"Alright, welcome back to music class, everyone!"

Mister Demi stood at the front of the room, friendly green eyes sweeping across the room and making a mental attendance check. Claire sat sort of near the left side of the room, that having been the only seat available in the classroom. There was no desk; instead a music stand took its place, and the seats were arranged in a semicircle around a podium near the front of the room. Everyone seemed to have an instrument, except Claire, of course, who had yet to have been given one.

Like most of the other teachers Claire had met, Mister Demi had small black horns on his head, which were accompanied by two white pencils sticking out farther back from his white hair. His left bang seemed to bear the black keys of a piano, and his white shirt beneath his overalls had a pair of eighth notes on it.

"As I've heard, we have a new student in class today," Mister Demi looked towards Claire with a nod.

Everyone was now staring at her. Claire felt her face heat up a little, and she waved nervously.

Of course I get called out. Thanks, Mister Demi.

"Claire, I'll help you get fitted for an instrument after I get the rest of the class set up for the day," the teacher said. "For now, just follow along until I get to you, alright?"

Claire nodded, and, thankfully, everyone seemed to have turned away from her.

After talking to the class a little bit, Mister Demi took Claire aside into a small room. Inside the room were a few dusty shelves with a scarce few instrument cases on them. There was one big instrument, maybe a euphonium or a baritone, but the rest were medium or small.

"Do you have any experience with instruments?" Mister Demi asked Claire. "Any past instruments you've played?"

"I took piano lessons once."

Mister Demi chuckled lightly. "Oh, didn't we all. Unfortunately, we only have one piano, and it's desperately out of tune. I need to get to that. So I'll find something else for you here. The selection's quite small, but we'll find something for you, I'm sure."

After trying a few wind and string instruments, Claire finally was able to settle and make a decent sound on a clarinet. Mister Demi showed her the ropes, giving her some note fingerings and a short lesson on music reading to refresh her mind.

"Reeds are in fairly short supply, but we'll get some more when they send in another restock," Mister Demi informed. "Luckily, most of the other kids are on harder reeds, so most of the softer ones will go to you, anyway. Any questions about any of that?"

Claire shook her head.

"Alright. Let's get back to class."

There wasn't much time left in the period, unfortunately, by the time Claire left the room. She squeaked around on the clarinet for about ten minutes before Mister Demi gave the five minute clean up notice. She carefully took the clarinet back apart, stuck it in its case, and Mister Demi gave her an instrument locker along the left wall to keep the instrument in.

Feeling bright about the rest of the day with a good class behind her, Claire left Mister Demi's classroom and looked at her schedule for the next teacher.

Bloomie. I think she was room 134?

Sure enough, Claire found Miss Bloomie's classroom in room 134. Miss Bloomie herself wasn't in the room yet, but most of the students were. Claire sat down at an open desk, setting her backpack aside. There was a boy sitting at the desk next to her, with black hair and what seemed to be a leaf and a stem poking out from his head. He was frantically scribbling down answers on what I guessed was last night's homework that he hadn't yet finished.

"Abbie, you didn't finish?!" A girl with hair varying shades of grey exclaimed as she sat down on the other side of the black-haired boy. Both of her hands bore grey sock puppets with goofy googly eyes.

Abbie, eyes laser-focused to his homework, replied with nervousness, "I-It's fineeee, I'm almost done now, I'm sure I can complete it!"

He chuckled nervously as he said this. It was obvious he didn't believe a single one of the words that left his mouth.

"Do you need any help?" Claire chimed in.

Abbie jumped a little, looking up from his homework in surprise that Claire was sitting there.

"Uh- nope, nope, I'm alright, haha-"

"Are you the new student I've heard about?" The sock puppet girl asked Claire upon her speaking.

Claire nodded. "Yeah. My name's Claire."

The girl smiled. "Well, then, welcome to Paper School! I'm Lana!"

Lana lifted both of her sock puppets. The left one's mouth moved with her hand, and although she tried to hide it, her mouth formed the slightly higher-pitched words coming out of the sock puppet's mouth.

"I'm Pip!"

The other did the same.

"And I'm Pop!"

Claire processed that, and just waved. Lana seemed satisfied with that.

"Alright, time for class! Sit down, everyone!"

A stern voice burst across the room, and immediately everyone took their seats. Abbie seemed to almost start hyperventilating, as Claire could see he still had half the page left, but with some encouragement from Lana he seemed to calm down.

Into the classroom came a woman with a black dress. Her black hair was cut flat by her shoulders, and it was half tied up in a choppy bun with a white bow. She, too, had black horns on her head, though they were larger than Mister Demi's. And her left hand, unlike her normal but clawed right one, seemed to bear a deadly looking box cutter-like blade that immediately made Claire nervous. Her demeanor was different than most of the other teachers Claire had met.

Miss Bloomie's eyes narrowed as she looked across the room for a quick attendance, and, upon seeing that everyone was present, she seemed to relax just a little.

