• 6.
    The next few days were for cleaning. Cerise told me what to do, how to do it, what to use, and how I would know when I was done. Normally I would have been super paranoid about being treated like that but I was in one of those situations where I had no right to complain since I was in unfamiliar territory. Son of a cleaning lady and I can’t even do that without instruction. I’m a sad piece of work.

    It turns out that I like eggs more that I thought; they’re easy to cook. I tried to make a recipe in a book we found in the house, something in French, and I nearly burned down the kitchen. Cerise hosed the stove down with the fire extinguisher. She said it would get easier if I started on the small stuff first, like grilled cheese sandwiches. Turns out she was right; they’re easy to cook too.

    You know what bugs me? Cerise seems to be good at everything. She knows what she’s doing, gets it done much faster and better than I could ever do, and still has time to dink around and teach me. Was she looking for a complete idiot to teach, because she found one!

    I’m actually glad they gave me a few days off before school started; I need them. Sure, I have to clean a lot but the atmosphere is preparing me for any “fruity” conversations I’ll have at school. I’m sure someone there will be talking about their prized pig.

    Speaking of animals, they all seem to hate me for they shun me like I’m a disease. I walk in and they clear a pathway for me, straight to the stairs. They try not to make a sound in my presence. Cerise comes in and they act like they’re real animals in the movies and make all sorts of noise when she feeds them, me hovering close behind since I am supposed to feed them.

    God, I’m thinking about her again. I should get my head checked. Maybe it’s because she’s the only person I “technically” know for miles. I don’t want to think about it.

    These past few days I’ve been thinking about my parents as well. Strange enough, I feel like they miss me. I wonder how they reacted to my cruddy note and what they’re doing right now. Probably nothing but I still think about it.

    The house looks like it’s livable now but there’s still no room for me unless…no, that is definitely not an option. The kitchen was the first to be clean, by Cerise. Then it was the living room, by Cerise since she started me in the bathroom. The attic, basement, closets, and bedrooms are still full of crap but cleaner, by Cerise with a teeny bit of help from me on the stairs going up the attic. The bathroom now looks like going to the Jon is as pleasurable as before, by mostly Cerise and me. Yeah, loads of work.

    Then we started on plowing the field for planting. I had no idea how to work the machines so I watched Cerise do it like the idiot I am. She decided that the best thing to put me in charge of was to take care of the animals. Man, those chickens are picky with their eggs and their beaks. I have a wrap around my hand from all the scratches they gave me and don’t get me started on the cow. Let’s just say we have problems at this stage in our relationship.

    On second thought, I want school to start. This is just too much for me and school now seems like a better place to be; no one there to talk me out of going either.
    ***

    Soon, it’s finally the day I get to go to school. I’m bringing my backpack even though there’s nothing in it but a binder. I expect to get some books today and there is no way I’m going to carry everything home in my arms. That would be like carrying gym balls when the container you got them from has wheels to roll it out on to the gym floor, stupid.

    I get my shoes on and say goodbye to the shunning animals, still shunning me even though I’ve been here for like what, five days? You’d think they’d get friendlier by now.
    Thank God it’s not my turn to cook today, I woke up late and Cerise had to get me up. I suppose that since she did wake me up, she would have started breakfast already whether or not it was her turn to cook. She makes a lot of eggs or just tells me to eat cereal. She drinks a lot of milk too because in these few days we’ve been here, we’ve had to buy another gallon. I’ve only had two glasses full.

    I pull out the map to my school as I make it to the gate. I have a lot of walking to do.

    “Hey!”

    I turned around to find Cerise pulling a bike towards me. It looked like a piece of crap, complete with a rust finish and squeaking parts. I don’t think I could ride it without it falling apart but apparently Cerise thought it would do.

    “I oiled it last night.”

    “I don’t think I can ride that.”

    “You can’t ride a bike?”

    “No. It just looks like it’s going to fall apart whether I sit my butt on it or not.”

    She smiled. “Trust it. It held me up fine when I tried it out last night so it will definitely hold you up.”

