into the darkness // matt espinosa

chapter three

Grandma's rickety beat up Chevy bumps down the road to Woodbridge High. I sit in the drivers seat; hoping that the school explodes at this moment. Sadly , it doesn't, and before I know it we're pulled up infront of the school. I get out and grab my backpack. "Have a good day, Renee," is all I hear as I shut the door. Yeah, I'll try.

I have a wrinkled sheet of paper in my hand. My schedule. Period 1- English with Mrs. Garry. Room 254. I sigh and open the door to hell. When I open it I feel as if there is suddenly a spotlight on me. Everyone turns to see who the new loser of the school will be. I keep my eyes on the ground most of the time. I hear whispers behind me. Nobody steps up to even say hi. I find the stairwell and head up to floor 2. I find the classroom and wait outside. It's too early for class to start yet. I take out my phone and pretend to text someone. At least it looks like I'm not a complete loser. 10 minutes later the teacher comes to open the door. Mrs. Garry is old, yet she looks sweet. She is very short, so short that I'm afraid I'll step on her as I head in behind her. "You must be a new student," she says as I enter. "How'd you guess?" I half smile as I pick a seat in the back. "I don't think I've ever seen someone waiting outside the door this early. We've still got 20 minutes before class starts. Are you sure you don't want to go out and meet some people out in the halls?" She asks? "No thanks," I smile as I sit in my chair.

6 minutes go by until more people start coming in. Everyone gives me weird and confused looks as they take their seats. Everyone seems to know each other except for me. The first bell rings right as another kid comes through the door. He keeps his head down and walks to the back of the classroom. He sits a desk away from me. I inspect him as he puts his books down. When he puts his head up, I look away. I don't want him to see I've been looking. I open my notebook and doodle random things while Mrs. Garry goes on about English class criteria. The bell rings and I'm off to period 2- gym.

I have never had gym in the morning, and now I realize how lucky I have been to have it in the afternoon. It's disgusting being sweaty at 8 in the morning. We run 4 laps for warmup. I can't even run one. The fat gym teachers yell at me for 'not trying.' I want to roll them down the highway and see how many cars they'd get hit by.

My next period is Woodworking. It seems exciting and fun, but it's really not. The smell of sawdust fills my nose as I walk in. My teachers name is Mr. Smith. He looks like he should be working at a construction site, not a high school. I sit in the back of the room again as he goes on and on about the safety and etiquette of wood working. People keep turning back to get a good glimpse of me. Nobody knows where I came from. I act like I don't see them and watch Mr.Smith, pretending like I'm interested.

Lunch is next. I'm dreading lunch. I can already imagine the stereotypical high school cafeteria. I decide to not get lunch. I'm not hungry anyways. I walk down hallways to see if there's a place where I can sit. The kid from English sits alone at the end of the math wing. I start walking towards him but stop. I want to sit with him, but I don't want to come off as a creep. He doesn't notice me so I turn around. I head for the bathroom and sit in there for the remaining 40 minutes looking at myself in the mirror and wondering what is wrong with me.

The rest of the day goes by in a blur. Math- boring, World History- cool class but bad teacher, and Spanish- boring; teacher can't speak a word of English. This is going to be a rough year.