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New Girl

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A funny thing with school buses, no matter the country, was that they were so similar. Old and smelly, invisibly divided seating arrangements and crude messages scribbled all over. Matilda had let the other kids scramble on board before she slunk down on an empty seat in front. She leaned her head against the window and let the voices of the other kids wash over her, even the drama and the gossip were the same, only this time everyone spoke English.
There was a buzzing in her pocket. Her most recent best friend Amanda had sent a snap, but it included at least four other people so Matilda didn’t bother to answer. Most likely Amanda had sent that snap to most of her Snapchat friends. Pretty soon the snaps would become less frequent and eventually stop, and even though Matilda had experienced this too many times to count it still hurt.
Her parents soothed their conscience by telling themselves, and Matilda, that living in different countries gave life experience and an open mind. All Matilda had experienced was the same but different middle and high school drama played out in six different languages. She had also come to the realization that friends were easy enough to find if she just let others think they knew her, as for a best friend, all she needed there was someone bubbly enough to balance her quiet.
So far Lone Oak High School hadn’t impressed her with an overabundance of potential best friends. Key Club were friendly enough and she hadn’t sat alone at lunch, but they were only doing their duty. A few girls in her classes had approached her and she had smiled enough and been friendly enough for them to keep including her in their lives, but she had yet to find that shiny bubbly person who would drag her into Best Friend Land.
Liza and Alani from Social Studies waved at her as she passed the giant fountain someone thought would be appropriate for a high school. And if this someone had thought the ugly thing appropriate for dunking freshmen in, they had really succeeded.
“Did you do all of the sentences for French?” Marissa appeared next to her, looking slightly frazzled, as always. “There were a few I couldn’t get right…”
“Let me see.” Matilda held out her hand and scanned the scribbled lines of not so perfect French. “Yeah, see. That’s in past tense and you have to conjugate the verbs.” Marissa squeaked and yanked the notebook back.
“How did I not see that?” She disappeared from view as she dropped down on a bench and started a fresh page. Looking up she gave a frowning smile. “Thanks Matilda, you’re the best.”

“Yeah.” Whatever. Come next year Matilda Sjögren would only be a paragraph in someone’s forgotten diary.



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