It was the first day of the new school year, the first day of my junior year in high school. I went in the lobby searching for my friends. They were talking and giggling together. I joined them and we talked about our summer. Then the bell rung and we went to the covered courts.

In the covered courts in our schools in the Philippines, we do not all go to the same section. I ended up sitting in a different section from the one my friends were at. The program started and I felt out-of-place in my section. I looked at the faces of my classmates and saw a few familiar ones but was totally blank-minded about who the rest of them were.

During the assembly program, my attention was divided between thinking about how to make new friends and listening to what the speaker was saying. When the program ended, a first-year classmate approached me and we started talking, but soon we went our separate ways when I met up with my friends near the exit gate.

I didn't really get to know a new friend that day but I did renew my friendship with my old ones.

© 2009 Shaira A.S. Original for CCF. Shaira A.S. grants CCF first electronic rights for one month; CCF may archive the material indefinitely and include it in an eBook anthology.

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