Bounded Minds: Story Hour!

"Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!!!" Terry sounded in a bored loud tone out of his mouth as he listened to Jesse babble.

His jaws stretching open so both Roxy and Jesse could see his spit dripping tongue.

"Me and the midget don't want to write about scriptures." Skullbreaker snorted out.


Hopefully Adelie wasn't to mad at him, Peter thought to himself as turned towards his group dragging his chair by one hand with him.

Well Joe and Connor were with him to at least. Maybe they could help him convince Adelie not to be mad at Roxy or him?

"Hey Adelie." He said as he sat across from her. "I'm sorry about what happened in the hall. I know you guys were just kidding but Roxy wasn't having any fun."


...............................................

Heeee's Back!

His dress shoes clicked as he made his way through the streets of Great Barrington.

Blue eyes giving a nasty look to any hick farmer giving him a suspicious once over. That was the best part of the city, say New York for example.

Everybody there looked the equal level of bad news so nobody cared as the chances of getting conned, murdered or a compliment were all pretty even.

Here it was all nice smiles and neighbors waving to each other, it was revolting really once you realized they all probably talked shit about each other behind closed doors.

But…..that’s just how things are in towns like these, white bread boring.

A thoughtful look spread on his face as he rounded another corner. Then his reason for being here was hardly what one would call boring and even he himself was a magnet for things ‘less’ then normal.

Speaking of reasons he noticed he was nearing his destination.

Hopefully they would understand.

Why he was even hoping!! Of course they wouldn’t no matter what he said or did the result was going to be the same.

Somebody or something was going to end up punching him in the face most likely someone of the female gender.

He was willing to bet the fine tailored gray suit off his back on that.

“Oh well its show time.” He said to himself stopping in front of a pleasant looking house.

Seriously talk about The Stepford wives.

The man’s hands went into his pockets, wonder if people would think he was pulling a weapon on them in this town he wondered……probably not they’d probably think he was getting ready to buy some candy or donate to charity.

At the thought of the two options he gave his wallet a tight squeeze

But as he hinted at no weapon was pulled from his pocket but a lighter and a pack of cigarettes was all that he produced.

“Okay.” The man said as he lit up a stick and slowly moved towards the house. “Let’s make a good impression.”

 

Connor took his chair to join his group and sized everyone up.
Peter's a nice guy, he thought. A little on the naive side, though. Adelie... that girl I can't stand. She makes me wish I lived in an all male school. Joe's.... okay, I guess. Good looking, kind of a mix between Phillip Marlowe and Sherlock Holmes, or so he wishes. Actually, he pulls it off kind of well. Stella... she's not here, but, she's a nice girl. The kind of girl I'd date if I were actually interested.
Connor sighed, and leaned back, fiddling with his headphones. He didn't hang around these guys too often, mostly just nodded at them in the hall or waved. Occasionally he'd ask them to lend a hand in a music video or something. Well, except Adelie.
"Anyone wanna talk like old noir detectives and gangsters?" he asked.

 

Amii's mouth pinched at having to be paired up with Haleigh. Tina she could deal with, but the pet of Little Miss Perfect -recently dubbed Gumball Head- was another matter entirely. And as for Kubi...

She still wasn't sure what to think of that girl. But she seemed harmless enough.

Another place or another time...huh... Amii rolled around a couple of ideas in her mind, and she came up with several unusual ones, but sharing anything would botch her otherwise nonexistent reputation. Sad to say, having no reputation whatsoever was harder than actually having a reputation, be it good or bad.

Sighing, Amii stood up and moved over to her group, just as everyone else did. She leaned against a wall rather than sit in another desk, keeping one eye on the door just in case she needed to bolt. Not that figured she would have to- it was just an old habit that she'd developed some time when she was a kid.
"So, any ideas?" she asked.

 

Kubi slid over to the only person she knew...sort of, Amii. "Hallooo, sorry again about hitting you, accident, I have an idea though." Kubii was in truth a little torn up about her quizz, it was...less then perfect. reading English was even more difficult then speaking it and writing it was even worse, her test was a genius kerfuffle of yes's and no's strewn about the page. She figured she would have gotten one of them right.

"My dad fought and died in the Vietnam war, my mom used to tell me stories about it, I think I could write this all by my self if some one would be willing to scry for me. I am from another place, and my dads story is from another time." Kubi nodded to her self feeling for once a bit intelligent. Then she looked at them wondering if, they even understood her English.

"I making sense?"

 

Tina groaned inwardly at being paired with Adelie's cronie, invisible girl, and the character from a bad anime. They would obviously be completely useless meaning she'd be left doing all the work. Kubi gave a suggestion and Tina snickered inwardly at her broken English.
"Or we could write as ignorant immigrants from another country who can't talk properly." She said nonchalantly and looked at Kubi. "All we gotta do is listen to the new girl talk and write down what she says. Easy."

