"What did you say, freak?" an angry teenager with far too broad of a back raised his voice as he grabbed his opponent by the collar of the flannel he wore over his white shirt.

"I said you'll be sorry soon enough, you fucking psycho!" the one whose collar was being pulled yelled back, his face so red and his veins bulging so hard that onlookers wondered if his head was going to explode.

Some rock'n'roll was blaring from a wireless speaker that another student had brought in and turned up to full volume before this fight started.

But what was it about? There were many who had no idea, in fact only one person knew. Hallie, who was standing right behind the "freak", also known as Johnathan Cunningham.

"Stop it, Johnny, please!" the girl begged, "He's not worth it."

"Don't protect him, Hallie. Not after what he did to you." She tried to pull him back by his arms, since Johnny was no match for the school quarterback. "I hope a Miracle happens and you get what you deserve."

Shane Devlin wasn't the smartest guy on earth, but even he could tell when he was being threatened. Then again, this wasn't the kind of threat you'd want to take seriously.

"You and what God are going to bring this Miracle down on me, huh?" he said in a mocking tone, though his clenched jaw showed no change in his anger.

Suddenly, the constant background noise died down in a heartbeat. The room fell silent, as even the bickering students didn't say a word at that moment.

Confused, they looked around and saw a delicate finger pressing the power button on the music box that had been causing half the noise in the classroom.

The same hands that had turned off another student's speaker were now clapping loudly, exactly once. "That's it, calm down and take your seats, class is about to start."

It was strange. He was by far the shortest, even though he was the oldest, but when he came in, people felt compelled to do what he said.

'Well, they wouldn't normally, would they?' Hallie thought, still fascinated by the charisma he exuded. 'Even troublemakers like Shane or his cronies Eric and Derek - when their class president spoke, they at least stopped to listen.'

With a sigh, she let go of her friend Johnny, who was sulking but also listening.

"Why are we even doing what he says?" Derek asked as Shane sat down with his feet on the table of his seat.

"I can't get detention now. Did you forget about the game next Friday?"

"They wouldn't really put you on the bench, would they? You're the quarterback."

"How would I know? Shut up." He reacted with irritation because he didn't like to admit that he didn't enjoy going up against this particular midget.

Truth be told, Ezra King was the kind of guy he would have normally picked at the beginning of their first term, and probably would have ended up torturing him for the next four years. But there was something about that short and skinny appearance that made him different.

Maybe his athleticism, in spite of his lack of muscles? Or the look in his eyes and the commanding tone of his voice?

He didn't like it, but he didn't want to deal with it either, so he steered clear of the goody-two-shoes, it was better that way. Better for him anyway.

"Hey, Ez, can you look into that?" someone said as their brown-haired, brown-eyed class rep wiped some old squiggly lines left by their homeroom teacher off the blackboard before getting ready to sit down himself.

"What do you mean?" He looked at his classmate, a boy with freckles on his nose, tall and lanky. 'What was his name? Morgan?'

"I don't know, their fight seemed a bit serious, don't you think?"

"Why? It's not my place to look into that."

"Yes, but I think you could help anyway. You're good at it."

Ezra knew that what he said wasn't true. After all, he was good at exerting pressure, people mistaking it for a form of respect they felt, maybe even a sense of insecurity or fear, but he wasn't good at conflict management. More than that, he simply didn't care and didn't want to get involved in their business.

When he looked over at the two usual suspects, as it always was whenever there was a fight going on, he could see Shane and Derek sticking their heads together, while Eric looked back in Ezra's direction apologetically. Derek would always be the one trying to stand up to Ezra by telling Shane to stand up to him, while Eric would take the path with fewer obstacles and pretend to be innocent.

Not that the recipient of those sentiments had ever cared one way or the other. With a sigh, he turned to look at the other, rather unassuming party. Johnathan Cunningham was a kid with a bright future, but he was too caught up in his feelings of alienation from the world after entering high school. He's the typical kid who grew up thinking he was smarter than all the other kids because he didn't play with a ball or chase girls. Instead, they ruin their grades by skipping class and meeting secretly to drink alcohol.

He sighed again. 'Hallie should know better,' he figured, since they had known each other for more than two years. They even talked sometimes.

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She looked uncomfortable when their eyes met. It was clear that she had something to do with what had happened between Shane and Johnny, but again, it was a stupid fight between two stupid teenagers with raging hormones. 'They will get over it.'

At that moment, the teacher came in, looking surprised at the order in the classroom, even though he'd seen it so often. But there was a heavy atmosphere looming over their heads, ready to come down on them at any time.

For a few hours, Ezra simply did what he was supposed to do. After delivering a stack of papers to a teacher in another class, he headed back to the break room, where the teacher of his parallel class caught up with him.

"Mr. King, do you have a minute?"

'Not really, I'm busy,' he thought, but kept himself from rolling his eyes at the middle-aged man, "Sure, it's lunchtime after all." He smiled instead. 'Right, what else could I be doing right now?'

"There is a new student starting this week, she will be part of my class starting Wednesday."

"A change after the year has already started?"

"As far as I know, her parents found a new job here in Ridgewood. But it's unfortunate for her to come into a class that's already settled in, so I'm afraid she might not find any connections here."

