CHAPTER 2
A few days passed and Krystal and I were slowly learning more about each other. Gerard was still paying me out whenever Krystal wasn’t around. But I just ignored him. I still haven’t told him that me and Krystal are going out on the weekend. As we sat in Home Ec. Together, I think that the class was actually starting to notice that we hung out together more than usual. We were listening to the teacher read through the recipe before we started to cook. I’ve always been pretty okay in Home Ec., but working with Krystal I picked up some tips. She cooked as though she had been doing it for years. Today we were cooking ANZAC Biscuits. We ended up finishing first. We decided to take the biscuits home so we put them in a plastic bag and chucked them in our school bags. We sat down at the tables in the Home Ec. Room and finished our theory work. At the end of the lesson, we grabbed our bags and went to our next lesson. We were outside our classroom when Krystal’s phone rang. She grabbed it from her bag and answered it.
‘I’ll meet you inside’ I whispered to her, she nodded and I walked into the classroom. I sat down at a desk and waited for Krystal to come in. About 20 minutes into the lesson, Krystal wandered in. She sat next to me and grabbed all her books out she needed for the lesson.
‘Who was that on the phone?’ I asked.
‘Mum.’ She grabbed her pen and started copying down the notes from the board. I went back to doing my work too.
At lunch we sat down in our usual spot. Ray, Gerard and Frank weren’t there yet. We kept a look out for them as we ate our lunch.
‘Hey, Mikey’
‘Yeah’
‘Where do you live?’ I grabbed a pen from my bag and wrote it on a piece of paper for her. ‘Okay, thanks’
‘Hey, Mikes!’ I looked up to see Gerard and Frank walking toward us. They chucked their bags down and sat next to us.
'Hey, what are we all doing this week end? Coz I was thinking we could all go see that new horror movie that's out in cinemas. How ‘bout it?' Asked Frank. I looked at Krystal. We had planned to go out on that weekend. But I'm willing to do whatever she wants to do. She caught my eye and nodded and mouthed; 'let’s go'
'Me and Krystal will come' I said.
'Great, Gerard?'
'Yeah, I'll come along'
'Sweet.'
‘Where’s Ray?’ Krystal asked.
‘Urh. I dunno. He probably set his hair on fire with a Bunsen burner again.’ Said Gerard. We all laughed
‘He set his hair on fire before?’
‘Yeah. I’m surprised that the teacher hasn’t banned him from using Bunsen burners actually.’ The bell rang and we stood up to go to class. We slowly walked towards the classroom. Gerard left for the math classroom and Frank headed towards the multimedia suite. We entered the classroom and sat at the back, in our usual spot. The teacher looked up when we were all seated and told us we had an assembly in this lesson.
'Leave your bags and phones in here. I will lock the classroom so no one can steal your belongings' we all stood up and walked to the hall. When outside, the teacher caught up to Krystal and said that the office would like to see her.
'I'll meet you after school if I'm not back before then.'
'Alright. Meet me at the playground across the road. I'll take your bag for you.' She walked towards the office. I followed the rest of my class into the hall and sat down in the row that my class sat in. I didn't pay attention to any of the assembly. I almost didn't stand up for the national anthem. At the end of the assembly (it was exceptionally long and went for the two lessons) I went back to my classroom and collected mine and Krystal’s bags and walked towards the playground across the road. I sat on a bench and waited for her to arrive. After a few minutes I got a message from Krystal; 'I'm sorry, I can't meet you at the playground. I’ve got some things I need to sort out. If you don’t mind, could you take my bag to your place? I’ll come by early tomorrow. We can walk to school together. Love you, I'll see you tomorrow' I closed my phone and stood up, grabbed our bags and walked home.  Gerard had walked home ahead of me, since I told him I was meeting Krystal at the playground after school.
I arrived home a few minutes later to find Gerard sitting in the lounge room playing Tony Hawk’s Underground 2.
I put mine and Krystal’s bags down in my room and changed out of my school clothes and into my usual black jeans and an Anthrax band t-shirt.
I returned to the lounge and sat down on the couch to watch Gerard play the game.
‘Krystal did a no-show then?’ He asked, not taking his eyes off the screen.
‘Yeah. She needed to sort some things out.’
‘Mmm. Fireball?’
‘You’re on.’ I picked up the second controller and got ready to join the game.

We played fireball a few times. We decided to do the best out of 5, which Gerard won. I went to the fridge and got a drink of milk. I had just sat down at the table to drink it when there was a knock at the door.
‘Get that.’ Gerard yelled. I put my milk down and went to the front door. I opened it to see Krystal standing on the door step.
‘Krystal! What are you doing here?’
‘Me and mum had a huge argument and I ran away from home. I was hoping I could crash here for a bit.’ I looked over my shoulder at Gerard, who shrugged his shoulders.
‘Uh. Yeah. You can. Our mum’s gone on holiday and doesn’t get back until near Christmas, so she wouldn’t care.’
‘Can I come in? It’s freezing out here.’
‘Oh, yeah of course.’ I stood back and she walked in.
‘Where should I put my bag?’
‘I’ll put it in my room for now until we figure out sleeping arrangements.’ I took her bag from her and she sat on the couch next to Gerard. I put her bag in my room and returned to the lounge.
‘What did you argue about?’ I asked, sitting down next to Krystal.
‘Well, I told mum about you the other day, and she told me that she was okay with it. And then today, her and dad came home and mum came to my room, where I was, and told me that I was to dump you because she found someone else she wanted me dating rather than you. I told her that I wasn’t going to and that she can’t tell me who I can and can’t date, and  then it went on from there, and I got sick of it and ran away.’
‘Your mum and dad don’t sound like very nice people.’ Said Gerard, who had paused the game to listen.
‘They’re nice sometimes. They’re rich. They hate the fact that I’m not as girly as they want me to be. They expect me to wear dresses and skirts and bright colors and do girly stuff. Instead I wear jeans and shorts, wear black and spend most of my time listening to my music and playing hockey.’
‘Won’t you get in trouble when they see you next though?’I asked
‘Yeah, probably. But they’ll get over it.’
‘Okay.’ We watched Gerard play the game for a bit, before going to the park around the corner and playing kickball.
‘Did you ever figure out where Ray was?’
‘He did set his hair on fire with the burner.’ Krystal and I laughed. ‘I can’t wait to see what his hair looks like tomorrow. Remember what he looked like last time Mikey?’
‘Yeah. Half his hair was missing and he had a small bald spot on the side.’
‘Stylish.’