Neverly Ever After

It's a new year, the sun is shining, the birds are chirping, the air is fresh. January really feels like its a time of complete renewal, except this year it really felt different. Not only was I about to start my new year as an official high school senior, I had a chance to make it into the first soccer, hockey and tennis team. However, it did feel a bit ambitious, but I wanted to try anyway. Despite all the new possibilities, I was excited about seeing my best friend Nox. We had not seen each other since the closing of school last year, but you know how having strict black parents goes, they just don't get the concept of sleepovers and, well, looking back, they kind of had a point. It is hard to let your child spend the night in a complete stranger's home. I can imagine all the thoughts that crossed their minds "Did they eat? I wonder what they ate. I hope the parents don't drink in front of the kids". The list is endless. Anyway, I arrive at school and it's buzzing as usual, newbies are around with their uniforms looking ten times bigger than they are, with name badges as big as their chests, haha shame I remember when I went through that, I had no idea how ridiculous we looked. Thank God we were too young to care. Our school was trying something different. We had a total rebrand since our old principle left and it was starting to feel more of an authoritative business rather than the democracy we once had where we had freedom over what we chose to wear to school, the extra-mural activities we wanted the school to adopt, how we would choose to wear our hair and, well, it sucked to a large extent, but hey we move. I spotted my friends and walked over to them. We hug and we're excited to see each other, but mostly everyone is wondering whether there will be new people in our grade. We continued to go on about how we spent our holidays and complimented each other on our new hairstyles. It was fun but the bell cut us short and it was time to head to our new registered classes. Nox and I are disappointed to learn that we have been separated AGAIN, but we promise that we will spend as much time together during breaks. "Later" she said, looking bummed and rather disappointed, she walked away. I decided to linger a little bit longer so I could see who exactly would be in my class, "hmm Trey Whitinger... who the hell is that?" I thought. I made my way to my assigned classroom only to find that I was still grouped with the same idiots that I had been with for the last two years. Don't get me wrong, I wasn't mad but I did feel like I wanted some change and some fresh faces. I scanned the room looking for anyone who looked like a "Trey". There were new people, but that just happened to be the name that stood out to me. I stopped in attempts to not look like a creep, but mostly because the teacher called for our attention, he was about to mark the register. He read through calling out the names of people who were present. As the T's were starting to approach, there was a loud knock on the door... There he was the guy that would change my entire life, stumbling in... "Trey Whitinger?" "Present", he replied.