Intentional
By: Nooran Masmali J
December 8, 2017
I stare down at my breakfast plate, and I start eating. My mom is on her laptop, and I could see that she has tea on her lap. I look out the window and find a black cat searching in the garbage can, looking for food.
I look over my shoulders and find mom still on her laptop. “Hey, mom?” I ask.
“Yes, Ari?” She looks at me as if she does not recognize who I am.
I hesitate, “um…do you know what dad’s doing? I really need to talk to him. It’s urgent.
“Oh yeah, he’s at work. He left when you were sleeping.” I look back down at my plate; in addition, I poke my pancake with my fork. I could see a piece of her at the corners of my eyes, and notice that she is staring at me. “What for?” She questioned.
“Oh, just some homework questions I need help with.” I lie. I really do not think I should have lied to my mom, but I really need to talk to him. Something between us two. Father and Daughter.
“Ok, that’s fine. Why don’t you go get ready for school? Wouldn’t want to be late, would you?” she winks at me and goes back to her laptop, taking a sip of tea.
I look at the clock. It is 6:50. My bus ride is supposed to come at 7:00, but it usually comes a little earlier. I look at myself from the mirror. I am wearing skinny black jeans. I then look at my shirt. It is a black tank top. Over it is my cute gray jacket.
After I look at myself, I go ahead and head outside. When I open the door, wind splashes all over me, making my hair go back. My hair is brown, long, and curly, with sprinkles of magenta on the very bottom. I shut the door behind me, and start walking. Once I reach the bus stop, I sit on one of the benches that remain. Some people in my High School are there, talking and laughing, enjoying their time.
“Hello,” says a voice. I look over to the right of my shoulder and find a girl about my height sitting right next to me. Her hair is blonde, with a streak of purple across it. She is wearing shorts and tennis shoes. She takes out her hand and points it right at me. I stare at it for a couple of seconds. “My name is Brittney.” I shake her hands.
“Hi, I’m Ariana. My friends back at New York call me Ari.” I reply.
“Well, aren’t we friends?” she says. We both laugh at that.
“Sure, I guess you could say that.” I smile at her, and she smiles back.
“Oh yeah. Ari, meet Emily. Emily meets Ari.” A person came from behind her and slowly stood. She walked right toward me.
“Hey,” She said in a quiet voice. “My name is Emily.”
“Hello, I’m Ariana. My friends call me”
“Ari? Is that what your friends call you back at New York?” Emily interrupted.
I do a short laugh, “How do you know?”
“Just overheard you and Brittney talk.” She looked back at Brittney and we all laugh. I look past Emily and Brittney and notice a bus heading our direction.
“Is that our bus?” I asked, squinting at the sight of it.
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure. No other buses normally come this way.” Brittney answered.
“So Ari, how do you like it here in California? Is it a lot different than New York?” Asked Emily, being curious.
“It’s actually pretty nice. I like the people here so far,” I say. “Why do you ask?”
“Just wondering. Never been to New York before.” She said as she climbed up the bus.
“Really? You haven’t been to New York before?” Brittney asked, “Wow, I can’t imagine how your life is right now! You should defiantly go visit anytime soon!
I glare at Brittney, and she puts on a confused face, “Brittney!” I whisper back at her.
“What? I’m just telling her my opinion!” Brittney exclaimed.
Emily sighed, “No no, don’t worry. I’m going there tomorrow…”
“Oh…my…god…are you serious! Aww come here I’m going to miss you!” Brittney held out both of her arms and fell as she was about to hug Emily. “Ow!”
“Oh no!” Emily shouted.
“Are you ok?” I said as Emily and I picked her up from the dirty bus floor. The other kids on the bus all started to giggle as they watched Brittney fall. “Hey, you be quiet now!” Brittney began to brush off the dirt from her shirt and started to brush down until she reached her pants.
“Yeah I’m ok, let’s go take a seat.” All the kids were staring at Brittney as she passed by. We took a seat at the very back of the bus, and the bus starts moving.
“I’m really sorry about what just happened. It was my entire fault.” Emily said, “And that thing I said about me going to New York tomorrow, I was just joking. All I wanted was to see the look on your face.” Emily looked down at her shoes, confused, “I didn’t mean for all of this to happen.”
“No its fine…really its fine.” We sat in our seats for twenty minutes, which was the entire ride to school. There are many people on our bus. When I say many, I mean many! All of the seats were full of people. The seats each had two or three people in them.
Emily was sitting next to the window, looking out of it. Brittney was staring at her shoes the entire ride, and I was just laying back in my seat and closing my eyes, trying to imagine what it would be like if I had not met these girls. The whole ride we were silent. We did not say a single word to each other. Finally, we reached the school.
As I looked over at the school, the bricks of the old building were rising over the horizon, gliding over the shimmering rainbow through the glamorous blue sky.
“Can you guys maybe walk with me? I could get some help getting around the school. I will not take too much of your time anyway. I just need to find the main office in this school.” I asked with a grin on my face. They looked over at one another, giggled, and went ahead and lead me to the office. “Thanks, I really appreciate it. Maybe we could hang out sometime?”
“Yeah, sure. That would be great.” Emily said with a big smile. As Emily and Brittney left to their first class, I went ahead and took my first step toward the office door. I stop. Thinking of how the principle, or whoever was in there, looked like. When I reach for the door handle, I hesitate. I open the door and walk in.
In there was a nice old looking woman that seemed to be working on her computer. Her blonde, wavy hair was hanging over her shoulders. She looked up at me
