Found (New Earth Saga)

Ch. 5

Of course he was Parisa's boyfriend. How dumb of me to think some guy would look at me that way. There's no such thing as River 2.0... I'm probably always going to be stuck as River 1.0. River... the girl who's a magnet for bad luck. The girl who can't seem to feel that close to anyone. River, raised by a murderer, shipped off to giants, her only friends are colored pencils. Ugh.

"Don't take it personally babe, she's not much of a talker," Parisa said, as she walked around the table to embrace Eric.

Wait. Damnit. I didn't respond when he introduced himself. I was too distracted with my ever spiraling mind.

"It's totally okay RIver. It's a big day, so let's teach you how to ride the e-scooter and then I can show you to your first class!"

Parisa and Eric ushered me over to a bright orange scooter that would apparently be mine for the remainder of the school year. While this was the perfect time for me to pay attention to this tutorial, I couldn't help but take in how perfect Parisa nd Eric looked together. Parisa had an effortless beauty about her, with her naturally bronze skin, and dark brown hair, so long it even went past her sounder when in a high ponytail. She had long thin legs, and a completely flat waist that made a bud of envy bloom within me. Although Parisa was tall, she still managed to look short when next to Eric. Eric had to be around 6'2", and his height made him look like a prince when stood next to Parisa. Beauty attracts beauty. Perfection attracts perfection. Hot mess-express attracts me.

From the looks of this riding tutorial, it looks pretty self-explanatory. The right side controlled my speed, the left side controlled the breaks, and all I had to do was input my class number into the GPS, and the directions would show up on the little screen. Then I just had to find the correct elevator to ride my scooter into, and I'd make it to class.

Of course, the reality of hearing how to use the scooter, and actually using the scooters are two different things. By the time we'd finished my tutorial, and I'd gotten my backpack secured into the compartment attached to the scooter, there were a lot more humans filling the halls. I quickly realized that some of the upperclassmen thought it was funny to ride recklessly through the halls in order to intimidate the 1st year students. Even though I wasn't broadcasting my new student status through the color of my scooter, I was brand new, and ridiculously overwhelmed by the chaos.

"Don't worry, just follow me. We're in the same 1st hour math class," Parisa said.

I tried to follow Parisa the best I could but it wasn't easy. Parisa was able to weave her scooters in and out of other scooters as if this were a race of some kind. I was just trying to keep up, when my scooter finally rammed into a green scooter that had abruptly stopped right in front of me. Instead of the slick metal crunching from our crash, both scooters burst with a soft bumper that suddenly appeared as soon as our scooters touched.

"Move it NERDS!" A voice shouted as they zipped past us on their own scooter.

Great. I was already a nerd and I hadn't even made it to class yet.

I righted myself on my scooter, ready to see if I could continue towards my class when I realized the collision seemed to have reset the GPS. Wait. No! I don't know how to get to my class without the gps.

"Excuse me, do you know how to get to-"

Another scooter bumped into me, making the bumpers burst from my scooter once again.

"Dude, pick a lane!" a male voice said as they turned their scooter around and proceeded to zoom down the hall.

Oh right, there were lanes in here I had to follow as well. The left lane was for fast scooters while the right lane was for slower scooters. But then you had to sometimes cross lanes to turn. Oh and if you went past the left lane that was going in your direction, you would be hit by an e-scooter going in the opposite direction. I imagine this is how driving a car must be, but I've never driven so who knows.