Author's Note: I hope you have as much fun reading this as I am having writing it. I still have a chapter or two to go intoducing charlie to the world until I can get into the main plot. Well, enjoy! Please review w/ constructive critisism.
Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight Saga characters.
Chapter Two
I found myself standing in the middle of a bustling crowd of people. They stood around waving, laughing, smiling. They all looked like they had known everyone for years. I walked forward, following the bunches of students as they gossiped their way down into the school, not caring if I became separated from my family; I didn't want to be labeled a Cullen on the first day of school. That was not a very good way of making friends.
When I finally found my way up the stairs and into the main lobby, I continued following other nervous groups of people that I assumed were other freshmen until I saw the long row of tables with letter ranges posted above them on the wall..
I walked up to the first table and waited for a group of giggly girls to finish. After what seemed like a lifetime, they finally finished collecting various papers and with a squeal, they left.
"Black, Charlie," I prompted the teacher at the table. He thumbed through a stack of papers labeled "B" with a sticky note.
"Here is your schedule," the man said, barely glancing up at me. He began collecting papers from a row of multicolored paper stacks, naming each as he went. "How to Survive Kayhi, a map, How to Use Your Library, study tips. Go through there to the auditorium and you will be instructed on what to do next."
When I arrived in the auditorium, I found that the cliques had continued, leaving me with nowhere to go. I saw my family, but I didn't want to be with them. I walked around a bit, noticing who were the football players and cheerleaders; math geeks and nerds; and the people who looked like they belonged in Juvi. Now where were the all-around nice people?
A voice behind me made me jump. "Are you new here?" I turned around and realized my silent question had been answered. A girl with long black hair that fell in waves on her shoulders stood there, slightly in front of a group of several other kids, like they had just been in a circle. They all had similar skin tones to my father and the other people on the reservation.
"Yeah," I replied, stepping forward to a more comfortable conversation distance. "I'm Charlie Black. I moved from Washington State."
"I'm Leona. And this is Mark, Alicia, Kristen, Hope and Dan," she said going around the circle. All of them waved, but Alicia did a kind of half wave with a blush. "I don't mean to be rude, but I couldn't help noticing your skin. Are you – half-native?"
"Yeah, my dad was a Quileute and my mom was white," I replied, not bothered by the question.
"The shade of your skin is really pretty," she pondered on that thought for a moment. "It almost has a kind of glow to it."
Yes, that is what I get, super shimmery skin. No super vision or mind reading or time travel …
"Sit down!" teachers yelled, coming in from different directions and herding us through the aisles. "Get in your seats!"
"Come, sit with us," Leona beckoned, following her friends as they met up with some more old acquaintances on their way to their seats. Slow-walking through the crowd, I finally found my way back to Leona. I plopped down in the seat and it deflated with a puff.
A surge of hushes and coughs and squeaks and rustles rippled throughout the crowd as an authoritive-looking woman stood up on the podium. "That's Dr. Rosette," Leona whispered beside me.
"Welcome," the principal paused dramatically, "to Kayhi, AKA – Ketchikan High School."
"Go Kings!" someone in the audience shouted, on cue. The rest of the freshman class followed up, the acoustics echoing the hoots, hollers and "Go Kings!"
I sat there for a moment, watching everything happen around me. Just as the commotion started to turn into a full encore, I caught the mood. I smiled and added my claps to the other sixty odd around me.
A while later, when everyone had calmed down, the Dr. Rosette continued her speech. She talked about life and school and balancing the two. There was one thing she said that really struck me.
"It doesn't matter where you are coming from. All that matters is where you are going. You will meet new people along the way who are going the same direction as you. Not every one will be the same. Some people may seem like superheroes, and others may just seem plain and normal. But the most important thing is to remember that every person is special in his or her own way, and has their own calling in life. They just might not have found it yet."
As she said this, I had a feeling of closure, my previous life was gone, in the past. Now I was standing at the start of a whole new road, and who knew what was in front of me.