Chapter 13 (post one)

 Pre-note: Another filler chapter! Mostly anyways. I have learned a lot in the past four months in my creative writing class, and looking back, find that most of this story is terrible. But I keep telling myself that I can make it better, that this is only the first draft and all it's for is getting ideas done. I really want to start writing again during the Christmas break! I am posting all this old work and I want to post NEW stuff! So if I start posting multiple sections a day, it's so that I can get to the point where I'm posting new writing. Anyways, enough rambling, here's so VERY rough writing:

Chapter thirteen, section one:

Monday morning they announced the dance that had been rumoured the week before. It was like a switch had been turned; the whole class instantly buzzed with anticipation. The teacher up front didn’t even try to calm everyone down, instead letting the class go early to lunch.

We streamed out of the school building. Stopping by the cafeteria, we grabbed sandwiches then walked to the front of the grounds, all the while discussing the dance.

One thousand boys; one thousand girls. The front lawn of the boys school, strung with lights and streamers. A huge sound system; a real DJ. Pulsing beats and new faces. The excitement was catching. After we settled into the grass, the chatter turned to boys. Eventually I couldn’t keep up, since they’d been studying these boys for years and I’d only first seen them last week, so I asked the girl beside me, who was sitting quietly without speaking a word, whether she’d run back to the residence with me so I could grab a book I’d forgotten.

She agreed, and as we walked, I got her to talk.

“What’s your name?” I asked, “I don’t remember being introduced.”

“Lulu,” she said, “And I don’t typically eat lunch with this group, that’s why we haven’t been introduced before. Usually I eat with a couple of my friends, but they both joined the volleyball club during lunch on Fridays, so I tagged along with Ella today.”

“That’s cool,” I said, “I’m no good at volleyball either.”

“Ha, neither am I! My arms get way too sore too fast!”

“Me too!” I laughed.

“You know you are really lucky to be hanging out with that group, being new here and everything.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. They are the most popular group at our school, as well as some of the richest students. Amy’s dad is the mayor of the city, they are loaded.”

“That actually explains a lot.”

“Like all the brand name clothes, all the latest electronics, everything she could possibly want.”

I paused for a moment, and then worded carefully, “I was never popular at my old school, why would that want to hang out with me here?”

“I typically don’t get involved,” started Lulu, “But I’ll tell you this because I don’t normally hang out with this crowd. They like the fact that you are a little odd.”

“What?” I asked, slightly taken aback.

“No, no,” said Lulu quickly, “In a good way, a really good way. You don’t follow trends and dress they way everyone else does outside of class, but you do it nicely. They like the way you dress and the fact it’s not the same. You don’t wear your hair and makeup the way everyone else does either, but you still look really good every day.”

I blushed with all the compliments. “Really?”

“Yeah,” said Lulu, nodding, “It’s true.”

“Well, I don’t have much makeup or hair stuff because I haven’t gone shopping yet, that’s why I don’t get all nicely done for school like everyone else. And my clothes I picked out all at once, without really thinking, so I just throw things together sometimes.”

“Well, you do it well,” she said as we walked into the elevator, “What floor?”

“Six.”

The elevator zoomed us up to the sixth rec room floor, where Lulu waited as I ran into my room and grabbed my Physics book.

On the way back, we wandered through the garden, since Lulu was meeting her friends outside the gym just before lunch ended.

“Do you ever miss your family?” I asked her randomly.

“Sometimes,” she said. “Elementary school wasn’t a boarding school, so I used to spend a lot more time with them. But I go home every weekend, so it’s ok.”

We came to the doors of the gym, but no one was there yet. There was a bench under a tree nearby, so we headed over to it and sat down.

We chatted about school and family for a little longer. I was careful not to give much away, since I had been taught by Jake not to mention earth. When she asked where I was from, I said it was pretty far away and she wouldn’t have heard of it before, and then quickly changed the subject. She understood that Jake was my Guider, and I don’t think she understood that meant I had come from another world, but she didn’t ask about my family.

When her friends joined us, we walked back to the school building together, agreeing to hang out again sometime.