First Impressions

Louisa hated the Washington High School orientation. The whole thing seemed useless to her, although of course her mom had forced her into it. She wanted Louisa to be "properly prepared to deal with the challenges of high school". From what Louisa could gather from the orientation, these "challenges" consisted of trying to dig deep inside her soul to try and find a crap she could give about how "amazing" the learning experience at Washington was.

"Mom, I have to go to the bathroom," Louisa said, desperately needing an excuse to leave the crowded gym. A pompous lady dressed in a disgusting shade of lavender was presently boring her ears off with a speech that went on and on about the great opportunities Washington gave their students.

"Okay honey, but be quick. I don't want you to miss anything important," her mom replied absentmindedly. Her attention at the moment was directed fully on the old woman giving her speech. Her mother had always been that parent who cared a little too much about Louisa's perfection in academics and preparedness for the future, much to her child's dismay. Louisa had stopped counting the number of parent-teacher conferences she had been dragged off to and lectures she had been given for getting anything less than an B+. Many of these lectures had ended in Louisa losing a peace of her will to live, while her mom intently listened and carefully processed the details of whatever the teacher had to say. This case was no exception; Louisa was nearly dead asleep on her chair while her mom absorbed every word coming from the tiny lady's mouth.

"Okay mom, ill be right back," Louisa whisper-yelled over her shoulder, already making her way towards the exit. She received several groans and complaints as she made her way hastily through the crowd and burst out of the gym. Louisa sprinted down the hallway, elated by her new freedom. As she rounded a corner, she ran right smack into another person going just as fast. The impact of their collision sent them both sprawling onto the floor.

"Oh my gosh I am so sorry!" Louisa exclaimed as she picked herself up from off the floor, "I wasn't looking where I was going." The stranger was currently picking up what looked like sheet music off the floor. Louisa immediately fell to her knees to aid the him in his task.

"It's ok,"the stranger grunted as he crawled around picking up the last few sheets, "I shouldn't have been going so fast." At these words he stood up. Louisa, who had finished picking up the scattered sheets, stood as well and got her first good look at the stranger she had run into.

The stranger that stood before her turned out to only be was a tall, lanky boy about her age (the fact he wasn't an adult made her extremely grateful). A mop of tangled mouse-brown hair hung down to his neck, giving him a bit of an unkept look. The wide, sheepish grin that played across his thin face showed off a set of green and orange braces (of all color combinations, he picked green and orange?). Louisa also noticed he was carrying a very large, black, well worn out case that looked like it might be for an instrument. It was covered in all sorts of stickers ranging from TV shows to movie quotes to song lyrics (really, who does that to an instrument case?). Louisa recognized the band name My Chemical Romance on one of the stickers (seriously, who did this guy think he was?!). She was so enraptured in her thoughts of why anyone would even like My Chemical Romance that she didn't notice the boy apprehensively eyeing the papers Louisa had just picked up. "So," he began, interrupting Louisa from her stupor, "do you think I could have those back or...?" Louisa looked at the papers she held in her hands and turned a light shade of pink.

"Oh, yeah, right," she replied, flustered. She hastily handed the papers over, but not before recognizing them as sheets of music. "So, you play an instrument?" Louisa asked the stranger as he eagerly took the music from out of her hands.

"Yeah, I play the base clarinet a little bit," the apparent musician replied distractedly, looking through his music to see if it was all there. As if Louisa would want to steal sheet music. He suddenly looked up at her. "How did you know?"