Good Riddance

The morning went by quickly with me attracting many stares and curious looks as I tried to find my way around the huge school. I wasn’t really concentrating on what other people were doing, I was more concerned with getting to my own lessons in the vast array of classrooms that made up the school buildings.

Only when the bell rang for lunch did I snap out of my automatic mode and actually pay attention to my surroundings. I had gleaned from my map that this school had two canteens because of the sheer size of the student populous. One canteen was for the freshman and junior years and the other for the soph and senior years. I couldn’t figure out why they hadn’t put the similar ages together and put the two younger years together and the two older years together – but no.

I walked into the canteen and was faced by two queues, one said hot, the other salad. I didn’t want either of those so I walked through the doors and into the room to eat my pack up.

I was amazed by the sheer size of the room, it had at least forty tables in it, each one with twelve chairs around the edge, most were filled but there was a table near the back that only had one person sitting at it and as I watched she got up to go. I smiled to myself and went to sit down at the table, it was exactly ten to one when I sat down. I managed to eat my lunch in silence for a few moments before I was aware of being stared at. I looked up and saw that the girls on the table next to me were staring, I smiled at them but they didn’t reconcile it, they merely looked confused.

Had I grown an extra head or something?

I turned back to my food but then another awareness that I was being stared at crept over me and I looked up again only this time to see five people stood on the other side of the table to where I was sat. There were two girls and three boys there and none of them looked particularly friendly toward me.

“You new?”

The voice of one of the girls made me look again as I attempted to look down. The girl who had spoken to me had long brown hair which was very straight, she walked around to my side of the table or at least attempted to, she was held back by the fact she was holding hands with one of the guys who had long sideburns and spiky hair. I nodded in answer to her question.

“Well then I’ll let you off, just for today” she said, “At one o clock, this table is our table”

“Kiera, she’s new, lighten up!” said one of the guys, he had shaggy black hair and had his hands shoved deep in his pockets, looking frankly bored by his surroundings.

“She needs to learn the rules” said the girl with the brown hair; Kiera.

“It’s okay” I said softly, “I’ve finished, I’ll just go”

They stared at me for a moment as I gathered my stuff up and I headed out of the canteen. Well they seemed like nice people. Not. Well they were seniors and seniors always thought they ruled the school, it was natural.

I looked at my map and located on it the arts block, it was one of the biggest in the grounds and it was relatively easy to find because it had a huge sign on the front declaring it to be PERFORMING ARTS AND MUSIC. I smiled as I went inside; this was more like home.

I walked through the empty hallways and I found one of the dance studios. There was nobody in it and I went inside, slipping my shoes off as I went. My bare feet made no noise as I walked across the wooden flooring of the studio. I went to the mirror, I guess this must be the ballet studio because there was a bar running down the mirror and I gripped the smooth wood under my fingers, feeling happier by the minute. I spun around and saw that there was a large speaker system in the corner and other mirrors around the room.

“Can I help you?”

I jumped at the voice and I turned toward the door with a blush creeping up my face. There was a woman in her twenties stood there looking expectant of my answer.

“Sorry” I said, “I’m new here, I wanted to find where the dance studios were for future reference”

“Why?” she asked, “Are you a dancer?”

I nodded.

“Well,” she said, “I’m Miss Hickett, I’m the dance teacher here, I’ve got a club in here now for freshmen, do you want to try out for dance competitions?”

“Yes please” I said quietly.

“What dance do you do?” she asked.

“Well I’ve been doing ballet for eleven years and modern dance, tap, ballroom and jazz for four years” I said softly.

“Oh” she said taken aback, “Well I could try you out tonight at six o clock?”

“Okay” I said agreeing heading past her toward the door.

“See you then,” she said, “In here”

I nodded and picked up my bag before leaving the studio. The rest of the day passed relatively quickly because I had something to look forward to at the end of it. I used the school phone booth to call my mum to inform her that I would be home late. She agreed because she was delighted I’d managed to bag myself and audition within my first day.

I arrived at the dance studio at quarter to six later that evening. I had spent the time between the end of school and then, doing some catch up work in the schools expansive library. The dance teacher was already there and she smiled when she saw me. I took my shoes off and put my bridge support shoes on which were in my bag.

“Warm up” she said.

“I already did” I said, “I ran here and did some stretches”

“Oh” she said with a smile, “Okay then, first off I need to know your name”

“It’s Scarlett” I said with a smile.

“You’re the new girl from England?” she asked. I nodded.

