A Second Chance (2 page)

My mom knows that I like to be organized and ready. I don’t like being behind or anything when it comes to school.

Mom nods her head yes, as she starts lifting the eggs out of the pan onto a plate. “I already made plans for
all
of us to go grab school supplies.” Mom says looking at my brothers. They always pitch a fit when it comes to going school shopping. But me on the other hand, I love it. I love all the new things that come out every year.

We all were just getting done with breakfast, when we heard the doorbell go off.  I excused myself to answer the door, as I open it, I notice a tall older woman that is probably in her early 40’s with brown hair and green eyes holding a basket of muffins in her hands.

I recognize her from the woman earlier that was fighting with the man. I give my best smile.

“Hi.” I greet her.

“Hi, I’m Jan Davis. I’m your next door neighbor. I thought I would bring you over a house warming gift, just a little something I baked.” She says, with handing over the basket.

“Oh, thank you. Would you like to come in to meet the rest of the family? We were just finishing breakfast.” I start to move out of the way to let her in.

She was about to say something, when we both turn as we hear “MOM” coming from Tate’s home. Oh wow, this is his mother. Why didn’t I notice it before? They look just alike!

Tate comes from around one of the bushes that separates our house’s. He looks like he just got out of the shower with his hair all wet, hanging just above his eyes. He walks over to his mom.

“Hey, Rayleigh.” He says acknowledging me. I wave at him as he turns to his mom. “I’m going out with some friends, I will be home later.” He tells his mom.

“Okay sweetie, maybe you should invite your new neighbor along as well.” She says to Tate eyeing me.

Before Tate could answer, I interrupted. “Oh no, I actually have plans. With school starting Monday, I have to get my supplies.” I wasn’t sure if Tate even wanted me to go, but instead of him having to make up an excuse not to been seen with me, like most people did to me at my old high school, I just rather take myself out of the equation.

“Oh okay, Are you sure?” Tate stumbled over his words.

I nod my head. “Well, Rayleigh, it was very nice meeting you. Please tell your parent’s that I am sorry that I didn’t get a chance to meet them, I have to run.”  Mrs. Davis says politely. 

“I will see you later, Rayleigh.” Tate yells over his shoulder, as him and his mother walk over to their house.

I walk inside with the basket of muffins and sit them down on the counter.

“The neighbors brought them by.” I state, before my parents have a chance to ask who they were from. “Can we go now?” I ask my mom. I am anxious to start my new school year!

Monday morning came quick. I got up and prepared myself for the day, knowing it’s my first day at a new school and a senior, I want to take my time getting ready. I had a hot shower; blow dried my hair, and put my make up on. I picked out my outfit the night before, a baby blue shirt to bring out my eyes and my skinny jeans with boots. I want to impress for success.

My mom dropped off my brothers first then me. I have been trying to convince my parents for weeks that I need a car. But they still think I should wait till my 18th birthday. I guess they think one more year added on my age would make me more responsible.

I kiss my mom on the cheek as she dropped me off at school and she wishes me good luck.

I walk into my new school and feel a sense of relief. This new life, new look, new me, hopefully, I will fit right in.  I make my way over to my locker and spot Tate. At first, I didn’t recognize him, because of the bleach blonde wrapped all over him, sucking his face off.  I should have known he had a girlfriend. Guys that look like him don’t stay single for long. As I approach my locker, I notice him finally pulling his face off the blonde, and look over and spot me.

“Yo, hey Rayleigh. “

The girl with him scowls when she sees me. She wraps her arms around his waist and coos, “Who is your little friend, baby?” He cringes when she talks, but quickly covers it. Hmm, I wonder what that is about.

“Courtney, this is Rayleigh, my new neighbor, she just moved here.” She plasters on a fake smile and looks over to me.

“Welcome to town, Rayleigh.”

“Um, thanks.” I mumble. I look back to my locker and open it up, when I hear Tate say he needs to get to class early. Out of the corner of my eye, I see him give Courtney a quick kiss and then takes off, telling me he’ll see me later.  I notice his girlfriend doesn’t take off to her class, straight away. I shut my locker and notice she’s giving me a nasty look. “Yes?” I ask her. Hoping she’ll move along now.

