First Day Part 3

As Harriette and Tamarai talked about DaeRi, Collin was watching Amado who was heading this way then. Collin wondered what his reaction should be to seeing him here all of a sudden.

Amado had moved to Mexico after Bentley graduated, he said his aunt who he was living with didn’t want him anymore and sent him away to his oldest sister in Mexico. Collin had assumed he would never be back.

“Surprise,” Amado said, suddenly right in front of him. He looked different, but the same. His once red hair was now purple and was a floppy mohawk. He had a new piercing in his cheek that Collin wondered why would anyone want. And he was taller, Collin could tell even sitting down that Amado had at least grown three more inches since he had last seen him. But his smile was the same big friendly grin.

“Oh,” Collin said. Beside him Harriette stopped talking and turned to look at Amado.

“Hi,” she said, looking a tad a bit confused.

“Hello,” Amado said in his thick accent.

“Hey,” Collin said.

“We have to catch up,” Amado said, “How about we hang out after school?”

Collin nodded, “sure.”

Amado grinned, “That’s great, I will see you then!”

And with that Amado turned and walked right out of the lunch room and Collin laughed. Amado was so weird.

“He’s so weird,” Harriette said, “is he your friend?”

“We hung out a bit with Bentley,” Collin said.

Harriette wrinkled her nose, “why would Bentley hang out with someone like that?”

Collin shrugged, ignoring Harriette’s harsh judgement.

Luckily Tamarai was obviously determined to get Harriette to forgive DaeRi and she brought up the fact that now DaeRi was sitting with two other girls, which distracted Harriette from her thoughts on Amado.

Admittedly Amado was out there, with his purple hair, plenty of piercings and tattoos. Not to mention his colorful choice of clothing. But still Collin didn’t like it when Harriette started acting all judgemental, which was really all the time. She wasn’t that accepting, sadly.

Collin hadn’t liked Amado much anyway, he was mostly Bentley’s friend. But Collin got the feeling that Amado liked him alot.

--

After school Collin waited on the steps for AeGuk, after parting from a whining Harriette who wanted him to come home with her because she didn’t want to spend all afternoon listening to Tamarai try to make her forgive DaeRi.

Finally she left with Tamarai when Collin explained that he had said he would hang out with Amado after school so he couldn’t just ditch Amado.

“Hola!,” Amado said, appearing behind Collin.

“Oh, hi,” Collin said, suddenly feeling awkward. They had never hung out without Bentley before.

“Do you want to eat?” Amado asked, “I am very hungry. Starving.”

Collin shrugged, “sure.”

Amado grinned and led the way to the deli, which wasn’t far from the school since the whole town seemed to surround the school. The deli was also a cafe/bakery. It was the only good place to eat in town.

“I have missed you alot,” Amado said.

“Yeah,” Collin said, not really agreeing because he hadn’t really thought of Amado since he left.

“Are you wondering what I am doing here?” Amado asked as he opened the door for Collin and then followed him in.

Collin shrugged, “I’m a little curious.”

Amado grinned, he did that a lot, “After we get some food, I will tell you.”

“Okay,” Collin said.

Amado grinned and ordered a chocolate croissant and a cup of iced chai, then looked at Collin and told him to order whatever he wanted.

“I will pay,” Amado said, “My treat.”

“Thanks,” Collin said, and he got a muffin and a iced tea with lemon. Then they brought their food to the table and Amado stared at Collin expectantly.

“Uhm,” Collin said, “wasn’t it you who said you’ll tell me why you’re here?”

“Yes, I was waiting for you to bring it up,” Amado said, grinning.

“Alright, I’m all ears,” Collin said.

Amado leaned in, “My sister didn’t really care much for me, she let me do whatever I want. Wanted. It was fun except you weren’t there. I wanted to spend my senior year here, so I told my sister and she said I could do whatever I wanted. She did not care at all. So I called my aunt and told her I was coming back, that my sister did not want me and she was the last person I could call. She didn’t want me back though, she said that I should call my parents and have them relocate me.”

