The drive to the local community college was only fifteen minutes from my house, which seemed much longer this early in the morning. As I pulled into the parking lot, there were groups of people huddled around in different areas. Everyone looked happy and cheerful, probably excited to start this new chapter of their life.

I might have enjoyed this more if it involved different people. Not that these people were rude or bullied me or treated me bad, it was just the same thing every day. It was like eating the same meal every day. After a week you would get bored of the taste.

That's how I felt with these people.

As I got out of my car, I made eye contact with Savannah Anderson. She waved at me and started walking to me from across the other side of the parking lot.

"I knew I recognized that black Jeep," she said as she came in front of me. "How was your summer Andrea?"

"It was pretty good," I told her. "I took up a job at the dog kennel."

It really was a pretty good summer. The dog kennel was a fun way to spend all of my free time. If there was one thing I did not get sick and tired of in this town, it was the dogs. Who could resist such a cute little furry face. For all of my life I had tried to convince my parents to get Carter and I a dog. There's a file in Carter's computer that is full of all the presentations we made and gave to our parents about why we should get a dog. 

It never swayed them enough.

"Aw really!" Savannah cooed. "I bet that was so much fun! I love dogs. My grandma has three of the cutest dogs in the world. She has one German Shepherd, one Husky..."

This was the reason I did not get along very well with Savannah. She talked way too much. I did not hate her, and I definitely was not rude to her, but I just tuned her out sometimes when she rambled on. 

"Does your family have a dog?" she asked me as my attention was brought back to the conversation.

"No, but my brother and I have tried so many times to convince our parents to let us get one," I explained to her. "They said it's too much money and too much effort that neither one of them are willing to give."

"That sucks, I'm sorry," she consoled me. "Maybe they will change their minds sometime in the future."

"I really hope so," I responded.

"I have to get to class, but I'll try to catch you around the campus later," she said cheerfully as she gave me one final wave and walked off to the main building. 

This was the first look I had gotten of the campus and saw that there were three separate buildings. Maybe I should have looked online before to see which building I'm supposed to be in. All I knew was that I needed to be in room 305.

I started walking towards the largest building that stood in the middle. There were a few picnic tables in the front lawn and they were all overtaken by the couples. I recognized all of them, shocker. 

I pushed through the revolving glass door and made my to the hallway straight ahead. All of the room numbers I saw were in the one hundreds, which made me positive that my room was not going to be this way. As I pivoted, I started to make my way to the opposite hallway. All of these room numbers were in the two hundreds.

That was closer, but still not good enough.

There were no other hallways in this building so I went back outside and tried my luck with another building. This one was two stories and was built with brick that had started to fade. Long, green vines had started to grow on the sides.

When I walked inside there was a lounge area to the left that was full with chatty, peppy people. Jamie Scott made eye contact with me and he immediately hopped out of his chair and made his way over to me.

"Hey Andy!" he yelled coming over to me and wrapping me in a hug. I hugged him back, I had learned it was much easier to give in than to fight his hugs. 

"Hi Jamie," I greeted. "You seem bright and happy as always."

"Of course," he responded. "I'm here and I'm about to start college. What is there to be not happy about?"

I wish I could have that kind of attitude about this place. Maybe Carter was right, maybe I need to start changing my outlook on this. Today could be a new day full of new possibilities. 

"You're right," I agreed. "Today is going to be a great day."

"That's the spirit!" Jamie said as he gave me a pat on the back. "I haven't seen you since the end of senior year, what have you done since?"

"I took a job at the kennel," I explained. "It was nice to take care of the dogs and play with them."

"That's not really what I meant," Jamie said, scratching the back of his neck. "What have you done for yourself since?"

"What do you mean?" I was confused by his response. What I did for myself was take up a job and get money. 

"I don't mean to act like a psychiatrist or something," he started to explain. "But what have you done to increase your life? Some people write down how their day was. Some people write down their goals for the day. Some people draw and illustrate how they are feeling. Some people walk their dogs to get that sense of accomplishment. Do you follow what I'm saying?"

"Wow, you're really into this whole 'bettering yourself' aren't you?" I responded. Jamie was somewhat like me when it came to never being satisfied. His dissatisfaction was with not feeling complete in his every day actions, he had always been this way in high school. He was constantly reaching out to other people to make them feel special and tried to lift them up. I remember during the weekends in high school he would drive two hours out of town to this special needs school and helped them out there. I wonder if he still did that over the summer.

"All the time," he told me. "There's always a way to enhance your life. So I'm guessing that means you really didn't do anything like that."

"No, not really," I responded, shrugging my shoulders. "It's just not something that I've really been worried about."

"Everyone has their own way to live their life, I respect your's," he said putting his hands up in defense. "What class are you heading to?"

