[color=7ea7d8]“Oh, I’m fine.”[/color] Poppy insisted to the others, her face impossibly turning redder. 

Was she new? Yes. Should she say that? Was there possibly some hazing sort-of-thing that these students might do? Poppy had heard about hazing in other schools and the idea quite scared her. At her last school, there was the dreaded Freshmen Friday…where they dumped freshmen in trashcans. Smiling politely and tightly, Poppy reluctantly nodded her head.

[color=7ea7d8]“Yeah, I’m new.”[/color] Laughing nervously, she turned to the girl she joined, her mortification doubled at the fact that this girl [i]saw[/i] her fall. [color=7ea7d8]“Er…”[/color]

[color=gray]“Yoh rike putha thoo?”[/color] Poppy squirmed in her seat, trying to understand the girl before nodding exuberantly. She had something in common with the girl – pizza! Common traits lead to friendship. And, Poppy read somewhere, if two talk about someone or something they both hate, they are more likely to become friends. [color=7ea7d8]“What do you hate? I hate sand, spicy stuff, and spiders. There was also this one girl named Samantha at my old school and she was a down-right bitch.”[/color]

What her answer might be, Poppy didn’t know, because just at that moment, people burst into the cafeteria, faces painted and cheering. Poppy nearly lunged herself out of her seat in surprise, but managed to save herself the embarrassment by clenching onto the table. After the speech the one girl – a rule breaker, apparently – made, Poppy nearly died of excitement and nervousness.

[color=7ea7d8]“A party? Should we go?”[/color] Poppy asked, glancing at her tablemate before she caught on. [color=7ea7d8]“Er, I mean, not that [i]we[/i] are doing anything together. That was just an assumption. My dad used to say, and I’m pretty sure everybody else did too, that when you assume you make an ass out of you and me. Man, sorry, I shouldn’t assume or I’ll make us asses.”[/color]

Poppy gestured wildly to the side as if to ‘crazy’ and raised an eyebrow, taking a quick bite of her pizza.