We rushed out of the dorm building along with a few other slackers. As we walk-ran our way down the path leading to the dining hall, the new girl, who's name I now knew was Valentina Brookes, kept mumbling about how long it took to just say goodbye to some guy named Jonathan who she referred to as excessively clingy.
"He could've just said 'buh bye' faster and I wouldn't have had to be sweating my face off running right now would I?"
She wasn't particularly addressing either of us so I assumed that was a rhetorical question and kept quiet, and I honestly wouldn't have known what to say even if it wasn't. She ranted on,
"I'm literally dying this. Is. the. Worst day EVER." She continued but I had stopped listening by then, as she went on I caught little segments of her single sided conversation about how there was 'actual dirt' in her super-super-expensive Brian Atwood shoes and how her Fenty makeup was ruined. I had to almost hold myself back from asking her what she thought shoes were meant for. Penelope took a brave step and decided it was about time to intervene,
"That must be so hard for you. We can start a petition to buy you new shoes on change.org. Surely there must be hundreds of people that sympathize with your need for new shoes, especially after this amazing feat you've just accomplished by walking on the grass with the rest of us peasants." Penelope spat out the last part hoping Valentina would get the hint. Sadly, We were wrong.
"Yeah, I thought that would be great too but I tried that last year when I spilled coffee on my Versace handbag, and some moderator had the audacity to report me? Ugh, people just don't get me sometimes, ya know. I can't believe I'm going to have to switch to wearing my emergency-back-up pair of shoes already. They're not even designer."
We looked at each other in amazement at this girl's lack of intelligence. We decided that by asking questions we only made her singular brain cell more and more overworked and that never ends well does it?
Once we reached the dining hall, a grand wooden building with fairly high ceilings and a half balcony in it, sort of like a library. Round wooden tables with a few chairs surrounding it were scattered throughout the hall and most of them were taken already. The tables on the balconies were long and from what I could see, it was meant for the teachers and other people who worked here. The building was clearly made to fit the school's thousands of students along with its staff comfortably.
I watched as my new comrades walked away from me leaving me alone. Then for the second time in one day i was assaulted by the 'high on sugar' Aidene Rayners. Only this time she didn't behave like a cat jumping on a mouse but instead she grabbed the collar of my coat and dragged me away and by 'dragged' I mean she took all my weight and i wasn't walking and not to mention half of my body was on the ground and well, you get the point.
One would assume that on seeing a person being almost hauled like a rucksack across a room filled with people would draw a fair amount of attention. Well, no, not here.
"I hath found wh'refore we can have'th a bountiful feast f'r dinn'r" she said, which made the situation no less terrifying. Honestly, after what happened this morning, her fluent Elizabethan English was the least of my concerns. In case you happened to be wondering I was still being dragged, all the way to the right side of the hall, where it wasn't as crowded as the rest of the hall, all the way next to the veg table, which was just the smaller, sadder, less crowded version of the non-veg table. I looked over at my "best friend's" tray and well i felt like a glutton because what she had on her plate was equal to like ⅕ of what i had on mine, me, who didn't even touch half of the food options, my main reason being them being too green. Healthy ,I don't eat healthy food.
All she had was 2 meager pieces of french fries and a singular piece of lettuce from the salad counter and 3 macaroni pieces plus a small ball which might have been a chicken nugget at some point before she split in half and put it on her plate (Yes i saw her do that).
"Are you trying to starve yourself to death or are you on a very serious diet?"
"Neither" and then she picked off 5 more french fries from my plate.
"It's a lot tastier when you steal food from others, I don't have much of an appetite today, or ever actually now that I think of it" she reasoned and I didn't even bother to respond.
"Shhhhhhhhhh! There's a corpse walking on stage. Watch. I think He's going to speak. Is speaking now" she said as she clapped a hand on my mouth.
