[interphase] -- // keifer&lilly

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Week One // Monday

First impressions were of the utmost importance in every day life, at least according to the way I saw it. Impressions are usually what dictate whether or not you will explore a friendship with the person. Or at least move from glaring at them in the halls to listening to their side of the story. In other words, the impressions that everybody had on me were quite bad. And there wasn't anything I could do about it, even if I felt like they were poorly created. Rumours. Simply rumours. That's all that they had ever been. No, you still did it, Lilly. You still did it. That's not a rumour. That's truth. But it was blown out of proportion by all from my school. All of them looked at me with condescending looks as if what happened was the one thing in life I wished to complete. Impressions, as I said, were terribly made when it came to me.

It was tough to walk through the school without getting at least one dirty look. It has been about three years and yet nobody is capable of getting over it. Even if it had nothing to do with them, which it really didn't, they still believed that it had to be discussed and passed around the school so nobody ever forgot. The teachers even knew, I believed. They were just as bad as all the students, looking at me as if I was some sort of monster. As if the fact that my innocence was supposedly taken away made me a terrible person. Like they had their purity, still to this day. In reality, nobody was pure and innocent once they hit the age of twelve. The Games forced us to mature way earlier than we normally would. It removed our innocence whether we liked it or not. It made us adults before we even had the chance to be teenagers.

When it came to partner work, the teacher would always pair me with the smart kids who really could care less about the social aspects of education systems. Even though they knew very well what had happened, they generally chose to steer clear of it and just focus on the work at hand. Especially when it came to the harder, and therefore my time consuming, projects. I wanted somebody who wouldn't be constantly judging me in scenarios like that. And yet, it was almost impossible to do so. Teachers would pair me up with everybody in the class and yet it would always end in disaster, apart from my actual mark. After all, I was always one of the top students in the class. I believe I was the top as of the most recent test. But that meant that I wouldn't be allowed to be with one of the geniuses that didn't care. The smartest kids would be paired with those who were, generally, not as intelligent. Or sometimes with the just slightly above average kids.

But when the teacher stood at the front of the class and introduced the next project, I was hoping that I would end up being with one of the smarter kids simply because it would mean finishing the year with a wonderful mark. After all, this was the end of term project that every class would have to work on at my grade level. We were almost finished schooling and so all of the out-of-class work was very difficult. It would take weeks to work on, hence why we were beginning two months before the last day of class. We would finish with enough time to present all of them to all of the separate classes and then to do our final tests. As the teacher explained the project, I tried my very best to not get distracted by looking over the people in my class and seeing who could end up being my partner.

It was rather simple but at the same time complicated. We would have to write up a report on a topic we had studied throughout the year as well as doing some presentation about it in order to reteach it to the class. For example, if we wanted to prove that we in fact did exhale carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, we'd need a report as well as a video, maybe. That meant that I needed somebody smart enough to do the project as well as somebody smart enough to not pick on me all the while. That always made work so much harder. And as she came to a conclusion on the description for the project, she said the words that caused the most fear I had felt since the moment where the door opened and all could see my intoxicated self with her legs on either side of my face.

"I was going to assign you partners for this project, guys. But because it'll mean a lot of time at each other's homes, I figure that being allowed to choose will be good." There's a burst of excitement suddenly, existing in the room solely due to those words. "So when I say go, I want you to all pair up. We're an even number." She looked at us for a brief moment before her lips formed the single syllable and her vocal chords allowed for it to be said. And just like that, the kids in the class sprang from their seats and found their best friend before deciding on the topic that they would pick. And just like that, the scientific details to Panem's formation was taken as a topic. Being a science class, there would be some interesting topics but all the good ones would be taken first.

Groups formed all around me and I knew that there was no point even getting up from my seat way in the back right corner, furthest away from the windows and the teacher. In fact, my desk was further apart from others, against my choice, really. I would have to wait until somebody came up to me before I ended up with a partner. That was how things usually worked when we'd end up with partners. And I never had the same because they'd make sure to pair up as fast as they possibly could in order to avoid me. I didn't even want it to happen. Why does it still have to haunt me? And so I kept my head down as I stayed in the corner, knowing very well that I'd hear the words 'I guess you're going to be partnered up with Lilly' any moment now.

Whether I liked it or not, I'd end up with a partner sooner or later. And probably later.