The First Day of School

I sit sideways in the back seat with one leg curled under me, staring out the window. 

My mom turns carefully into the teachers’ parking lot, already half full with cars.  She parks the car, grins to wish us kids a good day, and rushes off to the office to make some photocopies.  I smile briefly.  I don’t think she’s ever been afraid of anything in her life. 

My brothers get out next, grabbing their backpacks out of the tiny trunk.  I follow more slowly.  Derek is the first to leave the parking lot, confidently striding toward the high school building.  Alex follows close behind, always in his older brother’s footsteps.  And I turn to the middle school building alone.

I regret that my first year at this small school had to be eighth grade.  Alex is only one grade above me, but that small difference puts him in a separate building.  He might as well be in a different school: I'll see him about the same amount of time.  This isn’t the first time I’ve been to a new school; it won’t be the last.  But it is the first time I’ve been alone.

I hesitate just outside the door, wishing I didn’t have to go inside.  I pull reluctantly at the cold handle, which turns smoothly.  I enter the room and survey it deliberately.  The open room, obviously a cafeteria by the tables and salad bar, had several doors around the sides that led to classrooms.  Colorful posters decorated the otherwise plain white walls. 

There aren’t very many students there yet; my mom had wanted to arrive early in order to prepare for her first day teaching.  Those present are seated at the cafeteria tables, talking casually or pretending to sleep.  None of them notice the tall girl with long straight hair standing just inside the door, resting her weight first on one foot and then the other. 

There is a friendly-looking lady with soft gray hair standing in the doorway to one of the classrooms.  I sit down quickly at one of the tables before she notices me.  I glance around uneasily, wishing I had something to do.  After a while, not knowing what else to do, I take out a clean white sheet of paper—everything in my backpack seems to almost glow with newness—and begin to write.

It doesn’t take long before the cafeteria begins to fill up with more middle school students.  It’s not hard to tell that most of them know each other already.  After all, this is a very small school, and likely many of them have been going here all their lives.  No one speaks to me.  It’s as if I am not there.

The bell rings, and the classes begin. 

The classes are normal for the first day; it’s just orientation, no real work at all.  At lunchtime I sit with some other girls from my class.  I am the only one who brought lunch from home.  I don’t say much to anyone else, and no one else says anything to me.  They know my name from the homeroom teacher calling the roll; they don’t seem to care for any more than that.  Already I can tell which are the gossip bugs.

The afternoon classes are much the same; no material is taught.  After the last bell rings, the students walk off in groups, chattering.  I shove my backpack over one shoulder and climb the stairs in the high school building to my mom’s classroom.  She’s gathering her books and papers into cloth bags.  I glance into the room and back out again before she sees me.  I’m sure she’s the only teacher in the entire school that assigned homework on the first day.

I walk with uneven strides down the stairs.  I head out to the parking lot that I left this morning.  The car’s unlocked.  I throw my backpack into the trunk and sit in the back seat.  I wait for a little while, watching the other kids laugh and talk while they wait for their parents to come pick them up.  Eventually my brothers join me, and then my mom.  She starts the car and we drive off. 

"So, how did your days go?" Mom asks cheerfully. 

"Fine," Derek says.

"Fine," Alex says.

I shrug my shoulders.  "Fine."

I sit sideways in the back seat with one leg curled under me, staring out the window.