Alone Together

2 - In the New School

Alfred woke to Journey. He made himself sit up before he looked for his brother.

"Matt, wake up."

He watched Mattie turn around, his eyes still closed.

Alfred gave him a shove. "You're gonna miss the bus," he taunted.

"I'm up," he said tiredly as he slowly sat up. "I'm up."

Alfred stood up, stumbling a few times along the uneven floor, he made his way across the house and to his room. He closed the door and found a box with his clothes and opened it up. Pulling out a clean pair of jeans and a shirt, he got changed.

Alfred got his bag and searched for about ten minutes for his school things to put in his bag. He carried his bag to the front room, the only thing besides boxes in the room being the two book shelves in the corner and a wooden chair.

He looked out the front window to see the driveway in front of the garage. The black pickup truck and silver van missing. He wasn't sure why he was surprised. What did he think? That his parents would get a day off because they were moving? Right.

"Matt! What time are we going out to the bus?" he shouted.

He heard his brother shout back, "7 15."

"Why the heck did you set your alarm for six, then?"

"'Cause I wanted to take a shower."

Alfred thought about it for a moment. "That's not a bad idea," he mumbled to himself. He turned around just in time to see Mattie close the bathroom door behind him. Maybe he would take one if Matt got out soon enough. When Matt finally did come out, Alfred was sitting in the wooden chair in the front room staring at the screen of his tablet.

"Any good news?" Matt asked.

"ISIS lost 45% of their territory in Iraq and 20% in Syria," Alfred said, not looking up from the screen.

"That's cool." Matt poured himself a cup of coffee and slid the pot back. The coffee maker had  just about been the first thing plugged into the wall. God forbid it ever break and the family didn't have access to caffeine in the morning.

At a quarter after seven, Alfred and Matt walked out the door, locking the door behind them. Alfred heard the screen door close shut by the time he was only a few steps away. The sun was rising on his right. They walked just to the other side of the garage where the highway was. Okay, it wasn't exactly a highway, but it technically was part of the route that ran through the state.

The bus arrived around five or ten minutes later. Alfred climbed onto the bus first. A woman sat in the driver's seat, her hair tucked under a cap on top of her head.

"Good morning," she said with a smile.

"Morning," Alfred said.

Younger kids were scattered through the front seats of the bus, the back seats empty. Alfred walked to the back seats and took the single one in the very back. Mattie took the seat opposite him across the aisle. Alfred watched him almost immediately take out his iPhone and put his earbuds in. Alfred put his bag on the floor next to the seat and looked out the window. Admittedly he envied Mattie sometimes. He always had the cooler stuff. He said he'd had an iPhone since he was in seventh grade, something he had gotten when his dad had died. He always put that aside because his parents had split up. It wasn't like one of them had died. Sometimes he wondered which was worse, though.

There were two bus stops in the next three minutes, which confused Alfred a bit. Why didn't they just all go to one spot instead of the bus stopping every hundred yards? On the third stop, Alistor and Arthur got on. Arthur sat with Matt while Alistor sat in the set just in front if them.

Alistor started up conversation almost immediately. "What are your schedules like?"

"We haven't gotten them," Matt said, taking his earbuds out and putting them in his pocket along with his phone.

"Well, what classes were you guys in before?"

"Mostly honors."

"Nice," he said with a smile. "Don't worry. You guys'll fit right in!"

That was the only thing Alfred doubted. Not completely, anyways.

At the school, Arthur showed the two to the main office while Alistor went to meet with his friends. Arthur left soon after, saying something about having to meet with someone or something like that. The woman at the front desk gave them directions to the guidance office down the hallway. The two weaves their way through the crowds, eventually finding the guidance office, door open. After a few minutes of confusion, a woman gave them each a piece of paper, a small agenda and a combination lock. She had them both open the boxes the locks were in and write down the combinations on a separate piece if paper next to their names before they were finally able to leave.

"Why do we even need these things?" Alfred asked as they wandered down the hallway in search for their lockers. "I mean, there's only like five weeks of school left."

"You can do a lot on five weeks," Matt pointed out. He stopped at his locker. "I think we probably passed yours somewhere down there," he said, motioning down the hallway.

He found his locker in a minute, number 127 on the top. He put the lock on the locker and practiced the combination a few times, before shoving the piece of paper with the written combination in his pocket.

He dashed over to Mattie where they shared their schedules. They both had English in H block and science in G block. They both had some of the same classes, but not in the same block. Alfred would start with math in the morning, great, then to free period. After that, he had band which he was grateful for. Afterwards came geography, then French in F block. Mattie started with geography, then went to study hall as well, but to a different class room. He had English for C block and Spanish after that. Then, he went to geography and Latin.

A short tone sounded over the PA system. Everyone started walking every which way to, assumedly, get to class. Alfred said bye to Mattie and took one last glance to his schedule. His first classroom was in room 217. Upstairs. That meant he had to find a stair case. It didn't prove that difficult of a task. What did, was actually walking through the hallways and avoiding the people who didn't watch where they were going.

He only bumped into one person on his way to his first class. He had been looking the opposite way, trying to avoid others when he stepped right in front of another person. He stumbled a bit before they caught his arm, steadying him. Alfred looked up to see a boy with sheer white hair.

"You okay?"

Alfred quickly nodded. "Yeah. Thanks," he said quickly before continuing to search for his classroom. He made it there just in time before a longer tone sounded over the PA system.

He found an empty seat and sat down. A minute or so later, the class stood up for the pledge and sat down afterwards. Announcements started afterwards, though Alfred could hardly hear them over the chatter of everyone else.