    What, so now I’m too skinny? I can’t help it if I’m skinny. Apparently, I glared at her for she continued with an “all-knowing” smile on her face.

    “It’s true, you need to eat more. Do something about it or deal with it.”

    “So you want me to gain weight?” Most people would tell you to lose weight no matter now skinny you looked.

    “It wouldn’t hurt. You look anorexic with those clothes drowning you. Do your ribs show?”

    So what if they did? “Why?”

    “Its how people tell that their pets are anorexic.”

    “So now I’m a pet?”

    “No, let me finish. It is true in most cases for humans as well. I would ask if your shoulder blades show all the time but you can’t see your back. That’s another way you can tell.”

    I have to get out of here. “Okay, I have to go now.”

    She let go of the handles so I could get on and I pushed off before I had to continue this ridiculous conversation. Cerise called after me.

    “Good luck!”

    Thanks a lot, as if my day couldn’t get any weirder. You just pushed it into full, uncontrollable speed.

    Like I thought, the bike was a piece of crap and after about maybe ten miles, I had to stop peddling and start pushing. The squeaking was getting on my nerves and I about had it. I just wanted to find a cliff and push this thing over with it.

    But let’s get realistic; this is farm country so the tallest thing in short of a building is a hill without any steep juts or fall offs. Besides, most of them are hard treks like the one I had to give up on to start pushing my bike.

    Good news, I was about seventeen miles or so away and I had about an hour to get there so, good. Bad news, in order to get there on time, I would have to get back on the bike.

    I would have liked to look around a bit more but unfortunately, I had no time. I wonder if we could somehow get a car so it would only take about fifteen minutes to get to school. Wait, no, too much of a hassle for the priest. They would probably have to bug it to make sure we only went where we were suppose to.

    Man, I can see mountains here. I just had to look a little to my left to see the first one. It looked purple and I could make out a few trees on it. The one next to it had a little snow on its peak.

    BBBBEEEEEEEPPPP!!!!

    “Whoa!”

    A car, a black Ford truck to be precise, almost hit me. If it hadn’t honked its horn at me, I might have been stuck to its front bumper or, because of size, be stuck between the groves in its tires. Note to self: study your surroundings when you don’t have to know where you’re going.

    I had a pretty safe ride after that. I only stopped to let the car behind me go ahead since they had followed me for about half a mile and was too afraid to jump out and pass me on their own.

    The school looked…clean. Yeah, I’ll say clean because any other word wouldn’t have much of an impact.

    It was probably built in the last ten years, the students streaming in came from cars because they weren’t dressed for the weather, and it seemed to radiate a glow of an image of a smile, the creepy one that made you think they just wanted you to shut up and get on with your life. If that wasn’t clean looking, I might actually think picture-perfect would be a good label as well. I’m not sure if I’d like this place.

    The bike rack was in front of the school, all the other bikes looking state of the art and having owners that would obsess over every detail compared to my piece of crap that looked ignored for years and just as old as maybe, me or my parents. Some people turned their attention to me, some to my bike, but all the eyes came off me as they entered the building.

    It was then when I realized I had no bike lock. No matter, if anyone thought this piece of crap was worth something, it was better in their hands than mine. I just parked it and went in, avoiding everyone else like the plague.

    Unlike my last school, the office was clearly marked and right there when I walked in. I opened the door and went up to the lady behind the desk. She looked up at me after finishing a phone call that she was taking from an earpiece.

    “Can I help you?”

    “I’m a transfer.”

    “Name?”

    “Thains, Stephen.”

    She looked it up on the computer. “Ah, here you are. You’re schedule will print out from there.”

    She pointed to a printer behind the desk as if she expected me to go around back there to get it. I saw it print and then I went and got it as the lady picked up another phone call.

    Back in the hallway, I actually looked at the piece of paper. First period: Physics, Second: FST, Third: ASL, Fourth: US History, Fifth: eleventh grade English, and Sixth: PE. Basically the same schedule I had at my old school. Before I headed off to find my first classroom, someone came out of the office and grabbed me by the shoulder. I looked at him.