“Tate is mine, you better remember that.” She sneers at me, and then stomps off.  What a bitch.

I walk into my first class and move up to the teacher to check in with her. I hand her my schedule, so she can write down my name on her attendance sheet. As the second bell dings for everyone to take their sits, Ms. Washington calls the class to attention.

“Class, we have a new student joining us, her name is Rayleigh Bell.” Ms. Washington turns to me and tells me, just to take a seat anywhere I would like.

My natural instincts tell me to find a seat close to the back. I take my seat next to a guy that has the school football jersey on. He has curly blonde hair and looks kinda built. He turns in his seat and smiles at me.

“Hi, I’m Ben.” He whispers.

I acknowledge him by nodding my head; I’m not the type of person to talk in class, unless I absolutely have to.

When the bell rang to indicate that class is over, I gather my belongings and head towards the door. As I exit the classroom, Ben is behind me trying to get my attention. I realize then, I don’t know anyone here but Tate. So I start to make the best of it and start coming out of my shell.

“Hi.” I say to Ben as he approaches me.

“Hey. What’s your next class? I’ll walk you to it.”

I hesitate, no one has never ever offered to walk me to class, but then again, if I was still the old me, no one would probably ever talk to me.

I pull out my schedule to look at it. “Gym.” I tell him as I put it away.

“Great, I have weight training so we are going to same place.”

I put my hair behind my ear. “Okay.” I say, as I turn around to start walking to gym.

Ben was trying to talk to me on the way to our next class, but seeing how I’ve never really spoke to a guy before, I didn’t say much of anything but nod my head to let Ben know I was at least listening to him.  As we are about to walk into gym to go to our classes, I see Tate is also heading for the gym.

“Hey, Rayleigh.” Tate says walking up to me.

“Hey Man!” Ben says to Tate, before I say hi back. “Are you ready for this season?”

I didn’t understand what they were talking about at first, and then it hits me, football. Tate is a football player. Well, he has to be, what else could they refer to as ‘this season’ when football is the only sport that plays in the beginning of school.

“Yeah, have you talked to coach about you actually playing this year?” Tate asks Ben.

“Yeah, I talked to him this morning. He told me as long as I didn’t try to pull any funny stunts, then I should be able to play.”

Tate starts chuckling. “I’m guessing he is referring to the prank you pulled last year with his car.”

“Yeah, he gave me a warning to stay away from his car also.”

I look at both of the boys like they have lost their minds; Tate catches my look of expression and then tells me the story.

“This one over here,” Tate points at Ben, “thought it would be a funny prank to put coach’s car on the football field one day, while it was raining and the top of the car was still left down.”

“How did you not get suspended?” I ask

“Because Tate saved my ass, he flashed his smile he has and told the principal that he would for now be keeping me out of trouble.”

“Hey, it worked.”

I start to grow tired of their male bonding time. As I start to excuse myself, Tate caught my attention asking Ben how he knew me. As I look up at Tate, something in his eyes switch, like he was jealous. Nah, maybe it’s just protection. After all I am the new girl, and his neighbor.

“Oh, Rayleigh is in Ms. Washington’s class with me.” Ben states proudly. 

No one knew that I take AB Honor classes. That was another reason why I got picked on a lot, for being smart. But what could I do on a Friday and Saturday night, when everyone else was partying? I kept my nose stuck in my books to help me pass every test and every grade level.

“No way, I didn’t know you took AB classes, Rayleigh.” Tate smiles at me.

“Ah, yeah.” I laugh a little to hide my embarrassment and hide my face.

“Wait, how do you know Rayleigh?” Ben asks.

“Remember that dog, which just showed up in my yard the other day? Well, it’s hers.” Tate says pointing at me. I look up at him to see his full smile, teeth and all. He even has a little dimple on his right cheek. No wonder he got Ben out of Trouble, his smile was to die for!

Wait, Ben was the other guy that was playing basketball with Tate the day I moved in? I don’t know why I didn’t realize it earlier; probably because I was too busy looking at Tate. I glance to see what time it is, I know the bell must be ringing soon.

“Actually guys, it’s great how we are standing here explaining how we know each other, but we are seriously about to be late to class. And with me being the new girl, I rather not leave that kind of an impression on my teachers.” I tell them.

