Fox and I got out the car and started walking to the entrance. A group of girls stood near the entrance, all of them in bad knockoff Joe's jeans. I was wearing my favorite pair, and I couldn't help but laugh at the way they tried too hard to make them look real.
"Do you have something to say?" the shortest girl said.
"Only if you really want me to tell you." I said coyly.
"Yeah, say it so I can personally ruin your social life." A girl with short black hair said. She exuded the confidence of a leader.
"Okay, then. I was laughing because I have seen bad knockoff jeans, but those are possibly the worse knockoffs I have ever seen in my entire life. I mean Canal Street can do better than that."
All of them flushed, "What are you talking about? These jeans are legit Joe's jeans." The leader snapped.
"No, MY jeans are legit Joe's jeans. But believe me it is okay, this isn't the best town for shopping, so I won't hold it against you." I said before walking into the school. As soon as I stepped in the school I realized how mean I sounded.
"How in the world did you do that? I have had to deal with them since 7th grade!"
"Well I was really popular at my old school, but I wasn't mean or rude to people. But I had a lot of people who didn't like me because of something that happened when I was in like 7th or 8th grade. So eventually you learn to deal with people like that." I said before walking across the hall to the office.
"Wow that is … wow,"
"Yeah but I sounded like a complete jerk to them! I should honestly go apologize or something. I don't want to start my new school with enemies!"
"NO! They are the mean girls at this school. They deserve whatever comes to them." she replied.
"Are you sure?" I asked skeptically.
"Yeah they'll be fine."
I pushed open the door and was met with a blast of chilly air. A young woman behind the counter with really pretty reddish-brown hair smiled and said hello.
"Hi I'm Katara Westcott. I need my things for school."
"Oh yes, hi my name is Mrs. Jackson and I have your things right…" her voice trailed off as she looked around her desk for my papers.
"Here!" she said quite loudly, causing me to jump a little. She handed me my papers and told Fox to help me until I got the hang of the school.
"Sure, bye Tiffany- I mean Mrs. Jackson."
"Bye Fox!" She said with a smile
"Tiffany?" I questioned as we walked into the hall were the mass population of the students had decided to stand.
"Well she was a senior the same year my brother was and they were good friends, and she got married like a few months ago so it's still pretty weird not calling her Tiffany." she replied as we shoved our way through the students.
"Oh okay." I said as we neared the stretch of hall where my locker was supposed to be located.
"123, 125, 127, 129 here we go, my new home for one glorious year. Oh joy!" I said sarcastically.
Fox laughed and rolled her eyes. "Kid I'm liking you more and more."
I smiled and asked where her locker was. She pulled a green slip out of her purse and burst into a huge smile. "I'm 127, cool!"
"Oh awesome! I thought I would have to be stuck next to someone that I didn't know."
We unloaded our notebooks, and binders and other school supplies into our lockers and I started putting up my pictures and magnets.
"Oh he's hot! Is that your brother?" Fox said over my shoulder.
I nodded; my brother was 4 ½ years older than me and was gorgeous. We both had the cocoa skin tone but he got my mom's dark grey eyes while I got my dad's blue.
He was extremely thin, but had muscles that always got the attention of girls whenever we went somewhere. Sokka was 6'7 and modeled for Calvin Klein. It was the one dream that he was actually able to achieve and go somewhere with. His hair was the same dark brown color as mine but it was more wavy than curly like mine, but my hair was a lot longer, the tips of it touching the bottom of my back. Sokka's hair was in always in a short ponytail.
"Wow you look a lot like him." Fox said before turning back to her locker and putting a picture of her and Zuko in it.
"Yeah but everyone says that he is way more attractive."
"No I think you are both pretty cute but you seem to have more of a… innocent attractiveness about you."
I smiled, "Thanks!"
"Are you two close?" I said while pointing to the picture of the Azula and Zuko. They were smiling really hard and he had his arm around her.
"Extremely, he graduated from high school four years ago and I still can't get over the fact that he has his own apartment and a job."
I laughed at her sad face and patted her back. "I'm sure you will be fine Zula."
"Yeah yeah I'm sure I will." She said before grabbing a bright pink notebook and her schedule. "Okay I have AP American History, Art, Study Hall, Lunch, Gym, Web Design, Teacher's Aid and an Early Dismissal. What about you?"
"AP American History, Art, Independent Study for Art, Lunch, Gym, Creative Writing, Drama, and Early Dismissal. So we have first hour, second hour, lunch, fifth hour, and Early Dismissal together."
"Okay AP American is on the second floor and the art room is in the art wing, which is on the third floor, the Gym is outside and isn't that long of a walk. Oh Lunch is wherever you want. Juniors and seniors can leave campus. If you become friends with some underclassmen you can buy them something but they can't go with you. And you can stay around and do whatever for an hour or you can just go home for Early Dismissal." Fox said on the walk to the AP History room.
"Oh I warn you now that this teacher will make you introduce yourself in front of the entire class." She said right as we got the outside of the door.
"Great," I said with fake enthusiasm. I walked in and sat next to the seat that Fox through her stuff down on. She pulled out the pink notebook and flipped it the first page.
I followed suit and grabbed my favorite pen. A purple fountain pen that my dad got me for my 13th birthday. It had purple ink and made my handwriting look a lot better than it actually was. It reminded me of the handwriting from the Declaration of Independence.
