A Musicians Geek

Skaiylee Farris. She was always doing anything but classwork with her school day. She wrote lyrics for the most part and performed on school grounds with her band on half of the days in the week, sometimes more than half. She was talented in ways that were unique to most others. She was artistic in many ways, and excelled in only three areas academically. Music, theatre, and dance. And most didn't consider those academic at all. Collin Garrett was only half reading along with his classmates. More than half of his attention was on his lab partners notebook where she had written what he guessed was fresh lyrics. Collin knew firsthand that Skaiylee excelled in music, as he had seen her performances on stage at the school. He also knew she played piano as they shared music class together and he knew that she wrote captivating lyrics because she would share them from time to time asking for an opinion if she caught him peeking at her notebook. Collin didn't know much, but he knew the little he did from bumping into her around school, sharing a few classes and just being friendly overall. And he knew that she didn't participate in high school academia because that much was obvious. Everyone knew that about Skai. With the teachers singling her out at times in class to do work, It was sad that the teachers couldn't figure it out that if they wanted her to do well, someone would have to help her to get engaged and interested. Not force her to by calling her out with the whole class watching. With how often the young Collin saw Skaiylee going into her various after school activities, he knew she was more than capable of participating in things that she cared about. It was the same reason he participated in the Chess club, the Science club, and Math clubs after school. Because he cared about them. Passion and enjoyment drive our actions. Collin wanted to be a successful adult and had parents that cared about his performance in school which drove him to do well in school. Even though Skaiylee did not participate in class work, it didn't mean that she didn't stay busy. If she actually had a single care to pay attention in class, she could be quite the brilliant gal in school. With her seemingly flawless musical memory, it would make it relatively easy for her to perform well in maths and literacy based on her memory alone. She just had to try. Collin could only enjoy theorizing about Skaiylee because he wasn't the most social person himself. By the way the teacher began to read and scan the class, suddenly zeroing in on the person paying the least attention to his lecture, Mr. Chock started toward Skaiylee and Collins' desk. Skye happened to be the student that had been intriguing him lately with how the teachers had been so focused on her in any of the classes that they shared. He could not help but let out a mental groan at the teacher. Doing this was only going to make Skai retreat farther away from doing any work at all in his class. "Perhaps Ms. Farris can read paragraph 1 on scientific matter in index 2 of our course book." Mr. Chock said. Mr. Chock was honestly one of the most strict science teachers in the district, and he picked on Skaiylee a lot. Hearing her name, Skai looked up at the teacher with an irritated glance preparing to answer with a typical snarky response. "Chock, I don't even have the book with me. Why would I be prepared to read anything about science?" Collin gave a mental sigh thinking he was going to give the teacher a break for once and maybe a hint for them both as he nervously looked over to Skaiylee with his soft big blue eyes. Collin cleared his throat quietly and pushed his book across the table to his classmate and pointed toward the section the teacher assigned her to read aloud. Nodding down to the book, he hoped that he could maybe help both Skaiylee and the teacher out, though he didn't know if his aid would be welcome in the least by his sarcastic lab partner. Skaiylee looked up to meet Collins eyes and blinked only once. She found him so damn gorgeous. Even if he rarely talked to most people. There was something VERY mysterious and attractive about Collin Garrett. His quiet attitude and his intelligent demeanor made her always wonder what he was thinking. That, and she had quite the little crush on him. She called it little. Anyone who was able to read minds would say that little was not the right word to use. The polar opposite of little in fact. Skai slid Collins' book the rest of the way toward her and sighed deeply before she began to read the excerpt. Collin was kind of shocked to see her pull the book closer, actually beginning to read where the teacher wanted her to instead of blowing him off as she usually would. He was only operating on a guess with the girl, not really knowing how she would take things. Collin wondered idly about how surprised the teacher was with his little bit of help getting Skai to actually participate in class. He hoped that this might be a little turning point for teacher and student. "The term matter refers to anything that occupies space and has mass. Matter is what makes up the universe. All matter is made up of substances called elements, which have specific chemical and physical properties and cannot be broken down into other substances through ordinary chemical reactions." As she finished reading, she pushed the book back toward Collin, no readable expression on her Face. "Okay?" She said to the teacher, the sarcasm and irritation returning. Mr. Chock, accepting her reading of anything at all took the small victory and moved on. "Thank you for participating, Ms. Farris. So, moving on. Gold and Carbon are