Re: Hansard High Student Letter

When a new home is nothing new, the unpacking process isn’t much of a chore, but a brainless routine. Arms already laden with a heavy box, Jesse shuffled an even large one on the floor down the vacant hall. Without a thought of strategy or conception of decor, Jesse opened all five boxes clumped together on the bedroom floor and began pulling things out and putting them away, just is if it had all belonged there for years. Clothes in the dresser, pictures on top, shoes in the closet, and an entire box of books to be re-stacked in their usual tidy order on the sagging bookcase. Not many mementos, not any useless “memories”, none of the kinds of stuff people hang on to for years before they can bear throwing it away. When you’re a Saunders, you don’t keep crap. Takes less time to pack and few boxes to move without all that extra crap. At least, that’s what the Sergeant always says.

After emptying half the boxes, Jesse finally uncovered the one item she’d actually been needing to unpack. Her laptop. Their internet provider promised to have everything up and running by move-in, so here was the test. She plugged in and logged on. How about that, a connection.

Her inbox had seven new emails, but nothing at all interesting or important. Except for one from an unfamiliar email address. GreenLanternFrankie@yahoo.com. She judged from the subject line that it was from some poor dork at school forced to show the new kid around. Here we go again:

Dear Jesse,

My name is Frankie and our school told me you’re enrolling soon. As far as other schools in Sacramento go, Hansard High is the same I guess. I’m not sure what you like, but we have a lot of good things. The cafeteria sucks though. Try not to trip on the steps out front, I did on my first day. It wasn’t as funny as everyone thought. The library is big and quiet, usually that’s a good place to spend your time at first. I have a job in a quiet comic shop, so it reminds me of that mostly- I tried getting the librarian to put some comics in there, but she said it wasn’t going to happen. I guess that’s all I have to say. Oh, and even though you like something try and avoid joining a club about it. Then you get roped into a lot of stuff that has nothing to do with writing or chess, even if chess seemed interesting to you at the time.

.Frankie Halifax, GreenLanternFrankie@yahoo.com

Jesse laughed. She couldn’t figure out if this kid was funny, or really just a genuine dork like the rest of them. Regardless, she hit reply:

Frankie,

I appreciate the email. I’m sure Hansard High is great. Happy to hear about the library and I am pretty sure every school cafeteria in the country sucks. Does Hansard have a girls swim team? I’m not from around here so maybe you can tell me where the hang out places are and such.

Sorry you fell on the stairs, I’ll be sure not to trip.

PS – What does your handle mean?

Sincerely,

Jesse

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