"I'm supposed to be heading to Psychology, but I'm not entirely sure where it is," I explained to him. "It's in room 305."

"Oh I know where that is!" he said, getting excited to be able to help. "You are going to want to take a left down this hallway and it'll be the third door on your right."

"Thank you Jamie!" I said as I smiled at him and started to walk down the hallway.

I probably could get along well with some of the people of Plunger and hang out with them in my spare time, but they were just too easy. Hanging out with these people was like reading the same book over and over again, but expecting a different ending. Jamie always talked about his need to find a better more productive version of his life. Savannah would just talk so much you couldn't get your own conversation topic in. Everyone else had their own flaws like Jamie and Savannah.

Maybe I needed to be more positive and open.

I made it to the door that Jamie told me to look out for and saw that it was, in fact, room 305. Way to go homie.

"Hello! Good morning my dear!" the teacher greeted me as I took my first step into the classroom. She was probably in her late twenties or early thirties and had her blonde hair up in a bun. 

"Good morning," I responded as I gave her a slight smile. 

"What's your name?" she asked as she came closer to me and smiled to big it caused wrinkles to appear next to her eyes. She had vibrant green eyes and had make up on. Her makeup was not over the top, but instead very simple and quite nice looking. She seemed to be a natural beauty.

"Andy Prescott," I answered.

She reached over to her desk and picked up a roster and started scanning for my name. "Andrea Prescott? So you prefer to be called Andy?"

"Andy or Andrea is fine," I told her. I did not really care for the name Andrea since only my parents and family called me that(except for Carter, but he had many other names for me as well). 

"You said yourself that your name is Andy, so that's what I'll call," she told me. I really liked her already. Everything in me hoped that she was this cool when she started teaching. "You can take a seat wherever you want."

As I turned towards the desks I saw that there were already about ten students in desks. I recognized each one of their faces, which was not a shock. The best place to sit was in the back row in the right corner. This way I could be on my phone and play games on my laptop without being caught. 

Yeah, I'm not really the best student. 

I can do well studying on my own, but putting me in a room with uncomfortable chairs and a bunch of people I don't care for is no way for me to study or pay attention.

Seeing that the dream seat was open, I started making a b-line for it and quickly claimed it. I lounged back in my seat and pulled out my phone to waste time on either Instagram or Candy Crush. 

Both were very tempting options. Would I rather look at pictures of half naked models on Instagram that made me question whether I should order those fat burning pills on Amazon, or would I rather swap pretty colors while a white yeti looking thing told me how well I was doing?

Candy Crush it was.

"Good morning sweet heart!" the teacher started to gush as another student walked in. I did not even bother looking up to see who it was. 

"Good morning Miss Garris," a thick British accent responded. Alright, that got my attention. No one in Plunger has a British accent. Looking up I saw a new face, which was quite surreal. He got the attention of everyone else in the room as well since all eyes were on him.

He was tall, but definitely not over 5' 11". His hair was a dark blonde with some strips of lighter blonde in them. The color of his skin was golden and so smooth looking. He seemed to be someone who spent a lot of time outside considering the natural highlights and skin color. 

"That accent is...WOW!" the teacher gushed. She looked as shocked as everyone else did in the room.

"Thank you," he said as he ran his fingers in his hair. "But you are the one with the accent. That sounds amazing!"

"Oh shush, you're just lying to me," she said, waving a hand in front of his face. "My accent is the garbage of all accents."

"Absolutely not, it's quite pleasing to the ears," he reassured her. 

"And what's your name honey?"

"Clay Mitchell."

Harlow Dumphrey and Sierra Cane started whispering next to me and it was quite obvious they were fangirling over this boy. I bet they probably did get tired with trading off guys to sleep with around here. 

"Well, Clay Mitchell, please take a seat wherever you want," Miss Garris said as she waved her arm out in front of the desks.

He gave her a smile and started to walk down the aisles. Sierra and Harlow started giggling like little girls as he started to get closer to them, but quickly turned in front of them and put his backpack down on the desk next to me. 

I don't blame him, it was either a desk next to Sierra, a desk next to me, or two of the free seats in the front row. There was no way a new kid wanted to sit in the front row. 

"Are they always that giddy?" he whispered as he started to sit down and nod his head towards Sierra and Harlow. 

I looked over at them and they were both giggling and glancing at Clay. "Looks like you got yourself a fan base."

"How could I not," he said waving his hands in front of himself. "I mean look at me. It's not every day that this great of a guy comes walking through those doors."

I laughed at his response as he started to sit down in his seat. There was a part of me that hoped that the comment he made was truly sarcastic and that he was not full of himself and arrogant. We did not need any more guys like that here.