Tricia Patterson nervously approached the closed classroom door. Her heart was beating wildly in her chest and she had to stop and take a few steadying breaths. This wasn’t anything new. The way her family moved around, you’d think she’d be used to this by now.

New home.

New school.

And repeat.

Unfortunately, it never got any easier. The anxiety, the nerves, the fear of not fitting in. Most of the time it worked out all right. She’d make new friends, but in the back of her mind she knew it wouldn’t be long until she had to pack up and move again.

But not anymore.

Thanks to her parents’ divorce, Tricia wouldn’t have to move again. She and her mom had found a place in a small town on the east coast of Long Island and they wouldn’t have to pack up and move unless they wanted to.

She really hoped they wouldn’t want to any time soon.

It had taken a couple of days to get unpacked and settled in, and today her mom had finally brought her to the local high school to get registered. Secretly, Tricia had hoped to drag out the process a little bit longer, but no such luck. She was here, registered, had her locker assigned and her schedule freshly printed out.

There was no turning back.

Looking down, she stared at the schedule for at least the tenth time in as many minutes. “It’s just homeroom,” she muttered. “Nothing to do except sit and wait until the first bell. You can do this.”

With a steadying breath, she reached for the door, turned the handle and opened it.

Twenty-five pairs of eyes were instantly on her and her breakfast threatened to make a reappearance.

“May I help you?” the teacher asked. She was an older woman – maybe in her sixties – but she had a kind smile.

“Um…I’m Tricia Patterson,” she said softly as she walked toward the desk. “I just transferred here and…” Reaching into her one binder, she pulled out her paperwork and handed it to the teacher.

“Welcome, Tricia. I’m Mrs. O’Keefe,” she said, still smiling. “Why don’t you take a seat for now? I’ll rework the seating arrangement for tomorrow, but for now, feel free to sit at one of the empty desks.”

“Thank you,” Tricia mumbled and turned around. Okay, now there were only twenty-four people staring at her and it was still pretty damn intimidating. Scanning the room, she located an empty desk in the back corner, quickly made her way over and sat down.

After a minute, everyone seemed to lose interest in her and Tricia breathed a sigh of relief. She pulled out the papers they had given her down in the office and found a map of the school to show how to get from one class to the next. She was studying it when all of a sudden…

“Hey! I’m Sean Peterson.”

To her right, there was a boy, Sean, leaning over smiling at her. She glanced at him and wasn’t sure how to respond. Was he being nice? Sincere? Or was he someone she should avoid? Lord knows she’d dealt with that sort of thing in each school. It never failed that there was at least one person who seemed to genuinely want to befriend her only to turn out to be a freak in some way, shape or form.

“Hi,” she muttered and went back to studying the map.

“So, you just transferred here? From where?” he asked.

Mentally she rolled her eyes. Placing the paperwork back down, she turned her head and looked at him. “From Rochester.”

“Really? Upstate, huh? That’s cool.” He straightened and smiled and Tricia had to admit he seemed really nice. And he was kind of cute. Sandy brown hair, brown eyes and a nice smile. “When did you move?”

“Over the weekend,” Tricia said but didn’t know what else to add to her short response.

“Awesome. Where in town? I live over off of Barnford. I don’t know if you know where that is but…”

“It’s right by where we live, too,” Tricia said, hating how she sounded so excited at the information. “I mean, we actually live on Barnford. The house on the corner of Barnford and Grove.”

“Seriously?” Sean asked, his smile growing. “You mean the white house with the red shutters?”

Tricia nodded.

“I’m actually a block over,” he said. “I’m on the opposite side of the street, on the corner of Barnford and Elm.”

“No way!”

“Totally serious.” He twisted in his seat so he was facing Tricia. “Do you have your schedule?”

She pulled it from her pile of papers and handed it to him. “This is the part I hate the most. Trying to find the classrooms and figuring out who to sit with.”

“Well that’s easy,” Sean said. “Your schedule is almost identical to mine.” He looked up at her again, his brown eyes smiling. “Just stick with me and I’ll get you to all of them and then you can sit by me.”

Tricia almost sagged with relief. “I…I appreciate it.”

“There’s just one problem,” he said, his expression going almost comically serious.

“What?”

“I don’t know your name. I mean, I know you said it when you walked it, but I didn’t really hear it. I don’t mind walking with you to classes, but I figure you’d prefer it if I didn’t call you ‘Hey, you’ all day.”

Tricia couldn’t help but giggle. “I’m Tricia. Tricia Patterson.”

Sean’s smile was back. “It’s nice to meet you, Tricia.” Then he leaned in as if he had a secret to tell her. “With you being Patterson and my last name being Peterson, I think we’re going to be stuck with each other all through high school. It’s a good thing we became friends now.”

And in that moment, Tricia couldn’t agree more.