The periods passed agonizingly slow for Alex Stowe. He was weary and tired from having to wake up early, but he thankfully met a lot of people today. Being a Freshman was scary and new, surrounded by older people. His favorite class was art, which he excelled it. And Meghan was in two of his classes, Biology and Math, so he hung out with her in those times. His other friend Samheed was in his Chinese class, and they both could hardly understand what the teacher was saying. The first day of school was supposed to be easy, but he still got a few packets that were due tomorrow. Not only that, but there was already a math quiz next Monday!
The bell ringing for lunch was the best part of the day. The hardest part, though, was usually finding somewhere to sit for lunch. He had a few friends but none that he could spot from the lunch line.
On his way to an empty table he ran into a girl who he had English with. Her name was Lani Haluki, he remembered.
"Oh hey, Lani," he said with a smile. "You have anywhere to sit?"
"No," she said, and squinted her eyes as she looked around the room for a seat.
"You can sit with me," he offered.
Lani nodded and slowly smiled. "Okay. Thanks."
They took their trays of food and sat at an empty table that was close to the wall. Alex shifted uncomfortably and tried his best to make Lani feel welcome. It was definitely hard to make new friends.
"So uh, how do you like your classes so far?" He inquired, smiling.
"They're fine," Lani said with a sigh. "Of course, the first day is always confusing and boring."
He nodded in agreement and started to eat his sandwich. "You could say that again."
He was happy when his twin brother, Aaron, spotted him and carried his tray of food over. Next to him was a girl he didn't recognize.
"Hi," Alex greeted. "I could hardly find a seat anywhere."
Aaron grimaced and sat down. "I know. First day of school problems."
"Who's this?" Alex asked, surprised and a bit happy that Aaron actually made a friend.
The girl took a seat next to Aaron. "Hi! I'm Kaylee Jones. I met your brother on the bus."
"I'm Alex," he said, grinning at her. He looked next to him, realizing Lani was silently eating. "Oh, and this is Lani. We have English together."
Aaron did an awkward wave and started eating his chicken sandwich. "Ugh, man, this day is so long."
"And it's only lunch," Alex agreed.
Kaylee rolled her eyes, smiling. "It's exciting. I can't believe I get to join the swim team here!
"Oh I used to take swimming, but I failed miserably at it," Alex said.
"I don't even know how to swim," Aaron confessed with an embarrassed frown.
Kaylee stared at him. "What? You don't?"
"I never tried to learn."
"That's crazy! I'm teaching you."
"N-no," he protested. "Really, that won't be necessary. I can learn someday when I have a pool."
"The school has a pool," Kaylee said. "And screw it-even if you don't want to learn you still have to. Swimming is like, really good for strengthening your core and lungs."
"So I've heard."
The four, including Lani when she finished eating, continued talking throughout lunch, about everything from middle school to TV. Kaylee liked to watch Shameless and 90210, Lani enjoyed those shows along with Doctor Who and Once Upon A Time. Alex had recently watched 13 Reasons Why, and enjoyed Arrow and American Horror Story, and Aaron watched Doctor Who, Sherlock, and The Flash.
Overall, lunch was the best part of their day.
Lani's final class couldn't have been a worse way to end the first day. She hated gym. She wasn't very fast or sporty. She enjoyed reading and writing and drawing and dancing, all things that weren't gym class. She hurried to get changed in the girls locker room, feeling out of place.
She put down her bag and quickly changed into a t shirt and soft shorts. A red headed girl approached her, setting down her bag next to Lani's. "Hi, I'm Meghan Ranger."
She was in the middle of gathering her hair into a bun, and smiled. "I'm Lani."
She was caught off guard when Meghan's eyes widened. "Oh, so you're Lani?"
"Uh, yeah," Lani said. "What..what's wrong?"
"I was just about to kill him when he said he was flirting with this girl all math class, and he said your name and I was like 'that's so rude of you!' and he said you were trying to ignore him, and wouldn't look at him but I know how annoying boys can be, and I definetly know how rude Samheed can be when he tries to get someone to like him."
Lani had started to tune her out since she was blabbing on endlessly, but got the picture.
"W-wait-Samheed? You know him?"
"Sadly yes," Meghan said with a pitying look. "We've been friends since third grade, and he lives in my neighborhood. I'm sorry about him. He's an idiot, but he's better once you get to know him."
"After he flirted endlessly with me all class? That's most likely not going to happen," Lani stated defiantly. Meghan sighed and finished putting on her gym clothes.
The girls started to walk out of the locker room together to the gym. "Well, maybe give him a chance. Who knows. You could be friends with him. He's not an awful person, just can be a bit of a hot head."
Lani grunted and made a face. "Doubtful."
When they got to the gym, the gym teacher, Ms. Florence, blowed the whistle. "Alright girls, warm up! Ten laps around the gym! Let's go!"
Lani rolled her eyes and started at a slow jog. Meghan quickly followed suit, and a third girl followed them.
"You guys liking Artime?" inquired the girl. She looked athletic, and had brown skin, long dark copper hair that was pulled into a braid, and startlingly orange eyes.
"It's okay," Lani stated. "The first day is always boring, so I don't really know."
"I love it, I've been looking forward to high school for a while!" said Meghan. "This place is huge."
"Yeah, I don't know anyone here, but it's pretty cool to meet a wide variety of people," said the girl. "I'm Sky."
"Lani," said Lani with a grin.
"Meghan," replied Meghan.
The teacher blowed the whistle again and ordered all the girls to come over. "Times up! Find a buddy and start up on this scavenger hunt! You got 40 minutes. The list of things to find is on the wall by the door. Go!"
There was a desperate scramble of kids running to claim their partners. Meghan nearly latched herself to Lani, and Lani felt better about it when Sky paired up with a small blonde girl named Scarlet.
They walked to the list. Lani scanned it for a minute. "Okay, we gotta find the goggles first, since they the pool is next to the gym."
Finding it wasn't so hard at all, and they tackled the items off the list pretty quickly. They ended up at the water fountain to look for blue stop watches. Meghan found them on the wall below it, and cheered as she checked the last item off their list.
"That was way faster than I thought it would be," she said happily.
Lani nodded, beaming. She checked the clock. "And we have twenty minutes to spare. Wanna get some candy from the cafeteria?"
"You can do that?" Meghan asked with wide eyes.
"Yeah," she replied with a laugh. "They have it at the vending machine."
"Oh," came the reply.
The two girls made their way to the vending machine, and ran into Sky and Scarlet.
"Did you finish your list?" Sky asked.
Lani showed them it. "Yep! What about you?"
"Us too," Sky grinned. "Where are you going?"
"To the vending machine," Meghan said. "We want candy."
"I could use some candy," Scarlet said.
The others nodded in agreement and decided to all go to the vending machine. They all had money with them, so Lani got a Milky Way bar, Sky got a bag of peanut M&Ms, Meghan got a cookies and cream Hershey bar, and Scarlet got Reese's.
The four walked slowly back to the gym, relishing in their wonderful meal that tasted far better than what they had for lunch. They got back to the gym in the nick of time, and soon were allowed to change and go home.
"See you guys!" Sky said, walking to her bus. Meghan waved to Lani and Scarlet as she soon too had to leave for her's. Scarlet was getting a ride home from her mom, so she said goodbye to Lani and hurried out the door.
Lani smiled, the taste of Milky Way still sitting in her mouth. Maybe this year wouldn't be so bad after all.