The rest of the morning went by pretty quickly. I did eventually find my English class (even without the help of Laina!). Basically the same scene played out in every class; I walk in, everyone stares, I take my seat, everyone stares, I meet the teacher and everyone continues to stare. Some of the teachers- like my gym teacher, Mr. Simmons- even pretended to be interested in my life and asked me where I was from. So far, school hasn't been as bad as I thought it would be. Not yet, at least.
As my history class was coming to an end, I could barely sit still. I knew what was coming next. The part of the day that I knew I would dread most. Lunch.
My extremely boring history teacher, Mrs. Grant, continued to drone on and on about the Revolutionary War's impact on the thirteen colonies. Right now, even I, the history geek, didn't care. I noticed that most of the students were beginning to pack up their things, so I did the same.
Suddenly, the bell rang and in an instant, the room was empty. After I followed the herd of students out of the classroom, I entered the colorful hallways that now seemed like a jungle of people. I made it to my locker safely and promptly opened it to retrieve my lunch box. By the time I had remembered the combination and gotten my lunch, the hallways were completely empty. For the first time all day I felt calm and relaxed, but not for long.
When I opened the bulky cafeteria doors, the aroma of cafeteria food entered my nose, and the sound of loud chatter filled my ears. The walls were green and were covered in tacky nutrition posters. This cafeteria was a lot different from my old school. Then again, I had never been in the "new kid" situation at my old school. Maybe it wasn't always this crazy. Maybe it just seemed like that because it was my first day. Or at least, that's what I hoped.
Aside from the loud noise, another thought entered my mind. Where to sit?
I scanned the cafeteria, but it was no use. I walked around the cafeteria hoping that maybe someone would realize the lost expression on my face and offer me a chair, but nobody seemed to notice me. At this point, I even considered asking Laina if I could sit with her, but that would just be asking for trouble.
Towards the back of the cafeteria, I finally found a small, unoccupied table. I took the chance and sat there. I felt like such a loser sitting there alone. Even though I didn't have that many friends back in New York, at least I never sat alone there.
Occasionally I would get strange glances from other people who were probably thinking, "Who's that girl sitting alone?". Once or twice I even got a glance from Laina. I even thought that I may have seen the least bit of sympathy in her eyes, but then I remembered it was Laina, the girl who "accidently threw my glasses out the car window last month and who made me cry on my birthday this year. She didn't have a sympathetic bone in her body. Not towards me, at least.
For the rest of the lunch period I pretended to be very interested in my Harry Potter book. However I wasn't really reading it. I was just analyzing the actions of the people in the cafeteria. How they acted around each other, how they talked, and what they said. Hopefully I would be able to be one of them soon.
