The rest of the day went by uneventfully. Liz had gone to three more classes before the school day ended, and thus received three more contracts. Right as she was packing up her many papers to leave before the final bell rang, the loudspeaker could be heard once more, with a voice saying;

"All freshman and incoming sophomores see Mrs. Napta for locker assigning."

Close to five minutes later, Lizzie was standing in a mile-long line, stuck in a very narrow hallway leading to Mrs. Napta's office. Every time someone had received their locker combo, they had to side-shimmy to get past the line. Once again, Liz couldn't find Maria among the sea of kids, so she resigned herself to her phone. The hum of whispering voices calmed her into the most relaxed state she had been in all day. Lizzie felt proud of herself, she made it through the whole day without anything going wrong! Slowly, but surely, the line progressed closer and closer to Mrs. Napta's office, her musical voice getting louder by the minute. After about five more minutes, Liz finally got to the head of the line, and she was greeted by the most colorful, yet chaotic room she had ever seen. There were papers all over the walls, Playbills with tickets, posters, books strewn on every flat surface. It looked like a messy unicorn lived there. In the center of all the madness sat Mrs. Napta, navigating the rainbow labyrinth with ease. She spotted Liz, smiling so wide, Liz thought her face would get stuck that way.

"Hello! Miss… Eleanor, right?"

"Elizabeth."

Mrs. Napta snapped her fingers. "That's it! I'm sorry, first days are always so chaotic for me!"

A student, Liz presumed to be an upperclassman, chimed in, "All days are chaotic for you, Napta." The girl had short, blue hair, eyes so dark they were almost black, and a small nose stud. She smiled at Mrs. Napta, who returned the expression, laughing.

The teacher turned back to Liz. "This is T.J.! She's my senior assistant." T.J. nodded at Liz, waving hello, before returning to her phone. Liz was counting the Playbills on the walls, Mrs. Napta rummaged through an enormous stack of papers and pulled out a notebook sheet with very familiar handwriting. "Now, we already got a request from a Miss Maria to share a locker. Would that be alright with you?"

"Do we have to share a locker? I'm pretty messy and I don't want to mess up her mojo." Liz said.

Mrs. Napta explained. "I'm afraid that students must share lockers. We don't have enough space for everyone to have their own."

Lizzie shrugged. "In that case, I would love to have Maria as my locker buddy!" While saying this, Liz couldn't help but notice that the page that had Maria's handwriting seemed far too long to be just about lockers. Mrs. Napta gestured for her to come closer. She said, in a noticeably quieter voice, "She also mentioned that you'll want to speak with Ms. Lake before leaving. She wouldn't elaborate, but she said that it was important."

And with that, Liz wanted to go home, so she went straight to Ms. Lake's office. Or, she tried to. She didn't have the best sense of direction. She got turned around and ended up on the second floor, outside of the black box floors shone with fresh polish, squeaking with every step that Liz made. She stopped when she looked to her right and saw a full-on grand piano. Having only a keyboard at home, Liz strode towards it, not caring about leaving anymore. She lifted the cover and sat, placing her book bag next to her on the bench. Lizzie didn't really know much by heart, so she started playing 'Mary Had A Little Lamb', over and over again, because that wouldn't get annoying, at all. Once she had gotten bored and started playing random keys to make up her own amateur tune, she heard squeaky footsteps behind her. Liz turned to see Cheyenne, watching intently.

"It's okay, you didn't have to stop playing." she smiled warmly, gathering her hair into a ponytail. Liz had never seen anyone with hair as dark as hers. Not without dye, at least. Her skin was the color of caramel, and Liz could see a mark on her neck.

"It's alright! I don't like to play when other people might want to have a conversation."

Cheyenne sat down next to Liz, putting her bag on the floor. "Well, what do you want to talk about?"

