➵ 1.1 - michael

                                    

                                          
Michael was so ready for Monday, that is, if Jade showed up. If she didn't, the who cared. He needed to start trying to impress her if he wanted to win. And he needed to figure out if and when and how to tell Jade about the dare. And before doing that last thing he needed to buy a bulletproof vest, just in case. When Michael walked into art with Calum, he found his pretty redhead already there. Her head was bowed, her hand moving expertly on the paper in front of her.
                          
"Dude, I'm sitting back there today," Michael told Calum. 
                          
Calum grinned knowingly. "Just today?"
                          
Michael grinned back and gave him a middle finger. As the other students were walking in, he made his way to the back corner of the room and sat across from Jade. "If you're lost, your table is towards the middle where your friend is sitting," Jade said without looking up or pausing her drawing. She might have lost her mother, but she was still Jade. Of course she was going to be nasty to him. 
                          
"I'm not lost, Little Mermaid. I know exactly where I'm going."
                          
Jade looked up, flicking her hair over her shoulder. Michael did a double take. The eyeliner was back, but that wasn't what surprised him. Her pretty face now had a stud in her right eyebrow, a small silver ring in her nose, and snake bites under her lips. "What's your full name?" she asked. 
                          
"Michael Gordon Clifford," Michael said slowly, unsure of why she asked. He was still distracted by her face. She was fierce before, but now she looked dangerous. Beautifully dangerous. 
                          
"Well, Gordon," she said with a small, evil smile. "That's going to be your new name."
                          
Michael gave her a clipped smile. "That's okay. I like my middle name." That was such a lie. He hated his middle name.
                          
"Good for you." She looked down and continued working on her drawing. The bell rand and Ms. West rambled for a minute or two about when their projects are due and blah blah blah. Michael got up and grabbed his stuff from the shelf and returned back to the table, where Jade was still completely engrossed in her work.
                          
"What are you making?" Michael asked as he tried to make sense of the picture in front of him. There seemed to be flames, lots of them, surrounding the edges of the paper and a shadowed silhouette in the midst of it all.
                          
"Hell," Jade replied without looking at him.
                          
Hell. Michael wasn't surprised. She seemed like the girl who would spend her time drawing hell. If that's what hell looked like. "And who's standing in hell?" he asked as he pulled out his own artwork and laid it out on the table. It was good, but no where near as good as what Jade was making. It was a pair of eyes, for fuck's sake.
                          
"You." Her tone was casual, like she was completely at ease. 
                          
Michael raised an eyebrow at her, even though she couldn't see. "And what have I done bad enough to deserve a place in hell?"
                          
Jade shrugged, not bothering to even glance at him. "Some people don't need a reason."
                          
"Harsh."
                          
She didn't say anything and neither did Michael. He worked on finishing his sketch and started shading in the right eye. His goal was to make it look apparently lively, but also lifeless at the same time. Sometimes that was how he felt. Happy on the outside, but empty on the inside. However, in his depiction, there was a feminine quality to the eyes, which worked just as fine, Michael thought. He didn't want people to think he was expressing himself in such a way. 
                          
"You're good," Jade said suddenly and Michael looked up to find her studying his work, a small crease between her eyes. 
                          
"Would you look at me for a second?" The words stumbled out of his mouth before he could even think them over.