I can’t do this anymore. I thought, trying to focus on writing down my math homework and zone out the laughter surrounding me. I know- melodramatic eighth graders, everyone hates ’em. But I’m different- I swear. You just don’t know the whole story. It started when I walked into this wretched class. The worst thing in the history of bad things ever happening to people happened- I tripped. I know, oh the horror! But that’s not just it. I tripped. On my TIED shoelaces. And fell. And people stared. And Aaaughhhghgh.
So, that is how I ended up in this situation, hiding my face in my planner while my classmates laughed at my epic fail. Why did this have to happen on the first day? “Oh come on, it couldn’t have been that bad,” Mabel said, trying to calm me down as we walked to English. People around us laughed and talked, getting as much conversation as they could out of the five minuet passing period. “Not that bad! ” I yelled, throwing my hands up to illustrate my point. A couple people turned to look at the loud sound, this was a pretty normal occurrence for most people.
I lowered my voice slightly, still needing to talk fairly loud to be heard over the sounds of students traversing the halls, “It’s the first day of our last year at middle school, and even Mrs. Narmon chuckled. ” “Chuckled? Who even says that? ” she laughed, tilting her head and scrunching her nose up in mock confusion. “Shut up,” I laughed, pushing her away lightly. She shoved me back and soon we were ramming into each other full force, laughing as we continued on to room 105.
We sobered up as soon as we got to the classroom, Mr. Forre was really intimidating seeing as everyone liked him and I didn’t want to get on his bad side. Well, he wasn’t very intimidating in appearance, standing at a whopping 5″3′ wearing a floral dress shirt and bright blue bowtie, but he had one of those presences that you just couldn’t ignore. Well, no going back now, I thought as I pulled the door open and nervously walked inside. “Caly! ” I heard, and was immediately tackled by a blur of dark curls and blue. “Ha! ” I heard Mabel laugh at my expense from behind, barely avoiding the curly-haired missle that had just knocked me to the ground. Good to see you too, Daffy, but do you think you could let go now? I can’t breath. ”
I said to the girl currently crushing my windpipe in a hug. “I haven’t seen you all summer! How’ve you been? Was you’re summer good? Did you have fun? Did you do anything cool? Did you meet anyone new? ” she asked, not even taking a breath between questions. The bell prevented me from answering her, and the three of us quickly found seats near each other. Everyone stopped chatting as Mr. Forre walked in, his oddly imposing presence quietening the restless students. “Hello.
As you know, or have figured out, I am Mr. Forre, and I will be your English teacher for this year. My goal is to erase the damage that has been done in previous years by thinking that when writing, you have to use a specific format and it has to be this length and blah blah blah. No- this is not true. Authors don’t use only one format. ” As he went on, I could tell he was going to be a good teacher by his ability to capture the attention of thirty Middle-Schoolers on the first day of school.
That took real skill, especially in a seventh period class, which was the last class of the day. Now that that’s done with-I should probably take attendance. ” This made the class laugh, seeing as he looked like he had just remembered to do that. “Daffodil? Andrews? ” He called, looking around the class. “I go by Daffy,” I heard Daffy say, and he marked her down in attendance, noting the nickname. “Peter? Dickinson? ” Knowing that my name was probably around the middle of that list, I mostly zoned out during role call, only catching a few names here and there.
“Mable? Heathman? ” I snapped to attention hearing her yell “Sup! knowing that our last names are rather close together alphabetically. Please don’t make a spectacle of yourself, we do not need another Math. I thought to myself, Preparing for my name to be called. “Calypso? Jackson? ” I nearly panicked as I heard my name being called, not expecting there to be so few people whose last names start with I. “Here! ” | said a bit too quickly, wincing a little at the panicky sound of my voice. “But you can call me Caly. ” I said, trying to calm my thudding heart, internally cursing my eternal awkwardness. Why do I always get so nervous when addressed by adults?
A few other names were called and I eventually calmed down. Mr. Forre started explaining about what we were going to do in class today. “I will not be doing a ‘get to know each other’ activity because, come on, you’ve been with these people for three years, you should at least know most of their names by now. ” a couple of the students laughed at this. “Instead, we will be jumping right into work,” At this, we groaned, not wanting to have to do work on the first day of school. “I know, I know- Mr. Forre is the worst teacher ever, he’s making us do actual work on the first day! At this, he threw his hands up in mock horror, before continuing on with his speech.
“So, does anyone know what a mentor text is? ” I’d continue on with what we did in class that day, but then you’d get bored. So instead-time skip. I always love these things. “Yo, you got the stuff? ” “Yeah. It’s in my bag. ” Okay, so before you jump to conclusions and accuse us of being thirteen year old drug dealers, let me clear some things up. The mysterious object hidden inside Mabel’s bag was not drugs, it was a book Now you must be thinking-Oh my god, all this stupid suspense for a book? Seriously?
But it’s not just any book-it’s the Totally Amazingly Magically Wonderful Book of Mabel and Caly’s Friendship! Since that probably didn’t clear anything up anymore than before, I will elaborate further. Last year, when Mabel and I became friends, she suggested that we make something called a “friendship book” because she had done it with a different friend before. What a friendship book really is isn’t all that complicated. Basically it’s cloth covered notebook that we share. Every day we switch off, and write things that are on our mind, secrets that we want to tell the other, or other super important stuff.
Although, we usually just call it The Book, as to be discreet about it. Now that I’m done breaking the fourth wall- on to the story! Last night Mabel had the book, and of course we had to pretend to be super shady as we transfer it from one person to the other. “Thanks,” I said, zipping up my bag and making note to remind myself to read it later. “Damn. That’s my moms car,” I said. I had wanted to hang out for a bit longer today. “Bye, see you tomorrow! ” Mabel said, giving me a side hug and waving. “Adios. “