“Well Scarlett,” she said, “I’m just going to put on some music, it’s a mix tape and I want you to just interpret it as best you can and then I’ll do some choreography with you and we’ll see where we go from there”

“Okay” I said with a bright smile. She smiled in return and went over to the stereo system, she pressed the play button and some gentle classical music came on, I did some simple ballet steps to it and some tight moves, then some music I recognised; El Tango De Roxanne started to play and I started a much more vicious dance in which I was locked in a battle of dance moves with an imaginary partner. The mix ended and I stopped by the mirror breathing hard.

“Excellent Scarlett!” said Miss Hickett and I smiled at her, “I don’t need to do an choreography with you, you’re on the team!”

“Team?” I asked.

“There’s a school dance team and we go to state arts competitions” she explained.

“Oh, okay” I said, “Are there any boys that do dance here?”

“A few” she said, “Why?”

“It’s just I do ballroom and latin as well and need someone to dance with seeing as I left my old partner behind in England” I said, “We held the U16 European title for Rumba”

“Sweet” she said with a smile, “I’ll see what I can do”

“Awesome” I said changing my shoes back to my normal ones and putting my dance shoes in my bag, “When do you practice?”

“Well we have a class every night and seeing as you do most types of dance it’s up to you which ones you attend” she said.

“I’ll be there tomorrow” I said, “Which one is it?”

“Modern dance tomorrow” she said with a grin.

“Cool” I said and picked up my bag, “See you tomorrow”

“See you tomorrow Scarlett” she said. With that I left the studio and turned into the corridor, it was nice and cool out here and it made a contrast to the heat of the dance studio.

“Hey!” a voice behind me startled me and I turned around to see a guy running up behind me. It was the boy from lunch with shaggy black hair and now I could see; startling green eyes.

“It’s Scarlett isn’t it?” he asked. I nodded and blushed; I never knew how to act around boys, certainly older boys.

“I’m Billie Joe” he said proffering his hand as we stepped outside into the fast approaching November dusk. I took his hand and shook it gently before letting go. I started to walk away from the building and he fell into step beside me.

“I came to apologise for this lunchtime,” he said, “Kiera was bang out of order”

“Yeah she was” I said not looking at him.

“She’s just very territorial” he said defending his friend. I shrugged.

“Guess I’ll just find some other place to sit” I said with a smile, “No biggy”

There was a moment’s silence as he walked in step beside me, I was so surprised that he’d bothered to come and find me at all.

“You a soph?” he asked making conversation.

“Yeah,” I said, “I take it you’re a senior?”

“How did you guess?” he asked with a grin.

“The cocky friends, the cocky attitude” I said with a shrug, “Most seniors are like that”

“Glad to see you think so highly of us” he said.

“Well I haven’t seen any evidence to the contrary yet so...” I said tailing off.

“Okay then” he said, “Come sit with us tomorrow at lunch?”

I paused for a moment before looking up at him incredulously, “What?”

“Come sit with us tomorrow at lunch” he said breaking each word down into its monosyllables as if I was thick.

“Why?” I asked changing my question.

“As an apology” he said. I frowned at him.

“I don’t need your charity” I said sharply.

“Have you got anyone else to sit with?” he asked, I shook my head.

“Right then” he said, “Sit with us”

“Why do you want me to?” I asked still trying to understand, “You’ve got your group of Senior friends and I’m just the new weird English kid”

“In case you hadn’t noticed” he said, “I’m a weird kid too”

I looked him up and down then and I saw he was wearing some black skinny jeans, a black shirt and some skater shoes. The kind of thing that if my mum saw somebody wearing it, she wouldn’t let them in the house.

“I’m not your sort of weird” I said. I wondered why he was going to all this effort to make my acquaintance. We had reached my housing estate now and the gates blocked the way to the road.

“Do you live down here?” I asked.

“Hell no!” he said with a laugh, “I live back that way” he gestured over his shoulder back towards school.

“Well why did you walk with me all the way down here?” I asked with a bemused expression on my face.

“Because I wanted to talk to you,” he said, “You’re interesting”

“Oh-kay” I said turning away from him and going to the keypad to type in the code to go through the gate.

“Will you sit with us tomorrow then?” he asked.

“You’d have to run it past Kiera first” I said to him.

“Oh she’ll get over it” he said. I paused for a moment and then nodded.

“If you wish” I said.

He smiled a triumphant smile and after saying goodbye he turned on heel and with his hands shoved in his pockets, like they had been at lunch, he started to stride back up the road; the way we had just come.