Homeless

A/N - Thank you for the reviews, they're really the biggest motivation to keep writing. Also a personal thanks to Saige for beta-ing this chapter. ^^b

Driving to school, I let the rhythmic thumping of DJ markski's newest mix suppress my worries and apprehension. Trance often time has that effect on me, it just sort of overloads my brain and stops me from thinking. On my way to school I managed to only miss two turns, yay, go me. I've got a pretty rotten sense of direction, you see, I get it from my dad. That's pretty much how it goes with me though, Dad and I are a lot alike mentally, whereas I inherited Mom's looks. Of course that isn't counting my eyes, they're the one thing that's mixed.

I grabbed my shoulder bag from the passenger seat and hopped out of my Jeep. As I walked toward the main entrance to this newest of personal hells I had to take a moment to stop and prepare myself. As I expected, there weren't that many students on the grounds, chalk that up to either it being a small town or to my being over half an hour early. Looking around at the students none of them seemed to really notice me, which is just fine as far as I'm concerned. I'd just as soon avoid any unnecessary attention.

Finally composed, I made my way toward the office to pick up my class schedule for the year. I walked through the glass doors of the office and wow. It looked more like a sort of doctor's office than a school office, weird. I decided to just ask the elderly lady at the front desk as to where to get my schedule.

"Excuse me," I began, she was busy writing something down, "Could you tell me where I'd pick up my class schedule?"

"Oh! You startled me, deary." She looked up at me through her bifocals, with her eyes squinted in order to see me, it seemed. "You didn't pick it up yesterday, when they came out?"

"I uh, just moved here yesterday, actually." I shifted my eyes to the ground, "We kind of forgot with all the unpacking, actually."

"Oh, well of course then, you can pick it up with the guidance counselor down the hall, Mrs. Adams." She smiled kindly at me, but then immediately went back to writing on her stack of papers.

Re-adjusting my shoulder bag as I set off down the carpeted hall, I set off for the counselor's office, as indicated by a sign down at the end of the hall. At the end of the hall it widened into a room with some couches, in the middle of the room, set in a square toward each other, centered around a low table. I stopped before that at the desk with what looked to be a student attendant working it. The girl at the desk at extremely curly dark brown hair, pulled back in a pony tail, she smiled brightly at me as I stopped in front of her.

"You look like you're new here," She pre-empted me, "And I'll bet you need your class schedule, at least that's the only logical reason for you to be here."

"Um... Yeah, actually. I was told to find Mrs. Adams for my schedule." I said. She had put me off guard with her bravado in starting our conversation, or maybe she's just done this job before, regardless of it being the start of the school year.

"You'll find her around the corner of the desk and straight back in her office, she shouldn't be busy at the moment." She smiled at me, then stood and thrust her hand out at me. "I'm Jennifer by the way, it's nice to meet a new face around here."

Taking her hand I gave it a light shake, "I'm Becca, it's um... nice to meet you too." I smiled weakly at her, but quickly pulled my hand away and looked down at my feet, I hope she didn't notice how sweaty my palms were. Clearly the change in setting has done nothing to change my nervousness around girls. Add in the fact that I'm deathly scared of being outed here, and that I've never been good with new people, the best I could do was walk off to the counselor's office, staring at my feet.

Approaching the open door of the counselor's office I looked up as I knocked on the door frame. Inside I could see a woman typing into a computer on her desk. She appeared to be in her mid thirties, she had her light brown hair pulled back in a loose bun and was wearing a nice, but casual floral patterned blouse with a dark knee length skirt.

"Excuse me, I'm looking for Mrs. Adams? I need to pick up my schedule?" When I get nervous like this I start making everything sound like a question, it's a bad habit of mine. Mrs. Adams turned toward me.

"Well you're in the right place then. I'm Mrs. Adams, and you are?" Mrs. Adams had a very nice and soothing voice, seems like that's a requirement for guidance counselors.

"Oh, um, Rebecca Anderson." I answered, stumbling over my words a bit.

"Alright Rebecca, let me pull up your schedule and print it out here on the computer, then." She turned toward the computer and started typing and clicking, manuevering through what seemed to be a list of names. "So you're new here, right? Where did you move from?"

"Um, yeah, we came from Sacremento. California, that is." I don't know why I clarified that last part, I don't think there are any other Sacremento's, yay nerves.

Mrs. Adams let out a slight chuckle, light and amused. "You can calm down, I know it's stressful to start at a new school, but we're really quite harmless here." She turned toward me and smiled as I heard the printer start to hum and whirr to my left.

