It’s my first day at a new school. It is almost the second semester but my parents decided to move us halfway across the country. I am not excited to go a new school. I have to leave my best friends behind, and most importantly I have to leave my girlfriend behind. She is the most important person in my life, and that might be what you hear from every teenager, but I’m different. My girlfriend is my world. Anyway, I am at school now. I have my schedule in hand, my backpack on my shoulders. Mom offered to drive me to school, but I declined her offer. I wanted to take the bus, so I didn’t have to talk to my mom about “my feelings”. By the way, my mom is a psychiatrist, so whenever she assumes I have a problem, she tries to get me to talk about my feelings.

I’m walking into school, feeling awkward because I don’t know anybody. I thought the “new kid” was like everyone’s prized possession, like a trophy that everyone wants, but only a few people get. My classes are all honors because apparently, I am smart. I am in my first class: AP Statistics. My teacher puts me in a group with a Chinese dude and two girls. As I am about to sit down, I notice the girl sitting across from me, is frantically trying to finish her homework. Maybe it’s AP Statistics homework? But the funny thing is that she is also listening to music. Haha. When they say the pledge of allegiance, she is finishing the sentence that she is writing, so that she can also get up, but she doesn’t finish in time. Then she says,
“Whew! I’m done”. She notices me sitting there and asks me, “Who are you?”

I reply,”I’m the new kid”. She nods her head and tucks her hair back. She puts away her homework that she frantically finished and takes out a binder with flowers all over it. The teacher, Mrs. Nienhaus, I think, starts the class by introducing me. She says, “Shreya, will you help out our new classmate? This is his first day, and he has almost all of the same classes as you, so maybe you could walk with him to classes?”

Shreya looks at me, then at the teacher. She quickly replies, “Sure, why not?” in a raspy voice that could only mean that she has a cold. The class goes by, and Shreya teaches me what they have been working on in class, and before I know it class is over.