The neat little art teacher, at least a foot shorter than I, started to hand out sheets of beautiful thick paper. It seemed as if she handled them with reverence, slightly reluctant to let them out of her grasp into ungrateful hands.

"Draw sketches on normal paper first, then draw on these ones," she said sternly. "You won't get another of these papers, so make them count."

I smiled as I saw her shoot a hard glare toward some of the students, but I was surprised when her eyes lit up while handing a paper to Zach.

"Make it beautiful," she said, with no hint of sarcasm. Zach didn't smile back, he just looked at her and took the paper—showing nothing, saying nothing.

"You're drawing your bench partners," she added. "Draw them as you see them, not necessarily how they look. And no fooling around, you'll get detention if you abuse the situation."

I frowned. This was an unusual assignment for the first day of art class. Then I remembered that they had put me in the advanced class after seeing my grades from Chester High. Lost in thought, I didn't really see Ms. Neat standing before me until she hummed, apparently annoyed.

"You're the new kid," she said, but it wasn't a question, it was a statement. I nodded.

"I'm Dylan."

She didn't answer, instead she studied me with a strange expression layered on top of her features. After a moment of her scrutiny I started to feel a bit self-conscious. I wanted to look away but I couldn't let her, or the others, know that her stare made me uncomfortable.

"Don't cause any trouble," she finally said, making the same assumptions as everyone else. I let an eyebrow slip upwards before schooling my expression back to unaffected. I waited for giggles to erupt around me, but they never came.

Ms. Neat left me alone and went to stand in front of the class.

"You may start. Projects are to be handed in on Friday."

The signal sent the room into a hushed frenzy. Chairs scraped across the floor, voices were excited but kept low, but most of all, the room seemed to sizzle with concentration. I looked over at Zach and realized that he had already started. A small crease rested between his eyebrows, and it was the first time I saw anything out of place in that face of his. I let one traitorous smile slink through before I grabbed my pen, hoping I could do him justice.

I studied his angled features and the lack of life in his eyes. It was strange. How did he have that much presence without letting anything past that mask of his? I wanted to catch it all but had no idea of where to start. His tattoos were one thing, but not everything. As I sat there, I felt as if I was intruding on him, which I somehow was. I had no right to know his secrets. Finally, he looked up and met my eyes. I thought perhaps I would catch something in them then, but I didn't. He gave absolutely nothing away, not even anger at my obvious staring. I guess I had a good reason to stare, but I still felt a bit like a stalker, which was the last thing I wanted to be. The mere thought of the word caused a shiver to run up my spine, and not one of the good kind of shivers.

Forcing myself to think of something else, I snapped out of if and felt his eyes upon me. I realized that he didn't chose to see, he didn't want to see me—he only looked at my shell. For some reason that made me angry enough to start drawing.

———

The bell rang and students came to life around me. I lost my focus and took a moment to study what I'd drawn. I wanted to throw it away and was about to crumple the thick paper when I remembered that Ms. Neat would have another reason to dislike me. I sighed. I'd completely ruined him. Zach looked soft, and I knew he was anything but.

I peered over at his hard face and saw that he was still far away, deep in concentration. I tried to look at the drawing he had made, but as soon as I did, he flipped it over and shot me another flat look before standing up and walking away. My eyes wanted to follow, but I didn't let them.

"DYLAN!" Tyra's thrilled voice pierced through the general ruckus around me, and as I turned around all I could see was a running Tyra, bursting with excitement for some unknown reason.

"Freaking awesome!" she beamed, and I couldn't help but smile back even if I had no idea of why she would run through a classroom filled with people.

"What's up?" I asked.

"You remember Dana from before?"

"Yeah?" I had no idea where she was getting with this.

"Well, apparently you ruffled her feathers, and now everyone is talking about you."

"How is that awesome?" I didn't mind attention, but I also didn't want the entire school against be just because I had brushed off the social queen.

"Well," she paused a moment as if she was thinking of the right words to say. "I think everyone kinda waited for someone to acknowledge that she's not that cool. You should hear the gossip. Everyone wants a piece of you tonight."

At least it didn't sound too bad. The last thing I wanted was a brand of "social outcast" latched upon my forehead after the first day. I knew popularity shouldn't mean so much to me, but in one way it did. It would just be silly to say otherwise. Who didn't want to have friends? Especially after everything that happened at Chester High, I wanted to feel like I was a normal guy: one among all the others. However, I wasn't sure I wanted all that attention at once.

"You don't look very happy," Tyra continued when I didn't answer her.

"I'm cool. Just thinking about stuff."

She smiled, clearly sensing that I didn't want to talk about exactly what I was thinking about.

"Let's head out. I'll make sure no one pounces you on our way down."

My eyebrows rose. "Is it that bad?"

"No, of course not. But you just turned yourself into the most interesting person at school. Girls will lavish you with attention until you announce you're not interested. I haven's said anything about that by the way. Thought I'd check with you first."

That was thoughtful of her. I wasn't in the closet, but it was still a private matter. I didn't feel the need to have others tell others about my sexuality. I could do that in my own time. Besides, I didn't want my sexuality to be the first thing people knew about me. Although, perhaps that was already dealt with now. I was the guy who ignored Dana, not the 'new gay guy'.

"Thanks," I replied. "You don't have to keep it a secret, but it's also not the only part of my personality...hope that makes sense."

"Makes perfect sense to me. Anyway, should we go?"

I nodded and let her lead the way out of the room. Ms. Neat frowned a little at us as we left.

"Make sure he stays out of trouble, Tyra," she said, which made me roll my eyes.

"I'm not a troublemaker," I replied, even though it might have been better to just shut my mouth.

"We'll see about that," she said and looked down at the pile of papers in front of her.

Tyra gave me a questioning stare that I answered with a shrug. Teachers judged me all the time, it was nothing new.

As we left, something caught my eye, something crumpled up in a waste basket. I recognized the thick paper and pulled it up. I slowly unfolded it and stared at it in disbelief.

"What the..." Tyra said, standing by my side and looking at the paper. "That's a beautiful portrait of you, Dylan, who made it?"

I stood there for a while, unable to answer, just looking at myself seen through the eyes of another. Tyra was right: it was beautiful. It was dark, almost haunting and drawn with so much emotion.

"Zach." I whispered, partly to answer Tyra's question, and partly for myself.