Today was my first day of school. Unfortunately, I woke up late than usual which made me panic but there was still plenty of time to get ready. I wore my outfit and my favorite blue cardigan above. It helped me be confident about myself when I wore it. After getting ready, I was about to grab my backpack and head downstairs, when I realized Theo hadn’t even awakened yet!

I yelled at Theo as my mom always did when I was young, “Theo, you’re going to be late for the first day of school! Hurry up and get ready!”

It took about five minutes for him to get out of bed, put some clothes on with unmatching pairs of socks, grab his backpack, and head downstairs.

“Theo! You didn’t even brush your teeth,” I cried out.

“So? Who cares? I’m old enough to decide that on my own. I’m already ten years old after all,” he replied.

“Okay, it’s not me who will get embarrassed in front of all the students on the first day of school.”

I quickly headed downstairs with Theo and Aurelia cooked us breakfast. She was an excellent cook — especially regarding pancakes — although I didn’t want to admit it. After enjoying our meal, I had to walk to school with Theo since our school was near each other while Aurelia’s was in the complete opposite way from us. On our way to school, I told Theo how he should behave well and respect others but he didn’t bother to say a single word.

When I stepped into the school gate, it was about time the bell would ring so I hurried to find where my classroom was in the cold. Luckily, I arrived just in time to find where my locker was. I quickly grabbed my books and went inside my classroom, trying to look as confident as I could, while my heart was beating so loudly that I was scared someone would hear it. When I opened the door to my classroom, everybody was seated in their seats and the teacher was waving at me to come in. I slowly pushed the door open and went towards where my teacher was.

“Welcome to your class! I’m glad you arrived just in time or else you would’ve had to stand in the middle of the hallway for half an hour on your first day of school. I’m going to be your homeroom teacher Ms. Kate. Would you like to introduce yourself to the class?”

I took a deep breath and spoke bravely, “Hi everyone! My name is Diana and it’s a pleasure to have you all as my classmates. I hope to have an amazing memory with you guys for this school year.”

“Well, would you like to tell us more about you? Everyone will get to know more about you soon but we would still love to know what your hobbies are.”

“I love playing sports and I also like singing and dancing.”

“That’s incredible! I’m sure you have a great talent for every one of them,” she said even though she knew nothing about me or ever saw me do any one of them.

“Thanks,” I mumbled as I stood there, everyone still staring at me.

“You can sit next to Arthur over there.”

Arthur? That sounded quite familiar. I glanced at the boy Ms. Kate was pointing at and OMG! I was so freaking surprised to see the boy that I met at the airport!

“Umm… do you happen to mean the boy that’s sitting at the corner there?”

I’m pretty sure I look pretty dumbfounded because the next thing Ms. Kate did was to slightly roll her eyes, catch me by my arm, and lead me to the seat next to Arthur.

“Hi, Diana. I’m as surprised as you are to have found you here,” said Arthur.

“Yeah, what a coincidence. You must’ve come a little earlier than me. It is quite sad that I didn’t get to hear how you introduced yourself,” I replied shyly.

“Oh no, I studied here ever since I can remember! During the winter holiday, I had to visit my grandma back in Maryland so that was why you met me at the airport the other day.”

I felt myself blush. How dumb I must’ve sounded trying to guess the life of this boy that I barely knew about!

“Is that so? What a coincidence of you having your grandma living in Maryland,” I said and soon realized I was using the word ‘coincidence’ over and over. I think it was because I wanted to point out to Arthur that this ain’t a coincidence but that we were just meant to be together.

“Yeah, what a coincidence,” he repeated.

I think he was quite annoyed by me who happened to only know the word ‘coincidence’ because after that he tried to avoid talking to me.

After an hour of numeracy and another hour of science, our literacy teacher Mr. Ryan — who might as well be called a teacher who has a huge crush on Ms. Kate according to the students — told us to go to the library to read some books.

In the library, he spoke to his class, “As you may have all known, our literacy focus for this semester is going to be on historical fiction. So for today’s task, I want each of you to look around the library and find any historical fictional books you can find. After finding your book, sit anywhere you’d like in the library but you must all stay quiet. There will be consequences if any of you dare to break this rule. Your next task will be announced after finishing this one.”