    He looked really professional in his collared shirt and suit pants. I would have asked him if he left his matching jacket in his office if I had known who he was. He had glasses over his huge, green eyes and a neatly combed back black hair. He tried to look friendly but I got the same vibe from his smile as I had gotten from the school.

    “Are you Stephen Thains? Did I say that right?”

    “Yes. You did say it right.”

    “Good. Come inside please.”

    Dddiiinnnnggg.

    The bell for class to start had rung.

    “Don’t worry about it. Come with me.”

    The students were scrambling to class while I was taking my sweet time going back into the office. I felt even more separated from them than I had before.

    Inside the guy’s personal office, I realized who he was before he offered me a seat and introduced himself.

    “Please take a seat. I am the counselor here at Greenville Junior and Senior High School, Mr. Joseph MacLauny, and as such I wish to welcome you to the school. As you have probably noticed, this is a small school but we make up for it with our variety of grades here.”

    Okay, I have to put my thoughts in a checklist again. One: “Greenville”? It sounds like a cheesy movie name for a simple town like this or something out of a children’s storybook. Totally laughable. Two: You could welcome me all you like Mr. “I’m-going-to-introduce-myself-to-you-using-my-first-and-last-name-to-inishiate-a-friendly-atmostphere-so-you-won’t-feel-intimidated-but-still-use-“Mr.”-in-front-of-it-to-proclaim-my-superiority-over-you” (you can tell I love this guy already) but that will never make me feel anymore welcome than it had at my last school. In fact, it just makes it worse and more painful. Three: I really hope that the only reason you have a Junior/Senior high school isn’t because you wanted to make up for the lack in numbers. That’s just stupid coming from a school that screams the phrase “Quality over quantity.”

    Yes, I feel like a sarcastic b*****d right now and if I had the guts, I would have screamed it in Mr. MacLauny’s face, accompanied by hideous laughter. Instead, I let him continue.

    “We want you to feel safe here, Mr. Thains. So if there is anything you ever need, I hope I will be available to you.”

    Don’t you pull that “make you feel superior” crap on me by adding “Mr.” to my name, you old coot. I hope you gag on a turkey sandwich and no one saves you so that way I will never need to come back to this office. And I will never need your help because I would rather sell my soul to the devil before enlisting your help, unless you are the devil.

    I was ready to leave but this guy had a whole lecture prepared for me and wasn’t about to let the opportunity pass. Too bad he couldn‘t hear my negative commentary.

    “I know it must be hard for you. A new area, a new school, being the new kid.”

    No, you don’t but I’ve had this lecture before when my previous school counselor mistook me for a new student when I had been at the school for a year, so you can let me go at any time.

    “I was the new kid once, just like you.”

    I bet you were born here.

    “It can be terrifying.”

    I bet you twenty bucks that you were born here, have never left, and are going to die here.

    “So I know how welcome a helping hand can seem.”

    You’re neither welcoming nor helpful.

    “So that is why I’m extending my help to you.”

    I don’t want it. I mean, I really don’t want it.

    “Based on the report I received from your last school,”

    Here we go.

    “You’ve had a hard time coming to school. I assure you that this is frowned upon at this school.”

    I’m sure it’s frowned upon at every school. Oh, and you can thank my “friends” for everything; for that lack of attendance and for being here in the first place.

    “But I won’t lie to you,”

    I’m sure you already have.

    “I was surprised that someone with such a lack of attendance has such a high grade point average.”

    Most people are.

    “So you have proven you are a smart boy, just stupid for not coming to school.”

    Whoa, did he just say that? He just became higher in my opinion of him.

    He looked at me as if my surprise was from his words, which they were, but not they way he was thinking.

    “Yes, Mr. Thains. You can be smart and stupid at the same time.”

    That so wasn’t it. I just kept my secrets to myself.

    “So if you keep to your schedule, you’ll do fine here.”

    He wrote down on a pad of post-it notes and gave me the top one. It was my pass telling me I was free to go.

    “Good luck.”

    I don’t think luck will save me.