As I stared at myself in the mirror, I could not believe what I was seeing. I blinked about twelve times before I realized that this wasn't going to go away. My little brother, Jerry, announced my dilemma, "Call the mapmakers! Alert the media! The new Mount Everest is on Christie's face! Step right up to see the biggest-" I threw a tube of toothpaste at him and scowled as he dodged it and ran down the hall laughing.
He may be only two years younger than I, but sometimes Jerry acts like a three-year-old.
I turned back to the mirror and my reflection confirmed that this was officially the worst day of my life. Only the first day of eighth grade, and I already had a pimple. Not just a pimple, but a pimple the size of Mauna Loa.
I looked at the scattered products on the counter. I had tried every zit-zapper, but none of them had worked. I opened the drawer on the right side of the sink and took out my make-up bag. Finding some concealer, I put it all over my face so it would blend. I put on blush, eyeliner, mascara, and lipstick until I couldn't stall anymore, and had to do something with my hair.
I stared into the mirror and sighed. My messy brown hair was strewn around my face like Medusa's snakes. After I ripped my hairbrush through it impatiently and tied it back into pigtails, I took a big can of hairspray and sprayed it until I knew that my hair was going to stay in place.
I walked through the hallway and down the stairs to the kitchen, stuffing a pop-tart into the toaster as I went to cram my new school supplies into my bag. Hearing the ping of the toaster, I rushed to get my breakfast before it burned. Slinging my backpack over my shoulder, I headed out to catch the bus.
The bus ride was the same as last year. It was bumpy, loud, and hot. I decided to organize my backpack on the bus ride, putting my books in order of largest to smallest. I then organized my highlighters and pens by color, matching the colors of the rainbow as close as I could, and then by size.
We were almost at school, and I hadn't seen anyone familiar on the bus. My friends must have gotten rides or ridden their bikes. I hoped I would meet someone in class that I could talk to on the bus every day.
We didn't have a homeroom at Sierra Middle, so I just went to my first - and least favorite - class, Literature. We had Mr. Paynes for literature, and he wasn't my favorite teacher, if you know what I mean. I sat down in the second row, desk one to the right of the middle seat. I didn't like being front or center, just in case Mr. Paynes changed his style of teaching over the summer and was now calling on the front row. No one sat front and center; they were probably thinking the same thing.
The only people who sat in the front row at all were the brainiacs of the class. Even though this was the advanced class, there were still levels of smartness.
Katie Davis sat in front, like always. Katie was always the top of the class, no matter what. Even when she got pneumonia and had to stay home for a few months, she got straight A's. Everyone expected her to be valedictorian.
Jared Kretcher sat next to her. He was always in her shadow. She hated him because there were those unusual moments where he would get 101% on a test, and she would get 100%. He, however, had a little crush on Katie, and it was obvious to everyone but Katie.
There were five columns of desks, each column with six desks behind it, all facing the white board. Katie and David sat on the left side of front and center, and two kids I didn't know sat on the right. The girl in front of me was laughing and writing notes to the guy on the right of me. The other girl's bangles jingled like bells as she tied her hair back in a ponytail.
The door opened again at 8:20 - five minutes before the bell - and everyone got quiet and looked up to see the new addition to our class. The girl that walked through the door surprised us. She was tall and skinny and had long, bleach-blonde hair. It was straight and hung past her shoulders, over her old Abercrombie shirt. The bright yellow shirt looked comfortable against her faded blue jeans.
She would have looked like any of us; for example, I was wearing a green Hollister shirt with some deep blue shorts, but it wasn't her clothes that surprised us. She was very pale, and it was very hard not to notice the dark, super-sized sunglasses that covered almost her whole face. They covered half of her forehead and went all the way down to her cheekbones.
The glasses weren't ugly, they were cool. No one knew who she was, so it gave her instant popularity. The corners of her mouth were raised into a sweet smile, and her backpack was strapped over both shoulders, as if she couldn't support the weight on one. She came to sit front and center, and the talking continued.
All the popular girls and boys in the class were starting to write notes to pass to her. I was instantly jealous. She didn't have the right to just come into our classroom and steal our spots in the "cool clique." All of us had to spend years working our way up, and she just stole the opportunity to become cool right out of our hands.
It was odd, though, that she didn't talk to anyone. She ignored all the greetings and notes and took out a journal. She began to take notes. Of what? I asked myself. Class hadn't started yet, but she kept writing on and on, slowly, thoughtfully. Then, the bell rang.
