully didn’t back down. Chelsea knew he could put up a good fight against anyone, no matter how big they were. One thing Ben had in his arsenal was speed and she doubted Rex had that.
Rex let out an irritated sigh. He spoke with cool composure, ‘Look, crud bucket, I don’t know what your real problem is, but then again, I’m not a shrink. So why don’t you just rack off and go play somewhere else?’
Ben shoved Rex, but he didn’t budge.
Rex eyed him with contempt and spoke calmly once again, ‘You don’t wanna go there.’
‘Oh yeah? I want to go there, all right. Come on, new guy. Let’s see how tough you are.’ Ben made a lunge at him, but Rex was far quicker than Chelsea expected. In a move that wowed everybody, Rex grabbed Ben by the arm and flipped him over. Ben landed on his back a loud grunt, the wind bursting from his lungs. For a moment, he lay stunned, breathing heavily and then climbed painfully to his feet. Rex remained where he was and watched him tentatively.
Ben lunged at Rex again.
Whack!
Rex’s fist connected with Ben’s cheek and down he went, crashing to the ground. He lay shaking the cobwebs from his head, while clutching the side of his face. He made no effort to get up.
It was the most amazing thing Chelsea had ever seen - Ben lying on the ground, dispatched in one blow. ‘Wow! Where did you learn moves like that?’
‘Just a couple of tricks I picked up.’ For a moment, he studied her and then smiled - a dazzling smile that could have easily knocked Chelsea down next to Ben. ‘I didn’t notice you in the classroom before.’
‘My name’s Chelsea.’ She didn’t know why, but she felt like she was talking to a celebrity.
‘You were in Nut’s class? I can’t believe I didn’t notice you. ’ His deep blue eyes sparkled and then a curious look appeared on his face. ‘Your glasses.’ He reached out to take them from off of her face, but paused. ‘May I?’
Her knees felt weak. ‘Umm... okay.’
He gently removed them from the bridge of her nose. She had to blink to refocus her eyes. His handsome face blurred a little, but it was still there and he gazed deeply into her bright blue eyes as if mesmerised. He reached out his other hand and gently pushed some hair from her cheeks. She could hardly breathe at all now. She imagined him leaning forward and pressing his lips against hers. She was sure that if he did, she would faint.
Sadly, he didn’t kiss her. He blinked his long eye lashes a few times then smiled. ‘You rock.’
Chelsea didn’t know what to say, wondering if she needed a hearing aid as well as glasses. She stared at him like an idiot as he placed her glasses back on her face. Rex still smiled and it took several seconds for her to come to her senses. She glanced at the others around her. Their wide-eyes suggested they were as surprised by Rex’s actions also.
She turned back at him, but his attention had already moved away and he talked to someone else. Nevertheless, that didn’t change anything. He thought she rocked. Even if he hadn’t been sincere, it still made Chelsea feel better than she had in a long time.