As the car slowed next to me, I sighed and laughed, stopping in my tracks to see what they wanted.
“Heeeey Alley!” Maya exclaimed from her window, “What are you doing out there?”
“My mom had to go to work early this morning so I have to walk to school,” I said, stepping a little closer to the passenger seat.
“Oh, bummer,” Maya said smiling wide.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” I asked, utterly confused.
“You really think your mom would let you walk like 10 miles to school by yourself!?” she asked with her eyes wide.
“Uh, I don’t know? It’s only like 2 miles. It’s not that bad.” What was she talking about?
“She called us this morning asking if we could come pick you up,” she said cheerily, “Hop in!”
“Really?”
“Yes, really!” she laughed, “C’mon silly, get in!”
I stood there for another moment, grateful for the amazing mom I had. Then I came back to reality and opened the back seat door.
The car’s paint was a deep charcoal gray, and the interior was black on black. It smelled of pineapple and some other fruit that I just couldn’t pinpoint. I looked around as I put on my seat belt; this was a brand new car!
“Uh, sorry for asking, but did you guys get a new car??” I asked slowly.
“Wow, you noticed!” Maya said, “See mom, I told you she loved cars.” She turned around in her seat to look at me. “I told my mom you really liked cars, and I bet her that you would notice we got a new one, but she didn’t think so. After all, it’s kind of hard to notice, right?”
“Yeah, you know me and my cars. My mom tells me I got it from my dad,” I said looking down, “But anyway, it’s pretty nice.”
“Thank you!” Mrs. Carter said, looking at me in the rear view mirror, “Maya picked it out. We just went shopping this past weekend.”
“I love it!” I exclaimed, giving them a bright smile.
After that, Maya returned to her normal position and put her seat belt back on. The rest of the ride was pretty silent. I just stared out the window, admiring the scenery as it passed. The only thing I really liked about Oregon was the beautiful views. Mostly everything was green and there were bright flowers sprouting out from the grass everywhere you walked. There were tall evergreen trees and small shrubs scattered throughout the whole area. All in all, it was really beautiful and amazing.
In a few minutes, we had finally made it to school. Maya and I hopped out of the car at the same time.
“Thank you Mrs. Carter,” I said before closing the car door.
“Anytime Alley!” she called.
Maya and I rushed into homeroom right as the bell rang and took a seat in the very back of the class.
“Alright class, get out your books, the problems up on the board are due by the end of the period,” Mr. Keith announced, going back to sit at his desk.
“This is so unfair!” Maya complained, “He’s just too lazy of a teacher to teach us anything so he gives us problems to do out of the book. What kind of crap is that!?”
“I know, this blows,” I said, pulling my cinder block book out of my backpack.
I flipped through the pages, and when I finally reached the right one, I groaned.
“Do you see these problems!?” I practically yelled.
Maya scanned over my open book and groaned as well.
“This is retarded,” she pouted.
“You know, he’s only making us do the odd problems. Those ones always have the answers in the back of the book,” a new voice chimed in.
Maya and I both looked over to see who was talking.
“Oh, hey Alana!” I said, sounding more surprised than I meant to. It was the girl I met yesterday when I was waiting for my mom to pick me up after school.
“Uh, Maya, this is Alana. We just met yesterday,” I explained to Maya.
“Hi Alana,” Maya said cheerfully.
“I didn’t know you were in my Geometry class too!” I said, turning around towards Alana.
“I know, me either. I just figured that out,” she said with a laugh, “I wouldn’t be surprised if we had more classes together!”
“I don’t think so, I’ve covered most of the people in each class,” I said awkwardly. I laughed and looked away, sensing that she didn’t get my humor. It wasn’t really a joke, I guess I was just trying too hard to be funny?
“Yeah,” she said, “Well I’m going to get started on my math over here, I’ll see you later.” She smiled and turned around towards her friend on the other side of her.
I turned back to Maya and smiled.
“She’s nice,” I told her.
“Seems like it.”
“Alright then, I guess we should get started on math!” I said loudly.
“Right, math,” Maya agreed.
We spent practically the whole period doing those stupid math problems that Mr. Keith didn’t even tell us how to solve. Then, when we had about two minutes left in class, he assigned us more pages for homework! That was not cool…
The rest of the day went by pretty slow. Mrs. Wyler, my geography teacher, spent an hour and a half explaining how gas prices are going up. I don't know how someone could possibly do that, but it happened. Other than that class, the rest of them weren't too bad.
