Kara

The days that I thought would be wonderful with teaching experience in a good reputable school turned out to be hell when the school principal assigned me to coach seven mischievous boys to dance.

I protested the headmaster who burdened me with dance coaching while I was a history teacher. That did not make sense. Instead of listening to my argument, she set the schedule for me to start coaching in a few days. Hearing her announcement, I could do nothing but accept it with mixed feelings. Neither did I dance in my whole life nor was I a fan of the dance or anything related to it. Dance didn't intrigue me at all and it would never be. Nevertheless, the decision had been made. I forcefully had to do what I was told to.

I got out of the principal’s office with the entire burden piled up in my head. It wasn’t only about dance, the thing I never did make me worried. More than that, it was about those seven boys who called themselves Stars 7

Stars Seven

, the boys without privilege except being born in a rich family and having a handsome faces.

Stars 7, I absently muttered the name. Their faces abruptly slid through my mind one by one like a played movie. Colin Anderson the leader, a boy with blue eyes followed by the others: Dan Wilson, the green-eyed boy, Terry William the boy with exotic dark skin, Darren Thomson the red-haired boy, Ken Nakamura a slanting-eye Japanese boy, Reed Brown the boy with brown skin and Alan Smith, the tallest of all occupied my memory. Shaking my head, I got rid of their faces out of my mind.

I inhaled and exhaled, attempting to relax. How could my life be this sucked? For a moment, I closed my eyes and kept walking. My feet tumbled and my body fell forwards. I hit and stuck on the strong and strapping figure. I looked upon the boy in rebel jeans and a blue t-shirt wrapped in the unzipped denim jacket that at the same time looked down on me. He was 6 feet 4 inches tall with an intimidating countenance. His blue eyes and messy straight blond hair confirmed who he was. Colin Anderson was standing right before my eyes with a grin masking his visage. I flinched backward spontaneously.

"I'm…." My word died on my tongue as he cut it off.

“What a clumsy girl,” he mocked me. My eyes widened in incredulity; how could this seventeen-year-old boy belittle me as if I was nothing before him?

“What the hell did you say?” This impudent boy didn’t deserve my apology. I should teach him how to behave. “Don’t your parents teach you courtesy? I’m your teacher."

“So, what?” he confronted with a smirk on his face.

“You should respect your teacher,” I said strictly

“Now, you beg my respect?”

“What? How can you be so discourteous?” I spoke in high intonation. I was no longer able to hold my patience. He hunched his body, lowered his head to my ear, and whispered something. I took some steps backward. But, I still could hear his sentences.

“Listen! I know you’re a new teacher here. Let me tell you one thing. No one here has the nerve to criticize me. Watch your mouth.” Then, he lifted his head. I saw confidence and pride cover his face.

What he did had crossed the line. Besides, I had been teaching here for more than three months. At least, with three months of experience, I was not considered as a new teacher in this school. I was about to respond. However, his towering body walked toward me and nudged me aside. My hands clenched into fists, keeping all the vexation in my heart.

I turned around to face his back which had almost vanished in the corridor and promised myself to teach him a lesson. I swiveled to go back to the teacher’s office and found some students staring at me ruefully. I couldn’t figure out what’s on their mind. But, I was sure they were anxious about me.

Getting into the teacher’s room, I heard my name mentioned by some teachers there. It seemed they gossiped about me. It didn’t affect me though. I went straight to my desk in the corner and put my bag on it. Picking up some textbooks on the bookshelf on the other side of the room, I took a seat and immersed myself in the book.

One of the teachers, the bob light brown-haired woman approached me. She smiled at me and I returned her sincere smile.

“Good morning, Miss Corby.”

“Good Morning, Mrs. Hartman.”

“I heard that you were on duty to take care of those seven boys, Stars 7. I’m sorry about that.”

“Why?”

“Just for your information, no one succeeds to handle them. I wish you the best of luck this time,” she alerted me. I put my book down. Her threatening words worsened my day.

The quietness filled the room after the teacher who talked to me left. The clock on the wall struck 8. The bell rang to signify the first class would begin in a minute. With all the things which crawled around my brain, I marched to the classroom where I taught. I didn’t teach this level before. Besides, it was my first meeting after the summer break so I was a little bit nervous. I just felt something had been waiting for me in the classroom.

I recited some prayers before stepping inside the room. I never felt this worried. This feeling got deeper and deeper. The room was large enough with a capacity of twenty students. The teacher’s desk was right next to the screen which folded down. There was a board hanging on the wall. As one of the best schools in the city, the school also provided laptops and projectors for teaching and learning. The students sat at the seat lining up in four rows.

