Chapter 2: Orientation

He stepped out of the bus, careful, yet full of confidence. Today he was wearing a pair of red vans and denim jeans, along with a grey shirt that had the word "Supreme" stamped in the middle of a small red box logo on the chest section of the shirt. It was a simple yet clean outfit, and even caught the attention of many people around him. Gerald was trailing close behind, still paranoid about the idea of the upper classmen potentially sticking them into trash cans, or pulling off some other type of mischievous prank. He was still traumatized by what happened to him in fourth grade, and he be damned if he let it happen again.

Cautiously, they exited the bus and onto the side walk, only to be greeted by what appeared to be a well maintained in-door high school, and a large trimmed lawn that served as it's front. The campus it self appeared to massive, and both were almost certain they would get lost just trying to find their classes. Arnold checked his watch, they were actually pretty early, thirty minutes early to be exact, and many of the students of Hillwood high were either waiting outside on the lawn or flocking into the school. Contrary to Arnold's calm demeanor, Gerald was experiencing a little case of anxiety. This had to be a trap, it just had to be. There was no way their first day of high school would pass without an incident, that just wasn't how things worked. The seniors must be waiting somewhere, fully loaded with freshmen humiliating weapons of mass destruction.

"Hey you two must be new right?" A girl with neatly kept brown hair walked up to them. Her appearance suggested that there was no way she was a freshmen but rather... a senior? No, that couldn't be, all upper classmen are evil; according to Gerald anyway. They nodded reluctantly, Gerald suspicious about her motives. "Ah, of course. Well take these", she handed them a small booklet before she continued, " it's a map of the school and has the calendar and schedules, enjoy your time at Hillwood high!" And with that she walked off, leaving Gerald utterly confused.

"Dude, she didn't trap us in a trash can, get us jumped, make us her slaves, make us..."

"OK Gerald, I get it." Arnold interrupted, stopping his friend from creating a long list of false accusations. Geeze, if Gerald was this bad imagine how Sid was handling this situation... actually never mind he'd rather not think about that.

The two friends walked up the steps that led up into the entrance of the school, when a weird sensation suddenly fell upon Arnold's childhood friend.

"Ehm, where do you think your going mister?" rubbing the back of his head, Gerald reluctantly turned back. What was Phoebe going to bust him for this time?

"Um... into the high school with Arnold?" This had to be a test, if it's anything Gerald had learned while going out with Phoebe is that all women are the same. It's almost like they expected men to read their minds. Seriously, he watched enough chick flicks to know exactly where this was heading. First the girl asks a random question, then the guy answers back, then literally five minutes later there arguing back and fourth about a totally different subject!

"Oh I see." And with that she trailed off, leaving one last comment with Gerarld."It's not like I'm a freshmen who's totally vulnerable to other guys, I mean like come on now, who would seriously care about a girl such as my self, especially if they assumed I was single. But it's ok, I'll just walk alone, maybe I'll make a new guy friend or something." Arnold stared at the Asian girl stunned, when the heck did Phoebe become so self-assertive and outright sarcastic?

Gerald didn't take a second to glance back at Arnold before he ran after Phoebe, who was now ten feet away from them. In fact, all he could hear from Gerald's frantic pacing was, "Arnold I'll catch you at lunch! Yo babe wait up!" which he found to be pretty amusing.

Gerald is totally whipped.

Realizing that he was now alone, Arnold supposed that now was a good time to explore the large campus. He navigated around the crowded halls, passing by students who were busy filling in their lockers, gossiping, or trying to find their clique.

"Arnold, hey wait up."

He stopped, recognizing the familiar pitch of the girl's voice. Lila promptly pulled up next to him, gazing up at the taller boy. All around him his fellow classmates stared at him in awe, where they have failed, Arnold had succeeded without even trying. She was extremely popular among the guys, and even in high school that proved to be no exception. However, no one has even gotten close to getting into a relationship with her. Sure, she was sweet, compassionate, and well-mannered, but that didn't mean she was vulnerable to any just guy. Everyone who approached her was either kindly turned down, or god forbid, placed in that eternal bottomless pit of never ending sorrow and despair known as the 'friend zone.'

"Hello Arnold, where's your friend Gerald?"