"Heh, thanks. I guess I'm kind of wound up today, sorry." I smiled guiltily and watched the printer work it's magic, making my schedule.

"Can I ask why you moved from Sacremento? Your parents get a new job out of state?" She asked kindly. I could see the printer was almost done with my schedule.

"Uh, yeah, something like that.." I said, trying to dodge the question, suddenly I was on the defensive again. Seeing the printer finish and spit out my schedule into it's tray, I snatched it before Mrs. Adams could get to it. "Thanks." I said simply and turned to go. I was very ready to get out of here.

"Oh! Do you need any help finding your classes?" She called at my back as I continued walking away.

"I'll find them myself, thanks though!" I called back cheerily. I was starting to get back into my old ways of dealing with authority figures, just smile and act cheerful. Try it some time, it works.

Taking a look at my schedule I saw that I had Gym first, with a 'Ms. Schumaker'. I sighed in relief, gym had always been one of my favorite classes. At my old school they used to play music while we did any excercises that didn't require immediate instruction. Music of any sort helps me relax some and excercise helps too. Now I just had to find the Gym.

Walking out of the school office through the door I came in I walked forward in to the cafeteria. There were a few students over by the actual kitchen area in a line getting some breakfast it seemed, with a couple groups just sitting at the rectangular tables over on that side of the cafeteria. I was walking through a big cluster of round tables that were on this side of the cafeteria, there was only one student over in this section, a girl with dark black, straight hair coming down to just above her shoulders.

She was sitting at a table just a bit further in front of me with her school breakfast on a tray. Walking by her I took a closer look, black hair has always been a weakness for me. She was small. Small in a lot of ways, she looked to be short, very skinny, and even held herself in a sort of small, drawn in on herself, way. As I walked to the side of her table she looked up from her breakfast of cereal, an apple, milk and applesauce. Her eyes were ice blue and very alert, she seemed to quickly look me up and down and then survey the rest of the room before going back to her food. I kept walking past her table, but felt the need to look back at her, something about those icy cold eyes. So looking back over my shoulder I saw her head dipping back down to take another spoonful of cereal. Had she been watching me? I quickly looked ahead and kept walking, hoping desperately to avoid attention.

Walking forward I could swear I felt eyes on me the whole time, probably everyone staring at me, judging me and finding me wanting, that feeling made my skin crawl. Nothing for it but to keep moving, all the while I could feel them, all of them, looking at me. Taking a random left turn out of the cafeteria, I could hear in my mind those whispers from my last year. I sped up, hoping to out distance everyone and maybe my own demons. Little did I know that speeding up would be my undoing.

WHAM! Something ran into me, or I ran into it, either way I found myself landing on the floor, hard. My head spinning, I heard a voice. It was sweet, but tight with anger, uh-oh.

"Watch where you're going, jeez!" the voice said. Oh boy, this day just goes from bad to worse, I took a look up and began to formulate an apology, but at the sight before me the words stuck in my throat. The girl standing before me was beautiful, she had that classic blonde hair and blue eyes look, with a killer body to match. She was staring at me, her features creased with anger and by gods she was still beautiful.

"Well, nothing to say for yourself?" She spat at me. With my mouth hanging open, all I could do was try to stammer out an apology.

"I- I'm sorry, I wasn- wasn't watching where I was going- I-" All the while I couldn't stop staring at her. My eyes travelled over all her curves, her legs, long and milky. Her eyes, Gods her eyes! They were like deep dark pools, I could die happy losing myself in them. I had fallen silent by now and was just staring up at her, a fearsome blush burning my cheeks. She just looked back at me, now with a look of cool disdain gracing her striking features.

"Psh," She scoffed, "Whatever, watch where you're going." With that the beauty walked away from me. Once again all I could do was stare, this time at her receding form. Wow.

As she turned the corner, I shook my head to get rid of the images running through my head, no use entertaining any idle thoughts, it's not like that type of girl swung my way anyway. I sighed and took stock of my surroundings. To my left I saw the clearly labelled restrooms entrance, and opposite that I saw... the gymnasium! Miracles do happen, it seems. I stood up, and recognised that familiar pressure in my bladder. Deciding to hit the restrooms before my first class I headed that way, it's not like class would even start for another 20 minutes at least.

