The mic was handed to Kadie, who spoke about the various extracurricular activities that would be taking place during the school year, and then went on to briefly describe the procedure which would be taking place today. "We're not stuck with my brother, right?" I muttered to Tracy in mock concern. "Please say we aren't." She stifled a laugh and shook her head.
"I don't think we are," she replied at the same volume. "I didn't see his name on the list anyway, so I think you're safe." We grinned while Kadie finished her portion of the introduction, and then began calling up each group of leaders one by one to gather their students and leave the auditorium. Our group came at the very end since Kadie was overseeing that all the grade nines successfully found their leaders.
The morning was a lot of fun; half the kids in the group already knew me because I had been a peer tutor with their class during my grade twelve year. And for that reason, whenever they had any questions over the course of the morning tour, they tried to ask me. I didn't feel right about this though, since I was no longer an official student of Byerlin and was only here because Kadie had invited me; so whenever a question was posed to me I passed it on to either her or Tracy. After all, it was important for the new students to become familiar with their seniors who were still at the school.
A few minutes after twelve, we headed down to the courtyard for lunch. Our group was one of the first there, and so we all got our hot dogs before the kids started converging and chatting in groups. Meanwhile Tracy, Carrie, Kadie and I were talking too, occasionally checking to make sure none of the students we were in charge of had wandered off. Suddenly a small hand clapped me on the back, catching me by surprise. "Akash, my man! Good to see you bro!" I turned to see Carson, one of my brother's friends who had been on his soccer team last year. He always talked to me in this manner, as if we were the same age, and I always enjoyed his company.
"Sup dude?" I grinned back, exchanging high-fives with him. "Enjoying the tour of your new school?" He nodded and chuckled.
"Honestly, does every grade nine here know you Akash?" Kadie asked incredulously, with a hint of a smile on her face. I was about to answer but Carson got in first.
"You bet!" he told Kadie. "But Akash and I go way back, we're good pals!" Everyone in our little group laughed and then Carson went off to join some of his friends who had just arrived. I looked around and spotted my parents, talking to a few of the other adults who had come today; a further glance around made me grin as I noticed Sid in the courtyard too, desperately trying to conceal himself in his group of friends so that Mom and Dad wouldn't see him and trap him into conversation. I continued to watch until Tracy tapped me on the shoulder, and I turned to see her holding a bunch of keys.
"Mrs. Haws needs me to get something from her office for her, wanna come?" she asked. I nodded, and we left the courtyard, heading down a hallway leading to the Science office. Before we had taken more than ten steps down the hall though, a familiar voice called my name, and it took all my effort not to groan as I realized I hadn't escaped as easily as Sid had.
"Akash?" I turned to see my mom walking towards us. She smiled at Tracy and they exchanged greetings for a minute or so while I looked on in utter disbelief; Mom was smiling and laughing with Tracy, someone she had never met and had only heard about from me, as if the two had known each other for years. But I had long since learned not to try and figure out how her mind worked, because she was capable of kaleidoscopic changes in the way she acted, and I waited patiently to find out why she had followed us from the courtyard. Finally she turned back to me.
"Dad and I are going to head back," she began in Hindi, causing me to frown a little; there was no reason for them to not speak in English around my friends since they knew I would tell them what we were talking about. I gave her a pointed look to indicate that she should revert to English, and she got the hint. "We're going to walk back," she said, "so you can keep the car and come home whenever you're done here. I don't know what Sid's plan is so if he needs a ride bring him back too."
Chapter 30: Sid, The High-Schooler
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