I threw my hand onto the snooze button of my alarm clock, blinking the blurriness out of my eyes as I realized it was the first day of school. "Ugh," I muttered, forcing myself to slide out of bed. I dragged myself across the room and reluctantly readied myself for school. Now you may be wondering; why aren't you bursting with excitement to see your friends? Well that's because I changed schools. Yup. Lucky me, I had to change schools for my SENIOR year of highschool. Great.
"Sweetie! Hurry! You're going to be late!" My mother called from downstairs, probably already waiting at the door. I don't understand how parents expect their child to get ready in under ten minutes, I mean mom, I'm a teenage girl for Pete's sake. I'm not anything near a girly girl who take almost an hour to get ready and put on makeup, but I still take at least five minutes.
"Okay, okay!" I huffed in reply, probably not loud enough for her to hear, but I didn't really care. I slipped on a red open flannel shirt over my black tank top and tied my long red into a ponytail. Then quickly tied up my combat boots and shuffled down the stairs.
"Scarlett, come on, we only have five minutes to get you to school." My mom glanced at her watch, then pulled me to the car which she'd already started.
***
"Have a good day!" My mother smiled at me as I got out of the car. I smiled back unhappily. I hated that my mom had this tradition of her driving me to school the first day. It was embarrassing.
I pushed away the thought, walking into the school, keeping my head low and eyes focused on the ground.
I managed to find my way to the main office without getting lost, where the principle, Mr. Evans, gave me my schedule. "All students from last year had their schedules mailed to them." He explained. "I'll have-" Mr. Evans spotted a girl walking by and called her in. "Ms. West Wickermen will show you around." The girl apparently named West blinked at me, biting the inside of her mouth. Mr. Evans nodded, then sent us on our way.
"Hey," I tried to start up a conversation. "West, right?" I asked as I skimmed over my schedule.
"Mhm!" West nodded, her eyes lighting up and the prior awkwardness fading away. "What's your name?"
"Scarlett Moss." I hoped we would be friends, West seemed like a cool person.
"That's a pretty name." A strand of West's short, curly, brown hair fell into her face as we continued to walk down the hall. "May I see your schedule?" She asked. I nodded, handing her the piece of paper. "We have all the same classes together except first. We have different math teachers. You have Mrs. Penny. Her class is this way." West lead me towards my math class, walking quickly because the bell was about to ring. "I'll meet you here after this class so I can show you to our next period." She returned my schedule and smiled at me before heading to her class.
I took a breath then walked into Ms. Penny's class right as the bell rang. Students instantly looked up at me. "Ms. Moss. Our new student!" I had expected a typical old, rude math teacher but instead I was greeted with a quite young, kind woman. "Take a seat." She pointed to a desk in the middle of the room near the front. I hastily took a seat, not liking the stares I was receiving. Soon class started and a long, boring math lecture began. I sighed. Math was probably my least favorite subject, considering I sucked at it. I started to drone off, the teacher being to sound like one from Charlie Brown. After what seemed like ages, something hit me in the back of the head. I turned around instantly, my hand reaching to see what hit me. No. way. It was a spitball. A freaking spitball. On the first day. I spotted the person who had shot it. A typical teenage boy. He was cute, had styled black hair and green eyes. His eyes met mine, and they instantly filled with guilt as if he was sending me a silent apology. I glared at him, frowning, and my eyes probably had fire in them. I turned away, annoyed, facing the front of the class again, and continued to block out the math lesson.
The bell rang, and I stormed out of class, still pissed about what had happened. Suddenly someone grabbed my arm. I turned and yep, it was the guy who hit me with the spitball. "Hey, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to hit you." He looked at the ground. Wow, for a dude that spits spitballs, he seemed pretty nice.
"I-It's fine." I sighed in defeated resolve. He grinned.
"Anyway, I'm Keiren." He slid his hand through his black hair.
"I'm Scarlett. I just moved here." I spotted West walking towards me.
"Oh hey, if you don't have anywhere to sit, you could sit with me and my friends at lunch." Keiren offered.
"Yeah, sure, I'm in!" I accepted. "And also it's my friends and I." I corrected him playfully. He pretended to glare at me.
"Hey, Scarlett." West walked up to me, and Keiren looked at her. "Sup, West!" He said, trying to sound cool.
"Oh shut up. Just because she's new doesn't mean you have to act cool. Everyone knows you're just a pathetic nerd." West stuck her tongue out at him, laughing. Keiren acted like he was hurt.
"YOU TAKE THAT BAAAACK!" He screeched, causing everyone around us to look at him. West and I burst into laughter and Keiren joined us.
"Okay, okay," West stopped laughing. "We need to head to class. Come on!" She started heading to our next period that we had together. I then realized Keiren was following us.
"Oh, do you have the same class?" I asked.
"Yup!" He popped the 'p' as he quickened his pace to become shoulder to shoulder with us. We rounded the corner and West led our trio inside the door that was marked with the name Mr. Andrews. Keiren and West took their seats near the front by the teacher's desk. "We got a freshie." Keiren snapped, shoving a thumb over his shoulder to gesture towards me taking a seat behind him. My face flushed as I was greeting by the eyes of fellow students and Mr. Andrews. He lit up in a reassuring smile.
"Ah, so nice to have you in my class. I'm Mr. Andrews and welcome to AP History." He nodded before ducking behind his desk and reappearing with a thin pile of messy papers. He walked over and set them on my desk. "Here's the syllabus, it was mailed to the returning students over the summer after last year's in-school registration." He seemed considerably young for a AP teacher, maybe reaching thirty at most. I smiled, thanking him as he returned to his laptop. Soon after the bell rang and Mr. Andrews opened the class with a brief introduction.
"Open your textbooks to page thirty seven."