When 7th period finally came around, I was so bored I didn't even want to do P.E. Today we were doing racquet ball and since Maya had to go home early for a dentist appointment, I had to play by myself.
After roll call and our daily stretches, I walked over and got my racquet and glasses. Since I wasn't exactly all that coordinated, I wasn't a good racquetball player what-so-ever. The last time I played I ended up breaking a finger, and that was in 8th grade. So I really wasn't excited to start playing it in P.E. this year.'1
I started out at the end of the courts, and stayed there due to not being able to play. The people I was playing accidentally hit the ball over the wall, so as they went up to get it, I waited patiently on the court. Something caught my eye on the ground, and I took my glasses off to look at it closer, mesmerized for a moment. I heard someone calling my name, but in my weird trance, I didn't look up. Then it hit me.
A racquetball connected with my face so suddenly that I screamed as loud as I could. I stood there in shock and just looked at the ground, not sure what to do. The kid that hit me rushed over and tried to help but I waved him off. Even though I was acting like I was OK, my eye was stinging like no other and I couldn't open it. I raised my hand to feel around, to make sure it was still intact. I winced when I felt around it. Mr. Davey, our P.E. teacher, saw this and gave me a nurse's pass right away. Reluctantly I walked up the stairs and put my racquet and glasses back on their shelf and headed on over to the nurse's.
I walked into the nurse's office and the look on her face when she saw me told me that it looked pretty bad.
"Oh honey! What happened?" she yelled.
"Oh it's nothing. I just got hit with a racquetball ball. Is it really that bad?" I asked.
"Look for yourself," she said pulling out a little compact mirror out of her desk drawer.
"Oh my god!" My eye was so swollen it just about matched the size of the racquetball ball that hit me! It was gross and puffy and had a slight purple-ish color to it.
"It is pretty bad...," she went on, "But it's nothing I can't fix." She got up from her chair and opened up the freezer. Pulling out a frozen ice pack, she wrapped it in a small paper towel and handed it to me. "Keep this on your eye for a while, it will take the swelling down. As for the bruising...," she said, reaching a hand to gently touch the area around my eye, “it won't go away for at least a week."
"A week!" I squealed.
"I'm sorry sweetie," she said. And with that, she wrote me a note to go back to class and sent me back on my way.
I walked out the door, going on a silent rant under my breath about how clumsy I was. At least it wasn't a serious injury. As I speed-walked back to class, I spotted someone walking by the building closest to me. It was a guy, and he didn't exactly look like he was in any rush to get to where he was going.
Out of nowhere, a tree pops out from the ground and decides to attack my newly hurt face. I face-plant directly into the rough bark of the tree and stumble over a little bit. I guess this is what I get for not paying attention to where I'm going. I let out a squeal and quickly covered my eye with my hand, in a poor attempt to take the pain away. The tree had a small stub where a branch must have been growing before it was cut off, and it hit me right in the eye.
The guy that was walking by the building must have heard me, because he as walking over my way when I turned my head back.
"Are you OK?" he said rather loudly, a look of worry on his face.
Before answering, I took in his appearance. He was really tall and had messy, blonde-ish brown hair. His hair twisted in many directions, some pieces hanging right over his forehead. He had beautiful blue eyes that shined like no other, clear even from how far away I was from him. He was wearing a plain black t-shirt and some jeans, and looked really upset about something by the look on his face.
"Hello?" he waved a hand in front of my face, "Anybody there?"
"Uh...yeah, I'm fine," I said.
"You don't look so good, why are you covering your eye?" he questioned as he gestured towards the hand on my eye.
"Oh, nothing really. Just an accident."
"Let me see," he said. He gently pulled my hand away from my face and gasped as soon as he saw my horrible eye. "What happened to you!"
"I got hit with a racquetball ball...," I said, ducking my head in embarrassment.
"Oh I'm so sorry! It looks pretty bad," he said sincerely.
"Thank you."
"I'm Josh, by the way," he said, sticking his hand out in my direction.
"Alley," I said, shaking his hand.
"Pretty name…well, Alley, I'd love to stay and talk but I have to get back to class. I'll see you around...," he said trailing off, a slow smile spreading across his face," Oh and make sure you take care of that eye."
"Thanks, bye," I said awkwardly. I turned around towards the gym again and started walking back.
Well he seemed like a nice guy. When I first came here I didn't think there would be very many nice people. But I was beginning to think I was completely wrong. Or maybe I was just lucky enough to find the good ones. Either way, I was beginning to like this school more and more.
I sighed and put my ice pack back up to my eye. Hopefully I can make my way back to class without hitting anything else…