“Why aren’t you in class?!” a high-pitched voice blasted behind me.

I must have jumped ten feet in the air and spun around, before I touched down again. I was standing face-to-face with a Hall Monitor. We had those in California too and I have had more than my share of run-ins with them.

“Didn’t you hear the bell?” she asked, while waving a pencil eraser in my face.

She had spiked blonde hair that pointed in every direction with the back was long and hanging down to her shoulders. I think they used to call that hairstyle a Mullet or something like that. It isn’t a particularly flattering way to wear ones hair, but on her, it somehow worked. When she spoke, her head jiggled like an enormous blob of Jell-O. She was also built like a linebacker, with the broad shoulders and thick neck that typically comes with those types of sports people. I instantly assumed that, besides being a dorky Hall Monitor, she must also be a jock, either volleyball or… do they let girls play football in Maine?

Wait, do they even have volleyball or football in Maine?

Sure, Hall Monitor slash jock is a weird combination, but it’s not unheard of. Back in my old school, we called the Hall Monitors, Hall Nazi’s, among many other, equally derogatory names. I must confess that besides my many encounters with the Hall Nazi’s… back in the fourth grade, I also used to be one of them for all of about two days, before I got busted for sneaking out of school to go surfing. Gosh, I miss surfing!

So there I was, being stared down by the She-Hulk-Nazi and wondering, if she was going to jab me in the eye with her pencil, or put me into a headlock. It turned out that the big sport here in Maine isn’t volleyball or football; it’s hockey and of course, I know less than nothing about hockey.

“Let me guess, you’re the captain of the football team?” I said, trying to sound cool.

“What? Are you some kind of retard? I wouldn’t be caught dead, playing that pansy sport.” She said and I noted the throbbing vain, that had sprouted above her left eyebrow.

She turned to show me the back of her sweater. It read, ‘Boyd Bears’ and had an embroidered image of a bear wearing a hockey mask and holding a hockey stick.

I guess I know a little more than nothing about hockey, because I knew what a hockey mask and hockey stick were.

“Sorry, I-I’m new here.” I managed to say without my voice cracking and giving away, how scared I was at that moment.

“No excuse!” She said pulling a red card out of her shirt pocket and handing it to me. “Homeroom assignments have been hanging on the front doors for over a month!”

“Huh?” I moaned in confusion.

She pointed down the hall to the doors I’d walked through only minutes before. I could see several sheets of paper, taped to the insides of the glass.

“But I didn’t know. We just moved here yesterday.” I said.

The girl sighed, “Alright, what’s your name?”

“Alvin, Alvin Holloway.” I said nervously.