Read Online We're Working On It by Richard Norway - Free Book Online

Suit yourself, but you’ll be hungry by 10:00. Mark my words. I was a teenager once, you know?” Richard laughed.
    Cory smiled, his spirits rising with the brief bit of humor.
    They put the dishes in the dishwasher, Cory grabbed his back pack while Richard picked up his brief case and they left the house.
    Cory was silent as they drove the two miles to the high school, and as they approached the school Cory was watching out the window at everything. He was trying to make it a familiar route, which it would be in a matter of days. Richard eventually pulled the car into the parking lot, stopped in the drop off area at the main entrance, and Cory sat there for a minute, his fears returning. Finally he moved over to Richard, gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, turned away and opened the door to leave.
    “Cory, it’s just a school. Don’t worry. You’ll meet some kids you’ll like,” Richard said trying to give him a little encouragement.
    “I hope so.”
    “Know where you’re going first?”
    “Yeah, I’m prepared. I’ve got Geometry first period.” Cory turned away, but quickly turned back to Richard. “See you tonight, bye,” and was off to face his destiny.
    Cory walked into the building. He didn’t look back and was soon inside and out of sight. For a moment it seemed to Richard that the school had swallowed him and was not going to give him back, like a shark, ravaging its meal. Richard started to feel pangs of remorse for being the one that gave him up to the school. But, it had to be. Cory was growing up, just like Richard’s business and needed to be let go of.
    Cory walked down a hall with lockers filling both walls. The solid wall of lockers was broken only by a doorway leading to an occasional classroom or an occasional window. The hallway was packed with kids either talking to friends, rummaging through their own lockers for books and whatever else they kept in there or hurrying to somewhere that Cory assumed was a class.
    He glanced down at the piece of paper he’d been holding to remind him of the room number of his first class. The room numbers were above each door and Cory continued looking at them as he passed each classroom, buffeted by the herd. By now everyone in the hallway knew he was the new kid. They all seemed to be staring at him. Cory felt the stares, and knew he was acting like a dorky new kid with his room number on a piece of paper in front of him. What else could he do?
    He suddenly stopped as he saw the number he’d been looking for. Checking one more time to make sure he wouldn’t walk into the wrong class, he put the piece of paper in his pocket and opened the door to his first class.
    Inside, half of the students were still milling about, talking, while the other half were seated, waiting for the class to begin. All of a sudden, Cory realized that he didn’t know where to sit. He looked around for an empty seat, but he knew the empty seats may have been already claimed by some of those not yet seated. If he sat in one of them, and it was the wrong one, he knew he would be in trouble.
    Mr. Parks, the teacher, was seated on the edge of his desk talking to a female student. Looking the part of a geometry teacher in a white shirt and a plain dark colored tie, he looked up and saw Cory standing at the side of the room. “Excuse me a moment,” he said to the student and then stood up looking at Cory.
    “You must be Cory. They told me that you’d be coming to my class. Welcome to Geometry I.”
    The classroom noise quieted as the students turned to look at the new kid in the class. Cory became very self-conscience and looked down at the floor.
    Parks, sensing Cory’s embarrassment, eased the awkward silence. Pointing toward an open seat he said, “You can have that seat over there by the window.”
    Cory walked over to Mr. Parks and handed him his admission slip. He was grateful that this new teacher seemed to understand the embarrassment he felt being in front of the class