"Oh with Phoebe" he replied. "Dude's totally whipped." Arnold added, wishing he never said that.

Well that was lame

Lila giggled quietly, "Aw I see, yeah he is well, kept under a tight leash so to speak."

"So where are all your friends, didn't you get off the bus with them?"

"Oh, they're busy flirting with some guys or something. Hey did you get your schedule yet?" He shook his head, that had totally escaped his mind whatever reason.

"Did you get yours?" She nodded, holding up a piece of paper in front of face.

"Where do you get them?" At this point he felt like he was just bombarding her with questions, which he believed reflected poorly on himself. He was feeling stupid, first he forgot to get his class schedule, and now he didn't know where to get them. If he was trying to impress her with his intelligence, he was failing horribly.

"Oh, they're handing them out in the gym, I'll walk with you there if you like." Lila didn't seem to mind the boy's confusion, and Arnold was glad of it.

He rubbed the back of his neck. "You sure?" he questioned.

"I'm sure, besides, we haven't talked in awhile." Lila replied cheerfully as she turned to address him.

He smiled, "Yeah... I suppose we have some catching up to do, and thanks again Lila, in case you haven't noticed I'm well... kind of lost here."

"Understandable." she responded back.

They travelled through the halls towards the gym, which was literally across the campus from them. While they were walking, Lila asked a question that caught Arnold off-guard. "Hey Arnold, where were you all this time? I mean, you left without saying much... you were just well, gone." Her usually chipper and cheerful vocals were reduced to a quiet yet sad tone.

Arnold took note, she sounded almost hurt that he left, and that was enough to make him feel guilty inside. "I moved to Los Angeles. Seriously, one day I just came home and my grandparents told me we were moving for a business trip in the morning. I didn't have time to tell anyone really, I mean the only person I had time to even tell was Gerald, but even then I couldn't say where."

"Oh." was all Lila managed to say.

"Hey you ok?" Arnold began to become concerned, was it something he said? Lila remained silent for a moment before her mood changed back to her casual joyful self. "Don't worry about it, all that matters is that you're back."

Her words still didn't change the fact that he was still somewhat depressed of the notion that his absence had inadvertently caused Lila pain. He felt a bit irresponsible for not taking the liberty of saying good bye, especially since they were close friends. After what seemed like forever, they found themselves standing in front of the gym along with the other masses of students waiting to get their class schedules from the stands that were categorized by last name order.

"I'll go ahead and get my schedule, you can leave if you want." He spotted the stand with the first letter of his last name. Unluckily for him, there were about ten or so other students that were ahead of him.

"It's ok, I'll wait in line with you." she responded back softly, catching Arnold by surprise. He wasn't expecting her to throw him the offer; but hey, he wasn't complaining. But just out of common decency, he wanted to make sure she didn't feel obligated to stay with him. "Are you sure? You don't have to, it'll probably be a long wait anyway."

Lila smiled, nodding her head in approval. At least she appeared to be staying with him willingly.

The whole entire time she remained next to him, never once complaining about how long the line was or how bad her legs hurt from standing up too long. There wasn't much interaction going on between the two, but none of them really minded. Finally Arnold went up next, saying his last name so that the lady working at the stand could check off his name and hand him his schedule.

As she waited silently at his side, Lila pulled out her phone and checked the time; 7:15am, which left them only about fifteen minutes to get to class. But she wasn't in much of a rush, it's not like the teachers marked off students for being late on the first day of school anyway, besides, she was enjoying getting re-acquaintanced with her old friend. Unbeknownst to Arnold, Lila had missed him, and that was an understatement. In the wake of his sudden disappearance, she uncharacteristically interrogated many of the people who knew him for days, trying to find out where her football headed friend had gone off to. But she soon came to the conclusion that no one knew exactly where he left too, just that he moved. Upon stumbling on this realization, Lila was depressed for a brief period of time, and she couldn't understand why. Of course being sad that Arnold moved without her knowing made sense, but she couldn't help but feel that there was something much more than that.

Hell, she even got into a bitter argument with her friend Helga about the subject, who at the time was still madly in love with him. Lila's sudden urge to find out where Arnold was located gave the impression to Helga that she was trying to steal Arnold away from her, but that was far from the truth. It simply wasn't in girl's nature to steal boys away from anyone, especially from one of her best friends. Luckily for them, the drama subsided and slowly but surely Helga's love for the boy seemed to fade away.

