Chapter 2 It was September 2, 2025. The first day of the school year was off to a great start as I walked downstairs in my new outfit and tried not to wake up my sleeping brothers whose first day was September 3rd.I was excited and ready for the year ahead when mom greeted me with this: “morning sweetie! Are you excited to meet all the new kids in your class?”. That’s when I remembered, this year, I'll have to deal with a whole new class, full of new names and new people who want nothing to do with the real me! All they want is to be friends with Alyssa the pretty popular girl instead of actually getting to know Ally, the shy fanfiction writer who hates the cliques of popular girls. My mom saw the look of dread cross my face as I slumped down at the kitchen table with my new backpack at my feet. She crouched down to look me in the eyes and brush my bangs out of my face, she whispered to me, “hey, i know it’ll be hard in your new class since the school got bigger and added multiple classes but you’ll be fine. You’ll find your group, even if you’re not in the same class as Delilah and Casey. Now how would you like your eggs? " Mom smiled at me, that bright smile that made her eyes glimmer and told me that everything would be alright. After breakfast, I grabbed my backpack and rushed out to meet the bus at the end of our street. As I sat down at a window seat towards the back, I noticed two familiar faces walking onto the bus. Delilah and Casey looked right at me and I watched their faces light up! They practically ran towards me and hugged me so tight my arms hurt. We moved to the back of the bus so we could sit together but once we started talking it went something like this: Me: “oh my gosh i didn’t think i would get to see you guys since we’re in different classes!” Delilah (annoyed): “ugh girl i hate that we’re not together in any of our classes! At this point the teachers are just trying to make us miserable!” Casey: “ Well ally, do you at least know anybody in your new classes?” Me: “no but my teacher– Casey: “That sucks, Delilah and I have desks right next to each other! We already planned to put matching stickers on our desks!” Delilah: “oh my gourd!!! We should totally have matching best friend shirts!” And they kept talking like that until we reached the school and they walked off to class together like i wasn’t even there! At the time, I thought losing my friends for a few hours until lunch was the worst thing that could happen. I had no idea how wrong I was. My only choice was to go to my homeroom and hope that this year would be better than the last. Chapter 3 I walked into my new classroom to see that my teacher was the only person there, smiling familiarly just like she had every Saturday when she hung out with mom all those years ago. “Good morning ally!” she said cheerfully. “Good morning ms. Cassie - i mean ms lindenveg.” I said, almost slipping up and calling her by her first name like I used to. She winked at me and said, “Don't worry, you can call me Ms. Cassie if you want.” I smiled at her, sat at the seat closest to the window, and stared out into the forest behind the school. Suddenly Carlos walked into the room and took a seat at the back of the class, immediately taking out his notebook to draw until the bell rang. I didn’t pay any attention to him because he had never shown me any interest and I was living up to my no boys rule. Moments later, a boy that I had never met before walked into the room. Even though I had never met him, he stood out to me as the popular boy that everyone was obsessed with: Brian Welsons. Brian was the kind of kid to pretend like he was pushing you into the lockers and then say they were, ‘just kidding’ even though it didn’t seem that way. All the boys wanted to be him and every girl wanted to date him, except for me. He brushed my shoulder as he walked past my seat and when I looked up to glare at him he winked at me and put a slip of paper on my desk. I ripped it up right in front of him and rolled my eyes. I continued staring out the window and thinking to myself, “this is going to be a long school year.”
