“Fin, Fin” yells Leigh. I awoke from my sleep blinking several times before my sight concluded to Leigh. She pushed and shoved me until my eyes were alert. I slowly yawned and saw the happiness in her face. She started talking, but all I could hear was muffled noises that filled my ears, until they exploded with air, and I could now hear the excitement in her voice. She was going on about how excited she was, going on about being a Year 8 student at Pukekohe Intermediate. I didn’t take any notice, I was thinking about what classroom we’re going to be in.
I slowly stood up and walked through the dark damp hallway. Leigh was playing with her long blonde hair. I jumped in the shower, and washed my body, then I got changed. Then I threw my breakfast down my mouth, in a rush. Mum packed my lunch and kissed me on the cheek, “Have a lovely day”, says mum. We open the door seeing a warm bright sun, glowing in the morning sky. While we were walking down the stone cold path, I had realised that the bus was waiting. We both raced to the big yellow thing, and hopped on. We entered and stared, children throwing food and balls all over. We took a seat and hunched down, avoiding to be picked on, on our first day back at school.
We arrived at school and looked around, as we stepped onto the wet grass. Shivers went down my spine as the wind blew against my cold cheeks. We followed the other students into the hall, and placed ourselves in the back row seats. Suddenly, the hall filled with silence as all the teachers assembled at the front of the hall. The teachers then welcomed us and started calling out classroom names. “I hope we’re in the same classroom”, whispers Leigh, “So do I”, I replied. We waited and waited, until there were only 2 classrooms remaining, Mrs Crown and a new male teacher, Mr Twist, who grins and frowns. He started his classrooms role as I crossed my fingers, tight. He waited before saying the last student’s name, “Fin Opera”. Filling with horror, I walked to my new classroom leaving Leigh. I filled in the back of the boys line as we walked in the hallway and sat down in our new classroom. The teacher walked in and introduced himself. “I didn’t like him”, I thought.
The big boys were passing around notes throughout the maths timetable. Then they got caught and the teacher blamed it on me, as I was the closest to the note. “Get out of here”, yelled Mr Twist. I slowly stood up and scattered out of the class. I could hear Jake, Michael and Clark giggling as I left.
A few tears rolled down, while I walked in the boy’s toilets. My pants were slipping from my hips, so I dragged them up with my hand. “Fin Opera, please return to the office”, screeched the intercom. I dragged myself down the long hallway, waiting for the bell ring through my ears. The lady then told me to return to my classroom and apologise to that old dragon, sitting in the teacher’s chair. I gasped and stormed out, “I’m not going to apologise to that old dragon”, I thought, while heading in the direction of the rugby fields, where the boys all stood, peeling their eyes at me.
“Hey Fin, do you want a smoke”, says Jake, holding the packet wide open. “Oh, no thanks, I just come over to see if I could join in, but never mind”, replies Fin. “Take it and well play some rugby, aye”, argues Jake. “Oh, um okay, thanks”, muffles Fin. “Cough, cough, cough”. “Oh hey Fin”, says Leigh. “I have a really awesome teacher, Mrs Crown, she lets us have free time whenever we want, Oh stop Fin, what do you think you are doing! Take that out of your mouth and come with me, don’t stay with these losers”. “You’re the loser, these boys are my friends, now go away you geek”, yells Fin. Leigh screams and sprints across the field, heading to the girls toilets. “Nice work”, says Michael, grinning at Leigh, as she drifts away in sight.
“I knew that was a bad thing to do, but the Big Boys are now my friends, and Leigh is a geek, glasses and an Mexican hat, not cool at all!” I thought to myself. “I made my decision, but did I make the right decision?”
As apart of the Careers Day, Pukekohe Intermediate Students, of our school, presented their choice of topic:
