"Well, I was just waiting for you," Bradley shrugged, curious about this rule-abiding girl who was unlike most of the students in the school.
"Weren't you instructed to wait at your locker?" Annie looked at him with an annoyed expression, rubbing her forehead in frustration.
"You were just too fast," he said, trying to control his smile, knowing it was the most obvious lie ever.
Annie seemed to notice but didn't comment. Instead, she pulled out a notepad from her breast pocket and started writing something.
"Oh, what's that?" He leaned toward her to look at the notepad, which she immediately hid, looking back at him with a glare.
"My bad!" He lightly raised his hands in apology, knowing he had overdone it.
"Good. Now, follow me, and I shouldn't hear a single word from your mouth." Turning around, she started walking toward the stairs while still writing something on her notepad.
"Sure, sure," he lightly replied and followed behind her, still trying to peek at her notepad. 'Can't help it.' Even though he didn't want to invade her privacy, his curiosity was too strong.
His peeking was stopped when she put the notepad inside her breast pocket just as they reached the stairs. While a little annoyed he couldn't see what it was, he lightly sped up to match her pace and walked down the stairs beside her.
"Hey, I was curious about something?" Bored by the silence as they walked down, he decided to ask what he was initially curious about.
"Didn't I say not to say a single word!?" Annie looked at him with an annoyed expression. "And no, I'm not going to tell you the notepad's content."
"Ah, it's not about that. I was just curious about why you are so strict," he said, lightly shaking his head and asking the question he was initially curious about. 'And you're gonna get wrinkles if you keep making that face,' he thought, but didn't voice it, looking at her grumpy face.
"What are you talking about? I'm acting like how a student should be. It's all you guys who are too unruly," Annie said, shaking her head. "Now stop talking to me."
"Really? Because look at those girls." He lightly pointed toward the girls who were loudly gossiping inside the cafeteria as they passed it. "That's what I expect girls your age to do: having fun with your friends."
"Those four…" Annie looked at them curiously and then pulled out her notepad again. "Thanks for pointing it out. They were supposed to be in class. Let me deal with them after your locker stuff."
"Ah…" What he thought was a great example turned out to be a disaster for those girls, and he lightly apologized to them in his mind. 'So that's what the notepad is for?' Realizing the notepad was for keeping track of unruly students, he understood why she had pulled it out earlier, but he didn't care much about it.
"Anyway, whatever you are trying is not going to work, so follow quietly." Putting the notepad back, she gave him one last look and went down the stairs again.
"Well, I wasn't trying anything. I was just curious about you," he shrugged, looking back at those girls who were enjoying their last moments of freedom.
"Remove that curiosity then, as there's nothing interesting here." Annie looked back at him with a glare. "And stop talking."
"Hey, I can't just leave you hanging, and don't be like that. You're more interesting than you think." He replied lightly. While he had met various people who were like her, they were never as strict as she was.
Instead of answering, she stopped in her steps and looked back at him with a strange gaze. After a few seconds, she turned and started walking down the stairs again.
"Looks like I ain't getting any answers? Well, it was fun talking with you, though, and go easy on those girls." Realizing what she was trying to do, he still tried to continue the conversation, but once again received no response.
After a while, they finally reached the ground floor, and she turned around to look back at him with her usual grumpy expression.
"Which one is your locker?" she asked while looking around the floor for any unruly students, as maintaining order in the school was her priority.
"Obviously the one with 'Dead Dad!' scratched on it." He pointed toward his locker, laughing at the person who had done such a childish thing.
"Any idea who did that?" she asked, lightly touching the scratches. He shrugged his shoulder. "Don't know. It happened while I was away."
"Alright then, I will look into it later," she said, once again taking out her notepad and writing something on it. "Anyway, let's get this over with."
After putting back her notepad, she took a key from her shirt pocket under the blazer and used it to open the locker door.
"Oh, is that the master key?" He looked at the key curiously, memorizing its pattern.
"Guess it right. It opens every locker in this school," she said with a proud grin, which was unlike her usual grumpy expression.
"Oh, and how did you get it?" he asked curiously, as he didn't expect Mrs. Smith to hand over such a valuable key to a student.
"Um, because I bust my ass everyday helping Mrs. Smith to keep kids like you in line." She looked at him with an annoyed expression, wiping the grin from her face.
"Hey, I didn't do anything bad. And 'kids'? We are the same age," he said, shaking his head. It wasn't his fault that all his grades had suddenly dropped to E-.
"...Yeah, right," she said, looking him up and down with a judging gaze. "Anyway, go get your stuff from the locker."