Arnold stood in front of her, scanning his class schedule. He had Art for first his period, PE second, Spanish third, World Geography fourth, Algebra 1 fifth(much to his dismay, he hated math), and finally Accelerated English.

"Mind if I see what classes you have? We might have a couple together." Lila asked.

"Sure."

She was quick to compare their two schedules together, holding them side by side to see if they had any classes that matched up. The blonde boy waited in anticipation just hoping by some miracle she had at least one class with him.

Just one class, c'mon.

She handed back his paper and smiled, "looks like we have English together in room 362, the teachers name is Ms. McKenzie. I didn't know you were also in Accelerated English!" To his amazement, his wish had come true.

"Really? Mind if I see your classes?" He asked cautiously, praying that she didn't confuse them as being in the same class by accident. He scanned her class schedule, which was filled with accelerated or advanced courses. This didn't surprise the boy one bit, she was always smart and organized.

Hmm ok... she has Geometry(one full course ahead of him), Accelerated World History, Biology, Spanish, PE, and then... Yes! Accelerated English.

Arnold returned the piece of paper, careful not wrinkle it. "Wow, your taking some pretty hard classes, you sure you can handle them?"

The red-headed girl beamed innocently, making directly eye contact with the boy. "Of course, besides I want to make it into a decent university so that I can get a good paying job when I graduate. I just want to get create a better life for myself and my daddy you know? And my way of achieving that goal is by obtaining a proper education."

She was already thinking long term, and that was a trait he greatly admired. He knew her situation at home was difficult, and even though her father found a stable job, they were still struggling to make ends meet.

Lila checked her phone again, promptly putting it back in her pocket, "Arnold, it's ten minutes till school starts, we should really start getting to our classes." The blonde boy faced her, realizing that she had inched far closer to his side than he remembered.

"Oh wow already? Well, where's your first class?" he asked. Even though he saw her schedule, he didn't bother to remember any of the room numbers. The only class he knew they had together was English, and that was in room 362.

"Room 407, how about you?"

"Room 503... hey I'll walk you to class." Their classes for first period were pretty far apart, and if he decided to walk her, he was sure he'd be cutting it close.

She stared at him, eyes wide open. "Really? I mean I don't want you to run late."

Arnold smirked, "Yeah, it's fine."

Lila was somewhat taken back by his offer, not used to someone acting like a gentlemen towards her. Well, that wasn't totally true, but everyone who did had other motives for doing so... But she didn't get that feeling from Arnold, who she sensed was being sincere. "Aw, that's so nice of you!" The red-headed girl innocently tilted her head to the side and gazed up at Arnold.

They walked through the now emptying hallways as student's scampered around to find their first class of the day. They were only several feet from Lila's first class when they ran into an unpleasant surprise.

"Hey cutie." a deep voice said near one of the lockers.

Lily turned back hesitantly. "Um... Hi Wolfgang."

"What you doing later on girl?" His tone seem to convey a message of impurity and bad intentions, sending an uncomfortable shiver up Lila's spine. She couldn't stand the guy, but there was honestly nothing she could do. She was just too nice or too powerless to do anything against him.

"Nothing that concerns you" Arnold butted in, much to Lila's surprise.

Wolfgang gave a death stare to Arnold, "I wasn't asking you football head, you know a lot of people missed you but I didn't."

"Do you think I give a..." he was cut off by Lila. "Hey you two stop! And seriously Wolfgang, knock it off you jerk." His clique looked at both of them in astonishment, did these freshmen, especially Lila, really just defy Wolfgang? Lila never spoke up against him like that, and for whatever reason, it also seemed to shut him up. They walked passed them, ignoring them until they finally arrived in front of her class room.

"Thanks Arnold..." she said softly, her almost whisper like voice full of genuine gratitude.

"Don't worry about it Lila, I wish worthless people like him didn't exist." He was angry, not just angry, he was absolutely furious. He hated people like Wolfgang, who had little to no respect for women. Arnold wasn't the type of person who would hold grudges or hate anyone, but he couldn't stand guys who viewed girls as mere property rather than human beings, and he wouldn't stand idly by while that pathetic bully harassed a sweet girl like Lila.