Glancing at her neck, Liz asked, "What's the story behind that?" She pointed to the mark. Cheyenne laughed, bringing up her hand to feel it. "My brother gave this to me when I was four. He was six and had just discovered the magic of staplers." Liz snorted. Immediately after, she covered her mouth, flushed red. "I'm so sorry, I can't control when that happens." To her surprise, Cheyenne grinned warmly at her, exclaiming, "Why're you sorry? That was adorable!"

Did…

Did a girl just call her 'adorable'?

Before Liz could comprehend what had just happened, she remembered that she had to see Ms. Lake. She got up far too quickly, knocking her book bag to the floor, and both her and Cheyenne reached to pick it up. Cheyenne reached it first and meekly handed it to Liz, smiling.

"Here. I'm sorry if I freaked you out…"

"Oh, no, no! It's okay, I just remembered I have to see Ms. Lake before I leave. Uh, do you know where her office is?" Liz pointed up and down the hall, still perplexed on the location. Cheyenne pointed to the stairs. She said, "She's on the first floor, next to Mrs. Napta's office."

Liz laughed, sounding like a mad scientist, thus further embarrassing herself. She quickly turned and escaped down the stairs, nearly tripping at the bottom. She strode past the cafeteria once more, and passed it almost immediately. The room was small, with only five tables. Lining the walls were glass cases, filled with certificates and posters for shows of the school's past. Lizzie managed to spy 'Little Shop Of Horrors' and 'Oklahoma!' as she pressed on, passing a set of lockers and finally reaching the narrow hallway once again. Ms. Lake's office was indeed right next to Mrs. Napta's.

Nice going, fucking idiot…

Liz cursed herself as she walked in. However, looking around and observing the office, she suddenly felt better. This became clear as to why as soon as she heard Ms. Lake's voice, behind a sheer separator.

"Hello! Who just came in?" Ms. Lake peeked around the edge of her makeshift wall and saw Liz. "That's right, I told your friend to send you, come in! Have a seat!" For how intimidating she seemed at the assembly, Ms. Lake was awfully kind. Liz sat in one of the two armchairs that faced a large desk. Despite the chair being quite comfortable, she sat on the edge, her stomach doing backflips. Taking notice of this, Ms. Lake reassured her, "Relax. You're not in trouble. I just wanted to talk to you for a minute." Lizzie sat back in the chair, sinking into the firm leather back. Her foot began to bounce as Ms. Lake sat adjacent to her and spoke.

"Now, your friend, Maria, came to me at lunch to express some concerns about you. She was very persistent in seeing me."

"That sounds like her."

"Despite these concerns, I told her that I had already spoken with your parents about those issues, but I still wanted to speak with you. I want you to understand that we have a much more tolerant environment here, and bullying and harassment of any kind is taken extremely seriously. You have nothing to worry about. And if anyone starts bothering you in this way, tell me or one of the other teachers, and we'll be sure to take care of the matter." With a more grave look on her face, she continued. "This may not be my place to ask, but you are taking your medication?"

Liz's face fell to her hands, bound tightly on her lap, and she murmured, "Yes."

Her teacher's eyebrows furrowed with concern. "Sweetheart, don't be embarrassed. Other students here struggle with the same things you do. I just want to make sure you're taking care of yourself, and that your time here is as peaceful as possible. However, I can't guarantee that if you have an outburst like you did at your previous school." Ms. Lake leaned forward. "You put that boy in the hospital. You threw him over the stair railing."

"He deserved it!"

Complete silence, followed by a deep sigh from Ms. Lake. "Elizabeth, I'm sure that you had good intentions in your actions. I've heard the story from your parents, and that boy deserved to be disciplined for what he did, but that doesn't mean that you attack him and shove him over a railing!"

"Look, I know, alright? I had enough people calling me a freak before that, so I gave them a reason to! I know I could have handled that jackass with more dignity, and I don't know what happened to my brain, but I just got so angry! I can't even remember half of what happened, all I know is, he said… that... and the next thing I knew, there was screaming at the bottom of the stairs, and people so close to me that I couldn't breathe." Liz could feel herself struggling not to cry, her shoulders trembling and her eyes wet. Her stomach was now doing a full-on gymnastics routine, and she could feel her face getting warm.