 

Kubi eye's locked with Tina, she wasn't mad more embarrassed, ya, they noticed how bad her english was. She expected this however and even so, she forced a smiled. "What is ignorant mean?"

Ahhh well I guess you wouldn't be mad if you didn't know you were being insulted.

 

Amii's mouth pinched again at Tina's words. The girl wasn't exactly the most well-mannered, nor the kindest, but at least she wasn't as bad as Adelie. At least, in Amii's mind she wasn't. And Amii had had to learn English as well -so she knew just how Kubi felt.

"Unless you want to go on the mats with me next P.E, I think we should take her idea." Amii growled quietly from beneath her hood, locking eyes with Tina. Out of anyone on the school, even the boys, Amii was the only one who had ever managed to lock horns with Tina and come out equal. Now, that situation did not need repeating, but by the looks of things Tina needed a distraction. And remembering when Amii had been told by the coach to wrestle with Tina of all people had left scars on the both of them. Tina was powerful, but Amii had been faster, and could wriggle out of any kind of pin that girl could dish out. Sadly, their energy had been equal, and Amii wasn't strong enough to pin Tina, so it had ended in a draw.

However, no one could say how the next match would turn out.

"Look, let's just get this over with. I'll write, you get the materials and Kubi will tell the story. It's an easy A either way, and then we can all go about with our lives."

 

"Hey Adelie." He said as he sat across from her. "I'm sorry about what happened in the hall. I know you guys were just kidding but Roxy wasn't having any fun."

"Oh please, that girl doesn't know what real fun is." Adelie replied, absentmindedly touching her hair that she'd thrown up in a messy bun. Haleigh had managed to get some of the gum out, but still some remained...a constant reminder of her burning anger.

"And it's so cute how you think a little 'I'm sorry' makes everything all better again." Adelie continued, speaking in the tone she would with a kindergartener. "Whatever. Just get this stupid assignment done and make it quick. Chop, chop." She leaned back in her seat to let the boys work as she exchanged an annoyed glance with Haleigh.

She seemed to be dealing with the same junk, being paired with a bunch of outsiders. And one that was from way outside. The U.S. that is.

Haleigh chuckled inwardly at Tina's idea, which was actually pretty good stuff. Tossing back her curly hair, she eyed the girl, Amii, who had thrown the gum. Boy, was she lucky Adelie had been too mad to find out who had done it.

But of course she knew. And whether or not this little assignment worked out, determined if she was going to tell.

"A story about Vietnam, oh, how entertaining." Haleigh stretched in her seat, letting out a fake yawn. "Wake me up when it's over, k?" Laying her head on her desk, she closed her eyes, but opened one to glare at Amii once again. "You better be right about the A."

 

Connor glanced at Peter, shooting him a "dude, seriously?" look.
"Whatever. Just get this stupid assignment done and make it quick. Chop, chop."
Connor couldn't let this side.
"Wow. Several thousand feminists just keeled over and died," he stated. "Tell me, how does it feel to be the disgrace of the female population?"

 

I had walked out of my History class to be greeted with the sight of the 'popular' kids picking on a bookish girl, making fun of her for reading Pride and Prejudice, a classic. I tightened my grip around The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. "Fools all of them, no respect for classic literature, I doubt they even know how to read, besides what's the labels on their beauty products, and even then they probably have trouble." I thought, part of me wanted to cut into their self esteem so deeply that they might do the unimaginable... Take a look at their lives. But of course the chances of getting a bunch of people in the best years of their lives to actually do that were pretty low, it would be likely I'd be a 'retarded faggot loser that didn't know what he was talking about' or something else to justify their meaningless existences.

I observed the chaos from the back, I observed the girl that flew under the radar flick gum into Fields' hair, then get ran into by the new exchange student, Vietnamese I believe, though she's been in America for a while, her English, while broken and hard to understand was still somewhat understandable, which meant that she must have been here long enough to get somewhat of a grasp on the language, but still far from fluent, I'd say about a year.

Soon, I walked into the classroom and took my usual seat near the front, it helped me get away from the foolish troublemakers and fools, no one can pull anything when their just a glance away from the teacher. I had picked up my pencil and quickly but neatly wrote the differences between verbs, adverbs, and adjectives with a bored expression on my face as I was doing this. "God if anyone doesn't.... wait nope, I already know who won't get these correct." I thought, thinking of Terry and Adelie, they'll likely get an F on the assignment.

