Forty-One After Midnight (Completed)

Chapter One

I was just starting the second half of my senior year at Oak Ridge Academy and I had absolutely no idea what was in store for me. The kids that went to school there were the rich kids and the preps. They were the snobs and the jocks. Sure, I was rich, but I never considered myself to be one of them. I didn't shut people out just because they had less money, or didn't wear name brand clothing. I never made people feel bad about themselves, or thought I was better than anyone. I was simply me. My happiness didn't come from trying to be above other people. In fact, I was probably closer to the bottom of the popularity scale and I was perfectly content to stay there.

Of course, I would eventually learn that I was different from these typical academy snobs in more ways than one, and so were the kids that I chose to become friends with.

The only thing I was really thinking when I first arrived was that this year was going to suck. It was only going to be another school full of people I didn't like and a new place for me to not have any friends, just like all the others. I couldn't wait until I graduated. Then it would be good-bye class of 2041. I'm moving on from all of you and starting my own life somewhere I picked for once.

I looked out my window as my mom pulled into the big circle drive out front. A massive brick building stood before me. It looked to be a fairly old building with two floors, many windows, and a perfectly landscaped lawn. The entire campus was surrounded by trees. Lots and lots of trees.

"We're in the middle of the woods," I complained.

"It's not so bad," my mom replied as she reached over and rubbed my shoulder, smiling at me. "The city is only an hour away."

I rolled my eyes. Civilization. Malls. Normal people. All of that was at least an hour away. I knew she meant well, but this was not a comforting bit of information. Maybe to her an hour wasn't so bad, but it's not like I was going to have a car while I was at Oak Ridge, and walking would surely take well over an hour. I leaned over and grabbed my bag out of the backseat and opened the door.

Other kids were lazily walking around in their expensive pea coats and scarves, most likely bragging to their friends about what new expensive toy their parents had just bought them for their straight A report cards. I shut the door. My mother waved to me as she drove off and I stood still, watching until her taillights disappeared behind even more trees.

I looked around me. It was the beginning of January, the start of the new semester. Everything was covered in a thick blanket of snow and the air was just a bit too chilly for my taste. I wrapped my jacket around me a little tighter and started to walk up the long narrow sidewalk that lead to the large, double door entrance.

Let me just take a moment to mention that skirts are a bad idea in mid-winter weather. If they were going to make us wear uniforms, pants should have at least been an option for the girls. They could have even offered it as an optional thing only in the winter if they really liked the idea of girls in skirts so much. It had taken me less than a minute to make it to the building, but I was already shaking by the time I hit the front steps. I walked in hugging myself as some guy held the door open for me.

"Where'd you come from? Florida?" he asked as I walked by.

He chuckled a little.

"A place where pants weren't too manly for the girls to wear too," I replied in a rather snotty tone.

I shot him a dirty look and kept on walking. He mumbled something under his breath as I was walking away, but I didn't care enough to catch whatever it was.