I greeted them. They all responded except one boy that I just realized as Dan Wilson, one of the seven boys who would be my trainee in the school dance club later. He was busy focusing on the object in his hand, a mobile phone. That pissed me off. How could he ignore his teacher speaking before the class? I went toward him who was still absorbed by whatever was on the screen of his phone. It seemed nothing could distract his attention.

“What are you doing, Mr. Wilson?” He idly faced his handphone down and looked upon me. His stern face didn’t show regret or guilt. He was as calm as the river. His eyes gazed sharply at mine.

“I’m sorry.” He said calmly. Then, in a second, he took and kept his electronic device in his backpack.

Compared to Colin who tended to be frontal, Dan looked kind and obedient. At least, he was cooperative enough.

“Thank you for your cooperation.” I spun around to start the class. After taking a few steps to the front, my feet skidded. My buttock kissed the floor harshly. Dan Wilson spontaneously burst out laughing. Meanwhile, a few students covered their chuckles with their hands. Some watched me in sympathy. The rest acted nonchalantly.

The pain suddenly spread over my whole body. I grimaced and bit my lips. The destiny put me into the most embarrassing moment that I’d ever experienced before. At first, I thought the floor was too slippery. Then, I found out that something slipped beneath my heel. It was bubble gum. Someone threw it on purpose to get me into an accident. I managed to get up and glanced around to spot the suspect. I knew who the culprit was when my eyes finally landed on that green-eyed boy who was chewing the bubble gum. Dan Wilson. He wasn’t like what I thought he had been. I changed my judgment toward him.

“Dan Wilson! You’re free to leave, now!” I asked him in a rage while pointing to the exit. He didn’t argue. Surging at his feet, that boy grabbed his backpack and walked out of the classroom.

“See you after school, Miss Kara Corby.” He sneered and winked at me while parting. Driven by his bad attitude, I was eager to throw him my outrage.

I heard students murmuring something while I dragged my feet to the teacher’s desk. They looked down on their book as soon as I turned to them. I let the serenity drown us for a while before I inhaled and spoke.

“You need to be mindful with what you do. I just would like to set an example by letting Dan Wilson go out”. The students listened to my words in silence. None of them even lifted their chin. “I hope this kind of thing won’t happen in the future. At least, respect others if you want others to respect you.”

The students did not react to what I said. Their eyes still focused on their book. I was clueless if they listened to me or not. I had known since the first time, those seven boys had power over all the students here. Nevertheless, I never thought that their position in the school even influenced other students deeply.

From the file the school principal had given me, I got some information regarding those seven handsome rich boys. As the only child in his family, Colin Anderson, the leader in the group, was an heir of his father's business empire. Besides establishing the largest hospital in the city, Michael Anderson, Colin’s father, developed a real-estate business. Meanwhile, his mother worked as a heart surgeon. Anderson’s family contributed the biggest donation to the school. With all the assets, Anderson became one of the ten richest people in Vermont.

Dan Wilson was the second child of a successful businessman, Eric Wilson. He undoubtedly would inherit his father’s five stars hotel. Terry was also considered a lucky boy. As the only son of an American lawyer and an African designer with a popular brand, Terry William lived a luxurious life.

Having a famous mother and sister as models and father, a Broadway actor, Darren Thomson gained popularity in the school due to his family name. Ken Nakamura was Japanese, the only Asian in the group. His parents owned a famous big sushi restaurant.

Little did the school know about Reed Brown, as an American politician his father never exposed his family’s private life. The public didn’t even have a record about his wife, Reed’s mother. The last was Alan Smith, a son of a former American basketball athlete who had retired. His father coached a national basketball team. His mother was a yoga trainer.

I jolted back to reality when one of the students called my name. A curly, short, tawny-haired girl was submitting her essay while reminding me that the class had ended. I slowly left the classroom after collecting all the students' assignments.

Today’s class did not run as I expected. Colin and Dan had successfully ruined my day. What about the other five boys? Were they the same or even worse? Thinking about them made me almost insane. I instantly rubbed my hair.

The images of those seven boys and everything about them was still running around my head even after my steps took me to pass the corridor heading back to the teachers' room. Unexpectedly, I saw someone familiar not far from where I was. The boy was smiling at me. Yet, his smile didn’t indicate friendliness. It was a warning.

My memory recalled his words.

“See you after school, Miss Kara Corby.” His sentence played in my head like a song. Suddenly fear took over me.

What had Dan Wilson planned for me?