Courage From an Unexpected Place

Cento reluctantly walked up the steps to the school's front door. He was dreading another day of verbal abuse from Satania. It had been going on for almost an entire month, and he had been away from his home planet for one Earth year.

The first day at school, he had been lucky; his assigned seat happened to be next to a girl named Amber. They hit it off instantly, and they became good friends very fast. They used their free time after class to play games with each other, and Cento's shyness started to go away as they got along so well.

But then Amber moved away. She was replaced by another girl named Jenna. Jenna wasn't as nice to Cento as Amber was, and she made fun of him too. But she wasn't as bad as Satania, who liked to make fun of Cento in front of everyone instead of just in private.

Cento looked up at the large sign outside the entrance.

"WELCOME TO SCHENDER HIGH SCHOOL!" it read. "OUR MISSION IS TO EDUCATE OUR STUDENTS SO THEY CAN BE SUCCESSFUL LEADERS AND PEOPLE IN THE FUTURE! GOOD LUCK TO ALL OF OUR STUDENTS THIS YEAR!!"

The final line was all that kept Cento from running back home and never returning again. He didn't really want to go back to his old planet, where people would treat him like a freak because he is different from them, but that didn't stop him from thinking about it all the time.

He opened the double doors and entered the hallway inside, which was already filled with students chattering with each other and taking their bags out of their lockers. The teacher's lounge was across from the entrance, and he could see a few teachers sitting around a table drinking coffee drinks while talking and laughing loudly. He walked past them quickly; he didn't want them to notice him standing there looking nervous until they noticed him on their own time.

"Hey! He's back!" Cento heard someone shout at his back before he was able to get far enough down the hallway for them not to notice him anymore. His head dropped even lower than it had been before, if that was even possible, and his pace quickened even more than before. He could feel heat rushing into his face, which meant that he wasn't going to be able to avoid blushing if someone said something embarrassing about him now that everyone had seen him walk down the hallway into this school building today too!

Cento turned the corner quickly and blindly headed towards his locker like he did every morning. He knew what color locker it was because it was painted bright orange like everything else in this school building except the teachers' lounge furniture - which were all blue - but he still couldn't remember what number it was or what letter or symbol it had on its door...

Shoot! I'll have to ask someone what locker I'm supposed to open up! But who? Satania? No one else would speak to me since I'm so shy... But she might be nice enough today if I just talk to her first before asking her... Oh no!! How do I even start talking??!!