Chapter 6

“How’d I do?” Emily asks, as soon as we step foot through the front doors of the school. I take another sip of the latte and close my eyes then give a thumbs up.

“Delicious!” I take another sip and then a big bite of the scone. “Whoever invented orange scones is literally my hero. Okay, not literally but top 10, for sure. The lattes this morning have a hint of orange, how did you do that? They taste so good together.”

“Thanks, I’ve found this one brand I really love and I’ve been trying different flavors once a week but I saved this one for our tradition.” Emily has been a coffee connoisseur for years now and Elizabeth and I have been there through the good flavors and the terrible. Let’s just say sophomore year did not get off to a good start when she tried to mix different flavors, mint and cinnamon AND lemon, yikes.

“Good call,” I say and take another sip, again.

“Very good call,” Elizabeth agrees, her cup is almost gone from the ride over. We separate for a few seconds to go to our lockers and put some items away then meet back up by the bottom of the stairs. All of our lockers are in the same hallway but not next to each other. “Okay so none of us have classes together until after lunch. Emily and I have English and then you and Emily have Social Studies at the end of the day, right?” Elizabeth confirms our schedules. Sadly, we may not see too much of each other during school.

“Correct,” Emily and I both say. The first bell rings, letting us know that we have five minutes to get to class. We say our goodbyes and then hurry off to class so we are not late on our first day of Senior Year.

I climb the stairs to the second level and find my classroom, a lab for Advanced Physics, already beginning to fill with other seniors. I sit down on a stool at an empty lab station in the front row. A few seconds later, a kid takes the stool next to me. I look over and offer a smile before the teacher shuts the door and the bell rings signifying the start of class.

“Good Morning, seniors! I hope everyone had a great summer and is ready for a great senior year. Which will hopefully be your last year of high school, well at least for some of you it may be.” This elicits some laughs and I laugh along, the teacher and everyone in this class know that if you qualified to be in this class, you are definitely graduating this year. “ Many of you will know who I am since you all had me sophomore year as well, but for those of you who are new, I am Dr. Griffo. Yes, I am a Doctor and yes I am teaching high school. Alright students, look to the person on your right.” I turn to my right to face the new kid. “If you’re sitting on the end, look to your left.” The teacher adds to clarify and this gets a few snickers from the class. The new kid turns to face me and smiles sheepishly. “Alright, go ahead and introduce yourself to your new lab partner.”

“Hi,” I reach my hand out, “I’m Charlie. Nice to meet you.”

“Maximus, or Max,” Max takes my hand in his and gives two quick pumps before letting go. “Looks like we’re stuck with each other the rest of the school year.”

I chuckle. “Looks like it. So Maximus, or Max, you’re new here right? I don’t want to assume but I don’t think I’ve seen you around before, and I am usually pretty good with faces.”

“You can just call me Max. But yeah, I am new here.”

“It must suck to move for your senior year,” I comment while the teacher starts passing out notebooks and instructions.

“Yeah, well, I’m pretty used to it. My family tends to move around a lot.” He offers the information and I smile sympathetically.

“I get that. My mom and I used to move around a lot too.” I won't go into detail but he looks like he was ready to listen to more information. “So, we should probably get our notebooks set up, I heard that getting them right from the start will make everything easier.”

He nods and flips his notebook open then hands me one of the pieces of paper with the instructions on it. I thank him then we focus on our notebooks which takes up most of the class period, the teacher walks around the room to make sure everyone gets set up correctly then before we know it, the bell rings and class is over.

“What is your next class?” Max asks as he packs up his things.

“Uhm,” I check my schedule on my phone, “English.”

“Hey, me too. You mind walking with me? I’m not quite sure where everything is around here yet.” Max shrugs his shoulders and makes an apologetic face. I wave away his worry and hook my bag over my shoulder.

“Not a problem, we should hurry though, class is downstairs on the other side of the building.” I slip my phone into my back pocket and grab my coffee off the desk. Max hurries to pack up then we head out the door to English.

After English, Max once again asks what I have next and weirdly he is also enrolled in the same class.

“That’s funny, three in a row so far. I wonder if we’ll make it four after this. Here, let me see your schedule.” I hold out my hand and he seems reluctant but eventually, hands over her phone with his schedule pulled up. “Wow, I was kidding but it looks like we have all but two classes together. That’s so weird.”

“It’s not that weird. Really,” Max says, trying to diminish my worries. “Last year, at my old school, there were three kids who all had identical schedules. Now that was weird. Also, they could not stand each other, I don’t know why, it wasn’t even because they spent all day together, they hated each other before school even started that year.” Max rambles on and I paste a polite smile on my face but something seems very strange here. I’m sure it could be a coincidence but my life has taught me that being paranoid and trusting your instincts, keeps you from getting killed.

After school, Emily and I wave goodbye to Elizabeth. Elizabeth goes to Cross Country while Emily and I make our way down to the gym for volleyball practice. We’ll meet up again after practice to ride home together.

It isn’t our first practice, we started about a week ago to prepare for our first game this Friday. Everyone is buzzing with excitement after our first day of school and looking forward to kicking butt on Friday.

“North Ridge is going down!” Emily cries out as we enter the locker room with the rest of the girls. A cheer goes up and I join in. Emily runs up and down the rows of lockers, high-fiving every girl.

“Guys, the game isn’t for another couple of days, we need to focus. Some of us still aren’t 100 percent on our serves.” Tiffany gives a side-eye to one of the sophomores who made varsity. I toss my arm around her and smile.

“But Tiff,” I use her nickname, “you have to admit, you’ve gotten a lot better.” I tease and a few girls snicker. I can’t help it. Defending the younger girl doesn’t have to mean throwing shots at Tiffany but it is fun.

“Come on, ladies!” Our assistant coach, Coach K, comes into the locker room and waves her whistle at us. “Don’t make me blow this in this confined space. That will kill all of our eardrums. Let’s get out on the court and warm up, I’ve got some new drills to teach you all.”

We all groan, her drills are often painful. We reluctantly grab our remaining equipment and head out to the court. My knee pads hit each other as they rest loosely around my ankles.

“Nice to see everyone,” our head coach, Coach Martin, smiles at us all. He lifts his whistle to his lips and with one harsh blow, we all take off running.