Collin wondered then why Amado didn’t live with his parents anyway, but he didn’t ask because it might be too personal or something.

“I told her I wanted to live with her. She was shocked, she thought I didn’t like her. Which is true, but she does not need to know. So she said that I could come back if I behaved, and since I am not sure why she kicked me out last time anyway, I agreed. And now I am here!”

Collin nodded, “well then.”

Amado grinned, “Are you happy to see me?”

Collin shrugged, “sure.”

Amado frowned, “You are not? Why?”

“I said sure,” Collin said. He finished off his drink and he had already eaten his muffin while Amado was talking.

Amado saw that he was done with his food and laughed, “look at that! I still have all my food and you have none.”

Amado laughed and Collin just stared. It wasn’t that funny.

Then Amado stopped laughing abruptly and stared back, “You do not like me?”

Collin smiled and shook his head, “No, I like you fine enough.”

Amado smiled, looking kind of shy, “Thank you. Now enough of me and let’s talk about you. How has your year been?”

“Good,” Collin said, which wasn’t entirely true. It was probably one of his worst years, it was a lot of spending time alone and dealing with Harriette dragging him to all of these popular functions. But he didn’t want to talk about that, so it was “good”.

“Good,” Amado said, “Anything exciting happen at the school?”

Collin shrugged, “Not really.”

“You are still popular,” Amado said, “I noticed in lunch. And the hallways, people follow you and Harriette everywhere.”

Collin nodded, “Yeah, unfortunately.”

Oops, he forgot he didn’t want to talk about that.

“Not that it’s bad exactly,” Collin said, trying to backtrack. “It’s just having people following you around is strange.”

“It is like being famous,” Amado said, “But teenagers instead of paparazzi.”

Collin laughed, “Yes.”

Amado grinned, “But at least they do not follow you home.”

“Counting my blessings,” Collin said, holding up his fingers and counting down.

“But Harriette likes it, yes?” Amado asked.

“She lives for it,” Collin said.

Amado nodded, “she always looks so happy.”

Collin nodded, smiling. She did always look happy, which is why Collin dealt with all the popular stuff with her.

“You are happy?” Amado asked.

Collin didn’t know what to say, that was a weird question.

“Yeah,” He said, bewildered.

“Good!,” Amado said, grinning. “As long as you both are happy all is good.”

Collin nodded.

“Oh, I have no more food,” Amado said, looking at his empty cup in what could be faux shock but Collin wouldn’t be surprised if it was real.

“Yep,” Collin said.

“I guess you want to go home and be with Harriette,” Amado said, “Gossip about the first day.”

Collin laughed, “yeah I guess. But we don’t gossip.”

“You do,” Amado said with a completely straight face, “Popular people gossip. It is true.”

Collin laughed and stood up, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“You too,” Amado said, now grinning. “Thank you for coming with me.’

“You’re welcome,” Collin said.

Amado really wasn’t that bad, once you got past the piercings, tattoos, purple mohawk, choppy english, and strong accent, he was just a bit overly eccentric. But nice, and that was all that was important really.

First Day Part 2

Shae had felt confident about her first day at A.L. High up until her dad pulled into the parking lot, her parents refused to let her ride the bus, because they felt that was where all the bullying happened. But anyway, seeing the school, which was attached to the middle school so she had seen it before, but seeing it today and knowing she was entering through the main doors was terrifying. She had vowed that she would try harder to make friends and not just sit on the sidelines but now she wasn’t so sure.

She also wished she would have worn something different, she usually wore the basic jeans and t-shirt combo but today she had decided to try a little harder and was wearing green jean shorts and a yellow tank top with a cupcake on it, she felt very colorful.

“Alright, have a good day,” her dad said, waiting for her to get out of the car.

“I’ll try,” Shae said, reluctantly opening the door and getting out of the car. With one last wave and goodbye her dad drove away off to drop her little sister at the elementary school across town.

Shae turned to face the school and froze at the sight of the millions of students loitering outside and around the door. She didn’t know why she was so nervous, it’s not like she didn’t have to do this stuff in middle school. But in middle school she had Matt.