The teacher was standing behind the desk writing something on a piece of paper and looked like he wasn't three days out of college. He was tall and lanky with short dirty-blonde hair. He was actually pretty cute, but wasn't cute enough to distract me from my work. But that obviously wasn't the story for the group of girls that sat in the front row. It was the same group of girls with the knockoff Joe's jeans. They were putting on lip gloss and pulling the already low V-neck of the shirts even lower.
But I couldn't complain about the girls too much, obviously they were smart if all of them could take AP History together.
I rolled my eyes and sighed. This would be an interesting year. The bell rang and the teacher walked around his desk and leaned back on it.
"Alright class before we start officially, we have a new student. Sorry but it's like mandatory for me to make you introduce yourself in front of the class. So Ms. Westcott come on up. Oh I'm Mr. Duffy, but you can call me Haru." He said before moving to lean on the wall.
I stood up and walked to the front of the room.
"Hi, I'm Katara Westcott and I'm 18 and the only reason I moved out here with my parents is because I need somewhere to stay until I graduate. I've lived in New York for most of my life. I loved in Korea for 5 years when I was younger. I love to draw and paint. Umm I speak 4 different languages and have been to six of the seven continents."
"What languages do you speak?" a skinny boy with cool black glasses and chin length black hair asked.
"English, Korean, Spanish and Japanese." I replied.
"Cool." he said, I giggled and walked back to my seat.
"So Katara you have been to six continents. When and why?" asked Mr. Duffy.
I sighed, "Umm I went to Europe when I was 7 because of my dad's business. I went to Asia when I was 6 for dad's business again. Lived there until I was 11. Australia when I was 10 because… well because I wanted to. The house spiders in Australia are crazy enormous. I went to South America when I was 13 because of my dad's business again and I obviously live in North America and I went to Africa for the opening of Oprah's school and for the World Cup last year."
"Spoiled Rich Girl," one of the girls in the front said. Her clique giggled and they all flipped their hair at the same time like a bunch of annoying Barbie Dolls.
"Cheap knockoff," I quickly replied. The class laughed and a boy yelled "Burn!"
Suddenly I didn't feel like I needed to apologize at all.
She whipped her head around and glared at me, I smiled and waved sweetly.
"Okay class, quiet down. Mai, you don't know anything about Katara so don't say rude things like that."
"Fine, but you are rich aren't you?" Mai said, ignoring what the teacher had just said.
"Yeah, what does that have to do with anything?" I asked.
"Do you have your own credit card?" she asked.
I laughed, "Sweetheart, there is a different between being spoiled and having parents that trust you. But to answer your question, no I have a debit card because I have a blogging job that I use to make my own money. Now are we done playing 20 questions, because I'm pretty sure Haru would like to start class now."
Mai scoffed and whipped her head back around. Everyone just laughed and faced the front of the room, where the teacher immediately launched into a spiel about how the rest of the year would be and how much homework there would be and boring things like that.
I'm a really hard worker and have gotten good grades my entire life so I didn't really pay attention. My mind drifted back to Zuko and how nice and cute he was. He was out of college so he was obviously much older than me but he seemed so… dateable.
The bell rang snapping me out of the daze I was in. I gathered my things and waited for Fox at the door. We walked out together and went to out lockers. Someone that wasn't even in my class stopped me and gave me a hi-5 and then said something about Mai.
"Word gets around quick in these small schools." I said as I glanced back and forth between my locker dial and the combination on the green paper in my hand.
"Psh, you're telling me." Fox said before opening her locker. She tossed her things in and shut her locker and leaned against it while I put my things in my locker. I grabbed my drawing things and tucked it under my arm.
I shut my locker and made sure my wristlet was zipped before we started walking. We got to the stairs and Mai was standing there holding court with the rest of the girls in her clique.
"Oh look, the main topic of my conversation." She sneered.
I turned to Azula, "I must be really interesting."
Azula laughed and we walked around them. "Hey, you may think you are something important, but let me tell you sweetheart I am NOT a force to be reckoned with." Mai said.
"Okay sweetheart, I will keep that in mind, I promise." I said before walking up the stairs.
Fox walked beside me quietly, deep in obvious thought. "I think she finally met her match." She said before we got to the door that led us to the third floor.
"Well, I'm not trying to be 'her match' I'm trying to prove to her that she isn't the center of the universe like she thinks." I said before turning into the art room.
Fox didn't reply to me, so I turned to face her. She was staring at me with huge eyes. I walked to the table at the back of the room and sat down.
"I didn't mean to offend you" I said before putting my things on the table.
"I know, and you didn't offend me, it's just that I feel like she wasn't joking. Mai has NEVER been known to just stand back and let someone walk all over her. I don't want you like getting in trouble with her or something."
"I"m not worried about her. The worse she can to is spread a rumor about me. Besides I plan on going back to New York after this year. So I really don't care." I said before looking around the room.
'Where is the teacher,' I thought. I started adding random things to the front of my drawing pad and tuned out the world.
"Oh well, okay." Fox said. "No way." She mumbled.
"What?" I said snapping out of my daydream, but still focusing on my drawing pad.
"That boy lied to me! I am so going to hurt him when I get home." She said angrily.
"What?" I repeated.
"My brother is the-"
"Hello everyone and welcome to Art class." Zuko said before winking at Azula.