A Grand Entrance

Hello

Great. It's August, which means its mid-summer and a new school year. I'm pretty excited to see my friends again and make new ones, even though I suffer from mid-level acquaintance deficiency. In English, that means I have trouble befriending people. It's quite a queer thing though, I'm probably the most outgoing person you'll ever meet. Based on my school reputation, society expects me to be popular and have tons of friends, but as anti-mainstream as I am, I only hang out with roundabout three at school. Classmates don't count as my 'mates' per say, we're friendly but not friends.

I exchange my eyes from the old photos I took last year to my phone's time. It's 7:15 and time to get going to school. I pick up my maroon backpack, which I swear was heavier last year, and head out of my room. "Top of the morning to you sweetheart", my Dad says in his inherited Irish accent as I walk into the kitchen. "Good morning Dad", I reply with my dimples almost popping out of my cheeks. "How are you feeling about being a sophomore for the first time today?", Dad asks. I look up to the ceiling and move my lips in a circular motion before replying, "Pretty good actually. I'm nervous about having a new homeroom teacher after Mrs. Del Forno left. Of course, I'm happy Eugene and his little friends left, but I guess I'm just worried that I won't get along with their replacements.". "I actually really liked Eugene, especially when he came over to the house for that science project and broke your Mom's porcelain cat collection. I've been trying for 15 years to get your Mom to throw those fugly things away, but with Eugene's help, I didn't have to beg anymore!", my Dad replied with a chuckle with his glasses sliding down his nose. My Dad was the cool type, he unashamedly and correctly made use of slang terms such as fugly. I guess with him being a high school drama teacher it was kinda his job to know what they mean. "On a serious note though," my Dad said in a fluent tone, "you'll have an amazing first day and make great new friends. I mean look how beautiful you are!". I looked down at my blue tie-dye shirt, black skinny jeans and my high tops. My Dad always admired my hipster sense of fashion, and that's one of the infinite reasons I love my Dad. "Good morning," my Mom says marching out of her office, "let's get going Avery, even though I know you love being late" my Mom finishes in a sarcastic tone. My biggest fear is being late, and my Mom knows it, yet she still teases me about it. I give a goodbye kiss to my Dad and walk through the garage door with a "Save me now" type of smile.

The whole ten-minute car ride was silent, as most morning drives to the school are. I can never keep quiet, but trying to make conversation with my Mom in the morning is quite a struggle as she doesn't hear me through all her officey thoughts. I've gotten used to just admiring how beautiful New Jersey is in the mornings through the car window. I use that as an excuse when my classmates ask why I don't take the bus, even though the real reason is that I get tormented on public transport. Well, that and the bus has an ominous smell that makes me extremely queasy. My Mom's soft voice interrupted my daily thinking session when we arrived at school by saying "Here we go. Have a really good day today.". I replied with brief thanks and gave my Mom a hug and got out of the car. Just before I shut the door, my Mom leaned over the passenger seat and said "Oh and just one more thing. If any kids try to bring you down today, be sure to let me know, okay?". It was no secret that I've been bullied all my life, all the way from kindergarten to this very moment. I've practically been in every school In New Jersey and mostly everyone who knew my name knew why. Shoving the chilling thought aside, I replied to my Mom with "Yes Mom, I love you. Bye.", and I shut the door. Even though I agreed to tell my Mom if something went wrong, I'd keep quiet about it.

Standing still for a moment facing the school sign that read "Succasunna High", I took a deep breath and walked into the school building. After exchanging hasty "Hi's" and "How Are You's" in the corridors, I stopped at a locker with the number 45 written in purple on it. Last year my locker number was 22, but because 45 was my lucky number and the locker was closer to my homeroom class, I applied to rent it for my three remaining years at Succasunna High. After I punched in my locker's numbers, I continued walking to class, which was right around the corner. Seconds later I hear a clamor that's mighty close to a screech. "AVERYYYYYYYYYY!!", I hear someone yell. Before I could turn around to face this monstrous racket, my face met with a One Direction hoodie and soon I was doing a random gravity check on the floor. "Ave-freaking-ry!! Man, oh man how much I have missed you!", short before long, I recognized the type of speech being used and by whom. I only knew one person stupid enough to be that level of insanely crazy about me, and that is my best friend Emily Mandell. We grew up together because we lived on the same street. We both declared a BFF relationship by age six and it hasn't changed since then. "Oh, Emily Mandell, darling, how I've missed your presence too!", I said in my best British accent, "But seriously though, how was your trip to Spain?", I added."Ohmigosh! It was honestly the best thing that's ever happened to me after Pop-Tarts! There was a hell of a load of a lot of dancing, swimming, sightseeing and chatting up hot senora's!", Emily replied. "Well, talking about litty Spanish guys, check out that piece of sexiness!". We both looked down the corridor to an absurdly handsome dark-haired boy. "Em, just because he's dark-haired and tanned, does not mean that he's Spanish.", I stated, but Emily ignored my comment, smirked at me and said "Oh look at his outfit! Jeans and a pullover, I'd say the typical hotness starter pack! And he seems to be your type too", Emily winked at me and pointed at his maroon high tops. "Would you just please shut your mouth for the numero uno woman in your life - me. You know I don't judge people by their outer appearance, but he sure doesn't look like my type.", I said shrugging my shoulders with a slight smile. "Blah blah blah! You're so boring. Especially after that oath you took to refrain from having feelings for male organisms. I know you got really hurt by Shawn last year, but you kinda should let go and give other boys a chance to interact with you. Even Xavier is scared of you now and he's your best friend!", Emily exclaimed dramatically. After my nasty break up last year, I decided to control my bad habit of falling in love too quickly, and it actually worked. "Xavier fears his own shadow, Em. Don't be daft.", I said with a giggle. "We better get to class before Xavier's shadow eats him up alive, or worse – Katie Langley that's been crushing on him since the Cold War ended!".