An Exchange

Chapter Three - First Day at School

Penny

Jonas escorted me to the Administration area. There, I met my student counselor and receive my schedule. Back in Australia, we had a two week rotation system for our schedules, so the daily schedule seemed far simpler.

Jonas stayed with me for the next hour and a half. I was bored to the point where Jonas had to poke me every couple of minutes to keep me awake since my jetlagged still lingered.

Afterward, Jonas was sent to class and two of the senior class reps met me to give me a tour of the school grounds. I had met them both briefly the day before when they had come over to my host family's house, but because there had been so many people, I couldn’t remember either of their names.

As we walked, it amazed me at how different everything was from back home. Huge fences, security guards, a mixture of all the grades in the same class, no nerdy seventh graders getting under foot. It felt so surreal.

The male class rep, Seth, a tall and slim guy with ash blond hair and gray eyes, babbled on about everything, while the female, the blonde who spoke to me with her sister the day before, walked along beside me, smiling to herself. We finally finished touring the entire school grounds before Seth stopped and asked for questions.

“Yes.” I looked at him seriously. “Where are the dunnies?”

He looked at me, a lost look in his eyes. “The what?”

“The bathrooms.” The girl laughed and looked at Seth. “I knew you'd forget.” She pulled out my map and pointed to their locations for each building.

“I understand Aussie slang,” she said, patting Seth’s shoulder. “My dad’s Australian, so I have cousins down there.”

“Nice.” What a relief, someone who could translate for me.

 “I’m Zoe.” She smiled. “I didn't expect you to remember me from yesterday.”

“Sorry. Pretty much all the people there have become a blur.”

She chuckled. “It was pretty intense. You’re lucky to have Jonas. He’s a good kid. He’ll look out for you.” She glanced at her watch. “Well, we should get you to class.”

I slumped, my nerves filling my belly with butterflies. “Couldn’t we wait for the start of the next class?”

“I need to get to class,” Seth muttered.

Zoe shot him a fierce look, then smiled at me. “It'll be fine. I’m sure someone will be in there to welcome you.”

She handed me my map and showed me where we were going, and where I’d need to go for the following class. “Do you remember where the cafeteria is?”

I nodded.

“Good. We’ll meet you there for lunch. You’ll be fine.”

I certainly hope so. I’d seen enough American high school movies to doubt that. Terror gripped at my throat as she led us away.

*

Ryan

I walked to school for the first time since I got my license. I wanted some time to think. My mom went into a frenzy wondering why. I simply told her that I had broken up with Dylan and she let me go.

The first person to meet me at school was, in fact, Dylan. She immediately clasped onto my arm.

“Dylan, what are you doing?” I snapped.

“What do you mean, Ry?”

I shook her off and marched away to find Spencer to go to shop. We didn’t say much to each other in that class while we focused on our work. At one point, our teacher decided to pair us up and I was put with Giles. He looked about as pleased about it as me. We tolerated each other for the time we had to work together, but as soon as we could, we returned to our own friends.