Speaking of Matt, Shae saw him at with a group of people talking in on the steps.

“Ugh,” Shae mumbled, she did not want to walk past Matt right now. But she had to get into the school somehow, and while she did she might as well make it look like she wasn’t a nervous wreck. So she put on her best smile and started towards the school and up the step. She glanced at Matt as she passed him and was terrifying so see him watching her. He smiled and waved.  She smiled back and continued into the school.

Once safely out of Matt’s sight she let out out a breath and stopped with the smiling. She figured smiling too much would look weird.

She was glad to find her locker rather quickly, but not so glad to see two identical looking girls hanging out in front of it.

“Uhm,” she said.

The girls looked at her, waiting for her to say something else.

“That’s my locker,” Shae said.

“Oh?” one of the girls said, she laughed a little and stepped aside.

“Thanks,” Shae said stepping forward and, luckily, opening her locker after only one try. But the other girls didn’t leave, they continued to talk quietly right next to her.

“Hi,” one of them said to Shae after the other girl left.

“Hey,” Shae said, not really looking at her. She was too busy looking at the map her mom had given her. She was trying to figure out where her homeroom was.

“I’m Mariah,” the girl said.

Shae looked up finally and gave the girl a small smile. She was trying.

“Shae,” Shae said. “So I assume you have the locker next to mine?”

“Yep,” Mariah said, “Where’s your home room?”

Shae pointed to it on the map and showed Mariah.

Mariah grinned, “same! We can walk together.”

“Oh,” Shae said, knowing this was good thing but not exactly feeling ecstatic about it.

“I was afraid I’d have to walk alone,” Mariah went on, “my sister, who was just over here, her name’s Ella BTW, has a different homeroom. Which is so strange since we used to share all of our classes.”

Shae nodded slowly.

“Do you have any siblings?” Mariah asked, tilting her head.

“Uhm, yeah,” Shae said, closing her locker just as the bell rang.

“Older or younger?” Mariah asked as they started walking.

“Younger,” Shae said.

“Cute!” Mariah said, sounding all too excited.

“I guess,” Shae shrugged.

“So you went to the public middle school?” Mariah asked.

“I guess,” Shae said, not really sure if their was another middle school.

“Nice, me and Ella went to a private school in the city,” Mariah said.

“Oh,” Shae said, trying not to make judge her as a preppy private schooler. What was she doing here anyway?

“Ella wanted to try public school out,” Mariah explained. “And I didn’t want to be separated.”

Share didn’t say anything, just nodded as they arrived at the classroom.

Shae took a seat in the back, old habits die hard, and Mariah looked torn as she looked at the empty seat up front and the empty seat next to Shae. Shae half wished she would take the seat in the front, and half wished she would sit next to her.

Shae didn’t know how she felt as Mariah took the seat next to her.

---

Ella’s plan for the first day of school was find the popular-est girl there and befriend her. You could imagine her joy when she found said popular girl in her homeroom class. You could tell she was popular by the way the people surrounded her, as she talked, listening as if she was Jesus himself.

Ella smiled to herself, this was working perfectly. But all the seats around this popular girl were taken. So Ella took a seat near the front and tried to make it look like she didn’t really care about the popular girl.

And then homeroom started.

And it ended and Ella waited for the popular girl to leave but somehow she missed it, probably because the crowd left with her, and suddenly she was the last person in the classroom.

This was gonna be harder than she expected.

The next time she saw the popular girl was in study hall, which was mixed between grades. The girl was with the same guy she was with in homeroom, they looked terribly similar and Ella wondered if they were related. But they didn’t act like brother or sister, Ella noted as she took her seat behind them so she could watch without anyone noticing. The way the girl leaned in as the guy talked and smiled at him looked like they were dating. But they looked so similar, that would be kind of creepy.

Then Ella remember that she was supposed to be befriending this girl, not watching her. So Ella tapped her on the shoulder.

