“How about you share a desk with—" he paused as he scanned the room. "Rebecca, just until we can get you one of your own from the storage room. Rebecca, raise your hand so Katelyn can join you,” he said, pointing out a tall girl in the back of the room. “Clint, do me a favor and grab Katelyn my desk chair for now.”
“Sure thing, Mr. Graves,” a curly, blond haired kid answered, shooting a cocky grin my way as he passed.
None of this was new territory for me. The way we moved, Kevin and I usually attended at least three schools a year. I was used to being gawked at on my arrival, but I was beginning to realize this time would be way different since the school was so small.
“Here you go,” he said, setting my chair down next to the pretty girl the teacher had indicated.
“Hi, I’m Rebecca,” the girl next to me said, introducing herself.
“Katelyn,” I said, shooting her a shy smile.
“That’s Alicia and Shirley,” she said, pointing to the two girls who were sitting at the desk on each side of us.
“Hi,” I said, scoping them out. Their designer clothes and handbags clued me in that they obviously had money, and were probably part of the popular crowd here.
“Alright girls, introductions for the rest of the class will have to wait until later. We have a date with Ms. Higgins,” Mr. Graves said, mysteriously holding up a book I had never seen before.
Confused, I looked around to see if the rest of the class had their own copies, assuming the book he held was part of our course reading.
“Katelyn, I just started this book earlier this week, but you should be able to catch up with the storyline easily enoug
h,” Mr. Graves said, sitting down on a tall stool at the front of the room.
Before I could begin to catalog my astonishment, he began to read from the book he held in his hand. Looking around, I saw all the students watching him with rapt attention. It had been years since I had seen a teacher read out loud to the class, and I was instantly captivated at the idea. Sitting back in my temporary seat, I let myself forget everything but the words that were being read aloud to us. His voice was rich and his pronunciation of the words made the pages come alive. I was soon wrapped up completely in the mystery of the story and silently encouraged him to read faster.
All too soon, he closed up the book and it was time for us to move on to our next subject. I was grossly disappointed to see him put the book aside, but as the day wore on, I realized that in every subject he taught, he exhibited the same engaging attitude that made you want to pay attention to everything he said.
The morning quickly passed as we moved through lessons in English and science. Thanks to the friendliness of Rebecca and her friends, I didn’t feel nearly as lost as I normally did on a first day of class. Before I knew it, it was lunch time.
“Don’t we go to the cafeteria?” I asked as Rebecca and her friends pushed their desks together.
“No, we don’t have a cafeteria,” Alicia, one of Rebecca’s friends said wishfully. “I wish we did though, it seems like it would be kinda fun. We could have, like, a salad bar with everything on it,” she bubbly continued.
“Trust me, you’re not missing out,” I said as they looked at me skeptically. “No seriously, they’re always crazy loud, overly crowded and depending what the cook is making, the smells don’t usually mix well with a bunch of kids all crammed into one space.”
Everyone around me busted out laughing, making me flush at the sudden attention I was getting.
“Seems like you’ve had plenty of experience,” Max said as he and the blond guy, Clint, and another tall guy, whose name I didn’t know pushed their desks up against the backside of ours, creating a rectangular shaped table.
“Oh yeah, you could say that,” I said lightly, not delving into just how much experience I did have with different cafeterias.
After that, the conversation around our makeshift table flowed light and easy as my new friends peppered me with questions about my last school. I kept my answers humor-filled and centered them on the last school I had attended in California. Once I mentioned it was in California, they were instantly star struck. I didn’t bother to point out that the state was huge and the section we lived in was far removed from where a star would ever visit, let alone live. Their questions ran the gamut between stars they hoped I had met, all the way down to the mild temperatures I had enjoyed while living there.
In between answering their questions, I scanned the room subtly and saw the girl I had met the previous day with her brother sitting together eating lunch. Both were watching the group I was eating with intensely, and I smiled at both of them when our eyes met. Bethany frowned slightly at my smile and her brother Matt merely grunted and looked down at the table as he resumed eating his sandwich.
“Don’t mind him,” Rebecca said quietly, not missing the exchange. “He's got a chip on his shoulder since the school keeps holding him back. He was supposed to graduate with my brother two years ago, but had to repeat tenth and eleventh grade.”
“That’s what his sister told me yesterday. Are the classes here that hard?” I asked nonchalantly, like it really didn’t matter.
“Not really, the teachers are really great. Usually, if you don’t get something, they're pretty good about spending extra time helping pull you through,” she said, shrugging her shoulders.
My first big shock of the day came once lunch was over. I watched the other students around me grabbing their math and world history books once the desks were back in their rightful places.
“Where are we going?” I asked Rebecca, grabbing my purse and hoodie off the back of my chair.
“We rotate to other classes for math and history,” she explained. “We go to Mrs. Glenn’s class first for history, and her tenth graders go to Mr. Hanson for math, while his eleventh graders come in here for science with Mr. Graves,” she continued.
“That’s kind of kooky,” I said, not overly crazy about meeting a new teacher just when I had gotten comfortable where I was.