I walked in to the bathroom to find it empty, so choosing a stall at random I walked in and sat down to do my business. While I was at it, I might as well check my cell, pulling it out of my pocket I saw I had a single message.

Hey little sister, you doing okay so far today? Just pulled in.

I sighed to myself at Dylan's insistance on that 'little' sister term, I was gonna have to beat that out of him. Hitting reply I started my response.

Im okie no worries. Found my 1st period class already gym. Whhatd you 2 get? Heading into class now wont be able to respond. Ttyl

I hit 'Send' and flipped my phone closed, sliding it in my pocket and then wiping clean. Getting up I of course flushed, and did up my jeans before heading to the sink to clean up. I washed my hands thoroughly in the sink and checked myself over in the mirror. My hair was slightly mussed from my run in earlier, thinking back to that and that beatiful girl brought a blush to my face. I shook my head a bit to get those thoughts out of my head and dextrously smoothed my hair with my damp fingers, parting it down the side like I always do. Once more I washed my hands and then, after nodding to my reflection in satisfaction, I headed off to the gym.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Alright everyone, I'm Ms. Schumaker," Our teacher began, we were in the gym clustered up by teacher, there was a group of 20 some odd girls in my 'class' standing before the somewhat intimidating form of Ms. Schumaker. She was a solidly built woman, tall and toned, with more of a handsome look – as opposed to pretty. "I'm going to start off with role call, as I call your name I want you to go stand against the bleachers. The bleachers were a mechanical affair that basically sank back flat against the gym walls when not in use.

"Anderson. Rebecca." She called out in a strong commanding voice.

"Here." Great, I was number one, I hate how often that happens with my last name.

"Go ahead and stand by the bleachers, Rebecca. Over at that end." She gestured to the end of the bleachers closest to the door. "Albert, Kristina."

I headed off to the bleachers and tuned out Ms. Schumaker's voice. As I got to the bleachers I turned my back to them and leaned back, taking in the rest of the 'classes' in the gym. At the other end of the bleachers there was another group of girls with their teacher, a slender lady who had that P.E. teacher toned body. Across the gym the boys were lining up like we were, two classes of them on opposite ends of their bleachers. From across the room I heard them begin to count off numbers loudly, how strange.

Turning my attention back to my teacher I listened for some of the names of my fellow students, might as well start learning, I guess. A somewhat chubby girl with black hair and a brownish complexion was named as Maria Garcia. A mousy little girl headed to the bleachers next, her name was Lily Kent, it seemed. She looked nice, kinda meek, but maybe someone I could make friends with. My therapist back in Sacremento told me I just needed to make some friends to help with my 'ordeal' last year.

"Smith, Tabitha!" Our teacher – turned - drill instructor belted out.

"Here." A voice called back, it was... ear catching.

I turned to look who it was, and surprisingly it was the girl from the cafeteria this morning. Now that I could see her standing up I confirmed that she was in fact short like I thought, I'd guess 5'1" or so. She had a huge bag with her, like an old style hiking backpack, in military green. She hefted it with surprising ease, for someone barely bigger than the bag itself. I honestly don't see how She managed to lug that thing around. She made her way to the bleachers and I lost sight of her.Ms. Schumaker kept calling out names and I lost interest again.

Leaning back against the bleachers I started tapping my feet to the beat from a trance song that I called up out of memory. I wonder if this little town has any clubs, I could go for a good night of dancing. I figured, with it being the first day of school, I wouldn't have any homework tonight. So really, why not hit a club or something? A clap rang out and pulled me out of my head.

"Alright ladies, we're gonna go to the locker room now, I'll assign you all lockers and gym clothes there." Ms. Schumaker seemed a bit up-beat now that role call was over. "Let's hustle, we're already in the lead!" With that, she urged us toward a couple of double doors opposite the ones we came in from. We all picked up our things and walked toward the doors, many of us showing the tell tale sluggishness of the morning.

Walking through the doors brought us to a short hallway, I brought up the rear with the mousy haired girl, Lily, in front of me. I wonder what delayed her to the back of the line. At the end of the hallway there was a door with an 'exit' sign lit up above it. On the right there was a set of double doors that as we passed I saw lead to another gym. Our line, however, seemed to be moving to the other door, on the left, it was just a single door and my classmates seemed to be stopped in a neat line that was slowly making it's way in. I leaned against the wall and edged my way along as needed, after a minute the girl next to me followed suit. Summoning up all my courage I turned to the girl next to me.

"Your name was Lily, right?" I started. Might as well try to listen to advice.

