Jennie Kim.

A complete mystery to Lisa. Avoiding her for the span of the school year thus far was probably why. Okay, avoiding isn’t the right word. Not communicating or making the slightest effort to engage with the girl sounds about right. Their paths had just never crossed. Not until that God forsaken day.

Her class was having their first unit test for biology. Lisa wasn’t as strong in biology as she was in other subjects so she’d studied long and hard for it.

Their teacher had decided to seperate the grouped desks and seat the students in alphabetical order by last name that day to ensure nobody would “cheat with their friends” – as he’d so elegantly put it. It was just for that one class so no one complained, the next day they would all be back in groups with their friends.

Lisa was seated at the desk next to Jennie that day. She didn’t pay her much attention. Not even when Jennie had peeked at her test paper when Mr. Croker wasn’t looking. 

The test came to an end a minute before the bell rang. As the papers were being collected Lisa couldn’t help but think she did well on that test. Her studying paid off, she knew most if not all the answers. She’d never been so confident.

Little did she know that wall of confidence she had built would come crashing down the next day. Which was today. The unnecessarily loud bell rang indicating the end of the science class and the beginning of lunch. As Lisa was gathering her things to leave her teacher spoke making her look up in confusion.

“Jennie and Lisa. Please stay, I’d like to talk to the both of you,” was what he had said.

Countless thoughts ran through Lisa’s mind in the time of a mere second. Am I in trouble? being the most evident. She sat down, a wave of nervousness washing over her.

She looked at Jennie who was one step out the door. The girl let out a sigh of reluctance and sat down at a desk closest to the door in front of the room.

Mr. Croker stood up to close the classroom door to keep out the loud chatter of teenagers outside.

“So I was marking the tests from yesterday,” he started while walking over to his desk to pick up two of the said test papers, one in each hand, and holding them up. “And these two looked quite similar. Can you guess whose they are?”

Lisa was one hundred and ten percent sure they were very much in trouble after completely processing what Mr. Croker was implying.

“You don’t have to answer that.” Mr. Croker continued setting the papers back on his desk. “They’re yours. I’m sure you two have figured that out by now.”

Lisa had come to a conclusion after the teacher had finished his statement. Jennie had cheated off her.

“Mr. Croker. If you’re implying that one of us cheated – “

“That’s exactly what I’m implying,” he told Lisa.

“Well I can assure you it was not me.”

“Well, Mr. Croker,” Jennie spoke. She had an accent that Lisa couldn’t put her finger on. It was a mix of British and Australian. It reminded of her friend, Rosie’s accent. She had to admit, it was an attractive quality.

“It wasn’t me either.”

Lisa clenched her