The girl jumped and looked back, she looked especially cute when she was shocked, a good aspect for someone popular, “Hm?”

“Hey,” Ella said, “I just wanted to say I LOVE your shirt. where’d you get it?”

The girl looked down at her shirt and frowned thoughtfully, “I don’t remember.”

Ella laughed nicely, “I know that feeling.”

The girl smiled, “right. You’re new? I’ve never seen you before.”

“Yeah,” Ella said, “I’m a freshman, I went to a private middle school in the city.”

“Oh,” the girl nodded, “I’m Harriette, what’s your name?”

“Ella Montgomery,” Ella said.

“Cute,” the girl, Harriette, said. She then looked at the guy next to her and nudged him and looked back at Ella.

“Oh, hi,” he said. He had nice eyes.

“This is Ella, if you weren’t listening,” Harriette said to the guy.

“Nice to meet you, Ella,” he said with a nice smile. A really nice smile. “I’m Collin.”

“He’s my brother,” Harriette said.

“Oh,” Ella said, trying to keep her shock off her face.

“Twin brother,” Harriette continued.

Ella grinned, “hey, I have a twin too!”

Now she had something in common with Harriette. Good.

“Wow, really,” Harriette said, “What a coincident. Does she go here too?”

“Yeah, we couldn’t be separated,” Ella said, “Except for our classes apparently.”

Harriette laughed and smiled at Collin, “I know what you mean, every second away from Collin is torture.”

Wow, Ella thought, she sure does like her brother a lot.

Then the teacher told them to be quiet so with one last smile Harriette turned back towards the front.

And Ella was one more step closer to popularity.

First Day part 1

To Lexi and Honey Bell it felt like summer had lasted far more than three month. Their summer had not been very stellar, because Honey’s mom, and Lexi’s aunt, took Honey on college tours the whole summer so they had barely anytime to just enjoy the lazy summer days.

But today school was back in session and it was back to them spending all their time together.

“You don’t even understand how boring college tours can get,” Honey said on their ride to school. Lexi had gotten her driver's license over the summer and her parents congratulated her with a car.

“Ugh, and I’m gonna have to do them next year,” Lexi sighed.

“I can’t believe we’re so old,” Honey laughed.

“I can’t believe you’re going to college next year,” Lexi said. “It’s gonna be unbearable without you.”

“You can do it,” Honey said, patting Lexi’s thigh, “I believe in you.”

Lexi laughed at Honey’s oh so serious tone, “we’ll see.”

They pulled into the school parking lot and parked.

Honey grinned, “I never thought I’d say this but I missed school.”

Lexi laughed, “I think I did too.”

They joined the crowd of student streaming into the hallways. It always amazed Lexi how things change but stay the same after summer break. The hallways were full with mostly the same people, but they all looked a tad bit different. Or a lot different.

Sadly Lexi and Honey had to split up for homeroom, after a strike of good luck where their lockers were very close to each others.

“We can’t have everything,” Honey said as they split up.

Then throughout the day they would see each other, say hi and then split up again, until Gym which they shared. That was also the first time they saw Layla. They hadn’t exactly forgot about her, how could they after spending their whole year together last year? But they hadn’t seen her all summer and didn’t really try to see her either. Even when Lexi was bored out of her mind.

“Layla!” Honey said after spotting her in the changing rooms.

Layla looked drastically different, her once long fire truck red hair was now short and bleached blond.

“Wow,” Lexi said.

“Hey,” Layla said, she looked a tad bit nervous.

“Sorry about disappearing all summer,” Honey said, “College stuff. I love your hair!”

“No problem,” Layla said, “and thanks.”

“I almost didn’t recognize you,” Lexi said, not bothering to make up an excuse about why she didn’t contact her all summer.

“Yeah right, you totally didn’t recognize her,” Honey laughed, “You looked so confused when I pointed her out.”

“Okay, so I totally didn’t recognize you,” Lexi said. “You’re taller.”

“I am,” Layla said, scrunching up her face, “I wish I wasn’t. If I don’t stop growing I’ll tower over the guys.”