both elements-" As Mr. Chock continued his lesson to the class, Skaiylee retreated back to her writing, but not before shooting Collin a patient gaze. She wasn't sure if she was thanking him or questioning why he did it…. Maybe a bit of both. Maybe she was just staring because she was attracted to him overall. She didnt know. Collin only answered her gaze with a small smile as if to tell her, 'There. Wasn't that easy to get him off of your back?' Skai blinked slowly, somehow only half understanding what his smile meant. She had to ask. "Why the smile, Collin?" She tried. Collin just shrugged and gave a small grin for her trouble turning his focus back to the teacher before his inattention would be noticed. Skai let it go for now. Collin and his quiet attitude, it never failed to make her want to read minds… That or strangle him, she couldn't quite decide which In this particular second. When class had drug on for what felt like forever to Skaiylee, the bell had finally rung making the class fall into a factory of students packing up. Skai was working up strength all week to ask Collin if he would come to something. So. Since shed procrastinated as long as she could, she figured, it was now or never. She had to at least see where this could go. Worst the boy would say was no. "So Collin? My lyrics from a few weeks ago that you helped me with some wording?" She started. Collin just kept eye contact so she CONTINUED. "We're performing that one today at lunch. Will you come watch?" The teen asked her crush. Collin gave his head a tilt to his side as he thought about his ability to attend or not. It wasn't often he spent lunch in the main quad with most of the student body. He had other activities to fill his time and hed much rather study or read than socialize most of the time. Making sure that there were no competing activities he was scheduled to do during lunch, he reckoned the only thing that he had planned for lunch today was to read up for one of his classes, so he gave a shrug figuring that he could always do both. Lunch was 50 minutes after all. How long could a new song or two be? He could bring the book with him and watch her performance since she asked him to. He could still always read his book before and afterward if he had time. Upon deciding on his course of action he finally spoke a few words after another pause to bring his thoughts in order. “Sure. It will be nice to hear your song completed.” Skai gave a nervous nod and grabbed her bag. "Cool. See you later." Collin gave a nod before Skaiylee left their desk. He picked up his stuff and packed it into his bag before giving a friendly wave and heading off to his calculus class. He stayed in autopilot as he went through the halls heading to Ms. Davies room, his mind going over the events and everything that had transpired last period. Collin was wondering if the signals he thought he was getting from Skaiylee could have been romantic interest? After all, with all the classes they had and time they had been attending the same school, why was it now that she was showing an interest in him in that way when he'd never felt that vibe before? Or was he not paying attention? He was usually very observant, so what had he missed in his analyzing the girl? All he could do was shrug to himself as he finally arrived at his calculus class taking his customary seat at the front. There was a time for wondering and a time to focus. “Good morning Ms. Davies.” He said with a smile to the teacher as he brought out his notepad and textbook. “Good morning, Collin.” Ms. Davies smiled and nodded at him. The teacher also automatically gave out a few louder greeting responses as more students filed into her class. As she took a head count, she relaxed seeing more smiles than not for a Monday. Since she was teaching one of the more advanced classes, she had a class size that was the half of norm. So it was easier to keep track of the students. Collin immediately started to take down the problem that they would be working on for the day. As the class filled and began, the teacher went over the steps on how to solve the new equation. As the teacher went over the steps he took down each of the steps and put in the reasoning of why it was done for his notes. This class was usually so easy to predict what was going to happen since most of the kids in calculus wanted to at the very least try and learn what was being taught. As in most classes Collin didn’t really talk to others, he just worked on the assignment and stayed absorbed in his thoughts. At times throughout, his thoughts would circle around trying to decipher why Skaiylee invited him to come to her performance. Granted, the performances were good and even some of them turned out to be fun. He was just a bookworm all in all and his nose always felt the most comfortable while buried in a good book. Which is why he really preferred to interact with less peers than others. Skaiylee Farris also was a very talkative young lady in character, so he truly had no idea what flirting would be like from someone like her. When she wished to communicate, there weren't as many opportunities to wait and see how she felt or how she interpreted things based on her body language, given the fact that she usually just vocalized it. Before Collin could watch and analyze her. He was quite the opposite As he wasn't much of a talker himself, and the majority of his communication reception from others came from focusing on emotions and reading body language. After all, his parents were always of the mind that someone should pay attention and carefully listen to what people have to say. LISTENING referred to watching and paying