To Be Loved

3| Legs and Arms Spread Out

I was in Spanish class when I felt something hit the back of my head.

It was a scrunched up piece of paper that had some writing in it. I picked it up and looked around to see who had thrown it.

"Psst," someone calls out. I look back and saw a dude, wearing a face cap over his shaggy looking hair, wave at me. I hold the paper up in question.

"Pass it to her," he whispered and points to a girl sitting at the desk to my front left.

He didn't even apologize.

So I didn't pass it to the girl, instead I threw it out the open window and went back to listening to the teacher. I didn't look behind me although the rest of the class.

I was putting my books in my bag, after the class was over, when I felt someone come up behind me.

"You could have just passed the paper to Jane, you know?" It was the paper dude.

"Well I don't know who Jane is." I stated plainly.

"What do you mean you don't know who Jane is? Who the fuck doesn't know who Jane is? She's hot." That sentence doesn't make any sense, but he was looking all bewildered. I just stood there, resting my head against the doorframe of the classroom, waiting for him to move.

"Hey Joel can you believe this, man? This girl says she doesn't know Jane." He moves and looks back to his friend who had been standing behind him since he started to talk, I guess that's probably Joel

"Peter, leave her alone and let's go," his friend said and pushed him out of the class.

He turned to me and apologizes, "Sorry about that, he can be a little loud sometimes." he told me.

"Yeah sure." I told him, a bit surprised by his politeness.

"Are you new here by the way? I don't think I've seen you here before?" He asked me.

"Yeah, my family and I moved here a few days ago, this is my first day here." Why did I add that? Obviously, this would be my first day here.

"Oh, alright," he said and starts to work towards the door, "I'll see you around then?" he asked

"Yeah sure," I told him and finally headed out the class myself.

******

At lunchtime
_______________

I know I don't know much, but aren't schools supposed to give new students like a tour of the school or something? Because it's been three hours here and I don't know anywhere. I've only been able to get to my classes with the help of my schedule, but that's the only thing the dumb thing gave directions to.

Not even the bathrooms and I need to pee, real bad. Oh God!

"Do you need to pee?" I heard a voice behind me.

I was resting against one of the lockers in the hallway that lead to the cafeteria, pressing my knees together to hold in my pee.

"Er, yeah, do you mind direc_" I started, but I got interrupted.

"Then you should have enough brains to know not to do it on the floor of the hallway." It was the paper dude from my Spanish class. "The bathrooms are just around the corner," he points in front of him then walks off into one of the classrooms and shuts the door.

I blinked once, I blinked twice, still staring at the space he had stood. Okay that was very rude, that was very rude.

I'll admit it must have looked weird for me to be hunkered down like a toad in the middle of an empty hallway and he did give me the direction to the bathrooms, but did he really need to have call me out like that and how could he have thought I wanted to pee on the floor? That's foolish, that was foolish.

"I need to pee too bad for this." I got up and start towards his direction to the bathrooms.

******

After Lunchtime
__________________

"This is frustrating" Brie said standing beside me at my locker whilst resting her head on the next locker. "I mean, in Nigeria we just sit in our classrooms and the teachers walk in," she continued, moving her hands in all directions. "But here, you go from that class, to this class, to that class, I am tired," she bended down and touched her knee, "and my legs hurt like crazy."

"And you know what you have the next period?" I asked looking through her schedule.

"What?"

"Gym class." I told her and laughed at her reaction.

She fell on the ground, in the middle of the hallway that's packed with students, she fell flat on the floor, eyes closed, legs and arms spread out.

"I'm dead." she said from the floor and I laughed even harder.

"Don't be dramatic, come on." I reached down to pull her up.

"At least we have this one together, right?" She asked when she was up and dusted her army green hoodie.

"Yeah." I said, just as the bell rang and we started towards the gymnasium.

****

"How was first day of school, girls?" Mom asked a few moments after she came from work. We were seated by the kitchen table having chips and dips before dinner, we did this every time in Nigeria, before dinner we'd sit together by the kitchen catching up on each other's day and gossip on the funny things, people or scenes we'd seen.

"Depressing" Brie told her from her slumped position on the kitchen bench, she had her elbows on the kitchen counter while facing me and Mom sitting at the dinning area,"I mean, I can't believe I used to think high school was better than secondary school," she continued, "it's not."

Mom laughed, "it's just your first day, come on," she assured, then she asked "I'm guessing you didn't make any friends then?"

"Dami did," Brie told her, "some cute boy from her Spanish class".

"Are you foolish? The dude threw a paper at me and then insulted me, how is that making friends?" I asked her.

"Wait, some kid did that to you? What's wrong with him? Why would he do that?" Mom bombarded me with questions.

"I think he was high on crack." I said and they laughed.

"Or maybe he's had breakfast", Mom said and we laughed again, it was joke from Nigeria, if someone says you've had breakfast, it means you've just been broken up with.

"Maybe," Brie agreed in between laughter.

"Huh," all three of us exhaled at the same time.

"So how was work, Mom?" I spoke up after a while, simultaneously dipping a chip in guacamole, some real ones, that is, not the greenleaf poison they serve in Nigeria.

"Work was fine, though the office is quite...." she paused, thinking of the right word "glamorous," she decided "the staff too, they were all nice and welcoming though." She finished then added, "well at least those that I've met are, the office is quite big too."

"Do you like have your own office or something?" Brie asked her as she start to lose her braids.

Wait!

"Brie, why are you loosing your braids already? Didn't you just make it like, a week ago?" I asked her, mindful that I had interrupted Mom's reply.

"I made it in Nigeria and I don't like it anymore, I want to make a new one in this new city." She states with a serious face like any of what she said made sense.

Mom didn't seem fazed about it, so I dropped it.

Whatever.

"Well, it looks like chat time's over," Mom said looking at her watch, I look to the kitchen clock, "time to make dinner." She added, 6PM.