There are two types of new kids.

There’s the wholesome, studious type. Their dad got a new job that pulled him out of his boring nine-to-fiver, and they’ve moved to better their lives. The son was left end on his school’s soccer team, the daughter ran weekly bakesales to benefit the homeless. They fall into a group quickly; if someone asks if you know the new kid, you smile and nod, because they’re nice. They represent some pure, good ideal of what the world is that seems so far removed from where you are.

The second kind is endlessly more interesting. Rumors fly that they’re here because they were expelled from their last school for one reason or the other. She probably has a tattoo in some unspeakable place, he smokes and rides a motorcycle. When someone asks if you know them, you answer yes, because everyone knows of them before the first week is out. They’re on the opposite end of the spectrum from the first type of newbie: they represent something dangerous, something far away that you aspire to, but don’t dare actually step over the line towards.

Yesterday, I was the first kind of newbie. Today, I’m going to be the second. 

I get to school an hour before classes start. I decided a few weeks ago that I’ll need to do this for at least a week, maybe two if I want to make an impact. It’s a simple fact of high school that parking spaces are sacred symbols of popularity, and I’ve got the spot right on the fence. There’s no way I’m keeping it unless I keep showing up here early. At least, until it’s unequivocally mine. 

So far, mine is the only car in the parking lot. Honestly, this is at least mildly surprising; I was sure that there would be one or two terrified sophomores, driving to school for the first time and overeager. Maybe this is just what this school’s like. 

I desperately wanted to go out over the past few weeks, if for no reason other than to scope out the social scene. It felt horribly desperate to be sitting at home every night, watching the drudges of summer TV with my mom. Back home, I could have biked over to Ally’s house, or called Raj to find out where the night’s party was, or texted Big to get him to take me to a movie. I could have even gone and sat in Molly’s Diner, if it came to that. 

But, I knew that the best way to become the person I wanted to be was to create an air of mystery. Groundbreaking girls didn’t quietly drift into the party scene, meekly walking up to a park bench full of teenagers and introducing themselves. Groundbreaking girls made a bold statement. So, that was what I was going to do. 

We were in fourth grade when I met my first groundbreaking girl. Her name was Whitney, and she had already kissed a boy. And not just in some kindergarten marriage; no, she had a boyfriend. He was in sixth grade, went to the middle school a few miles away, and was hopelessly in love with her. Whitney was the one who gave Big his nickname; before, he was just Anthony. When she heard that, Whitney scrunched up her nose and shook her head. It was then that he was rechristened Big, and before long, few among us could dream of calling him anything else. Even as Big (previously a, well, big kid who had hit puberty early) slowed down his growth, grew into his baby fat, and began playing baseball, he was still Big. 

I shake thoughts of Whitney and Big and everyone else left in Hamilton out of my head. It’s no use to think of them now. I need to look ahead. 

I pull down my sun visor to check that my hair is in place. A few nights earlier, bored and nervous, I watched a dozen Youtube videos on how to achieve a perfect, effortless ponytail. The old me would have gone with loose curls if I was trying to impress. But, the whole point of a new Sadie is that I’m not trying to impress. The new Sadie doesn’t care what any of these people think. The new Sadie doesn’t have time for anything beyond a simple ponytail thrown up in thirty seconds on the way out the door. Never mind that this took me twenty minutes this morning, and another three hours last night.

Back in Hamilton, I know exactly what I would have been doing today. I’d wake up in my own bed, in my bedroom with a view of the lake I learned to swim in. I’d put on black Keds and a flowered dress, my hair loose and straight like I always wear it. I would picked up Ally, and then we’d drive to Big’s house. He would keep us waiting an extra five minutes before ambling out, more laid back than I could ever imagine being. We would pull into school twenty minutes before the bell rang, sliding easily into a parking spot a few rows back that everyone would immediately acknowledge as ours. Then we’d laugh and compare schedules, whispering back and forth about how much everyone had changed in a few short months, until the bell rang, and we walked inside. 

I close my eyes and breathe in and out steadily. Two hundred miles away, Ally’s probably packing her lunch. She got her license a few weeks ago, as she actually needs it now. I don’t know when she’d leave. I don’t know if she’s going to pick up Big, or if there are other people she’s going to give a ride to. For the first time in my entire life, it’s the first day of school in Hamilton, Pennsylvania and I have no idea what any of my friends are doing. 

