Hunter

Chapter Twenty Seven - Standstill

It had been a week since I had talked to anyone. As angry as I was trying to be, as indifferent as I tried to appear, I was worried. Worried that maybe I had pushed my best friend away and that maybe Jasper would never return. I tried to put it out of my mind because it was the first official day of the Integration Program, and I was trying to stop the natural scowl that was growing on my face for having being stuck with the same person who wouldn't tell me how to get out of the building a week ago.

"... name is Aiden Steel, and I'll be your tour guide for today." He was in charge of showing us around the school and letting us know the ins and outs of being a South Lake Shark.

"We're going to start by going around and getting to know each other. Each person will state their name, age, year in high school, and any extracurriculars that they're participating in. If you want to add anything extra, feel free to do so. I'll start." He cleared his throat and tucked his sheets of paper underneath his arm. "My name is Aiden Steel, as you already know, I'm eighteen and I'm a senior. I am a member of the Robotics and Science Olympiad teams, and I am also a football player." There was an awkward 'should we clap or not' moment when he was done, but eventually that died out.

"Who would like to go next." There was a long and awkward silence, and I decided to end it.

"My name is Hayley Hunter, and I'm sixteen years old and a junior. I am a member of both the Cross Country and Track teams." Once everyone was done, he continued.

"Alright, it's a pleasure to meet you all, and I just want to go over how today's going to pan out. Since Crescent had a much larger student body than South Lake, with a ratio of 1:9, we have decided to split up into groups of ten with one South Lake student and nine Crescent students. I'm going to be your student mentor for the next couple of weeks or for however long you need to get settled in. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, you can ask me. On the sheet you have in front of you, you'll see my contact information: phone number, e-mail, social media, and others. Honestly, the best way to contact me is through text, because then I'll be able to get back to you as soon as possible.

"The itinerary of the day is as follows. You're going to get your general lockers first, then your gym lockers. If you're in band, one of my classmates is going to pick you up so that you can go and get your band lockers and meet the director. I believe that's the two of you?" He pointed to the two guys who were obviously in band, one carrying his cello, the other, his bass clarinet. "Actually, you can go over there first so that you don't have to carry those around the whole day." The two of them wobbled off with their instruments, looking glad to have dropped them off somewhere. Eight.

We walked down the hallways to get our lockers and then our gym lockers. Thousands of papers were thrown at us all at once and we really didn't know what do with them. I stuffed them into my still empty backpack, not caring about the ones that they actually wanted to be returned.

"Alright, we've gotten to the point where our in-school extracurricular activities separate from us. I know Crescent does it differently where you can use your free period for student council, but we have a designated period for that. So, if you're in student council, this is Mr. Breza, and you can follow him." Four people left.

Aiden continued down the hallway, showing us each where the main parts of the building were. The cafeteria, the three gyms, the sports fields, and the main offices. Once we had done a full circle around the school and were starting to know our teachers, our group got even smaller.

"Alright, now this is the part where Seniors go off and have a talk with our principle about graduation requirements, course changes, and such." Three seniors walked off to join a much larger group. "I guess that leaves you and me."