As the Jonas Brothers blared over the radio, Rachel’s nerves began to grow. She felt her body tense up and get cold and clammy. She only had a few more minutes before she walked into AHS for the first time.
The minutes felt like hours as her mom drove down the windy back roads of Bedford, New York. Rachel looked out the window and saw cars full of teenagers drive past her, smiling and laughing. Rachel got even more nervous, thinking about the prospect of making new friends.
For a moment she imagined herself riding along joyfully in a car with all her new friends, laughing and gossiping about boys.
Rachel’s warm thoughts were cut short by a buzzing coming from inside her backpack.
1 New Message:
Rachel flipped open her Motorola flip phone and saw a text from Dana.
Dana: Happy 1st day! We miss you XOXO.
Attached to this text was a picture Dana had taken with her camera phone of their entire crew of friends back home.
Rachel sent back a smiley face, even though that was anything but how she was feeling inside.
Rachel’s mom turned on her blinker and made her final turn into the driveway of the school. Rachel looked out the window and saw a large sign that said, Welcome Back AHS Students.
As the family car slowly reached the front of the school, Rachel could see groups of friends hugging and greeting each other in the school yard. The student parking lot was full of BMWs, Audi’s, Mercedes’ and Saab’s. This was nothing like her old school parking lot.
As the car sat there in front of the school, Rachel’s mom reached for her purse and fumbled around for her wallet. Rachel put her head down so nobody could see her face. Her mom slowly pulled out twelve crumpled dollar bills and handed each of them four dollars.
“Here’s your lunch money. Have a great day and make lots of new friends,” their mom said in an overly cheery voice.
Rachel felt even more out of place as her 1997 grey Station wagon pulled up to the front door of the school. She hopped out of the car fast so nobody would be able to remember which car she had stepped out of. She said a quick goodbye to her mom, shut the door, and entered the sea of new faces at AHS. She already wished this day was over.
Chapter Three
As Rachel made her way through the bottleneck of kids entering the school, she felt completely alone. Mark and Sarah had disappeared into the crowd, and she was pushed and shoved as she squeezed her way through the front door of AHS. This school was very large, much larger than her small rural Pennsylvania public school. The hallways smelled of bleach and stale cafeteria food, which made her nose burn.
As Rachel got inside, she heard yells and screams of excitement as friends reunited for the first time. She reached into her backpack, trying to find her student schedule. She couldn’t remember her homeroom number, or her locker number. Standing in the middle of the hall, she rummaged around in her bag, but couldn’t find any of it. She felt the kids breeze past her, down the hallway and towards their homerooms.
She pulled out her army print FiloFax. She flipped through the pages, searching. But her schedule and locker information was nowhere to be found.
Feeling desperate, Rachel looked around for help. Rachel saw two girls coming towards her laughing and whispering, and hoped they would stop and help her, but they didn’t even notice her.
The chatter of voices got softer as locker doors began to slam shut.
RING. The sound of the first bell.
Suddenly, a boy crashed into her, making her lose her balance and trip.
“Sorry!” the boy shouted as he ran past her, not stopping to see if she was okay.
Rachel stood there and held back her tears. She couldn’t believe her first day was starting off so poorly.
She started walking briskly, in hopes of finding the main office. As she came towards the front of the building, she squinted and saw a small inconspicuous sign that read “Main Office.” She pushed open the heavy glass door and walked in.
“Good Morning, Dear,” said a nice old lady behind the desk. “You couldn’t be in trouble already?” she asked with a laugh.
“I--I um--lost my schedule. I’m new. Rachel Wood.”
“Okay, let’s see here,” the receptionist said, as she poked at her iMac keyboard. “Ah ha—Rachel Wood: 10th grade. You’re in Mr. Allen’s homeroom. Room 102.”
She printed Rachel a copy of her schedule and handed it to her across her desk, “Good Luck.”
“Thanks.”
Rachel scurried down the bleach-smelling hallway, towards her locker. She was the only one left in the large, empty hallways and she knew that was a bad sign. She must be late. Very late.
Rachel’s bag was heavy and she needed to empty it before heading to her classroom. As she flew through the halls a calm came over her. The blue tiles on the floor made her feel like she was walking through the ocean, and the lockers were painted a cool yellow color, which eased Rachel’s mind. She glanced at the ascending numbers until she came to locker 74. She reached for the knob, opened it and put all her books in, leaving out one pen and a notebook. She slammed the door shut and put her pad lock through the hole. 36-32-26. Rachel jotted the code onto her hand with her blue Bic pen, then booked it to the room marked 102.
Rachel gulped and pushed the door open. Everyone sat quietly in their desks, facing Mr. Allen as he spoke and turned and stared at her. It was anything but what she wanted on her first day. She noticed kids in the back begin to whisper as they stared at her in the doorway.
“Ah, Rachel Wood I presume?” said Mr. Allen.
Rachel nodded.
“First day and already tardy,” he continued.
“I’m sorry-- I’m um-- new and I got lost,” Rachel muttered.
Laughter arose from the back of the classroom.
“Don’t let it happen again. That’s your seat,” Mr. Allen said as he pointed to the only empty seat in the room. It was front and center.
As Rachel walked over and sat down, the class was silent. It was an intimidating silent. Mr. Allen looked at Rachel again as if to say, I’m watching you, then continued his lesson.
“Where was I?” Mr. Allen continued, “Oh yes. This year we will be learning all sorts of things in social studies, from the pilgrims, to Abraham Lincoln to the Cold War. You will have homework every night and I expect each and every one of you to complete it.”
Rachel sat in her chair and began to tune him out. As Mr. Allen’s abrasive voice grew softer, she wondered, who was this teacher anyway? He couldn’t have been more rude or embarrassing.
Rachel wanted desperately to turn around and look at her new classmates. She resisted, in fear of being accosted by Mr. Allen. She was also nervous to see the twenty-something new faces she would see each morning for the rest of the school year.