“He can be strict with particular students but I don’t think you’re included in his list,” someone whispered in my ear and continued, “Oh, I forgot to introduce myself! My name is Layla. Nice to meet you!”

“Hi, Layla,” I greeted. “Thanks for informing me about it. I mean, I don’t want to make any mistakes in front of…” but soon realized she was gone to find her book.

I also walked around the library like the others were doing. I tried to concentrate on finding one but kept on being distracted by the ones around me. Especially Arthur. He seemed to always follow me where I was going. ‘It’s just a coincidence,’ I reminded myself and tried to walk away from this dude who just popped up in my life out of nowhere.

By the time everyone found their book, the class was over so we all had to head back into our classroom. Our next class was social studies and we had to go and talk to a bunch of younger grades’ students. This school did have a weird curriculum if u ask me.

After our class with Mrs. Charis, everyone rushed to the cafeteria to buy their lunch. I also stood in line to buy a sandwich, an apple, and a can of soda. After grabbing my lunch from the cafeteria lady, I scanned around the cafeteria to see if there was any empty table for me to sit and it was a relief because I found one in the corner of the room. I slowly moved my way hoping that someone would ask me to sit with them but no one did and I wasn’t that disappointed because I hadn’t made any friends so far after all. When I arrived at the table, I placed my food and quietly sat down alone. I was quite lonely until a group of girls came up to me when I was minding my own business.

“Hey, who do you think you are? The queen of some six-year-old fashionistas?” one of the girls said with a smirk.

“Excuse me, my name is Diana and where did fashionista pop up from?” I replied boldly.

“Oh, I was just trying to give you some fashion advice honey. Who wears that kind of cardigan nowadays?”

“What’s wrong with it? I think it works just fine. Who are you to judge my outfit like that?”

“Well if you want to know me that bad, I can tell you. My name is Ashley and you might as well call me that most popular girl in this whole school,” Ashley boasted.

“That doesn’t make you the queen of snoops. Just mind your own business because no one asked for your help.”

“Others would’ve been grateful if I bothered to even notice them but I guess you are just one of those egoistic people that you don’t take my advice and I’ll give you my word: you will surely regret this. Do you want to know what makes me so confident about my popularity? Unlike you, who’s wandering around the school and trying to find someone to sit with, boys were all chasing me around to get my number on my first day of school here. I gave you a chance to be a part of us since I got to admit you’re kind of pretty and all that — of course, you are not as pretty as me — but instead of taking the chance, you spoke to me with all those rude words. There won’t be a second chance. Now get off our table because this belongs to us.”

“Nobody asked you for that useless offer and I came here first anyway. Just because you call yourself popular doesn’t mean you can stand on top of me telling me what to do. I’m not going to be acting dumb around you like everyone else does.”

When she was about to jump on me and start a big catfight because she couldn’t take it anymore, I felt someone hold my hand and drag me off to another table. When I looked up, I saw Layla smiling at me.

“Don’t let that jerk say those mean things to you. You can sit with us if you want to. Nobody likes that spoiled brat anyways,” she said.

However, Ashley must’ve heard what Layla said because right after the word ‘brat’ she started throwing her precious lunch made by her chef at us. I was about to tell Layla that I was fine with whatever Ashley was doing and that she should ignore it but it was too late because she was already throwing her own food at Ashley and her minions too.

“Guys, stop it! That’s enough!” I yelled out but then realized it was too late.

Everybody in the cafeteria was watching them and was screaming “Fight! Fight!” at the same time. Before anything went further, the janitor called the principal which made her call Ashley and Layla into the office. I felt bad for Layla but then thought it wasn’t really my fault because I wasn’t the one who told her to start a food fight. It was a hundred percent her own decision. After thinking so, I was relieved that I didn’t have to go to the principal’s office but someone must’ve snitched on me.

“Ms. Brown please come to my office right now. Thank you,” came a voice from the school’s speaker.

