I stand in front of the heavy front door next to my sister.
"Smile girls!" I put on a small smile and my dad's camera flash blinds me.
First day of school pictures.
He's got gobs of them.
I'm still seeing spots when I see the large yellow bus pull in front of the house. I grab my bag and walk with Charlie.
"Bye, dad!" I holler.
"Later kid." He says, going inside.
The bus doors whoosh open and we walk up the steps. The bus is full save for an empty spot up front next to a small blonde boy.
The bus driver who even sitting is taller than me-stares at the small boy.
"Well, Sam...er, you feel like being squished?"
We look at the boy who looks disheartened as he scrunches as close to the open window as he can.
Charlie gives me a quick glance before sitting next to him as close as she can. Even then, I still sit half off the seat.
Not knowing what else to do, I give Sam an awkward smile.
He just stares straight ahead.
We drive off and get to the school in twenty minutes.
After mentally preparing myself, I get up and walk out, Charlie following suit. I see tons of people outside of the large building.
A boy and girl walk hand and hand and Charlie remembers her righteous anger. She stomps in front of me and I jog to keep up with her.
"Char-" I bump into someone's shoulder and stagger back a bit before continuing after her.
"Charlie! Wait up!" I say. She doesn't look back and I see her disappear into the building in a flurry of brown hair.
I struggle to rush after her and when I get through the large doors, I see her entering the main office.
I follow her in and we stand at the counter. A woman comes over.
"Hello, how can I help you girls?"
She puts on a guise and smiles widely.
"Hi! We're the Finleys, we're new." The woman seems to appreciate this positive attitude because she gives a smile twice as big.
"Oh, of course. Let me just fetch your schedules." I watch as she rummages through a purple tray on a desk. Growing impatient, I turn to look out the blindless window and see a group of boys.
They don't look much older than me and they stand at the opposite side of the hallway. There's a tall one with shaggy black hair. He's eyeing smaller kids with a smirk as they walk by, not wanting to turn their backs on the group.
Then there's a skinny one with light blond hair. He doesn't fill his gray tee-shirt and has a scowl on his face.
My eyes flash to one who's holding a small boy by his backpack. He's a bit bigger than the rest and is wearing a cap and a smile.
My gaze shifts to the last one. He has a mullet like hairstyle and isn't doing much of anything. He has a watchful gaze on everything going on and when he speaks, the rest turn to listen.
I get called back by Charlie who holds my schedule. I take it with a small smile to the woman and a thank you.
"Here, you're going to need these as well," She goes under the desk and comes back up with two small leather bound books. She hands one to me and one to Charlie.
"Now these are the Derry School Rule Book and Code of Conduct. These are yours to keep. Consider it a gift." She smiles.
"Thank you..." Charlie says, losing grip on her fake smile.
We both walk out as the woman hollers, "Have a great first day!"
I turn to mutter something in response and when I turn back around, Charlie is already making her way down the hall.
I sigh and start to walk after her.
Except I can't because of the person I just ran into.
I look up and see the boy with black hair. I feel my palms become sweaty.
"Um, excuse me," I try to walk around him, but he wraps his arm around my shoulders and pushes me back in front of him.
"Um, can I-"
"I haven't seen you around here before." He says with a smirk on his face. He starts playing with my hair.
My eyes shift to his hand and I try my best to nudge it off.
"I'm new, I need to go find my locker." Hoping he'll let me leave, I turn in the opposite direction and the boy with cap grabs my backpack and pulls me back.
"Look, I don't want any trouble." I say, starting to get annoyed. "We don't want trouble. We're just trying to give you a nice Derry welcome." The tall one smiles and grabs both my backpack straps.
I look around to see if I can find an adult or even Charlie, but it's a sea of strangers and I'm in the jaws of a shark.
"What's your name?" He grabs my schedule, probably knowing I won't tell him.
"Lorraine..." He says my name and I hate the way it sounds coming from his mouth. "Well, Lorraine. I'm Patrick. Better get used to saying it. Or screaming it, whatever you want." He gives me a wink.
"Yeah, okay, bye," I say before grabbing my schedule and walking past him in one quick motion. I walk as fast as I can in the direction I saw Charlie disappear in. I see her searching around nonchalantly. Then she spots me and annoyance fills her eyes.
