"You're up early," Jean Valjean commented. Cosette spun around to look at her father. It was only about 7:00 (school started at 8:00) and she was already showered and dressed.
"I'm nervous," she admitted, "new year, I don't even know anyone..."
"Oh, you'll do fine," he assured her, making two cups of coffee. He handed her one and she gratefully took it, as if to drink away her nerves. They sat and talked together, making Cosette think of how lucky she was to have her father.
She knew her story well. Her childhood could easily become a lifetime movie. Cosette was the bastard child of a man named Felix and his girlfriend, Fantine. However, Felix soon abandoned the twenty-year-old Fantine, leaving the orphan girl by herself. With no money and a child, she sent Cosette away to live with strangers and became a prostitute forced to live on the streets. It was Valjean, the aging mayor at the time, who had finally saved her. He found her on the streets and heroically took her to the hospital. Two days later, she dramatically died while he came to visit her and Jean Valjean took it to himself to save her eight-year-old daughter from the cruel people she was forced to live with while her mother worked. Cosette had lived as Valjean's daughter ever since.
Cosette, honestly, didn't remember her life before meeting Valjean. She had sort of mentally blocked it from her mind. She didn't remember her mother at all, and especially not her father. However, Jean Valjean was all the father she ever would need. If Felix was still alive (which he probably was), Cosette had no desire to meet him. If the people she lived with were still alive, she didn't want to meet them, either.
She knew something like a new school wasn't suppose to scare someone like her, but Cosette was still terrified. About an hour later, she found herself standing (a bit awkwardly) outside of Mackintosh High School, a fairly large building, but an average school.
No one had told her where to go or what to do and she watched, with her heart slightly sinking, as her father drove away.
"Um, excuse me?" Cosette called, desperately trying to seek help in the crowd of people. Someone finally had helped her and mentioned something about going to the library. It was all so confusing.
Nervously and trying to hurry, she found herself falling onto the floor. Cosette didn't even realize she had fallen into a boy until she looked up to see a friendly face offering to help her up. They talked for a while and he seemed nice, she even had to admit that he was really adorable.
He introduced himself as Marius Pontmercy, a junior like her. Marius also had a friend that was with them named Eponine who seemed sort of shy in comparison to her extremely friendly companion. There was a small assembly for all of the incoming juniors in the library that morning and afterwords, first period.
Marius escorted her to her first class, which unfortunately wasn't with him or Eponine. Cosette didn't need to have a class with him, but it would still be nice to be able to sit with someone she at least somewhat knew.
Her first class was with Mr. Andre's English class. Her teacher didn't really present himself as very knowledgeable or kind, he kind of passed himself off as uninterested. However, English was easily Cosette's favorite subject, so it didn't matter what type of teacher she had.
All in all, her first four morning classes seemed typical. She didn't really meet anyone new, but all some of the girls looked like they were friendly and no one struck her as mean. The woman who was in charge of her study hall, Mrs. Guidicelli, seemed overly dramatic and unpleasant, but she was the most exciting part of her day so far.
It was lunch time Cosette was dreading the most, where was she going to sit? Standing in the long lunch line, she scanned the giant cafeteria in hopes of finding Marius, or even his friend Eponine. However, she couldn't find either of them.
With a tray of milk, an apple and sandwich (Cosette didn't really even know what was in it), she surveyed the cafeteria, but no one seemed to want to offer up a seat. She started to grow anxious, realizing that she had no where to sit. And she didn't want to sit with the dorks of the school because she didn't want to be labeled as a nerd on the first day. Maybe she could go sit in the bathroom and eat, just for that day...
"I wouldn't eat that if I were you," a voice said from behind her, making Cosette jump slightly. She turned around to see a tiny, blonde girl who smiled at her. Cosette laughed at her joke, feeling a sense of relief. At least someone was talking to her.
"I'm completely serious, the food here is disgusting. My name is Meg, I'm guessing you're new? I've never seen you before," the girl said.
"I'm Cosette. Oh, and I'm new. I just moved here this summer," she managed to say, mentally scolding herself for sounding so awkward.
"Do you want to sit with my friend and I?" Meg asked, motioning towards a table where a girl sat by herself across from a packed lunchbox. Cosette nodded and smiled, happy to follow the blonde girl.
The other girl, Meg's friend, lifted her head to see Cosette and smiled at her. "Hello," she greeted.
"Christine, this is Cosette. Christine is my best friend," Meg introduced.
"Are you new this year?" Christine asked politely, she nodded again.
"I'm a junior," she said, trying her best to start a conversation. Christine and Meg offered to give Cosette parts of their lunches that they packed for themselves. Meg was completely right, the food was absolutely disgusting, but at least she had made two new friends.
Christine, a senior, and Meg, a junior, had been best friends back since Christine was a second grader and they were on the same bus. They also shared a love for the arts, Christine liked singing and Meg was a dancer. However, their personalities were different. Meg was loud and talkative, while Christine was much more reserved and quiet, even her tone of voice was much softer in comparison to her friend.
The lunch period ended sooner than Cosette had wanted it to and she could only hope the girls liked her. They seemed to, at least, because both girls insisted on giving her their phone numbers. With helpful directions from Meg, she managed to find her next class, physics.
Mr. Javert was the teacher of this class, a tall man with a stern face. Immediately, she saw Marius trying to get her attention, pointing eagerly to a chair next to him. She waved to him and took a seat next to him.
They whispered to each other for a while as their science teacher went on and on about the school year to come. Luckily, they also had painting together after. By the end of the day, Marius offered to give her a ride home.
"No, I'm fine. I just need to call my father and he'll pick me up," Cosette insisted.
"It's okay, I want to," he continued. She shrugged, following him to his car.
"We just need to wait for my friend, Enjolras," Marius explained, "He can sit in the back." She laughed and they talked for a while about their school days. Cosette was really starting to like Marius, he was funny and nice. Even though it was only the first day of school, she could only hope they would remain friendly.
Finally, his senior friend, Enjolras, arrived and they could go home. Marius even insisted on buying them both ice cream and Cosette's first day ended much better than she thought it would.