Today is my first day at Kennedy Junior High. A boarding school, as usual. Funny thing is, it’s in Canada. Why would a Canadian School be names after an American president?

My parents just don’t want me, I guess. They always send me off to one of these boarding schools and pay extra for me to go to summer camp. I haven’t seen them since… well, about five years.

I put on simple clothes- a black tank and black capris, with my black ankle chain and bracelet. I pull my red hair back into a ponytail.

Of course, I don’t apply makeup. I never do. My parents say maybe they’ll let me have some when I’m eighteen. That’s about four years from now.

I grab my new books. I’m only a week late for this school’s start, so probably I didn’t miss much. My clock shows it’s 8:00- time for breakfast. I reluctantly open the door.

I sit with my friends at breakfast, as usual- Opal, Dan, Kristen, and Mark. Now, why would boys be sitting with girls? Because we’re not ordinary kids.

We’ve been in contact with Aelita for a long time, when we found the factory. We learned about Lyoko… and the fact that in France, there’s a group just like us. Their names are Jeremie, Ulrich, Odd, and Yumi. And somehow, Jeremie managed to materialize Aelita. So we don’t get a lot of contact… except for when we meet on Lyoko. Because I, the ‘genius’ of the group, know how to use the supercomputer, just like Jeremie.

I never go to Lyoko, I went only once so that I can remember returns to the past. But I work with Jeremie on finding Aelita’s anti-virus.

There’s a new girl at school, she walks in five minutes late. She’s wearing plain black, but she’s definitely not goth or emo- her hair is a soft red. She carefully picks her way through the crowd to the breakfast line. When she gets out ten minutes later, she looks lost. Then I realize, she has nowhere to sit. Thinking what I’m thinking, Kristen gets up and goes over to the girl.

I look around, lost. Where am I going to sit? I identify the snobs and popular girls and vow to avoid them.

A girl with long, dark hair and glasses walks up to me.

“Hi, what’s your name?” she seems friendly enough, so I reply.

“I’m Abby Lerexon, you?”

“I’m Kristen Laei (AN: Pronounced ‘Lay-eye’). Nice to meet you. Do you want to sit with me and my friends?”

“S-sure,” I stutter. Already, somebody wants to be friends? This might actually be a good school. Kristen leads me to a table, with four others sitting there.

“This is Dan,” she says, pointing to a short boy with blonde, curly hair. He waves. “This is Mark,” Kristen points to a thin, medium-height boy with short brown hair. “This is Alex, my brother,” this time she gestures to the guy with black hair like her own, and glasses. “And this is Opal.” Finally, the girl with long brown hair in pigtails smiles, and waves. She’s exceptionally pretty. “Everyone, this is Abby Lerexon.”

“Hey, Abby.”

“Hi, Abby!”

“Nice to meet you, Ab.”

“Hello, Abby.” They all scoot over to make room for me, and I awkwardly sit down between Kristen and Dan. I look at my food and somehow lose my appetite.

“Uh, not to offend anybody, but who’s shoe did they scrape this off of?” everybody laughs and I’m glad they didn’t take it as an insult to their school. I try to eat my food, but end up choking on it. Kristen thumps me on the back and the food flies out. “Heh,” I giggle weakly.

Somehow, Dan is gobbling down the food. “Dan will eat anything,” Mark explains. “Once, he actually ate Surprise Loaf on Meatloaf day. He ended up barfing like crazy for a week.”

“Meatloaf day?” I ask, panicked.

“Yes, once a month is Meatloaf day. Stinks.” I open my mouth to agree, but then the bell rings. In unison, everybody in the cafeteria stands up and throws out their food. I take my schedule out of my pocket. My first period class is math. I groan inwardly. Math is my least favorite subject. Then I notice Kristen leaning over my shoulder.

“Math? That’s what Opal has: go catch up to her.” I’m glad at least somebody friendly is in my class. I really do like Opal; she seems really nice. She’s quiet, but I can tell she’s kind, trustworthy, and honorable. I catch up to her.

“Hey, Opal. I have math too, with Ms. Starle.”

“Okay, I’ll show you where to go. Just follow me.” I take in sights as I follow her, memorizing the scene and coming up with landmarks so I can come to the classroom myself if I need to. We arrive at class number 513, and Opal enters. I follow. At the desk is a lady with lots of makeup and blond hair. I know that this teacher is not going to make me like math any better.

To my dismay, we have assigned seats, and I’m supposed to sit next to a girl called Mona. She has blond hair like the teachers and way too much makeup. She’s wearing a short miniskirt and spaghetti strap, with flip-flops. I can tell she’s one of the popular girls.

“Like, hi, I’m, like, Mona, the like most popular girl in like the entire school.”

“I’m Abby,” I mutter, just as Ms. Starle says to the class,

“We have a new student. Please stand and introduce yourself.” Slowly, I stand, and say,

“I’m Abby Lerexon.”

“Thank you, Miss Lerexon, you may sit.” I do just that: sit. “Okay, today is the first day of your second week in school of the eighth grade. We have finished our introductions and you know the rules. So now we can begin math. You all obviously have a basic understanding of algebra, you learned that back in fifth grade, so we’ll review that. If the variable n equals…”

A note hits the back of my head. I look behind me, but it’s not visible who threw it. “…Miss Lerexon! Pay attention! Would you be so kind as to tell me the answer?”

“Umm, 34, Ms. Starle.” I take a wild guess.

“That is correct. When the variable n is equal to 29, and 5 is added to n, the answer will be 34.” I can’t believe my luck!

The teacher drones on and on, and I uncrumple the note. It says:

Abby,

Please, meet me outside at the vending machines at 2:00. Don’t ask any questions, please, just do it. I have something for you.

- A Friend

Who can this ‘friend’ be? Opal is sitting next to me so it can’t be her. She hasn’t moved and is paying full attention to the math teacher. I’m just not like that- I can’t focus for even ten minutes on math.

Sooner or later Ms. Starle lets us out of the classroom, everybody bored. Math is not a good way to start the day. I look at my schedule- five more classes until lunch and break, which is 2:00. I have Science with Mark, Phys Ed with Kristen, Latin with Alex, Reading with Dan, and Writing with Opal again. After lunch/break I have Home and Economy with Dan, Computers with Alex, and Art with Kristen. That’s all I know.

I race through the day to lunch, I can’t wait to meet this person. I look at the food- anchovie pizza- and decide I’m not hungry. I grab a cookie from the stand, it’s crummy but something, and run out to the vending machines.