The next morning, Liz's mother came into Liz's room and shook her awake. "Time to go to school! Time to get up and go to school!" Her mother called cheerfully. Liz opened her eyes somewhat, still half asleep, and blinked a couple times. She drew herself up against the headboard and yawned. "Come on now, time for school! Remember school? Academics? Yeah? Okay, come on now, up, up."
"What?" Liz asked, confused. What was 'school'? OH! Like Garden? Yeah! "Oh yeah!!" Liz cried and hopped out of bed immediately. She knew she used to despise waking up early in the morning to go to school, but she knew today would be different--like how every student is excited the first day back to school after a long and exciting summer break. Liz quickly jumped out of bed and pulled out the first pieces of clothes from her bags she could reach--jeans and a T-shirt, whatever, she'd fit in fine--except for her boots. Those boots had been specially designed to enhance her Duel technique and in the rush of packing she hadn't considered bringing any other pairs of shoes.
Liz rushed to the kitchen and grabbed a bite, then headed out in the direction of her school. Her mother caught her as she was turning out of the driveway, "Remember, Liz, you can't tell anyone you're from another world!" Liz nodded and backed the car parallel to the curb, preparing to transition gears. "Just tell them you're temporarily here to stay with your friend. And that you're from some other state or something," her mom called out. Liz nodded widely to show her understanding, then waved goodbye and drove off.
Liz parked the car in the school parking lot, with a note she'd written telling the administrators sorry she didn't have a pass because she was new on the dashboard, and headed up to the office. Her high school was an interesting little thing, completely indoors with no windows--the students joked that it was like a prison. Beyond the concrete walls, exterior, and interior, the only other tint of color on its structure were the school colors, maroon and gold, displayed proudly by everything from stripes to paintings of the school mascot.
Luckily today, Liz was rather early to class. She climbed up the stairs by the maroon lockers to the office (matted in the same tint of gray carpet) and searched the area for some administrator that could ultimately direct her temporary classes. High school does these things sometimes--with all the rush and confusion of whatever new controversial student strike or policy challenge, schedules and transcripts get lost in their usual process. Liz knew she could use that to her advantage. The closest person she saw was sitting in a row of seats by the teacher boxes, searching through his backpack he'd placed on the chair next to him.
"Um, excuse me," Liz asked subtly, but it was enough to get the boy's attention. He turned his attention to her immediately and Liz could immediately catch a glimpse of his brilliant crystal blue eyes. "I'm kind of new here and I was wondering where the VP's office was?" He stared at her for kind of a long while which made her feel extremely uncomfortable. "Um...? Is there a problem?" The guy shook his head, while letting out a yawn and ruffled an apathetic hand through his already untidy brown hair. Something struck Liz in the heart, the second he'd finished his actions and this time it was her that was taken aback.
"Yeah, just go down the hall and it should be the third door to your right I think," he said, but refused to break eye contact as he did so. Liz felt somewhat flustered--it was that familiar feeling, like when you're trying to name an actor of a certain movie and can't quite remember, but its on the tip of your tongue.
"Thanks," she said quickly then left to follow his instructions. Where all high school students like that? Apparently so, since when she walked down the hallway she attracted even more pairs of eyes. She shrugged it off, thinking it was probably just the boots--they kind of brought a lot of attention anyway. Getting a schedule was no problem at all, just a little bit of talk, excuses, apologies, and promises to get parent signatures the very next day. Now all she had to do was find Jen and Amber. As she left the office, she glanced up at the clock--7:40 AM still--she'd have enough time to search for them before the bell rang in ten minutes.
Liz got real lucky that morning, as she spotted the girls immediately when she turned the corner. "AMBER! JEN!" Liz called and they immediately turned around. They looked over and took a second to take it in--that person was Liz? OH MY--LIZ!! They screamed and then charged at her, despite the weight of their backpacks and nearly ran her over as they came and hugged her (rather violently).