I was about to reply(read yell at her) before she twisted my head almost giving me whiplash and then I saw the zombie at the teachers table walking towards the podium. And for what he looked like, well, we can say 'corpse' was a fairly accurate description.
He was old, like really old, almost decrepit. His skin was tinted a sick shade of grey and stuck to his bones, although most of it was covered by his black and green three piece suit, which was understandably worn out.
His eyelids were barely open from what I could see from my seat all the way at the right side of the hall. He walked up to the wooden podium at the front and leaned on his fairly expensive looking black walking cane generously decorated with gold that he didn't honestly seem to need despite his age.
He tapped on the mic and raised his hand, making the entire hall go quiet. He took a deep breath in, doing a really good impression of a helium balloon being let out slowly. He cleared his throat and began,
"Welcome, to Havenpoint academy, and of course welcome back for those who have been with us already. For decades now this school has stood here in Deadwood, South Dakota. Every year we have a new batch of students and every year they have managed to... disappoint me." He spoke in a whisper but his words were carried out crystal clear, resonating throughout the hall.His dull almost dead green eyes scanned the room observing at his young, energetic, future 'disappointments'.
"I will not explain why, how, who or when they managed to disappoint me but i will mention that i will not be expecting any better from you. I should also mention that I have stood in this position for the past 32 years and I have not had the delight of seeing even a single student that hasn't ruined themselves, of course besides myself. I too once was a student at this very school years ago. But those glory days of absolute..... discipline are now gone." He had an accent I couldn't really place. Arabic maybe? I could see a few senior students mouthing his words, so I guess this wasn't the first time he's used this speech. How compassionate.
"I will also make sure that Mr. Harris is put to detention along with Miss Rivers and Mr. Kyle for shamelessly mocking me in their very inaccurate attempt of imitating me and i will also make sure that that any student who has shown a disregard for the rules will be punished or even in certain cases expelled"
How on earth was this guy appointed as the principal of a children's school? I do not know but at least he was somewhat reminiscent of an older, more decrepit Trunchbull from Roald Dahl's book.
"How is it that all the people who hate children end up becoming the headmaster of a literal school?" Aidene said, taking the words right out of my mouth.
"And Miss Rayners..."his green eyes fell on her making her freeze.
"I do not hate children. I am merely disgusted by those who show a lack of basic intellect and respect. Make a note of that"
Aidene being the unexpected jack-in-the-box that she is, yelled back "NOTED SIR!" while standing on the chair with a fist full of french fries and waving it in the air.
"Miss Rayners sit down before you end up in detention. On your first. Day" by now the whole school was staring at her open mouthed and wide eyed. She has officially made it into the school history book.
She leaned towards me and whispered "How does that guy know my name?"
"Miss Rayners, I know your name because I go through the admission book. That little book every single one of you wrote your name in" He said, now addressing the other students.
"We will make sure that none of you will be exempted from the school rules and that every single thing you do, will be recorded and remembered. And Miss Rayners a, it is great that you aren't afraid to speak up, but do not repeat it." He said with a hiss, narrowing his eyes into a stone cold glare.
"I believe it is about time that dinner is over head back to your dorms" he said ..... No, commanded.
That conversation was about enough to know not to speak anywhere near him again.
We started heading back to our dorms when Aidene caught up with me. Some students pointed at us and murmured something inaudibly.
"Did you notice he knows us but we don't know his name? Maybe we can go and ask him later"
"Are you alright in the head? We are not going near him ever again and if you are then you are alone" I replied.
"Aidene! We need to head back now. Curfew is at 8:00" a auburn haired bright green eyed girl came running towards us and now that she was close I realized that her head only reached my shoulder.
"Anne, meeteth Natalie Vales mine own roommate, who I hath met this very morrow." She tried to wave and was about to say something(probably something about the Shakespearean) when,
"GN! TTYL" Aidene shouted over the crowd and ran away with Natalie trying and failing to keep up to Aidene's longer strides.
And once again I was left alone to return to my dorm.