Chapter 2 - I Meet A Mysterious Black Head

When we drove up to Goode High School, my heart began to race. My mind started to fog as I stepped out of the car onto the sidewalk with excitement and nervousness. This place was huge and, I got to say, a bit scary. Let me explain. Even though I'm in seventh grade, I'm in high school for the arts which my mother insists that I am extremely amazing at. And… I am pretty amazing at acting.

"Iva," my mom called softly from the driver's seat inside our beat up, bright blue mini-van. "Just remember how awesome you are. This is just orientation-"

"Mom," I cut in quickly.

She smiled and put her hands up in surrender. "Sorry, sorry. Go have fun."

I smiled and waved as she drove away. Turning back to the building of scariness, I stood still for a while, looking at it; taking it all in. Then, confidently, I took a deep breath and walked my first step onto the school property. As I considered at the main doors, I shook my head at the huge crowd of teenagers and ran for the side door to sneak into orientation.

As I pushed through the door, two cheerleaders beamed at me.

"Hey!" They said cheerfully. One was a gorgeous blond with cool blue eyes. The other was African American with beautifully curled ringlets resting on her shoulder. On their outfits, their names were stitched in cursive, which is painful on my dyslexia.

"Welcome to Goode. You're going to love it." the blond pronounced as though reading a script.

"Oh, um thanks," I mumbled.

The other girl stepped closer to me. I finally deciphered the meaningless spaghetti words on her shirt: Kelli. "What's your name, fish?"

"Um, Gadiv… Fish?"

"Freshman," she answered casually. "Your name is Gadiv?"

"Oh, no," a laughed nervously. "I'm Gadiva."

They nodded their heads.

The blond grinned. "Cool. You might want to go to orientation now. Don't want to miss it," she winked.

I smiled half heartedly. Oh no. Who would ever want to miss that? But I just slowly walked on. I heard another person walk through the side entrance. I peeked behind me to see who it was. He looked kind of cute and he had longer black hair (but not too long). His eyes were a soft, sea-green and he looked as confused as I was about the cheerleaders. Hm. My kind of guy. As I turned to trudge on, I heard him say, "Uh, Percy." That's an interesting name. They were probably asking the, "Oh honey, what's your name, fish?" question. Then the weirdest thing happened.

"Oh, Percy Jackson," the blond girl said evilly. "We've been waiting for you."

I hid behind a column and stared at the group in complete confusion. Percy… should I call him Percy? Oh well. I will. Percy looked really nervous and a bit scared. Suddenly, I heard a man call somewhere close to me.

"Percy?" the man smiled. It was Paul Blofis. The owner of the school.

Percy's whole face turned from horror to relief and he began to walk over to the Paul. I heard a clanging sound. I gazed back as Percy tripped over Kelli's leg. Was that her leg? This day was getting really weird. I shook it off and watched him dash away from the glaring girls to Mr. Blofis.

Paul grinned. "There you are! Welcome to Goode."

"Hey, Paul- uh Mr. Blofis," Percy edgily greeted. He glanced back. The cheerleaders had already disappeared. I shivered fearfully, then turned back to Percy and Paul.

Paul looked at Percy sympathetically. "Percy, you look like you've seen a ghost."

"Yeah, uh-"

Paul clapped him on the back. "Listen, I know you're nervous, but don't worry. We get a lot of kids here with ADHD and dyslexia. The teachers know how to help."

Percy's face softened but it seemed as though he looked amused. Then he looked over somewhere and his face became panicky again. I ducked and stared over in the direction he was looking but saw no one that appeared suspicious. Then I noticed a girl regard Percy and her eyes widened in amazement. I twisted back around. Percy stood behind Paul inconspicuously to hide.

"Where's the orientation," he whispered quickly.

"The gym. That way. But-"

"Bye." Percy called and ran in the direction of the gym.

Paul seemed confused. "Percy?" But the black headed, mysterious kid was already running. I shook my head in wonder and glanced back over at the girl. She had frizzy red hair and paint stained clothes. Her face was filled with confusion as she pushed through the crowd towards me.

"Um hi," I waved.

She smiled distractedly. "Hi."

"What are you looking for?"

"This guy. Have you seen someone with black hair and green eyes? Maybe a sword slicing through people who blow their noses?" she smirked.

I looked at her, puzzled about the sword idea but replied, "Oh, Percy? Yeah, he went to the gym."

She examined me. "You know him?"

"Oh, no. I just saw him and… yeah."

She nodded and laughed. "Well, thanks. Oh, and I like your hat." She took off towards orientation. As I followed, it was a bit more dawdling. I had a lot to think about.