Tate and Ben look at me and start laughing. “What?”

“Nothing, nothing at all. Don’t want princess to be late to class.” Tate says as he throws his arm around my shoulders and smiles at me.

We walk to where the changing rooms are. I tell the guys, I will see them after class, as we go our separate ways; I make my way into the changing room, just in time for the teacher to assign me my locker for the semester and me to change.

I walk over and a short, petit girl with brown hair is by my locker changing. She kind of reminds me of myself, before I got some kind of personality and stopped be so blah.

“Hi, I’m Lily!” She says in a squeaky tone, kind of like a mouse.

“Hi, I’m Rayleigh.” I tell her, as I open my locker to put my things in and change into my gym clothes.

“I saw that you were talking to Tate and Ben.” She says.

“Um yeah, Tate is my neighbor and I just met Ben.”  I tell her as I put my shoes on.

“They are both the stars of the football team. “ Lily tells me. Well that tells me that I was right about them playing football.

“Oh yeah, that’s cool.” I say to her.

I’m not trying to be rude. But if people are just going to try to speak to me or be my friend because I know Tate then I don’t want anything to do with them.

“You must be new.” Lily states.

I nod my head at her.

“I’m sorry, for just jumping into a conversation about Tate and Ben. They don’t let just anyone into their circle of friends, so I was surprised when I saw you talking to them. Tate usually doesn’t give anyone the time of day but his girlfriend, Courtney and the football team.”

“It’s fine. “ I tell her with a smile on my face.

As Lily was about to say something else, coach came in and told all of us to hurry up and get out on the floor or we would have to run a mile today. At the moment, I never seen so many girls scoot of the locker room so quickly.

The first week of school has flown by; this new school wasn’t so bad. The only thing I received was a few bitchy remarks from Courtney and her friends, but otherwise nothing.  It feels great to finally be free. By the time Friday came around, I was hanging out with Lily a lot, then Tate and Ben would join us. By what I could tell, I think Lily has a thing for Ben, but she won’t say or do anything about it. Once I start to know her a little better, and Ben, I’m going to try and play matchmaker. 

As we’re eating lunch, Tate and Ben start talking about football. With me, knowing nothing about it, I ignore their chatter and talk to Lily.  We’re making plans for the weekend, when I hear Miss Bitch, Courtney, come over.

“Why are you sitting with this loser for baby?” She says glaring at Lily.

I didn’t give Tate time to defend us, as I took the lead to stab at her. “The only loser I see is you. Back off.”

With that, Tate finally says, “Courtney, be nice.” That seems to settle her down, but instead of walking off, she glides herself onto his lap, as her back is turned towards Lily and me.  I look over to Lily and raise my eyebrows, and mouth ‘bitch’, which causes Lily to giggle and mouth back ‘thank you’.

“So, Rayleigh.” Ben says as he turns towards me. “What are you doing this weekend?”

“Um, nothing. Was going to see if Lily wanted to hang out.”

“How about you make some time for me.” He’s trying to charm me. So not going to work. Before I can say no thank you, Tate speaks up.

“Hey Ray.” Tate says, peaking out around Courtney, and giving me a new nickname. 

I look up, “Yeah?”

“You are super smart, and I’m not. I need help with a few classes, could you tutor me?” When he says that, Courtney goes into a deep freeze. You can feel the room’s chilliness. She looks pissed that he would ask me. “Please, Ray.” He’s pouting, and that causes bitch face to get even more pissed.

I sigh, “Fine. But I’m not fooling around. If you want a tutor, that’s what you will get.”

He smiles. “I knew you’d say yes. Thanks Ray.”

I smile back at him. And notice Ben looking defeated. “Cock blocker.” I hear him mutter.

I shake my head at him.  “Baby, why don’t you let my brother tutor you, he’s home for a while from school, he’s smart.” I laugh inside, knowing that she hates the friendship we’ve formed and has been queen bitch about it since I started school here. But I’m not going to let her bring me down.

“No, you know, I’ve never gotten along with Brayden, why would I have him tutor me? Besides, Ray is my best friend.” Then looks at me, and tilts his head, “Or in girl lingo, bff’s.”  I laugh when he says that. Men should never say bff.