Ms. Lake quickly got up and sat in the chair next to her, gently placing a hand on her shoulder. "Shhh, it's alright. You're safe here. No one's going to treat you like that again. I'll make sure of that." Liz hiccuped, followed by a small chuckle. She always got a serious case of hiccups when she was upset, and strangely enough, it helped her feel better. She smiled at Ms. Lake, whispering a 'thank you.' Lizzie got up, and gathered her bookbag, while Ms. Lake added, "Mrs. Dahue is the student counselor, if you feel yourself getting upset for any reason, please go straight to her. Her office is close to the school entrance. Or, if it's particularly serious, come to me, and I'll get it sorted out. I'll see you tomorrow." With that, Liz left Ms. Lake's office, feeling a bit more vulnerable, but glad that she was finally able to go home. As she passed by the cafeteria once more, she saw Maria and Nate, chatting by the entrance. Liz noticed that Maria had a red mark on her hand.

"Hey, you good? Your hand…" Liz pointed to the mark. Maria laughed, and said, "I got a bit too excited in dance, did a leap that I didn't prepare for, and fell on my hand!"

Liz was still confused. "But, why is it red instead of bruised?"

Nate answered. "She slid on the floor with her hand underneath her."

Ouch.

Maria began to leave, beckoning Liz to follow. "Come on, I've already had to make a million excuses for why I haven't left yet."

"Was it Aunt Brittany or Aunt Santana?" Liz smirked.

"Take a wild guess." Maria held up her phone to show that she was texting with Santana.

Both laughed, and left. They raced eachother down the stairs, and Maria was the obvious winner. As they got outside, Liz asked,

"Are they picking you up?"

"Nah, subway."

"Same."

They both took a left and headed towards Times Square. Thankfully, this was a short time before rush hour, so the crowds weren't too bad. Well, they were bad, just not as bad as they could be. As Maria and Liz weaved between foot traffic, Maria asked,

"Are you gonna audition for Chicago?"

"Probably not." Liz eyed the sky anxiously. It was cloudy and she didn't bring an umbrella.

Maria, always prepared, began to fiddle with her bag to get her own umbrella out. She continued, "What about freshman elections? You know, student council?"

Laughing, Liz elaborated, "Maria, today was our first day. I wanna give myself a bit of time to adjust before I start doing stuff." Thinking for a second, Liz added. "I wouldn't mind having a smaller position, though. Like Treasurer or Secretary."

"See, that's the spirit! Get involved, make friends!"

"I'm surprised I managed to do exactly that. I thought people would just avoid me."

Maria finally fished out her umbrella, narrowly dodging a man in a suit. "Why? You look friendly."

"It's all in my head. At least, that's what Luke tells me."

"Luke's the best."

Liz grimaced. "Okay, that's pushing it."

The rest of the walk to the subway station was discussing their classes and various teachers. As they passed the turnstiles and made it to the R and N trains, Maria said,

"I'll see you tomorrow! Say hi to everyone for me!"

"Same goes for you, say hi to Bridget for me! Get home safe!"

They both waved goodbye, and Liz went to the Downtown side, while Maria went to the Uptown side. Maria's uptown N arrived first. So Liz was left with nothing but her thoughts and a hundred strangers on the platform. Music was playing somewhere, and everyone was either looking at their phones, or checking if the train was close, always disappointed. Liz texted her parents that she was on her way home, and a few minutes later, she could hear the deep rumbling of a train getting closer. Upon further inspection, she saw that it was an N, meaning that she would get home faster. Her hair billowed in the gust of wind as the train sped into the station, full of people. The doors opened, gracing Liz with it's sweet, sweet air conditioning. Thankfully, more than half of the passengers had gotten off, so Liz managed to snag a seat before the car filled up again. Her phone buzzed as she got comfortable, reading,

Okay. We'll see you at home, sweetie! Love you!