Everything changed at once. The atmosphere became stale as Mr. Paynes walked into the classroom with a briefcase. The new girl stiffened and quickly put the journal away, pulling out a slightly larger one. She opened the journal to the first page and paused with her pen on the paper.
Mr. Paynes began to talk. I wasn't quite sure about what because I was intrigued by what the new girl was doing. As Mr. Paynes talked, she wrote like a bullet. It seemed as if she was writing every word, every syllable, every letter. I looked over her shoulder and I saw that she had written down every word Mr. Paynes had said, and in her own personal calligraphy, too.
Mr. Paynes split us into six groups of five. We would be working with these groups all semester. He split us up in a way that I didn't understand. The new girl was in my group, as were Katie, Jared, and the boy sitting next to me. Everyone moved their desks so that they were in their groups.
"Hello, my name is Christine Willows, but you can call me Christie," I said to everyone at the table. The boy next to me muttered something, but I didn't catch his name.
"Katie Davis," Katie said, and shook the hand of everyone at the table. The tone of her voice implied that she would be the leader of the group. Jared introduced himself, and everyone looked over to the new girl anxiously to hear her name.
She cleared her throat and then spoke in a no-nonsense tone. "My name is Abigail Peterson. Nice to meet you all. Now, I would appreciate it if we could get to business," she said. The way she said the words in her innocent tone didn't fit. It was also very hard to take her seriously in her sunglasses, but it seemed as if she wanted to be taken seriously.
Mr. Paynes began to pass out a folder to each group.
He said, "Now, open your folders and choose a book from the list. Your whole group will do a report on the book of your choice."
"So, we need to have a leader and someone to write everything down," Katie said. She was obviously trying to fight Abigail for the leader spot. "Who wants to be which?" she continued.
Abigail replied, "I'll write everything down. Now, what book do we want to-" Katie cleared her throat and glared at Abigail. Abigail looked down and began to write again as Katie took charge.
"Now, what book do we want to read? We have a few choices, but we need to choose something soon," Katie said. She took the folder that Mr. Paynes had passed around and took the first paper out. The choices on it were Romeo and Juliet, The Diary of Anne Frank, White Fang, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and Wuthering Heights. We took a vote, and three of the five chose The Diary of Anne Frank.
Katie and I chose The Diary of Anne Frank; and Jared - taking Katie's side of things - chose the same book. The other boy chose White Fang. The odd thing was that Abigail didn't even vote. She said it didn't matter because she had read all of them already. That made Katie jealous.
After we voted, we talked about where we could buy the book. After that, Literature was over.
We only had a few periods, and there were three levels of eighth graders. The first level were the kids below average. The second level were the average kids. I was in the third level - the gifted level. The gifted group stayed together through all five periods. Mr. Paynes was first period for us and he taught Literature and Grammar. Mrs. West was second period and she taught History. Mr. Jemma taught Math, Miss Kress taught Science, and Ms. Hernandez taught Spanish. We also had Zero Period Art, but it wasn't required, and I didn't like art.
We moved on to Grammar where we had a quiz to test what we needed to work on. After that we went to Mrs. West's classroom. In History, we began to study about American History. Then it was lunch.
I walked my aluminum tray down the counter, picking up two slices of pizza, pudding, and peas on the way. I took a carton of milk and went to sit down at a table. I was going to sit with Katie, Jared, and Michelle, my friend in the average class, when I saw Abigail sitting at another table.
Abigail looked uncomfortable surrounded by popular kids. She was looking straight down at her food through her large glasses, every now and then stuffing a pea in her mouth. I wondered if she was anorexic, maybe bulimic. That would explain her weight.
One boy at their table disturbed my thoughts. I noticed him as the boy in our Literature group, the one whose name I didn't know. He was obviously flirting with Abigail. Ugh! I thought. I felt sorry for her. She looked up briefly at him and muttered something. I imagined she had said something like, 'Shut-up!' or 'Go away,' but when she looked back down to her food, he smiled and continued talking. He put his arm around her and she sighed.
It disgusted me how politely she was treating him. She didn't do anything to deserve this. Except for corrupting the popularity spectrum of the class! I thought. I shoved my conflicting thoughts into a corner of my brain and swallowed my pride. "Abigail! Over here!" I shouted, waving.
She looked up warily and smiled slightly when she saw me. She told the boy something I couldn't decipher. I hoped it was something rude, but Abigail didn't seem like the rude type. The boy took his arm from her shoulders and smiled. He is totally hitting on her...ugh! I moaned internally.
