"Kelly! Get up! It's the first day of school, you don't want to be late!" Mom said as she walked into my room.
"Yeah I do, I just want to sleep in," I complained. "Summer went by way too fast."
"Come on, it's your first day of high school. A milestone. Besides, I made pancakes and bacon."
That got me up. We never have breakfasts like that. I put on some slippers and raced down the steps. Andy, my 16 year old brother, was already at the table, scarfing pancakes down.
"Slow down, there are starving people in China," I said.
"And you're not one of them," he said, poking my stomach. I'm not one of those superskinny girls, I'm more of a size 12 or 14.
"Neither are you," I said, poking him. Andy was average sized as well.
"I'm making more, calm down," Mom said. She put two pancakes on my plate. I helped myself to four pieces of bacon. Andy started making pig noises in my direction.
"ANDREW! Stop," Mom said, giving him a look.
"Sorry, Mom," he said. He went on eating his breakfast. I ate mine and I finished it pretty quickly. I then went upstairs and I pulled out a new outfit. I had khaki shorts, a short sleeved white t-shirt, and on top of that, a button down, short sleeved blue plaid shirt. I put on my brown leather sandals and my hemp necklace on. I looked into my mirror. I caught a glance of two pictures stuck in my mirror. One was of me and a kid I used to be best friends with, Isaac Hanson. We were grinning from going apple picking. The other one was ripped in half. It showed Isaac. I always wondered what happened to him, what he was doing. Then, I usually went on to think about other things. I reached out and took the pictures with me. I put them into my navy blue backpack. I went into the bathroom and brushed my hair and my teeth. I went downstairs. Andy soon came down. Mom came in.
"Can I get a few pictures of you two?" she asked.
"Mom," we complained.
"Just a couple!"
"All right," Andy said. "But we gotta hurry."
Mom kept her word. She took two of Andy and I together, and two pictures of each of us individually. She handed us lunch money, kissed us, and sent us out the door. I got into the front seat of Andy's car. He put the radio on and drove us to school.
"Do you know where you're going?" he asked me.
"Yeah," I said. I pulled a schedule out of my pocket. "I'm headed off to room 114 for first hour Social Studies."
"Great. Good luck," he said as we pulled into the school. Andy went to his parking spot and we walked into the school.
"I'll see you in third block, okay?" he said.
"Definitely. Bye," I told him. We walked off into the school. I saw Melissa and Chris, my two friends.
"Mel! Chris!" I yelled.
"Kelly!" they said. We all grouped up.
"How long have you guys been here?" I asked.
"Only about 5 minutes," Chris informed me. "We were waiting for you."
"Sweet," I replied. The bell rang about five minutes later. Chris and I headed off to Social Studies. We had a male teacher. We sat down at two empty desks halfway back. I recognized about half the kids in the class. The tardy bell rang, and my teacher stood up.
"Hey guys, welcome to 1st block Social Studies Challenge, I'm your teacher, Mr. Harrison. I'm going to call role, if I don't call your name, just let me know. Nicole Adams?"
"Here," she said. I smiled at Nicole. I knew her from Jr. High.
"Chris Atler?"
"Here," Chris said from next to me.
"Kelly Bartolacci?"
"Here," I said.
"Did I get the last name right?" he asked me.
"Surprisingly, yes," I said.
"I hope so, I had your brother two years ago," he said with a grin. "Andy, right?"
"Yep, I'm sorry," I said.
"So am I."
I grinned. I was going to like this guy. Mr. Harrison went down the roll. He went on to explain the details of the class and so forth. He went over a bunch of stuff. He handed us new schedules. He said we had new ones in case you lost your printout, or if you had class switches. Chris and I went over our schedules. The only other classes we had together were Band and ANP. The class went by fast. Second hour was English. I had Mr. Gendron. After he called roll, he made us all stand up. We went around the room, said our name and a few things we liked. Then, we sat down and we went over some other stuff. Mr. Gendron has been here for three years, but he didn't have my brother, or if he did, he didn't say anything about it. He seemed like another cool teacher. We went over some of the curriculum and the stuff we'd need for the class. After that, Mr. Gendron told us a few jokes. I left the class laughing. So far, it was a good year! Right after second hour, we had lunch, which was good, because I was starving! Classes are 86 minutes long, but you only have 4 classes a day.
At lunch, I sat at a table with Chris, Melissa, and a few other Jr. High people I knew. We began to talk.
"Hey guys, I'll be right back, I gotta get a drink," I said.
"All right, Kelly," they said. I got up and headed out to the drink machine. I bought a lemon Powerade. I came back in and I ate lunch.
"Kelly, what do you think of Mr. Harrison?" Chris asked me.
"I think he's a good teacher! Do you have Mr. Gendron?"
"I do," my friend Sarah said.
"You'll like him, he's awesome."
"Great, I have him fourth hour," she said.
We went over some of our teachers, the ones we liked and didn't like. The lunch hour flew by. We went to band and had a marching rehearsal. We'd already had been going for about a month, in that class. After I was done, I felt like I jumped into a swimming pool with my clothes on. Chris and Melissa and I were standing around, talking. I heard a knock on the door, so I opened it. A guy was there.
"Hi, can you tell me-- Oh my God," he said.