attention as well as retaining communicated words. He was taught to listen to everything before giving a response and even then, sometimes it was best to keep answers brief and to the point with no embellishment needed. And the young man was very much his parents' son. - Collin was the child of Dr. Jeremy Garrett, and lawyer Samantha Faye-Garrett. They both had strong work ethic and believed that education was the cornerstone of success. Everything else came second. Social networking, recreational play, leisure activity; it all came after ones' time has been adequately spent immersed in learning or working. With parents like that, it was no wonder Collin would prefer to spend his time engaged in academics as opposed to being a typical teenager, most of whom prefer to have fun and enjoy social interactions. That included Skai. She was a social teen. So the lingering question that remained for Collin was, was Skaiylee interested in Collin as more than a lab partner or even friend? Collin had not really had any experience with any Boyfriend or girlfriend before. He'd not ventured into relationships yet at all, though he did have some friends in his clubs. But that was about it. And his friends even were not anything like a romantic relationship type of deal. Just friends who shared common interests. After thinking it through with attention to details over the last hour of class, it did seem to become clear that Skai definitely had some interest in him, whether as becoming a friend or something more, he couldn't tell yet. And how did he really feel about that? He knew that his family didn’t really want him to have any girlfriend or anything like it until he was in college so he could ensure primary focus on his schooling for as long as possible. Getting ahead of the curve to make his life easier later on was pushed heavily by his parents. Collin also didn't really ever have interest in anyone so far nor did he know of anyone with interest in him, so he'd never really focused on dating. He also wanted to get his schooling taken care of and out of the way so he could go to college and become a doctor himself. He really loved science and planned to follow in his fathers footsteps and practice medicine. But also be involved with science. But outside of school? He really never gave it much thought before; If a girl had come to show interest in him for a relationship? He started to think it would be a wise move to perhaps start thinking of whether he would he take the opportunity to date if the chance arose..... He should really decide for himself at this point. He was 16 years old after all…. As he started to think on what had gone on so far with Skaiylee, he searched his own emotions to see if he wanted to be together with her? Did he like her? She did seem like a nice girl aside from her blatant disregard for school. She didn’t at all work hard in class and his parents would never approve. But, she did work really hard on her music. She had the drive to be a good student. He did think that there was a way to help fix her feelings toward general Ed if someone would be willing to put the time in to help her. Would that person end up being him if they were friends? Or If they were an item? And Should it be him to help her? Would it then be his responsibility to take on? Even now when their relationship is undefined, should he still aim to help her improve herself so she could get through school? It seemed like a decent thing to do..... Though regardless of her school adventures, he did think he should focus on the possible friendship opportunity. Or any dual romantic interest there could be if that's where things headed..... Skaiylee was nice to him. She could sing and play music well, and she seemed fun to be around if the people in her company around school were any indication… If she wanted to date him, would he want to date her? As his mind bounced back and forth with the issue, he came to realize that maybe it was time to venture beyond the books. He did want to start having more social interactions unrelated to schooling. He loved school, no doubt about it. And learning gave him drive and happiness. But there were times he wanted companionship. Skai did look quite cute today now that he thought about it. Did he always find her cute? Or did that start this late morning since she asked him to her show? When the bell rang for lunch, Collin packed up his things late, as the majority of the class was already out of their seats and bombarding to get out of the classroom door. Skymouth Performing in the quad for lunch always made the school get a little hyper. Most people were into the pop rocky music that they tended to play. I was kind of indifferent to the genre to be honest, but it was enjoyable at least. "Skymouth" is playing a new song today! Let's go!" A few gals mutterred. "Hurry! Jebs got new drumsticks! Ahhh! He'll probably toss his old ones into the crowd like last year!!" "Bailey said Cobys new haircut is sick! I gotta See this!" A few guys exclaimed. "Skais originals are always fire! I cant wait!" More friends of hers said. Collin half smiled to himself, and decided that even though he did not know much about relationships, he would start here and go to Skais performance. He had nothing to lose to attend and afterward, if Skaiylee expressed interest in him in some way, hopefully he would not mess up anything too badly.... Only sometime later, would he come to learn that he probably should have put more thought into his choices of dating at this age, since he was really not at all ready for the roller coaster of everything they would be getting themselves into together this year..... ~~~~~~