Southern Californ-I

II.

Southern Californ-i

<>The Next Day<>

Pulling into the student parking lot, I cut the engine and gathered my binder along with all the papers I had to fill out the night before. I was nervous as ever because I don't know what schools out here were like. It's not that I don't have social skills, it's just I don't exactly like people. I'll speak if spoken to but I'm not one to start a conversation, like ever. If I'm lucky enough, I won't have any attention on me and I'll be sent to the back of all my classes where I can gladly hide in a book or something.

Stepping out of the car, I needed to drop the papers off in the office and then get my schedule. My purse resting on my forearm and my binder in my other, I walked straight through the doors and was shocked at just how many people there were. You had people hanging out by their lockers, couples walking hand in hand-if not making out on the steps or against a wall- and you could clearly distinguish social groups. There were the cheerleaders, the jocks, band and many others but it was clear that none of these groups were for me.

Keeping my head low, I just made my way to the office trying not to bump into anyone or be bumped into. I pulled out the papers and handed them to the secretary. She put her glasses on and eyed my paper before typing in a few thing into her computer. She handed me a small half sheet of paper that had my classes and first was english... at least it's a class I'm good in but I'd much rather have had an elective first thing in the morning. Second was chemistry, third was an off period, fourth was history, fifth was culinary and sixth was another off period. Not too bad of a schedule so now the challenge was finding all these class rooms. If I were to take a guess, I'd assume core classes were on the first floor and electives on the second.

"Vanity, here's your locker and combination." The secretary said as she handed me a sticky note. "If you need help finding your classes, there's a directory right outside the office." She said with a smile and I thanked her before walking out of the office to take a look at the directory. It wasn't too hard to follow, so as long as I stay downstairs till lunch, I'm fine. My classes were all near each other and the ones upstairs I could look for during lunch or even my off period. Something as small as figuring out my classes made me feel about ten times more relaxed but the sensation of many sets of eyes just staring at me was unsettling.

I had a few minutes till the bell rang so I decided to just listen to music as I headed to my class. Again my head remained down but this time at my phone as I got text after text from Mickey. The music silenced everyone around me and I felt like I was the only one in the hallway.

From the tops of my eyes, I saw others coming my way so I stepped off to the left to avoid them and then focused back into my phone to change the song when I felt a sudden bump.

"Watch out, God damn. There's a whole fucking hallway." He spat at me when I looked up at him. He was the same guy from yesterday and he had his eyebrows furrowed yet again but I just chose to play it off like I couldn't hear him from my headphones and just went on my way. The tone of his voice sounded like he had so much hate. It startled me and I didn't even as much as see him there when I stepped to the side... was bumping into him that much of a problem? Jeez, if someone bumped into me I wouldn't have raised my voice and gotten mad about it.

When I reached my classroom, I took out my earbuds and stuffed them into my purse, along with my phone and found the teacher sitting in the back at his desk with a pile of books just off to the side. I cleared my throat before approaching him with a paper in hand.