Abigail got up and held her lunch tray in front of her as she walked over to me. I turned around to seat us at my usual table, but I was met with so many glares that I almost dropped my lunch. I turned back around and led the way through the lunch hall to an empty table.
Abigail sat across from me and blushed as people stared at us. "Thanks," Abigail said, "I wasn't very...comfortable there...if you know what I mean." She sounded - actually thankful. Still doesn't change the fact that she is POPULAR! a voice in my head screamed.
"Any time," I replied, ignoring my impolite thoughts.
"So," I said, trying to remember how to make small talk, "I...uh...like your shades. Where'd you get them?" Like I really cared.
She answered me politely anyway. "I'm not quite sure, really. They're not mine, they're my sister's," she said, smiling at me.
"You have a sister?" I asked.
"Yeah," she replied. She sounded like she regretted bringing her sister into the conversation.
"I wish I had a sister! It must be so much better than having a little brother," I said truthfully. "Is she older or younger than you?"
"Older," she said quickly, casting it off like it meant nothing, "She's seventeen. I wish I had a little brother. I always thought they were so cute!"
"Little brothers aren't cute, they're nightmares! Mine's twelve and he still acts like he's three!"
"Wow."
"How old are you?" I wondered out loud.
"Thirteen," she said.
"I'm fourteen," I replied.
I didn't know how hungry I really was until I took a bite of pizza. Abigail was very patient while I greedily scarfed down a slice. "So, did you just move here, or what?" I mumbled with a mouth full of crust. I was too hungry to care about manners.
"Yeah. My dad, sister, and I just moved here a few months ago," she said. She picked up her slice of pizza and carefully took a bite.
"Where do you live?" I asked. I instantly wished I hadn't said that. I didn't want to sound "stalker-ish" to someone who could be my friend. I ignored the thoughts that scolded me about using that word. Friend... "If you don't mind me asking, of course."
"Um...no problem! I live on Old Wagon Road. It's near-" she began.
I rudely cut her off, "I live on Old Wagon, too!" I was surprised that she lived so close. Wouldn't I have noticed someone moving in? Knowing myself, over the summer, probably not. "Maybe we can hang out sometime."
She brightened a little bit, but it didn't look natural. It looked like she was being careful, as if she wasn't sure being friends would work out. "Yeah," she replied simply.
I ate some pudding and opened my milk carton. I took a swig and thought about what to talk about next. I noted to myself that we could continue with sunglasses.
"Why are you wearing sunglasses?" I asked. I wondered if I was pushing it. I didn't want to force us into friendship. I noticed that I really wanted to be her friend now. A simple conversation eased the tension between us.
"No reason," she said. It made me suspicious. It's just a typical teen answer. I told myself, I would say the same thing. My thoughts didn't ease my suspicion.
"Um...can I try them on? They look like a designer style," I said.
She thought about it for a moment. It looked like she was struggling with something. She hesitantly said yes and handed me the glasses.
Before I could say thanks, before I could even take the glasses, my mouth fell open in surprise. I stared at where her glasses had been covering her right eye. I couldn't take my eyes off of the swollen black eye that was in its place. It was as dark as the shades. She held the glasses out expectantly.
I reached my hand out, not taking my eyes off of the huge bruise, and took the glasses. The suspense was killing me. I had to ask. "How'd that mess happen?" I asked, trying to joke it off.
"This?" she asked, pointing to her black eye. What else would I be staring at? I thought. All I could do was nod. "Oh, it's nothing. I ran into my stair banister at home." She shrugged.
She looked like one of those cartoon dogs, the ones with the dark spot around one eye. The only difference was that those dogs usually had brown eyes. Her bright blue eyes jumped out of her face.
"Oh," was all I could mutter. I was pretty sure that a banister couldn't do that kind of damage. Even if it was sharp. It looked like she had gotten in a fight. Why wouldn't she tell me? We weren't great friends - okay, barely friends at all - but even if she lost, she was so frail, how could she be expected to win? I wouldn't judge her for that.
The warning bell rang and I came back to reality. I jumped up and shoved my leftovers in the trash can nearest us. I placed my tray at the top of a stack. The lunch hall was emptying quickly, and Abigail tagged behind me the whole time.
I didn't remember giving her the glasses back, but she was wearing them now. As we left the lunch hall, she nudged me with her elbow. I was half expecting her to say something about her eye again. Another excuse.
"Um...," she started to say, "if my dad asks me if I made any friends on my first day of school...," she paused, "do you mind if I say you?"
Her question took me by surprise. My thoughts of what she was going to say were totally wrong. I muttered, "Sure."
She smiled, and we were silent as we walked toward our next class.