Different

Chapter 1

The other boy was probably about middle school age and had bright red hair down to his ears. He looked familiar, and was probably only a year or so younger than me.

Ms. Peak began walking down the hall. The other three kids began to follow her, so I followed them.

When we stopped at another classroom Ms. Peak smiled at us and told us she'd be right back before emerging into the classroom. The small girl broke the silence first, introducing herself, "My name is Jade, and I'm 7," she beamed in pride at her age before introducing the small boy, "this is Percy-" she gestured to the young boy "-he's 8!" The young boy smiled shyly and waved at me and the other boy. "Um," the other boy started in a small voice, "I'm Kai, I'm 13."

As everyone got quiet, I realised they were waiting on me to introduce myself. "Oh! Uh, hi, I'm Lizzie, and I'm 14."

They all smiled at me.

Suddenly, Ms. Peak burst out of the classroom with another girl. She had wavy blonde hair, green eyes and a face full of freckles. She awkwardly waved to greet us.

Ms. Peak began moving again, this time toward the social studies wing. She stopped outside of the door of a history classroom and went in. We all stared at the new girl, who smiled awkwardly at us.

"I-I'm Jazzi. I'm 14."

I smiled at her, "I'm fourteen too. My name is Lizzie."

She smiled at me. She had a nice smile. Her eyes kind of crinkled at the edges and seemed to light up a little more. Her smile seemed really genuine, and it looked really good on her.

Before long, Ms. Peak emerged from the classroom with two people, a girl and a boy. The girl had curly shoulder length that was dirty blonde with blue streaks through it. She had a blue beanie on that matched her highlights.

I looked at the boy and groaned when I saw who it was.

Jordan. With his short perfectly gelled blonde hair and blue eyes that I had come to hate. If he hadn't picked on me so much, I'd honestly probably think he was cute. But, he had made my life a living hell for the past several years.

Ms. Peak wasted no time and began walking again, this time toward an exit. We were all frozen in place. Were we supposed to follow her out of the school? Was she even allowed to take us out of school? It was the girl with blue streaks in her hair that spoke up.

"Where are you going?"

"To my car," Ms. Peak responded, turning to us.

"Are we supposed to follow you?" the girl asked.

"Yes, I'd like to take you out of school for the day."

Jazzi cheered at this and began walking toward Ms. Peak. We all shrugged and hesitantly went after them.

Ms. Peak's car was a red mini-van with a plush interior. We all piled into it. Jordan, the girl with blue streaks in her hair, and Percy were in the very back row, Jazzie, Percy, and I were in the middle, with Kai in the front.

"Does everyone know each other?" Ms. Peak asked. "You have Jordan, Jaedyn-" the girl in the back cut Ms. Peak off, "Actually, I go by Jae." Ms. Peak nodded, "Okay then. So you have Jordan, Jae, Elizabeth, Jazmine, Kai, Percy, and Jade." We all nodded. "Oh! And my name is Aysa." Ms. Peak said. Aysa Peak, I thought to myself, that's a pretty name.

Aysa checked that we were all buckled up and began driving.

"Where are we going?" Kai asked.

"It's a surprise., Aysa responded, smirking.