My second chance in a strange reverse world!

The rusty hinges of the classroom door resonated around the room as I pushed it open, causing a few heads to turn in my direction. I could feel numerous girls' gazes on me, ranging from interested to flirty. The boys, on the other hand, seemed unconcerned by my entrance, soon returning to whatever they were doing before. My gaze darted around the room, stopping on Peyton and Kevin, who both seemed relieved to see me, their stiff shoulders now relaxed.

I proceeded to my chair, and despite the fact that I could still feel the girls' attention on me, I wasn't as nervous as I had been. Perhaps I was becoming accustomed to being the focus of attention. I couldn't help but applaud my adaptability.

On my way to the place Peyton and Kevin had prepared for me, I observed a familiar girl seated in one of the seats at the front of the classroom.

She was the girl with glasses and brown hair from the morning; I knew it was her from the plain red long-sleeved shirt she wore, which had a small logo of what I presumed to be a band. As I observed her, I couldn't help but think that she was doing a fantastic job of hiding her true beauty —or ugliness— behind those thick frames and unkempt brown hair.

She was engaged in her algebra book, her eyes buried under her hair veil. However, she looked up to see me because of the loudness of my walking. Her eyes, —now visible beyond the hair veil and glasses— become intrigued yet suspicious, as if she was used to others not paying attention to her, yet she was questioning why I looked at her.

Now knowing that she was basically the equivalent of my past, paranoid and probably harassed self, I wanted to be friendly and smiled and waved at her, causing her to widen her eyes and look back, as if looking for the person I had waved at.

She seemed to retreat into her shell when she noticed I was waving at her, burying her face in her mathematics book and retreating back in her seat.

I wondered why she would do something like that, in my old reality if someone said hello to me at school and it wasn't some kind of trick, they would basically be fulfilling the one requirement to automatically in my head be my best friend, and if it was a girl, —which is basically what I am in this reality of reversed gender roles,— I would have basically fallen in love instantly.

I was confused until I heard a girl speak. "Did Alex really say hello to Sage?" the girl near the back of the classroom asked incredulously, but with a hint of annoyance in her voice.

"What did you do to Alex, Sage, huh?"

Another girl complimented the previous comments, addressing me. "If she's blackmailing you Alex, tell us, we'll smash her face in, okay?" She said, her black eyes confident and angry.

I grimaced. Now I understand.

This was a colossal oversight on my side. I should have known that if I said hello to the girl —who I now knew was named Sage— and ignored the others, the other girls would become jealous. However, I couldn't really blame myself because no other female had ever waved at me in public at school save my younger sister, and it was common knowledge that she was my younger sister because she was virtually famous for her looks. As a result, no one was particularly envious.

"A-ah, I-I didn't do anything." I heard Sage say hesitantly, as the atmosphere seemed to get increasingly tense.

I cursed in my head because I was realizing now that there were so many more people talking to me that I had a bad habit of getting lost in my thoughts in the middle of a conversation. So turning my attention back to the increasingly tense atmosphere, I quickly tried to fix what I had done.

"N-No need." I said quickly drawing the girls' attention to me and pulling the attention away from the self-conscious Sage. "I was just being nice, nothing more."

"Are you sure, Alex?" the girl in the background asked again.

"Yes," I said, this time a little more firmly. "I don't want anyone to do anything to her, understand?"

I received a few worried and hesitant looks, but after a while they just said. "If Alex says so"

I felt like a parent scolding their fighting children, but I really hoped that my words had done something to at least help Sage. I felt bad for her, but nevertheless, this was the most I could do for the moment.

When I finally reached my seat by the window, Peyton quickly turned to look at me. "Are you okay?" He asked, I thought he was referring to the conversation just now, but he continued. "Kevin and I went to the infirmary and you were gone, neither was teacher Smith." He grimaced. "We thought the worst for a moment."

Kevin joined the conversation. "We were worried about you."

"Sorry guys." I excused myself, however, as I was about to continue, I felt like slapping myself in the face. "I forgot my backpack."

As I was about to get up, Kevin smiled knowingly and lifted a very familiar backpack. "You were looking for it?"

I smiled. It was great that they were so considerate. "Thank you." I said grabbing my backpack and after taking out the math book and putting it on top of the desk, I continued our conversation from earlier. "I don't know why you thought I was in trouble though, teacher Smith is not that kind of person."

Peyton and Kevin shared a look. "Alex, it's always better to be safe than sorry. Even if she seems nice, you can never really know someone's true intentions.," Peyton continued, approaching me as if telling a horror story. “There have been cases of male students being taken advantage of by female staff, so it's best not to be alone with someone you don't know well."

Although I could see where Peyton was going with this talk, I found myself needing to defend teacher Smith. "She's a good person, she didn't do anything inappropriate, believe me."

Kevin sighed, shaking his head. "I thought you weren't so naive Alex, now you're making me worry about your safety."

I snorted and folded my arms, plopping down on the desk. "I can take care of myself."

"Yeah yeah sure," Peyton scoffed.  "But still, Jackie chan, share your location when you're alone somewhere with a woman, you can do at least that, right?" Peyton looked me in the eye. "We care about you."

My face softened a little. "Sure, no problem."

"Good." He smiled brightly and right after that a teacher came in to teach math class.

Harvier

Sorry for not bringing a chapter last week. My procastination and my exams came together and for the first time I was a little worried about my results. However, in the end I succeeded!