Lila frowned. "He's always been like that too me, I don't know why. It's been like that since middle school. I mean, usually I can just shrug people like him off, but I don't know, there's just something, well... threatening about him."

"Well it shouldn't be like that."

She sighed, he was right. "I know..."

"Then don't let it."

Lila was comforted by his words. There'd been a lot of guys she met, but none were like Arnold. He was compassionate, protective, and sympathetic. But she really didn't want him to get involved with Wolfgang, especially since that could potentially get him into a lot of trouble or even seriously hurt.

"Don't worry about it too much." She perked up, hoping to alleviate some of Arnold's worries. He looked a bit stress, and she knew it was because of what just happened.

"Please Arnold, just forget about it ok? He's not worth it." She reached for his shoulder, hoping that it would relieve some of the tension's that were building up inside him. It seemed to work since his rate of breathing seemed to slowly return back to normal.

"Well here's my class, I'll see you in English. Just take it easy ok?" She gave him a quick hug before she entered into her class, waving him goodbye as the door closed.

Arnold nodded, his encounter with Wolfgang still dangling on his mind.

His first day of high school was proceeding relatively fast, and before he knew it he found himself in his final class; Accelerated English. Turns out hitting high school wasn't so bad after all.

As Arnold entered into the classroom, he was somewhat caught off guard by how young their teacher was. She appeared to be in her early twenties, and had golden blonde hair with astonishingly bright brown eyes. It's not like he was interested in her, he was far too young for that, it's just that he happened to notice her unique features. Re-diverting his focus, his vision browsed the room, in search of the familiar dark reddish-brown hair that belonged to Lila.

When he finally managed to spot her in the rows of chairs, she waved back at him, welcoming him to sit in an empty desk next to her. He paced down the row while many of the student's awkwardly stared him down. He hated being one of the last ones arriving to class, and this was just one of the reasons why. He sat down in his seat, right next to Lila.

"So how do you like high school so far?" He whispered.

"It's alright, how's yours?" Lila replied.

"Not as bad as I thought... minus that little run in we had."

Their conversation was interrupted by the teachers voice, which sounded shockingly welcoming but commanding at the same time.

"Welcome to Hillwood high. Obviously I will be your English teacher for the year." she paused before speaking again. "You can all address me as Ms. Mckenzie, or you can just call me by my first name, formalities don't really matter to me anyway... So how are you all enjoying your first years so far?"

"Eh it's ok" a student towards the back answered back. She waited patiently for more comments or outbursts, but finally came to the conclusion that there were none.

"Dead class I suppose... anyone else care to ask a quick question or comment?" She surveyed the class, finding no volunteers. "Aw c'mon guys, I don't bite. Seriously I'm probably the youngest teacher here, which means I'll probably understand where your all coming from!"

She had a point, hell, she even looked like a student herself. How she possessed enough knowledge to teach a high school class was beyond Arnold.

"Well, seeing that many of you seem to lack the proper intelligence to voice your opinions, we'll start by introducing ourselves." Ms. Mckenzie's tone was intentionally sarcastic, causing many of the student's to chuckle.

"My full name is Reena McKenzie, I graduated from Harvard at the age of twenty." Everyone's jaws in the room dropped, too stunned to even comment. She smirked, expecting such a reaction from her class. "Yeah I know, what am I doing here right? Well I decided that sure I can be making six, probably even close to seven figures, but it isn't as rewarding as helping developing individuals such as yourselves attain a heightened sense of systematic instruction."

"Wait what?" a student near the middle of the room unconsciously blurted out.

The blonde teacher snickered quietly, "well this is an accelerated class after all, so you should've understood that. But since I seem to have lost many of you, any of you care to paraphrase what I just said?"

"What she meant is that instead of benefiting herself, she decided that she would rather help student's like us learn." A timid voice answered, her summary short and to the point. Arnold searched around the class room, only to find that the person responsible for answering was right beside him.

"Very good! And your name is...?"

"Lila Sawyer."

"Excellent answer Lila, I can tell you'll do just fine in this class." and with that she began handing out the syllabus for the class.

The rest of English class passed uneventfully, and before Arnold knew it, his first day of high school was officially over.