"LIZ! I can't believe you actually came!" Amber cried as she gave a little wiggle of excitement. Liz looked around rather cautiously--apparently the whole school was watching them now.
"Well you'd better believe it, 'cause here I am!" Liz laughed.
"How long are you staying?" Amber queried, her eyes fluctuating back and forth slowly as they observed the students around them clear out--no show here, just move along.
"Just about a month or so," Liz murmured quietly as Amber and Jen both frowned. Apparently 'just a month or so' wasn't good enough for them, but honestly, when Liz thought about it, she knew that any more than a month and Zell and herself would go crazy.
"Come on, we're going to show you around the school," Jen said, grabbing Liz's arm and dragging her off in some random direction. "We've got to get you to remember this old school here because you've probably forgotten everything and everyone about it!" Liz nodded slightly; she'd lost a lot of memories to her amnesia, and something inside of her told her they were the most important--it wasn't even anything telling her, just a gut feeling that to come here meant to reclaim the faces and names she'd unwillingly lost.
"You see, Liz," Amber explained as they approached the cafeteria. "There are certain chains and cliques you don't want to get near." They stopped for a moment and pointed discreetly to a large group of people standing in front of it. They all looked the same--dressed in desperately slutty clothes, flaunting their attitudes with their highlights and accessories, and generally standing inconveniently in the middle of the path to class as if to gain the recognition they already had. "Those are the jerks. They're all beautiful and they accessorize like goddesses, but they're all conceited and self centered and couldn't care about anything other than how much his or her shirt cost or such and such."
"A lot of them are messed up though, drugs, alcohol, you name it, they've tried it," Jen explained. Liz nodded and urged them to move on. She didn't feel any need to stick around and observe them like a science experiment. Jen and Amber dragged Liz along by the arms as they headed towards the front of the school called the "forum"--basically a no-man's land for people who didn't want to be noticed. Everyone there always felt the spotlight as it was generally the center of the entire school. "Those are the 'nice kids' over there. They're actually respected by everyone--extremely nice and smart, which is hard, but not all of them are very er... fortunate in looks." Jen motioned towards a group standing off towards the side of the forum.
"That person over there," Amber sighed suddenly, pointing at a boy standing within the 'nice kids' group. "That's Ronny Calor!" Jen sighed with great admiration as Amber glanced at him dreamily. Liz glanced in that direction and noticed that it was the exact same guy who'd directed her to the VP's office earlier that morning. She saw him ruffled a hair through his hair again, and then she turned towards her friends who were still swooning. "He's the hottest boy in school!" Jen fanned herself as if the hotness was getting to her. Liz giggled; why were they so boy crazy!?
"All of the girls want him, but he's out of reach," Jen explained, sighing with melancholy. "He always says he's still looking for that special someone." Liz nodded, the stared off in some other direction--okay, this was enough for her--and at that point all she could do was think about Zell and smile childishly at herself. "Which is ridiculous, I mean we're in high school--aren't we obligated to date around?" Wow, Liz thought to herself. What kind of concept is that?!
"So apparently, that special someone is no one here, then?" Liz asked. Jen and Amber clapped sarcastically at how unbelievably quickly she was catching on! Liz chuckled, but kept her mouth shut.
"Exactly," Jen nodded, then pointed at a different boy, back at the cafeteria. "That is Thomas Goton. He's the second hottest, but he's completely conceited and arrogant. He looks at us girls like... PROJECTS! I mean, what the heck? But he's cute, and that's really the point." Liz looked over at Thomas curiously--his slick blond hair and dark green eyes were rather impressive in comparison with the other boys, but he was completely filthy looking in the sense that some luster in his eyes appeared defected and malevolent. Liz wasn't looking forward to speaking to him.
Finally, the bell sounded and the students began to file toward their classes in waves. Liz looked down at her schedule for the month and saw that she had biology class first, so she headed down the hall and with the rest of the students and basically let them file her into the right class.