“Tall people are cool,” Honey said.

Then the gym teacher blew her whistle signaling for them all to get to work. It was just laps so they could still talk.

“I like your hair,” Layla said to Lexi.

“Oh?” Lexi said, reaching up and touching her hair. She had dyed it very strawberry blond over the summer. “Thanks.”

“You guys both did excited things with your hair and mine is just brown,” Honey said.

“You could’ve,” Lexi said.

“Yeah right, remember I was out touring colleges all summer,” Honey said.

“How’d that go?” Layla asked.

“Boooring,” Honey said, “And I still have no idea what college I want to go to.”

“You’ll figure it out,” Lexi said, “I believe in you.”

Honey laughed, “We’ll see.”

--

Harriette noticed that this first day of school went a lot like last years. Except this year people weren’t just asking about her summer vacation, but also about DaeRi. She didn’t want to talk about DaeRi and that’s exactly what she told everyone.

It took forever for Harriette, Collin, and Tamarai to make it to their homeroom, which they surprisingly shared. And when they arrived it was just more of the same until the teacher quieted them all down.

Harriette was glad not to see DaeRi for most of the day. She didn’t share any classes with her, plus she shared a lot of classes with Collin which just added more good to her day. At lunch was the first time she saw her.

Of course Harriette, Tamarai and Collin all sat at the “Popular Table”. Tamarai was saying something about her English teacher when DaeRi caught Harriette’s eye from across the room. Harriette tried not to feel too happy to see her sitting all the way on the outside of the popular circle.

“Hm?” Tamarai said noticing that Harriette’s attention was elsewhere.

“Oh,” she said when she looked over to where Harriette was looking and saw DaeRi. She frowned.

“What are you guys looking at?” Collin asked. He glanced around and seemed to stop at something else.

Harriette looked at Collin, what was he looking at? She followed his line of sight and saw a familiar looking face but Harriette didn’t quite know who it was.

“Who’s that?” she asked.

“Huh?” Collin said looking at Harriette.

“Who’s that you’re looking at?” Harriette asked.

“Oh, that’s Amado...” Collin trailed off, “He used to go here before Bentley graduated but he moved last summer. We used to hang out with him.”

“Oh, yeah,” Harriette said. Tamarai was looking at them, kind of confused.

“I guess he’s back,” Collin shrugged, “but what were you looking at?”

“Oh, just DaeRi,” Harriette said, “I haven’t seen her all day.”

“Oh,” Collin said.

“Isn’t it sad to see her all the way over there?” Tamarai asked.

“Sad, after what she did to my friends and herself?” Harriette laughed, “Not really.”

Tamarai frowned.

Harriette shrugged, “I don’t have much sympathy for someone like her.”

--

Earlier that day after English Tamarai ran into DaeRi.

“Finally!” DaeRi exclaimed, “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

Tamarai shrugged, “Sorry.”

“So how’s it going?” DaeRi asked.

Tamarai frowned, “Why don’t we talk after school?”

DaeRi stopped walking and stared at Tamarai, “What? Why?”

Tamarai frowned, “It’s just that if I’m talking to you and Harriette’s not people might think it’s kind of weird.”

DaeRi frowned, “No way, you’re the last person I would have thought would do this. Base our friendship on what other people think?”

Tamarai bit her lip,”I don’t know what to do. Harriette expects me to stick with her, and if I’m with her I can’t be seen with you.”

DaeRI shook her head, she could not believe this was happening. Her one best friend abandoning her for popularity.

“I’m sorry, but Harriette has been there for me from day one,” Tamarai said. “she accepted me into her family with open arms. And being her sister has changed my life, I can’t just leave her.”

“But I’m your best friend!” DaeRi exclaimed, calling some attention onto the two of them. Tamarai could hear people start to whisper just as the bell rung. With one last look at DaeRi she turned around and headed off to her next class, leaving DaeRi alone in the hallway.

