Extraordinary.

I groaned as I sat up in the plush red bed, recognizing it from the morning before. My heart skipped and my breathing hitched as I fell out from beneath the covers, reaching frantically for my cell phone. ‘November 15, 2007’ glared back at me, along with the time and my hopes fell dramatically.

Of course it was the same day. November fifteenth had worn out its welcome in my mind, if I could only get it to leave and be done with it.

I trudged over to the closet, bending over to pick up an old pair of jeans, that I distinctly remember buying in the eighties, and put them on quickly. I’d run out of cliques to hang with, now I was a drifter and how I dressed didn’t matter. I wondered, vaguely, if that was the moral of the story; if maybe I was stuck in such a monotonous mess because I concentrated too much on where I fit in so many lifetimes ago.

“Inhale,” I reminded myself when my chest started to constrict. What could I have done to prevent this cycle in my life? Exhale. Nothing, I decided, it was just meant to happen. Water tore at my eyes almost begging me to tear up, but I ignored the impulse and pulled my hair up into a pony tail.

“Anna, darling!” a distinctly feminine voice yelled almost daintily up the stairwell. Her voice had an accent to it that made me believe just for a second that I might be in some foreign country. I stood in front of the mirror for a moment, trying the accent out on my tongue. I smiled when it felt familiar, knowing that it would make today just a little bit better.

“Yes, mother?” my voice was suddenly more pristine and airy with my fake accent, I found the time to giggle a little behind my hands.

“You’re going to be late!” she cried back at me, the edge to her words sending me into a flurry as I hurried around the room, gathering all that I would need for the coming day. Being in that seamless foreigner role I forgot to bring a ‘pleasure’ reading book even though I knew that in seventh period Ms. Edmunson would request that we pull them out.

My sock clad feet made no sound as I stumbled down the stairs into an utterly unfamiliar living room. “Hurry, hurry!” the petite blonde in the kitchen called, making ‘shoo’ motions towards the front door. A smile tugged at the corners of my lips and I nodded before running out into the cold, listening as the door slammed itself shut behind me.

Accent or not, the day still ran by me in the same boring colors. Homeroom was uneventful, racing easily in a tie with second period, where we watched the original Romeo and Juliet, in the ratio of drabness. Third period stood out, but only because the room was neon green, and fourth period almost put me to sleep with the same old impromptu speech on being more like the naive new kid -I only took offense the first time.

I drug my feet all the way to fifth, my ego only slightly tarnished by the good kid-bad kid speech, knowing that it would be the same problems as the day before, never to get resolved. “Anna?” Someone yelled, trying to wave me down from across the hall. Brown hair and bright blue eyes automatically called me out. “Anna!” She screamed again, realizing that it was really me and not someone else with the same shape. I slowed enough for her to catch up before returning to my natural pace. “Anna, I’ve been looking for you everywhere!”

My eyebrow rose just a little, but my interest was definitely piqued. She’d never come right up to me like that, always hiding in the back of the room in all her mousy glory. My heart sped, maybe she was the one all along.

Inhale. “Yeah?” Exhale. British accent. I needed to remember that.

“Yeah,” Maureen nodded, unperturbed by my blasé attitude. Thank God, I thought. “Yeah, Mr. Hyghlers wanted you,” she gasped, not struggling to keep up but obviously uncomfortable from having to catch up.

At her words I stopped dead in my tracks. Mr. Hyghlers was never out of the ordinary, where some of the teachers would switch it up on a whim, he was never one of them. His art class had been perfectly normal, as far as I could tell. What kind of sign was it that he sent poor Maureen after me? “What for?” I asked carefully, slowly backtracking. The art room was only yards away, I could see it if I turned my head.

“He didn’t say,” she shrugged before smiling and walking towards her locker.

I paused for a moment, “Maureen!”

“Yeah?” she spun around, obviously surprised I even knew her name.

“Wanna hang out later?” The smile on her face was all the answer that I needed before I jogged in the art room’s direction. Mr. Hyghler was leaning up against his desk, hair ruffled into artful perfection, concentrating on the opposite wall where the newest eighth grade art projects were hanging. “You called?” I asked, wondering if that would fly in the UK.

Hyghler looked startled. “Uh, yeah,” he took a moment to get a grip on the situation, “I had a question about your project.” He took a step forward so that he was no longer leaning against his messy desk.

Confusion echoed in my eyes and a wrinkle etched itself into my forehead. “Uh, what project?”

“Exactly,” he pointed at me, taking another step and handing me a piece of paper I hadn’t even noticed was in his hand. “You didn’t even start.” He looked almost disappointed, with a little crooked frown and sad eyes. “Why is that?” he asked, sounding like a therapist from my past.

Distant past, I decided. “Because I didn’t find the point,” I murmured, not trying to offend him, but obviously doing so. I hurried to cover my tracks, “I mean, it wasn’t a stupid assignment, I’m just not going to be here when it’s due.” My scrambling hadn’t helped. Hyghler took another step towards me, putting a mere foot or two between us.

“What do you mean you’re not going to be here?” I don’t think he noticed how close we were, his eyes were so sincere. It was like I was reading his mind, it was like he was genuinely interested in why I wouldn’t be here come tomorrow.

I stuttered, “I-It’s a long story.” I took my chance to escape when the bell rang, only glancing behind fleetingly. It was enough to see the hurt look on his face as he tried to figure out just what kind of enigma I was.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered to myself as I thought up excuses for my tardiness and grabbed all of the books I needed for fifth. “I’m sorry, because I don’t know either.”

I spent all afternoon talking with Maureen, helping her with her problems, praying that she was my key, wondering if it was really Mr. Hyghler who had needed my help. I cringed as I remembered blatantly turning him down.

By morning, though, I had already forgotten the problems of the day before. It was the sixteenth and only for a second could I wonder about who it was that inadvertently solved my problems as I fixed theirs.