The Moonwalkers

Recess Table

I sat alone at a table as I nibbled on leftover alligator bits, now breaded and deep fried, as I read a comic on my phone. There's this awesome new manga, courtesy of Chris who recommended it to me, and it was really addictive.
"Charlotte?" A voice called, making me look up from my phone.
It was Barbara, her blonde hair styled just like Barbie's. She had a small smile on her face as she regarded me. I waved in reply as I swallowed my mouthful of food.
"Why are you sitting alone?" Barbara asked, looking slightly confused.
I just shrugged since I didn't know what to reply to that.
She sighed and motioned for me to come with her. "Come on, sit with us. Our table is over there."
I turned to look and saw a bunch of girls from different classes waving with smiles on their faces. I turned back to Barbara.
"You sure?"
"Just come, there's still space for you. You don't have to sit here alone."
I reluctantly grabbed my things and followed her over to the other table, seating myself between her and another girl with red hair.
There were five of them besides myself. There was Barbara, that redhead, a girl with gorgeous bushy black curls, a girl with straight jet-black hair dressed in goth fashion, and a very cheerful-looking girl with pigtails and a wide buck-teethed grin.
"Hi!" The pigtailed girl asked, looking at me. "You're new here?"
"Not exactly, I've been here for... a little over a month?" I shrugged. "I'm Charlotte, by the way, in Barbie's class."
The girl nodded. "I'm Priscilla. I'm in the class downstairs."
Not gonna lie, buck teeth actually suited her. She had this really sincere and adorable smile.
"I'm Kayla," the curly-haired girl said with a smile. "Welcome to our recess table."
"Yeah, we're all in different classes so we're forced to only meet during recess, sadly," the redhead beside me said. "I'm Lydia, by the way."
I hope she never reads Pride and Prejudice. Nothing against that story, just that it has a very annoying character named Lydia that I'd love to smack.
"I'm Luna," the girl in black muttered at last.
"Pleased to meet all of you," I smiled as I continued to eat. "It's really nice of y'all to invite me to join you."
"Oh, it's nothing," Priscilla chuckled. "By the way, what's that you're eating?"
I felt a trickle of sweat slide down my forehead. What am I gonna say? That we slaughtered an alligator and made cutlets out of it?
"Just some... cutlets," I smiled. "My favourite."
"Oh! Nice!" Priscilla grinned.
"Pris, if you're still hungry, you can have one of my sandwiches," Kayla piped up. "I'm having a hard time finishing this one, and still have one more."
Priscilla gladly reached over and grabbed Kayla's sandwich. I heaved a sigh of relief and turned back to my meal. I caught Luna staring at me from the corner of my eye so I turned and smiled at her.
"Are you, by any chance, in the chess club?" Luna asked.
I nodded. "I am."
"I think I've seen you before, you stood for the third form representative, right?"
I nodded again. "Yeah, but no one voted for me. The president forgot to erase the big fat zero beside my name."
Luna shrugged and went back to her meal. That was a little odd but I guess she just found me familiar. I quickly finished my alligator bits and got up, packing up my things as I did.
"Where are you going?" Priscilla asked.
I slung my bag on. "To the library."
"Oh, I was just gonna go there," Lydia said, getting up. "Come on."
We waved at the rest and started in the direction of the library.
"So which school were you in before transferring here?" Lydia casually asked.
"Harmony High," I said. "Grand Peace is a way better school, though. There were lots of bully cases back in Harmony, and a lot of drama too."
"Oh, we actually have drama here too, but not as much though," Lydia shrugged, slowing down as we neared the staircase. "Just like the name, it's mostly peaceful here."
I nodded, ascending the stairs at her heels. "I can tell. I was just there for two and a half years and a creep broke into the senior block. It's a good thing us juniors were well away."
"Gosh, that's dangerous!" Lydia said in surprise. "Then again, which girls' school doesn't have a creep? But the dude broke in? Darn that's scary!"
I stopped short. "You mean... this school has a creep too?"
Lydia nodded. "Yep. But he's usually at the back of the school, behind the fence. He can't get in through there since he would have to get through a wide and deep ditch first. So yeah, it's relatively safe. Also, we third-formers are the biggest victims since that fence is right behind our block."
"Gosh..."
"And right behind my class window too."
"Gosh!"
"Yeah, and he comes like... twice a month or so."
"Do the teachers know about this?"
Lydia shrugged. "They do. Apparently, the same dude has been terrorising this school for like... ten years now."
I stopped short. "Ten years?! And the school is doing nothing about this?"
"Nope."
"They didn't even call the police on him?"
"Seems like it."
"Gosh..." I shook my head.
"Eh, don't worry, the guy can't do nothing," Lydia nonchalantly said.
"Dude..." I sighed. "There's no telling what he may do. This is child endangerment!"
"I admit, it is," Lydia smirked slightly. "But even the school's not doing anything, so what's the point?"
She is right, especially since the guy doesn't actually do any damage but that doesn't change the fact that he's a creep. Then again, most girls' schools have this problem, and it's no longer a surprise at this point.
We arrived at the library entrance and put our things away on the shelf beside the doors before going in.

I waved at Lydia and made my way back to class. It was good having recess with Barbara and her friends, they were actually pretty nice. Lydia was nice too, even explaining the library rules to me and helping me get acquainted. Before this, all I did was go sit there while scrolling through a manga on my phone.
Maybe I should borrow a book sometime instead of just reading mangas. Then again, mangas are awesome too so maybe I can do both.
School ended right after Maths period with Miss Nettle giving us some homework. Barbara was groaning at the thought, I just agreed with her for the sake of being nice. After all, it would be kinda mean for me to say that I actually thought it was easy...
I made my way down to the foyer and sat down while listening to my Passion by Night Tempo which featured one of my favourite City Pop Singers, Kaoru Akimoto. It's not always I get a new song from my favourite singers, seeing how I favoured 80's music. Some of my friends think I'm weird because of this but I stopped caring about what they say eventually.
I silently sat as the music blasted through my tiny earbuds, bobbing my head to the beat as I watched the gate. I wish the song was longer, seeing how it was just too good to be just three minutes long.
I spotted our car pass the gates and got up, pulling my earphones out as I walked out.

"Where's Mom?" I asked as I got in beside Chris.
"She's tied up at work for something," Charlene said. "So we have to pick her up now."
"What's for lunch?" Chris piped up. "By the way, those alligator cutlets were really good."
"I know!" I agreed, grinning. "But yeah, what's for lunch?"
"We'll ask Mom, okay?" Charlene sighed. "Because you guys always seem to corner me, as if I know what we should get for lunch."
"Fine," Chris and I said together.