--

Now at Lunch Tamarai felt terrible about the scene in the hallway earlier. On one hand she knew that sticking with Harriette was what she wanted to do, but on the other hand she felt terrible about ditching DaeRi. She hoped that one day maybe Harriette could patch things up with Daeri again. Even if it seemed unlikely.

Obsessive Perfectionist Ways

“Okay, ready?” Tracy asked Heather. They were sitting in Tracy’s room getting ready to make a video for their Youtube channel.

Heather took one last look in the mirror, fluffed her hair a bit, then took a seat in one of the chair in front of the tripod where the camera was sitting.

“Ready,” She chimed.

“Alright,” Tracy said hitting play on the camera and joining Heather in the chair next to hers.

“Welcome to-” Tracy paused abruptly and scrunched up her face.

Heather let out a sigh, this was the tenth try and every time Tracy would pause somewhere and say it wasn’t good enough. Heather tried to ignore Tracy’s obsessive perfectionist ways most of the time, but she had places to go and people to see.

“Hello, and welcome to 2girlFASHIONS,” Tracy said, “I’m T-Heart.”

“And I’m H-Song,” Heather said, with her best entertainer smile on. The one she spent a week trying to perfect.

Heather and Tracy had started their fashion blog, 2girlFASHIONS, two years ago. They started with outfit of the days, and moved on to fashion tips and reviews. Then the next logical step would be a Youtube channel, which they made during the summer. They already had a pretty substantial amount of subscribers.

Today they were trying to do their first tag video, the best friend tag. But Tracy was making it take forever, they hadn’t even gotten to the first question yet.

“We asked you guy what you wanted to see,” Tracy continued, “and a lot of you guys said the best friend tag. So that’s what we’re doing!”

Heather grinned, “so let’s get to the questions?”

Going good.

But Tracy froze and then scrunched up her face.

“No,” she said.

Heather groaned, “I promised my mom that I’d be home to see off my cousins.”

Heather’s cousins had stayed the summer while her aunt and uncle celebrated their anniversary in Paris. Her cousins were only five, ten, and thirteen, so basically a bunch of little brats. The summer with them had not been very enjoyable.

Tracy glared at her, “fine. Just go.”

“Ugh, come on Tracy,” Heather said, “Let’s just finished this video quickly.”

“If you’re not willing to put in the time for our channel then just leave,” Tracy said, standing up turning off the camera.

“Fine whatever,” Heather said, “I was gonna invite you to my place, but I guess you don’t want to come.”

Tracy just shrugged and stood there, as if waiting for Heather to leave.

Heather sighed and stood up, “see you later.”

Tracy just shrugged again.

Heather rolled her eyes and left the room. She said goodbye to Tracy’s dad and his girlfriend who were sitting in the living room watching one of those lame sci fi movies from before her time then left. She glanced back up at Tracy’s window where she could see Tracy sitting at her computer. Heather sighed, these fights were so petty, but they happened all the time nowadays. Heather didn’t want to worry about the state of her relationship with Tracy but she still did.

Back in Tracy’s room Tracy was sitting at her computer trying not to hear Heather’s car pull out of the driveway. She didn’t mean to snap at her again. It just happened, she was always on edge lately because she had a pretty bad feeling that her dad was gonna invite his girlfriend to live with them. She didn’t want Patty, and her weird obsession with outer space, in her house.

So she was a little angrier at everything.

When she went downstairs later to see if dinner was in the works she found her dad and Patty watching some show about aliens.

“Uhm, do you guys know what time it is?”

Her dad practically flew off the couch, he obviously hadn’t seen her enter the living room.

“Oh, wow, look at that,” Patty said checking her watch, “It’s late, you must be hungry.”

“Not really, it just that we usually have dinner at night,” Tracy said.

“We can order some pizza,” her dad said.

Tracy made a face.

“No?” her dad said.

“I told you I’m on a diet,” Tracys aid, “Pizza is not one of my diet foods.”

Her dad frowned, “oh.”

Tracy shook her head, “whatever, I’m not hungry, you guys can do whatever you like.”

And with that she left the room, feeling as she usually did after seeing Patty; angry.