When the groups were called I let out an audible groan of annoyance and exasperation. "Really, I must deal with that horrid girl?" I thought, I sighed quietly and got with my group, I shot Adelie a glare when she ordered us to begin working for her. "Oh my, I believe my clairvoyance has decided to grace you with a gift of possible futures... hm... you'll be some sleazy guy's secretary, you won't be any good at it, you'll mess up in the simplest of ways, but you need that job in order to fund your shopping addiction, so you have to do what you did in the first place to get that job, bend over.... oh here's another... you'll be a house wife to very rich man, but you won't love each other, you're just something for him to use and get to bear heirs, every week he'll probably go out on 'business trips' but you know it's to one of his mistresses while you have to stick around taking care of children you didn't want in the first place... and I think this is the last one, you're going to be a plastic surgery disaster, you'll get your real estate license in your late forties, early fifties in an attempt to find husband number three so then he'll take care of you after you basically look like a living skeleton." I said, not hiding my annoyance.

 

Connor glanced at John, and couldn't help snickering.
"Heh," he said. "Maybe you should use smaller words around her. I think you lost the poor girl."

 

Hearing the insults, Adelie's scowl couldn't get any darker. Anger pumped through her veins as she stood up, pushing back her seat. Clenching her fists, her nails dug into her palms. Though she wasn't intending a fist fight...not at all, she'd leave that to the delinquents.

"MR. WOODROW!" Adelie shouted. Her shrill voice echoed around the room. "Mr. Woodrow! I can't possibly work with these...these....dirty animals!" Staring at the boys in disgust, her hazel eyes gleamed with revenge.

"I mean, seriously, I know my presence makes your hormones go crazy. But stop it with the sexual jokes! They are entirely inappropriate to use in this assignment."

 

"I'm GAY lady!" Connor shouted back at her, amused. "The only comments I'm gonna make about you is your weight issue!"

 

I merely smiled at her pathetic attempt to try to embarrass us. "I'm sorry Mr. Woodrow, but I think that she was having a dream, we've been working while she's been off daydreaming and applying make-up, in fact she just shoved the assignment off on us because she didn't care, I believe her exact words were 'whatever. Just get this stupid assignment done and make it quick. Chop, chop', besides, I'd never be attracted to her, mainly because I'm not attracted to women whatsoever, and I prefer substance and appearance, rather than just appearance, they're utterly boring if they have no personality and only resort to using their looks. I don't resort to juvenile behavior and neither have my cohorts, unlike her, we've been working diligently this whole time." I said keeping a calm demeanor, I shot Connor a look that said 'Keep calm and be quiet'.

 

Thomas looked up from his desk. He knew full well of Adelie's reputation and the way she managed to irk people, but he he also knew of the way Joe liked to irritate Adelie. He did not miss those high school years. Then Conner spoke up. Woodrow's face became deadly serious. "Gentlemen, speak only of the assignment or I will have you complete it by yourself. Conner, if you have a problem with Adelie speak to me...there is no need to go insulting and getting yourself into trouble as well." He said sternly. "And Adelie, next time simply raise your hand. There is no need for you go breaking windows or piercing eardrums in order to get attention." He dropped his gaze back to the computer screen at his desk, though his ear was now listening intently for whatever would come next.

----

Tina returned Amii's glare for a long moment but finally backed down with a huff. Amii was the one person in this school she respected even a little. Few were able to match her when it came to the wrestling mat. She's almost lost last time they fought, and she had no desire for a rematch. "Fine! Whatever. As long as it gets done."
"Wake me up when it's over, k?" Haleigh lay her head on her desk, she closed her eyes, but opened one to glare at Amii once again. "You better be right about the A."

"I don't think so Aphrodite-wanna-be." Tina said smashing her knee up underneath Haleigh's desk. "You're helping out to. I'm not letting ride on our hard work." The Asian glared at Haleigh, daring her to protest.

 

"Yes Mr. Woodrow," Connor said. He respected the man, one of the few who deserved it.
"Alright," Connor said. "As I was saying, how about 1930's noir style writing?"
He glanced at Joe. Something the other boy said had caught his attention, he made a note to ask later.

 

"What does gay mean? what does it mean to chop chop? what are hormones? what is A-rara-do-dite...mean? What is sexual jokes?" Kubi took a deep breath trying to keep up with all the strange English being thrown around.

 

Peter sighed as everyone traded verbal blows.

"Gay means happy." Peter replied. "Chopping means cutting something up and hormones are um.....hmmm."

How would he explain that one?

Terry rolled his eyes at Kubi and Peter. "Idiots." He muttered turning towards Adelie. "As for hormones going crazy...." His lips going up into a smirk

 

I looked over at Connor. "I like it, how abou- wait." I said, I got up and then began moving our desks away so then Peter, Connor were sitting next to each other I was sitting in front of them, and Adelie sitting with her back toward us. "Ah, that's better, we'll know what we're talking about and since Adelie has no intention of contributing whatsoever we'll work and make male only parts, if she wants to assert herself she'll have to improvise, though her head'll probably just explode from the difficulty of actually thinking of something clever." I said smiling, I sat down. "As I was saying before, how about we go with that? I mean it'd be easy to do something with a 1930's noir style, should be simple enough, right?" I asked.