Even though I was pretty sure nobody knew my name, I couldn’t help feeling embarrassed about having to go to the principal’s office on my first day of school, especially when it was because of a food fight with the school’s most popular girl (at least she called that herself). As I slowly walked down the hallways to Mrs. Johnson’s office, I saw Arthur coming towards me. ‘Oh, what a perfect timing,’ I grumbled to myself.

“Hey, how is your day going?” he asked with a sympathetic grin.

He probably heard my name coming through the speaker so I answered, “Got involved in a food fight, I guess.”

“It’s with Ashley isn’t it?” he asked like he already knew everything that had happened.

“Yeah but how did you know about it?”

“Oh, it’s the same thing happening over and over again whenever a new student comes to this school,” he said.

“She does this to every one of them?”

“Of course, it hasn’t always got to do with food fights but something similar.”

“Well, thanks for your information. I better go now or it would make Mrs. Johnson way more mad at me than she is right now.”

When I arrived at her office, I could see both Layla and Ashley sitting in front of her shaking nervously.

As soon as I sat next to them Mrs. Johnson began, “So I heard that you started all this mess, Diana Brown. Is that true?”

Wait what? I didn’t even move a single muscle on this stupid food fight and now she was thinking I started this thing?

“There must’ve been some kind of confusion Mrs. Johnson but I haven’t done anything!” I cried.

“Diana I have two witnesses here that say you were the one who threw the food at Ashley first!”

“Well, they are lying! You can ask anyone from this school and they’ll tell you it was Ashley who threw it at me.”

“Oh, shall we?” she asked with a glare. Then she called some kids who were still eating their lunch to come see her.

“Hello, students! I’m sorry to have bothered you but I would like to ask you if anyone of you knew who started this chaos?”

The kids looked at me and Layla then at Ashley and gave each other glances. I was sure that they would immediately all yell out the name ‘Ashley’ but that’s not how it went. Instead, they said, “Diana started it.”

Just as I heard the name ‘Diana’ I jumped out of my seat and yelled at them, “What? Me? I am innocent? I haven’t done anything to Layla or Ashley! In fact, I had nothing to do with this food fight! I mean I guess Ashley was mad that she had to hear someone calling her a spoiled brat but did I say it? No. Did I tell Layla to respond to her immatureness? No.”

However, no matter how hard I tried, of course, Mrs. Johnson had to believe those innocent-looking kids and gave me detention for a whole week. Now that I think of it, maybe the poor kids were afraid that Ashley would bully them if they snitched on her which made them accuse me of this whole fight.

After the exhausting day, I walked home alone. I was thinking of lying on my bed as soon as I got home and listening to some music with a bunch of chocolate chips stuffed in my mouth but that was not how it went.

As soon as I arrived at our doorstep, opened our front door, and stepped inside our house, I could tell that something was wrong from the stern look on my parents’ faces.

“Diana Brown, what is wrong with you?” my mom shouted as soon as I sat on the couch. “I can’t believe you…” then she stopped short and just sat there with her hand covering her face with frustration.

“We got a phone call from Mrs Johnson,” my dad spoke instead of my mom. “Your mom and I are just surprised you will get involved in a huge mess like this on your first day of school. We’re just disappointed. You were always an excellent student, Diana.”

I was about to defend myself but then thought to myself, ‘No one is going to believe me even if I told them the truth. Of course, my parents would believe that smarty pants principal rather than their daughter.’ So I decided to keep quiet; not because I didn’t have anything to say but because there was no point in talking about this to them.

However, when my dad kept making a fuss about what had happened and kept questioning me when they wouldn’t believe me even if I told them the truth, I had enough. I just ran up to my room with tears strolling down my cheeks. I made sure my door was locked so nobody could disturb me before I jumped on my bed with my headphones on. Thank God I left some cookies on my table or else I would’ve starved to death after all the dramatic things that had happened today. I then stuffed my mouth with some cookies as I planned to on the way home and I couldn’t feel any happier that day. My day went as a disaster but I won’t let it happen again. I vowed to myself that tomorrow I’m going to show Ashley and Layla what I’ve got. I’m gonna teach them a lesson!