I’m distracted by another car pulling into the lot, finally. Sadie the student council secretary wants to get out of the car, wander around and hope that whoever’s in the other car takes it upon themselves to come make introductions. But, the cool, apathetic Sadie knows that that is more enthusiastic than any sane person should be, much less a groundbreaking girl. I turn on my engine; in my experience, the cool kids always have their cars on, surely doing damage to their batteries and the environment. The new Sadie doesn’t need to care much about the ozone layer. 

It’s been years since I last saw her, but I still wonder if Whitney is the type of person to keep her car running in the parking lot. Her family moved again in sixth grade; to Philadelphia or Dallas or Phoenix, I can’t remember. She left the way she arrived, ensuring that no one would forget about her anytime soon. The going-away party was a foreign idea in a world in which people either knew each other for a lifetime or simply drifted away into oblivion. Whitney’s party was frenetic and exciting, the place to be for all the eleven year olds in Hamilton. After an hour, the insociable sixth grade version of myself was trying to slip out the door quietly when Whitney grabbed my arm. Pulling me into a tight hug, she whispered in my ear, “Keep them on their toes, Sadie.” I laughed, brushing her off and wishing her good luck. I walked home, another normal day.

My going-away party was significantly less noteworthy. My friends and I sat at our favorite diner, a place with decade-old salt and pepper shakers and grease stains on the menus. I sat at the head of the table, Ally on one side and Big on the other, and the group of us talked. We asked after old friends who had gone off to college, reminisced about our shared childhood memories, and laughed at the antics of our classmates the night before. We didn’t talk about the future, only about the past and the moment we existed in, in the confines of the diner where one waitress had worked for as long as any of us could remember. It was one of the happiest nights of my life, yet also one of the most normal. 

However, none of them are here. I hadn’t been to the diner since, haven’t spoken to most of the people who had been there that night in weeks. The old Sadie may have spent the last night in Hamilton stuck in the past, refusing to recognize the mere existence of a future. The new Sadie will only look forwards. 

More time has passed than I expected. There are other cars beside me, now. Shiny students mingle by the doors, hugging old friends and bouncing in the unexpectedly frigid air of late August. According to my watch, I have seven and a half minutes until my first class. Just enough time. 

I reach into my purse, and pull out the black sunglasses I spent days fretting over. Were they too aloof, to obviously the choice of someone trying too hard? Eventually, I settled on situating them atop my head, to be pulled down if I feel the urge. I pull the sun visor down to check myself one last time. You only get one first impression. I slide open my door, and pull myself out.

Perfectionist I am, I’ve practiced these moments endlessly in my bedroom, in my head, in my dreams. After pulling myself out, I swing my car door shut behind me, looking around the parking lot in a manner I hope appears lazy, not calculated. I reach up to smooth my hair, then walk confidently across the parking lot to the soundtrack of a John Hughes movie that beats in my head from memory. I pull my paper schedule out of the top of my bag, to give my hands and my eyes something to do beyond wander. I pretend to study it intently, even though I memorized it and the map of the school as soon as it arrived in the mail. This is where my plan becomes less certain; I can’t study the schedule too long, lest I look confused and lost. If I look up, however, I need somewhere to center my gaze. As I’d hoped, a third option presents itself. 

“Hi there!” A girl with a tight, blonde ponytail and rosy cheeks skips up to me. She’s wearing a horrendous red t-shirt with “WELCOME TO LINCOLN!” written on it in ugly green lettering. It’s unclear if the Christmas theme was intentional. 

“My name’s Whitney,” she says, thrusting her hand into the air between us. “I’m part of the official welcoming team for Lincoln High School, are you new here?”

A smile grows on my face. I hope it’s cool and friendly and aloof and intelligent and nice and attractive and everything else that is supposed to make someone groundbreaking. I hope this Whitney will go back to her friends and tell them all about the new, other-worldly, groundbreaking manic-pixie-dream girl. 

I take her hand, shaking it firmly in the way my dad taught me when I was eight. “Hi Whitney, I’m Sadie. It’s nice to meet you.”