She turned her head toward me "Um, yeah. I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name."

"Rebecca," I said with a smile, "I generally prefer Becca though."

"Nice to meet you, Becca. Did you just start here? I don't recognize you." She looked at me curiously.

"Uh, yeah... I moved here from Sacremento, actually." I answered. "Have you lived here long, then?"

"Mmm. Yeah." She smiled sheepishly at me, "I've lived here my whole life, actually. Or at least as long as I can remember."

"Yeah? So what do you do for fun around here? I'm not used to small towns." Silently I hoped she'd answer with clubbing, hoped hard.

"Hahaha!" She laughed, "There's really nothing to do here to be honest with you. I suggest hanging out with friends, or finding yourself a cute boy." She giggled at the last part.

"Really?" I felt my hopes crash and burn, "No clubs? No movie theaters? No parties? No raves?" I asked desperately.

"Well we have a theater, but it's only got one movie playing at a time... Other than that... No, sorry." She half smiled at me.

"Ugh... Lame... I'm gonna be bored out of my mind on weekends." For the briefest second I missed Sacremento.

"Well personally I like to spend my weekends outdoors." Lily sighed happily to herself, she seemed to be recalling a happy thought.

"Oh yeah? What do you do outdoors then?" I'd never been too much of a nature person.

"Photography, mostly. Though I do some sketching as well."

"Really? I've never really known an artist before." We were standing in the door way now.

"Heh! I'd hardly call myself an artist-" She started respond, but was cut off by our teacher standing in the door way.

"Name?" Ms. Schumaker asked in a renewed monotone voice.

"Uh, Lily Kent." She responded.

"Alright, here's your lock." She handed Lily a combination lock, "Short and shirt size?"

"Brought my own gym clothes, this year." Lily answered, digging in to her backpack and starting to pull out some clothes.

"Alright then, you know the dress code for gym clothes?" Ms. Schumaker asked, still sounding completely bored.

"Yup!" Lily chirped.

"Go ahead and pick out a locker from the far set, then dress down." Our teacher turned her attention to me now, "Name?"

"Rebecca Anderson?" Talking with Lily had returned some of my social confidence and I couldn't help asking it as a question. Wouldn't I be the last one on her list at this point?

"Right." She said, luckily not picking up on my sarcastic tone. "Here's your lock, short and shirt size?"

"Um, Medium for both?" I responded, taking the lock. I didn't want to get something too tight for gym clothes.

Ms. Schumaker turned and grabbed something behind her, "Here you go then, pick out a locker by your classmates and dress down." She handed me my new clothes and I walked into the locker room.

Looking in the locker room, I saw a small office to the right with clear glass windows. On the left there were probably 10 sets of lockers, and down at the end I could see some stalls for restrooms. I walked down to the last set of lockers where my classmates were, looking for some place with an unclaimed locker.

"Becca, over here!" Lily called out, waving at me from the end of the line of lockers. She had saved a locker right next to the showers for me, it seemed.

"Hey, thanks." I said, as I set my bag down and started pulling off my sweatshirt.

"Oh don't thank me yet, I only grabbed these 'cause they were the only ones next to each other. You looked like you could use a friend."

Pulling my sweatshirt off all the way I smiled at her "Really? I- thanks, yeah a friend would be nice." I made a friend, I couldn't believe it!

"Anyway." She said, "Unfortunately that puts us right next to Tabitha." She nodded toward the huge pack sitting against the edge of the lockers.

"Oh, that's that raven haired girl right, with blue eyes, super skinny, really short?" I asked, caught a bit off guard that she had a reputation. "What's wrong with her...?"

"Uh... yeah." A look of confusion on her face, "Well, there's not really anything wrong with her but... She doesn't have the best reputation around here."

"Why's that?" I asked, pausing with my shirt half way off to wait for her answer.

"Well, they say that she's um... er... that she... likes girls." She finished the last two words quickly.

"R-really?" I stammered out and busied myself with taking my shirt off all the way and tossing it in my locker with my other clothing. Tabitha was a lesbian?

"That's what they say." Lily responded, while now putting her gym clothes on, pink shorts and a light purple t-shirt.

"Huh." Was all I could manage. I couldn't decide now if I wanted to try to talk to this Tabitha girl, or avoid her and any possible rumors like the plague. On the one hand, I'd never met anyone else who was gay. On the other hand, I don't think I could take another year like my last.

"I'll meet you in the gym!" Lily said, as she closed her locker and walked away. I finished getting dressed and locked my locker, fighting against the crowd of the other class of girls on my way out to the gym.

"Hey!" I heard from a girl as I accidentally bumped her coming through the narrow doorway.

"Sorry." I mumbled. I was completely lost in thoughts of Tabitha, those ice blue eyes of hers a vivid memory, that just seemed to have been waiting to be called up and reviewed.

The rest of gym class flew by as I numbly went along with the warm up, and then the assortment of games to play. Thinking back to this morning I remembered seeing Tabitha look away from me quickly, when I looked back at her. Maybe she wasn't judging me... maybe, could she have been looking at me as I walked away from her? Could she have been checking me out?

The sound of four whistles blowing did little to get my attention, and apparantly that got me the attention of Ms. Schumaker. I just kept thinking back this morning in the cafeteria, I numbly kicked the red rubber ball in front of me. Looking up I realized everyone was filing back toward the locker rooms, I was lagging behind quite obviously. Ms. Schumaker was walking up to me from the badminton nets.

"Anderson, right?" She asked.

"Yes, ma'am." I responded with a gulp.

"You were dragging your feet quite a bit today, so you're on clean up duty. Come to my office when you and the other girl are done, I'll write you a pass for being late." She promptly walked away and out the main gym doors, propping them open as she went.

"Yes ma'am." I mumbled and set about cleaning everything up. I grumbled to myself and went over and started with the badminton gear. I unhooked the poles from the ground and rolled them together, not really paying attention to anything else in the gym.

Hefting the nets I stumbled my way over toward the closet, as I got close though I suddenly bumped against something. Hearing a sharp cry of alarm I realized that it was a someone, not a something. I set the nets down on the floor and looked at who I'd knocked down.

"That's three times you've ran in to me!" It was that girl from earlier that I'd bumped in to, the crazy beautiful one.

"I- Um, I uh, I did- didn't mean to, I just- it was an accident!" Once again I stammered out my words, completely captivated by this beauty on the ground. She was leaning back on one elbow with her legs spread, she didn't seem to be making any move to get up.

"Uh-huh, three times is no accident. You gonna help me up?" She said, that cool disdain returning to her.

Still staring at her, I couldn't keep my eyes from travelling up the line of her long luscious legs, to the crux between her thighs. It was covered tightly with her little school issue gym shorts, they must've been a size too small.

"Well?" She held her hand up toward me.

Looking at her hand I raised mine toward her, but couldn't stop my eyes from wandering to her very ample bosom. Her breasts were... perfect, encased behind her tight t-shirt.

As I grasped her hand she looked at my eyes and followed my gaze, suddenly she let go of my hand with a sharp gasp. Looking up at her I saw her eyes had widened, she seemed shocked and... scared?

"Oh my god, you're one of them aren't you?!" She suddenly got to her feet on her own and took a step back. "You're one of those Dykes aren't you?!"

I stood there mortified and staring at her like a deer caught in the head lights. Not again... No this couldn't happen again! I had just made a friend! It was going so well! Why now?!

"You are!" She said, now she seemed angry. "You're another one of those fucking dykes!" She took a step toward me and then suddnely shoved me. Hard. I fell to the ground roughly, twisting and landing on my side. "Don't you dare touch me again! We don't need any of your kind here!" She took another step toward me. I closed my eyes, expecting the worst. Then I heard that voice.

"Leave her alone, Courtney..." That voice... it sounded like Tabitha's. I'd only heard it once, but it had left quite an impression. Still I curled into a ball, feeling the tears start to flow.

"Oh, come to save your fellow carpet muncher, Bitha?" Courtney spat at Tabitha.

"I told you not to call me that anymore. Just lay off her." Tabitha's voice was cool and collected, quiet, but commanding.

"What, and leave another one of you dyke bitches in our school? I don't think so." Courtney's tones were icy and filled with hate.

"Don't do something stupid, Court." I heard a thump and whimpered in spite of myself.

"Whoa whoa whoa, okay okay, I'll leave, just- I'll leave, okay?" Courtney's voice was suddenly filled with fear. Hearing a rapid pattering of feat, I felt myself succomb to the racking sobs I'd been holding in check until now.

A hand touched my shoulder and I flinched, curling up tighter. "Hey... hey, it's all right now. She's gone now." I slowly relaxed as Tabitha's hand rubbed up and down my arm.

"It'll be okay, I gotcha now..."