Life, Starting All Over Again

Chapter Four

That night after a yummy spaghetti dinner to celebrate my first day of high school here, David takes me out to practice driving. We take Jody's old Toyota Prius, which is the color of my new boots-milky brown. He takes us to an abandoned parking lot that he says used to be a big shopping center. I practice some u-turns, and shifting gears, as well as the occasional gas and break pedal exercise. I feel like I'm getting a little better with each move.

We stay out practicing for almost an hour. David lets me drive halfway home. "You know, if you want your own car, it's perfectly fine to start looking this weekend." He says casually as he starts the engine. I have a slight suspicion that this is some kind of joke. "Really?" I manage, my voice alarmingly tiny. "Yeah. It might be nice for you. You could get to and from school faster than taking the bus." I nodded in agreement. "Sounds like a plan." I say. David smiles his reply.

The next day at school feels odd. Different than the first day, I guess. But there's a weird tension in the air, like something unexpected is going to happen. My classes are normal, my teachers seem normal. I get homework in 3 classes: math, English, and history. I take the bus home and sit by myself in the back, texting Bella since she gave me her number at lunch.

When I get home, I start my usual routine. Have a snack, get out my homework, and start it. This time, it takes me almost 3 hours to do it. I'm done by 5:45. I call Jody to see why her and David aren't home yet. She said they have an unexpected dinner meeting to go to. They won't be home until 7:30. She said I could have leftover spaghetti. So, I start making my lonely dinner.

I finish dinner and clean up by 6:09. I watch TV and go onto my social media accounts. I just created them last night after David and I got home from driving. I got Facebook and Instagram. Bella is bugging me to get a twitter account too, but I think I'm good with these two for now. I post a picture of myself on Instagram making a weird face. Bella responds with a silly photo of herself. I smile and turn the channel on TV to ABC.

I finish off the rest if my first week at Highland High. This included two incidents involving Julia. The first was at lunch.

Wednesday, 12:35 PM, Cafeteria

Bella and I sat our usual table. Today's lunch in the cafeteria is spaghetti. Bella said, "Whoops, forgot napkins! I'll be right back." She got up and walked over with her tray to the condiments and silverware area. She wore her sneaky black sneakers today, which should've been the right shoe choice. But, they weren't. When she was almost to the napkins, Julia emerged from the lunch payment area with a tray of spaghetti and two puddings. I played the moment in slow mo many times after it happened. Bella crashed into Julia. Boom! Both platters of spaghetti and the pudding went right all onto Julia. Amazingly, not a spec on Bella.

"Uhhhh! How could this happen?! This is cashmere!" Julia exploded. The whole lunchroom tool this as mealtime entertainment. Julia's very nice pink cashmere sweater now had several splotches of red sauce, noodles on her neckline, and a couple chocolate additions. It now went from blah pink, to many different colors. "I-I'm super sorry, Julia!" Bella stuttered quickly. "Sorry?! You will pay for this Bella, you will pay big time!" Julia turned away on her heels. Her minions followed, casting deep glares at Bella.

This now completely ruined the little reputation Bella had at school. I tried to console her that Julia overreacted, and that it would all be forgotten. She kept telling me how scared she was of Julia's revenge. I assured her that she couldn't do anything too low, after all she is the most popular girl in school. The next thing that happened wasn't quite so bad, but the timing could've been better.

Friday, 2:03 PM, 5th Period Science

That class, science, is the only class Bella, Julia and I have together. That day in science, we started a group project. We were divided into groups of three randomly by our teacher. The project is on experimenting with fish versus frogs. Sort of about their feeding patterns and food preferences, I guess. Bella, Julia, and were chosen to be group number seven.

For the first ten minutes, we worked on our personal hypotheses. Then, we were to share our frog hypotheses in front of the class. Bella went first. "I hypothesize that the frogs will eat similar things and that they will have different eating patterns depending on the frog." I went up after that. "I hypothesize that the frogs and fish will have very different eating patterns and eating habits." I reddened under the strained applause. Next, Julia stepped up. She looked a little too happy to be reading in front of the class. I found this suspicious.

"I believe that the fish will eat only the specific grained fish food and eat about once a day." I saw the teacher roll their eyes. "For the frog, I hypothesize that it will have the given eating patterns. However, it's ugliness will increase the more it eats, just like Bella does when she eats lunch." Julia snickered and looked in Bella's direction. The class cackled. I steamed up with anger, and turned to Bella, giving her a sympathetic look. She just put her head down on the table, turning invisible again. Julia got sent to the office, but who knows what's going to be done about it.

So now it's the weekend. Saturday, precisely, and I'm reading in bed and snacking on a banana. It's 1:09- I finished lunch an hour ago, and I'm pretty sure Jody and David are out grocery shopping or something. I yawn and glance out the window. It's about thirty-one degrees outside, but I can confirm that it is absolutely freezing. I pick up my book called "A Guide To Driving" that David got me. It's very helpful and gives good tips on driving.

At about 2:30, Jody and David got home. We went to the Toyota and Subaru dealerships of Portland. I think I'm leaning towards the cheapest Subaru I can find at this point. There's a small sedan and a compact model that I'm interested in. We test drove three cars, but came home with none. "Next weekend we can go back." David said when we got home. I mumbled "Okay" and drifted off to my room.

On Sunday morning, Bella called me. She said she was bored, and wanted to hang out later. I told her we could meet at Starbucks or something. We agreed to meet at 3.

I arrived ten minutes early. She got there twenty minutes later. She pulled into a parking space at the very front. She has a grayish blackish Toyota minivan that seems to be leaking oil. "Hey." She said, locking her car. "Let's go inside." I shivered and nodded.

I got a chocolate croissant and a tall decaf mocha. Bella got a regular tall coffee and a blueberry muffin. We sat in two window seats and started eating.

We talked about school and homework. "Do you think Julia is done getting back at me?" Bella asked as she guzzled the rest of her coffee. "I should hope so!" I said. "If she's not, she definitely has nothing better to do!" We laugh. I hope I have made Bella feel better.

At 4:09, I got home from Starbucks. Jody and David were there doing housework. I went up to my room and got onto my Mac.

I snooped onto Julia's Instagram gallery of photos she had posted in the last two weeks. Most of them are of her and Austin. Ugh, he is sooo hot. How could he be so blind about who Julia really is? A bully and a prima donna. Maybe some day he can open his eyes to who she really is.