I walk to her and she throws up her arms.
"What the fuck dude?" She exclaims. "Where the hell did you go?"
"You're unbelievable."
-
I walk into my homeroom class with everyone else and walk to the teacher's desk.
"Mr. Meriwether? Hi, I'm Lorraine Finley."
He's an older man who has a friendly smile and warm eyes.
"Well hello, Lorraine. Um...hold on let me get you a textbook." He opens a cabinet behind his desk and gives me a Literature book. "And this is yours to keep up with until the end of the year," I nod and he scans the room for a place to seat me.
"Lorraine, you'll be sitting here." He points to a desk in the second row on the right, by the door. It's the second to last desk and looks well within seeing distance from the board so I walk over and sit.
About fifteen minutes into a discussion about The Scarlett Letter, I began zoning out.
I look around the room at everyone and see one of the four boys from before sitting in the back at the opposite side of the room.
He's the one with the cap and I quickly look away, hoping he didn't see me.
-
I'm sitting at a table in the cafeteria lunch line with Charlie and her new friend Greta.
Greta doesn't like me very much, but I can tell she so desperately wants Charlie to like her so she's tolerating me.
"So, um, how's your first day going?" Greta approaches the topic cautiously, afraid she might say the wrong thing.
Charlie doesn't look at Greta as she opens her soda.
"Fine." Greta looks disheartened that Charlie shut her down so quickly. She turns to me and I see her pretentious attitude fade. "And what about you?" She sneers in a way she wanted only me to notice.
"Good, I guess. It was a weird morning." I say eating a french fry.
Charlie digs her fork into a piece of peach. "Why?"
"I just ran into these guys,"
"What guys?" Greta suddenly became interested.
"These four guys. I don't know all their names just Patrick's."
Greta's jaw dropped and she looked at Charlie, who seemed just as confused as me.
"What?" She says to Greta. "Oh, nothing." She shrugs, an amused smirk evident on her freckled face. Charlie quickly drops the topic.
"I'll be right back, I'm gonna go get some chips."
"Okay..." Greta says, watching her leave then turning back to me, all smiles replaced with fake judgemental ones.
"So what'd they do to you?" She asks, stuffing forked chicken into her mouth.
"They didn't do anything," I said, annoyed at this girl by now. "Why, who are they?"
"Bowers' Gang."
"Bowers?"
"Yeah. The little blond one, that's Victor. He's like the least terrible out of all of them, but that isn't saying much." She shrugs. I nod.
"Then there's Belch. He's the big one. His name is Reginald, but you probably have a death wish if you call him that." She says with a smirk. "They just have him around because he's the only of them who actually owns a car." I can't believe how blunt she's being but I don't say anything because I need more information.
"Anyway, they're not the ones you should worry about. It's their leader. Watch out for him."
I shudder at the thought. "Oh, Patrick. Yeah, he seemed pretty-"
"Patrick? Ha, right. Patrick's not their leader. Henry Bowers is." She smirks.
"Henry? You mean the one with the mullet?" I make a motion to my hair. She snickers. "Yeah." I nod again, looking down.
"You're pretty lucky New Girl. They don't like to leave their victims unscathed."
I scoff, "What, so you're saying I should be grateful?" She gives me a condescending look. "Are you an idiot? That's exactly what I'm saying." She smirks and shrugs.
"That is unless they're planning on saving that for later." My heart sinks.
"Later?" She scoffs this time. "You didn't think they were done, did you? Wow, you really are dumb. Listen, we're not friends or anything, but you should stay away. He's bad news." I feel my blood run cold and my hands get clammy.
A few minutes go by and Charlie comes back with a bag of Doritos.
"What'd I miss?" She asks, seeing my visibly shaken demeanor.
"Nothing." Greta and I say in unison.
-
"Charlie, I don't know why you hang out with her," I say waiting at the bus stop outside the school with Charlie. "She's a bitch."
Charlie looks bored as she inspects her nails. "Oh please Lorraine. You and I both know she isn't smart enough for that. She's just annoying."
I shake my head. "Then why are you her friend?" I ask. "She makes me look good." I stare at her in disbelief.
Not even Greta deserved that. "You're such a bitch," I say.
She smiles as the bus pulls up. "Thanks." I scoff and follow her up the steps.