Gone Like The Wind

Chapter Two: Italian Class

At 8:30, I have my first class. Italian with Mrs. Giannoti in room 163. I suck at Italian. It's a surprise I managed to pass my 7th grade Italian class with a smudgy 72%.

As I stroll down the vast hallways, I notice something about all the students: they all have friends. Like, they're never not with them. If you see Wendy Dukeson, likely she's with Georgina Wilkes.

And if you don't have someone to walk with in the hall, people notice. I can feel people staring at me. Probably wondering if I have any friends. Probably considering my placement in this school.

I manage to find room 163 right before the bell rings. I slide into a wooden desk seat near the heaters and look for the teacher.

A lady with bouncy, curly black hair and soft brown eyes sits at the front, wearing a beautiful maroon sweater and black jeans. She's probably Mrs. Giannoti.

I hope she doesn't make too big of a deal that I'm the new kid. I remember in 6th grade, a girl named Jayme was new to the grade. All the teachers treated her like she was a precious gem, and Jayme obviously hated it. I would hate it too, if teachers smothered me with too much teacherly love, trying to welcome me to a new school.

Plus, I'm pretty sure all the kids in this class here already know I'm the new kid. I've already gotten four different looks just by entering the room.

Mrs. Giannoti stood up from her desk and gave the class a lipstick smile. "Welcome students!" She says, "Hope you had a great weekend! Unlike me. Had to organize my desk." She rolls her eyes.

Everyone in the class started laughing and smiling. Obviously, Mrs. Giannoti was the teacher that everyone liked, even if you didn't have her as a teacher.

"Alright, I'm going to take attendance, and then we'll start the lesson." She heads over to her computer and checks off names.

"Alyssa Matts," she says. A girl says, "Here." Oh God. My name is coming up. She's going to do the thing where she looks at the screen confused, because she's never had a student with my name and slowly realize I'm a new student, and then say, "Class, we have a new student" and then make a huge speech about how we should respect me.

Weirdly though, Mrs. Giannoti doesn't make a huge deal out of me being new. She says, "Nicole Miller." I say, "here." Then Mrs. Giannoti says, "Nicole here is a new student from Minnesota. Please welcome her warmly to Chamber Oaks." And then she continues with attendance. No forcing me to tell the class about myself. No forced smiles.

I really like this Mrs. Giannoti.

Then, the door opens and a tall girl with a complete head of dyed blue hair walks in. She's wearing red leggings and a black MCR T-Shirt, with dirty Converse. "Sorry I'm late," she says.

"It's okay Lauryn, take a seat next to...Nicole." Mrs. Giannoti says. Lauryn sits in the seat to the left of me.

"Hi," she says. "I'm Lauryn. I'm assuming your name is Nicole?"

I nod and smile. "Nice shirt." I say. I'm not a fan of MCR, but I've heard a few of there songs and they seem pretty good.

"Thanks!" Lauryn says. "Most kids at this school will give you looks for wearing a band t-shirt, but all of them will be working at 7-11 in 20 years, so it's fine."

I giggle. Lauryn is funny. She seems like the kid everyone thinks is weird but is actually pretty cool to hang out with. At my old school, that girl was Lillian Forensth.

"So you're new to Chamber Oaks?" Lauryn asks. I nod.

"Well, it's a good school, filled with with crappy students," Lauryn says. "You need to be able to figure out who's pure enough to hang out with."

I giggle again. "Pure?" This Lauryn girl is honestly making me laugh more than I thought I would in the whole day.

Lauryn smiles. She has braces, in two colors, black and white. "You know how in Harry Potter all of Voldemort's followers have the Dark Mark, that identifies them as evil?"

"Yeah," I say. Lauryn's a Harry Potter fan too!

"Well, at our school, it's kinda like that." Lauryn says. Then she draws a circle with two lines across it. It looked like a hashtag inside a circle.

"This is what the cool kids like to call, the Tattoo of Royalty. If you see anyone with this tattoo on their arms or wrists, they are likely a terrible, horrible person." Lauryn says.

People at this school get tattoos? As if Lauryn read my mind, she says, "They aren't actual tattoos. They're just Sharpie tattoos that they re-draw on their arms every day."

"Oh. That sounds pretty tame." I say. Lauryn laughs. Her laugh reminds me of a dog barking, but I love that.

"Alright, I'm done with attendance everyone," Mrs. Giannoti says. "Let's go over some Italian greetings."

And as we went over our Italian words, I felt a glimmer of happiness inside me.

I think I just made my first friend.