"And you want me to take care of her?" He felt it coming, and all his instincts wanted to scream at Mr. Henry for his laziness. 'If you're so worried, you might as well help her yourself, why don't you?'

They stopped for a moment by a row of unoccupied lockers, keeping their conversation discreet. "I know it must sound unfair to burden you with such a responsibility, but you are the most suitable for the job," he claimed, sounding sympathetic, "our new student is not the only new student we will get this week, so I thought I would ask you before Ms. Brier does."

'Brier? She teaches the seniors. There is no way she is gonna ask a junior to mentor a senior.' It seemed absurd. "I'll see what I can do."

"Great. If it doesn't work out, it's not your fault. We'll just see how it goes, okay?"

'It won't work out because I'm not really going to try.' He smiled warmly instead of saying anything and gestured a quick goodbye to the teacher in front of him.

When he went out to get some air, someone was waiting for him by the tree where he usually sat listening to music without being disturbed. A girl with black shoulder-length hair stood there, staring off into the distance as he approached.

"Hallie," he said to get her attention, "did you need something?"

A little startled, her head whipped around in his direction to meet his questioning gaze, but averting her eyes right after. "Oh, there you are. I was actually looking for you."

"I thought so."

For a good minute, they just stood there, alternating between scanning their surroundings and looking at each other, not quite meeting with their eyes.

Not wanting to waste any more of his precious alone time, Ezra sighed and put his bag down in the usual place. "This is about the fight from this morning, isn't it?" After all, he had seen her as a spectator, but her words had made it seem as if she was more than that.

"Yes," she replied meekly, looking away again, as if searching for the answer to her question in the bark of the tree next to her, "Ez, can I... Could I talk to you about something? Something private." There was an awkward feel to her words and the silence that followed.

"Why would you want to talk to me about something like that?" They barely knew each other, even if they had exchanged a few words here and there, so he wasn't the right person to turn to, in his opinion.

He would claim to know her and Johnny better than most people in the school, but that was a given since he rarely spoke to anyone on a personal level.

From her point of view, she shouldn't feel very close to him at all. He was sure he'd seen her with people close enough to share her period schedule, but he was certainly not one of them.

He went drinking with her and Johnny once in their second year, just to try it out. But in the end, he left without even drinking because it seemed too trivial.

"I don't know. Johnny's so..." She checked her surroundings again. "He's so emotional. You saw it yourself. But you're not like that, you're more..."

"Calm and collected?" he finished her sentence, jokingly, with an affected smile.

"Cold," she said, "well, not that it's a bad thing or so, it's just how you come off sometimes. You're really nice, but... very distant. And that's why I thought maybe I could talk to you about it."

She thought it would make her feel braver to know that the other person didn't feel anything when they talked to her. A lot of people didn't see it; the teachers didn't see it.

But she saw it, that one evening they spent together, she could tell it was all for show. It was probably a miracle in and of itself that he could even remember their names, but that only spoke to his diligence and efficiency.

He was like a machine.

And like a machine he felt to her. 'Cold,' she repeated in her mind. That's what she saw when he looked at her right now, as if her heart would freeze.

Ironically, that itself made her feel calmer. With people like Johnny, their emotions made her feel even more anxious. Talking to him before had made everything even worse, and she wasn't ready to face that type of mess.

But with a "Not now, look for someone else first," he kicked her to the curb the next moment, smiling a warm and kind smile, while plugging in his earphones.

It was a slap in the face, but at the same time, she didn't feel disappointed. Funnily enough, she expected something like this to happen. So she didn't show any hard feelings as she walked away while he watched her disappear.

Ezra, on the other hand, hadn't expected any of this. Still, he didn't feel bad about it. He wasn't the one she was looking for. If she knew it herself? All the better.

In the end, he did get pestered by the senior's teacher, but since he had already committed to mentoring someone else, he unfortunately had to say no. Otherwise, it was a very quiet day in this suburban town.

"I'm home," the eighteen-year-old said, barely louder than he usually spoke, as he entered one of the many similar looking houses on the street. No one noticed, which was to be expected, since his father was still at work, his mother was probably busy cooking and couldn't hear him over the noise of the extractor hood, and his younger sister was upstairs listening to loud pop music on repeat.

He could smell the food, and when he reached the second floor, he could hear music that sounded all the same, but this time it was in a language he couldn't understand.

"Ease up on the volume, Jen!" he yelled, knocking on the door as he passed it to reach his own room.

"Who's listening to your bitching?" she yelled back, but had to turn the music down anyway to make sure he could hear her.

"Stop yelling at each other and come down to eat, both of you," their mother chimed in from downstairs, "and don't forget to wash your hands first!"

Just as he was putting his things in his bedroom and going to wash his hands, trying to find some space at the sink next to his sister Jennifer, he felt his cell phone vibrate.

There weren't many people who had that number. In fact, most of them were with him in this very house. He turned away from the washbasin and scooted over to his room, as if he had just forgotten something.

"Where?" he said, the first thing he did after answering the call from an unknown number which he knew by heart.

"This is different," the deep voice on the other end said, "there's someone you need to meet."

"Why?"

He couldn't see it, but a wry smile formed on the lips of the man he was talking to. "It seems you have finally been chosen as a Mentor."