 

Connor nodded.
"Shouldn't be that difficult," he said, scribbling some notes on scratch paper. "What should the dialogue be about? A murder scene? Drug bust?"
Some bits of half-remembered movie or radio scenes began sprawling out on the paper, which eventually turned into what looked like poetry.

 

"OW!" Haleigh yelled as Tina hit her desk, knocking her head on the wood. "Keep your anger problems to yourself Karate Kid, this is school property! You wouldn't want to disappoint Mr. Miyagi." Laying her chin in her hands, a smirk played on her lips. "And Amii over there, didn't include my name in your plans so you don't need my help. But afterwards, I'll be happy to read and give my most honest opinion."

Adelie in turn, was not happy to give anything. She couldn't care less what the dialogue was about, who was saying what, or even if she'd get an A. She'd just make up for it with extra credit or something.

While the boys talked about the 1930s, she just sent a flirty smile Terry's way.

 

I contributed as best as I could with 30's noir novels, show, sand movies that I had watched and read, speaking at a low volume so then only Connor and Peter would hear. Whenever I thought Adelie was even listening in for a little bit, I began mixing in random timeline and countries to confuse her, speaking just loud enough for her to hear properly, I'm pretty sure that she didn't know what noir even was, so I thought 'why the hell not, right?' After a while I peeked at what we had. "This is pretty good, I think we'll get an A, though Adelie will probably get a big fat F." I said, saying the last part lower smiling.

 

Kubi gave up trying to understand everything, beside, now she really wanted to tell them the many stories she had heard about her very own father.

"Anyway my father was fighting with the American forces when north Vietnam invaded the south, they most never treated him well except one, a man by the name of Ryan, they became friends fought many battles together, lost many friends. One night while they were wading through the jungle, my father heard a sound off in the dense bushes, it sounded like a bird. Tried to warn the Americans he did, but they wouldn't listen, "It's just a bird" they said. but my dad, he's smart he knows that jungles bird sleep at night. So he tells Ryan what it really is, the enemy, they were communicating through animal calls, and they were getting louder, closer. Hours past as My father and Ryan pleads with the others to listen, all the while the bird calls happen more frequent, slowly building in volume." Kubi leaned in, now in full story telling mode, her awkwardness seem to leave her, and a calmness descended.

"My father he turns to Ryan. he says. We are going to die very, very soon, if because your silly Americans do not listen, come we should run." Ryan turns and say's.

"My friend, I will follow the orders of my commander, I will die gladly, but you have a family. And you are not a u.s soldier, slip away now, I will cover you. Then suddenly!" Her voice picked up, drawing the attention of some students, their curiosity aroused by the subject. It wasn't often they heard about the war from a foreigners perspective, certainly not a Vietnamese perspective. Funny enough her accent actually added to the authenticity of it all.

"The birds, went silent... My father slipped away while Ryan distracted them with a toast, the last thing he heard from the Americans soldiers was frantic gun fire, the cries of the lucky few who died on the spot, and the screams of the unlucky few who were captured, only that and the flashes of light from gun fire he could see, as he ran through the jungle." She paused for dramatic affect, a proud smile appearing on her face.

"He never saw Ryan again, when he returned to see if his friend was there all he found was the gory remains of the commander, his head had been cut off and was a foot from his body laying face up, a look of terror etched on his face. And his guts were everywhere, like he was savaged by some beast, only that and blood, pools of it all over like it rained wine did he find. My mother tells me, she says, "Your dad hoped Ryan was killed, because if he was captured, the devil himself could not torture his poor soul as they could... the end!"

Kubi sat down looking proud of her self, "I have many stories, many many stories like that."

 

"Mr. Miyagi's got nothing on Sensei Spellmen." Tina retorted before settling down to listen to Kubi's story. As she finished,
Tina smiled at the new student with new appreciation. "You tell a damn good story, newbie. So how about a dialogue between soldiers in the Vietnam war?" She offered. picking up a pen and bouncing it between her fingers.

 

"I'm a newbie! hee, hee, what's a newbie?" Kubi assumed it was a compliment, there seemed to be no end to her amusing ways.

Kubi went on to speak about all sorts of intense dialogue between the soldiers, lots of it was violent but, that was to be expected, this was a terrible war. Occasionally Kubi got so excited she would break out in Vietnamese, only the blank stares of her partners made her aware of the habit, eventually they finished despite this.