#3 YOU WOULDN’T LIKE ME
The first day in a new school is never the best day. She knew it already from her experience. Moreover, for her this was just another schoolish school. For her there were white walls, some teachers, and some lessons, crowds of young people which she didn't intent to get to know deeply and whom she would traditionally leave after one school year without any good-bye. Generally, goodbyes were not her strength. It was easier to do as if she would come back after the summer holidays and then nobody had a problem with it. This way she was avoiding many questions, which was the most important aspect. Anyway: how should she take a goodbye from people who barely knew her? She knew almost everything about them at the end of the school year and they didn't know much about her. It was almost like her very own ritual.
Because she wasn't one of them. She wasn't a girl with loving and warm-hearted parents, eating her mother's home-made mushroom soup, arguing with her father, playing with the family’s dog, having smiley-face posters on her wall. Some people are just broken inside and unbreakable outside. In addition, she didn't establish any friendships. It wasn't her cup of tea.
For her new class mates, this time in Warsaw, it wasn't as easy and open. Everybody in the class knew about the new pupil coming to town and everybody was curious what kind of person she was. Here, people were not used to changes as maybe somewhere else. People kept talking about it for more than a week, because of Marta's mother, who was the school nurse. She had shared this secret with her daughter and spreading news in a small school is not a very difficult task. The last person who got the news was Tomek, who preferred to play soccer to sitting with the girls listening to the gossip. The guys' interests in sports now began to get into conflict with another wish: getting a girl you can call "your girl". It was the silly age when you start thinking about your first love, about your first kiss and about girls who tried to put on some nice make-up and wear high heels for the first time. Of course, you had wouldn't talk about it, because such secrets should not give an opportunity for anybody to make a fool of you! This was the atmosphere in which the third class of the Polish High School named after Szymborska, a Nobel Prize winner in literature, started this week.
This class was apparently calm. The tutor has not arrived yet and everybody already knew all stories from the holidays, because on the second day of the school year you already got to see some pics from Christopher who was in Ireland or from Martha who was in Paris for a week. Everybody knew, Justyna stayed here all the time, in Warsaw, because she had to look after her brother and sister. The only new thing in the air was the new pupil with a most common and boring name that was easy to remember. Kowalska is just like Smith and you should be happy that you don't call such a person Ms. Doe. Ane the new girl didn't expect this city would hold her longer than she planned. Only the faintest bad feeling, and she would never return here.
Only Wiola, called Viola by her friends, a blond wonder of nature and the class representative for two years, one of the most beautiful girls in the class and even in this city of 2 million, who knew the rare tricks of dating boys, the one who always knew the best solution when it comes to boys, didn't seem to be so happy. But being a pro, she didn't show why her mood wasn't as great as on any other day. She was sitting among the others chewing on her lip.
Gosia, rather a bad candidate for size zero clothes or playing a leading role in a High School Musical, was telling more jokes than anyone else. Everybody was laughing, remembering the holidays, which seemed to be so far away from reality now like the distance between the earth and the moon. Martha was speaking about her hunting results in Montmartre, one of the city parts in Paris. Boys were talking about cars, Formula 1 and football (what else?) and about their efforts in driving school. Christopher wanted to practice with his brother's car tonight.
In the same moment she already thought: another schoolish school.
Then Mrs Polanska entered into the classroom and looked around slowly. After some seconds, she already knew who was missing. One of these persons was the new girl. Moreover, Mrs Polanska had the honour to inform her pupils about the new girl.
-Darlings, I know you already miss holidays, but do concentrate, please.
The youngsters were smiling and one of boys said:
-We are always present at the ceremony at the end of the school year.
-Yes, I know. I would rather see you all during the whole school year and not only once a year.
Mrs Polanska wanted to spread the news, which her pupils already knew about, as she noticed. There was no nervous atmosphere in the class. She added quickly and just by the way:
-So, from now we will have more pupils in our class. There will be a new girl. Her name is Kowalska, and her first name is Emilia. She is supposed to arrive today and I hope you will like her.
Viola moved a little bit when she heard the name of the new girl and even more so when she heard the first name. She was afraid that the person coming to this class would be the one she already met before. And she wasn't so happy about it.
Some other people showed a little bit of enthusiasm, in the end they were not supposed to know about the new classmate until now. Also, they were a little bit exited about the new one. They already knew each other since primary school and three years ago, they all started High School and knew each other well. Their school was a part of a bigger school complex - the smallest one and the most hidden between old oaks. Next to this High School there was a bigger primary school. The kids didn't disturb anybody, because they had their own buildings apart from the High School.
However, Emilia Kowalska didn't show up. Right now she was walking along one of the main streets in Warsaw admiring Nowy Swiat and other sights. The Warsaw Castle wasn't as pretty as she expected it to be. She preferred Cracovia with its Middle Age atmosphere full of artists’ souls. In the castle she was missing any atmosphere. She walked step by step and was thinking about the new school.
It was her tradition to skip the first day in her new school with all its ceremonies and official events. She hated it. It was the first day after holidays, and she preferred not to be in the centre of attention. After the holidays, there always was so much to talk about, so she was hoping to go rather unnoticed. Now, after moving house, she wanted to rest. She was almost 17 and her grandmother grew older with every year and didn't have enough strength to deal with another relocation. Besides, this time grandmother said it should be her last house moving. If Mia wanted to study (in two years time), she was welcome to move on. Grandmother has become tired of this moving house procedure that was repeated year after year. Now there was a condition: stay two years in one city and then do whatever you want.
Mia wasn't interested in building did up relationships with her class mates, because she already knew right from the beginning that she was going to leave the place after a year. She had already lost so much that she didn't want to lose more. She wasn't interested in things, that were important for girls - like make-up, shopping and parties. She didn't want to start a relationship, because she was convinced she was screwed for eternity. She didn't know why, but she had her experiences, her memories and didn't want to share them with anybody.
Any kind of feeling was already gone. The fresh air and walking through the new city were the best medicine. She didn't want to think about her experiences and those thoughts she had tried so hard to delete from her memory. She had to be always prepared. She didn't know exactly for what, but she knew there was a person in the world, which she never ever wanted to see. She was escaping from the past but this past had the really annoying habit to catch her anytime she thought she had found at least some peace.
She didn't have to think about excuses, because she could always say „I didn't know where my class room is and you know, the new city, the new neighbourhood and girls just don’t get it right with the timing and so…”. It worked out great every time she had to use it. But she already knew well the plan of the school, she already knew her
timetable. She already memorized it from when she came to this school to show her documents and enrol for the upcoming year. She chose this school because it had a good educational level and was prepared for any test. There was no test. When the tutors looked at her marks, there was no reason to be worried about the IQ of the new pupil. There was no negative comment about her, either. She has always been a perfect, unproblematic case.
Furthermore, this girl was interesting for another reason: some of her data was governmentally protected. You could only see the last school plus some other data, but nothing else. The teachers usually asked her only a few questions, rather a formal procedure than a necessity. Thereby Mia had the opportunity to get to know the new school and this one visit was enough to memorize all the details she needed to know. She knew how many exits there were, how you could get there in the fastest and slowest way and such things. It was a routine. She did her homework well. However, nobody should notice it.
Currently - as she was walking through the capital - she didn't give her new classmates a chance to get to know her. Not now.