"See you all tomorrow students! Remember tomorrow is a regular day which means you get off at 2:30!"

Both Arnold and Lila got up at the same time, already assuming that they would walk out of class together. They promptly exited the class room; school busses left exactly at 12:25pm on minimum days, and it was already 12:15. Either they got there on time or they walked home, which actually wouldn't be a bad consequence for Arnold with Lila in his company.

Rushing down the hallways of Hillwood high school, Arnold was curious to see if Lila's after school schedule was free.

"So what you doing after school?"

"Um, I think I got a doctor appointments, then right after I have to start some my homework unfortunately. How about you?"

"Probably help move in the rest of my stuff back into the old boarding house." He solemnly replied back.

"Aw, that doesn't sound very fun. How'd you guys manage to get the place back?"

Arnold dug through his memory. "Well, we just left in under the care of a family friend."

"I see, well at least you guys didn't lose your property like me and daddy, I honestly really miss living in Pleasantville." Lila stopped walking, a painful memory suddenly conjured up in the girl's head. Arnold turned back to see what the sudden commotion was about.

"You ok Lila?" The girl snapped out of her trance, nodding in response to Arnold's question.

Lila sighed, "Yeah, just a little flashback that's all"

"Are you sure? It looked like you were sick to your stomach or something." He was concerned at this point, this was so uncharacteristic of her.

"No, I'm fine, thanks for asking though. Besides if I didn't move from Pleasantville I wouldn't have met you, Gerald, Phoebe, Helga, and all my other friends." She insisted, smiling back in order to draw away any suspicions.

The two stumbled upon the convoy of buses where student's were already waiting to enter.

"Hey Arnold! Where were you man? The buses are about to leave!" Gerald shouted from near the one of the yellow vehicles, mistakenly leaving Phoebe behind.

"What up Gerald, well our classes are all the way in the back of the school so it takes awhile to get here." Our? What was he talking about? Gerald didn't see anyone else with him, but then again he wasn't really paying attention. The boy switched his attention to Arnold's side. Oh, now it made sense. Gerald grinned, proud that Arnold was taking the initiative, or so he thought.

"Oh, sup Lila, didn't see you there."

"Hello Gerald." she politely acknowledged back.

As Gerald began talking to Arnold and Lila, he felt a tap on his shoulder.

"So what made you think that it was a great idea to just leave without even so much as an explanation why?"

Oh man, Gerald was really in for it this time Arnold thought, and Lila seemed to get the message too, as she was chuckling quietly.

Your an idiot Gerald, you know that?

"Well obviously I came up to talk to Arnold and Lila, besides, we're riding on the same bus anyway!" Gerald defended, hoping to avert her wrath. Phoebe smirked, much to everyone's confusion. Then straight up out of no where she embraced perplexed Gerald. "Aw I love how honest you are!"

"Your not mad at me...?" Gerald asked hesitantly.

"Of course not, why would I be?" Well he wasn't going to question that.

The doors to the busses opened, and the student's were slowly admitted in. Gerald and Phoebe entered first, hoping to sit in the back for, well, obvious reasons. Lila and Arnold were about to enter into the bus when Lila suddenly heard her name.

"Hey Lila, where you going?" Rhonda questioned; all of them always sat in the same area on the bus, with Phoebe being the exception.

"Oh well I was about to sit next to.. um... Arnold, why?" she responded back cautiously.

"Girl you know we always sit on the bus together!" The self-proclaimed fashion queen joked back. Meanwhile Nadine and Helga were walking towards Rhonda from behind, causing Lila to become noticeably uncomfortable. How would she react seeing this?

She turned to Arnold, waiting for a response. It didn't feel right leaving him alone, and she certainly wasn't the type to rudely leave unless stated otherwise.

"It's ok if you sit next to your friends Lila, I don't mind." Truth be told he actually did to an extent, but he wanted her to decide for herself.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, it's fine."

The bus driver honked, "we're running a tight schedule I don't got all day!"

Lila nodded at Arnold, waving goodbye as she headed to back of the to line to wait with her friends.

Can't win them all man, just be glad Lila's friend with you again.

A/N: Like always, review, that's always welcomed! Let me know how you feel about the story, it motivates me to update faster!