"Welcome back, everyone, I hope you finished the homework that I assigned yesterday."

Abbie tensed up. Lana glanced at him.

"Go ahead and pass your papers up your row, and I will collect it now," Miss Bloomie instructed. "Then we'll start the lesson."

Abbie solemnly passed his paper to the person in front of him. Lana didn't seem as worried about the grade, but didn't look... at ease about it, per se. Hard class, Claire assumed. She'd just have to pay close attention, then.

Whilst collecting all the papers from the front row of the class, Miss Bloomie seemed to notice that Claire existed.

"Ah, you must be our new student, Claire?"

Now all eyes were on Claire again. Her face got warm again. Shyly Claire nodded.

Miss Bloomie gave her a smile, though she had teeth as sharp as the blade on her hand that made it seem a little unfriendly. "Nice to meet you, then."

Then suddenly she switched back to her earlier stern demeanor as she set the homework papers down on the front desk. "Alright, everyone, get out the textbook from beneath your chair and turn to page three hundred thirty seven."

Claire did as instructed, flipping the textbook open...

...to some nonsense that she did not understand in the slightest.

What the heck does any of this mean-?!

Claire exhaled deeply. Maybe I have more catching up to do than I thought.

As Miss Bloomie began to explain the material, Claire glanced over at Abbie and Lana. Both of them seemed equally confused, but seemed to be absorbing whatever information Miss Bloomie was giving.

At least I'm not the only one not getting this at all-

Claire paid close attention to what Miss Bloomie was saying, taking so many notes that her hand proceeded to randomly cramp as she wrote. She would definitely have to go over it later - none of it was piecing together in her head properly, like two puzzle pieces that were definitely not meant to be next to each other.

By the time the bell rang and she received her homework from Miss Bloomie, she had managed to make whatever amalgamation of ancient languages Miss Bloomie had written on the board make a little sense to her. She still, of course, had no idea what she was doing. She'd have to ask someone for help later.

"Did that make any sense to you guys?" Claire asked Lana and Abbie quietly after they left Miss Bloomie's classroom.

"Not at all!" Lana exclaimed overenthusiastically, sock puppets in the air in celebration for reasons Claire didn't understand.

Abbie shrugged. "I usually just wing it on the homework. I try to understand, but... my brain just isn't wired to understand anything like that."

Claire sighed. "At least I'm not the only one who didn't catch a lick of that. She was speaking a whole other language."

"Oh-ho, you'll love Miss Thavel, then," Lana said with a bit of sarcasm. "She's the actual language teacher, and geez Louise, I cannot understand a word of any language she teaches us."

"Yeah... try to pay close attention in her class," Abbie exhaled. "And whatever you do... don't fail. Miss Bloomie might let you off, but that's a slim chance. Miss Thavel will give you more homework or detention if you're lucky. And don't even get me started on Miss Circle."

Lana shuddered. "God, I don't get anything in her class."

Miss Circle... Claire checked her schedule. Yup, that was her next class. Oh boy.

Abbie leaned over and saw the schedule. "Yeesh. Good luck there. My advice? Stay quiet, do your work, and stay above a D... unlike me. I think she hates me or something, because no matter what, I cannot bring that D up. If I'm not careful, I'm gonna fail, and that..."

Abbie shuddered.

"Hey, you can bring it up!" Lana encouraged Abbie. She gave her a pat on the head with a sock puppet. Was it Pip? Or Pop? Claire didn't remember. Lana then glanced at Claire.

"Yeah. Like he said. If you can keep out of the failing range, you're in good shape. If you can't... good luck."

Claire nodded. "Okay..."

A teacher was walking down the hallway on the other side of the corridor, one Claire hadn't seen before. Lana and Abbie both stepped closer to the right wall, giving her a wide range of space. Claire followed. The teacher had short hair, a white dress, and seemed to have a headpiece bearing the first three letters of the alphabet on building blocks like you'd find as baby toys. She seemed to catch sight of Claire as she passed, and her eyes narrowed. The student next to her, who had been listening to whatever she said, also followed her eyes and saw Claire. The dark, pointed ears on her head, similar to that of a wolf's or a dog's, perked a little, curious. Then, as they walked away, the teacher turned back around and the girl resumed listening to her.

"Looks like Miss Thavel already doesn't like you," Abbie sighed.

"Why? I haven't even met her before," Claire queried.

"She just hates everyone," Lana said. "I wouldn't be too surprised. I've heard she was wanted for murder before the pandemic."

Claire jolted in alarm. "What?!"

Lana laughed. "Kidding! Even if I had heard that, it's probably not true... I think."

Lana spaced out. Suddenly, one of her sock puppets popped up.

"Lana! You're gonna be late again!" Lana exclaimed as the puppet. Claire still didn't remember whether it was Pip or Pop.

"Yeah! Get going!" The other puppet said. That was definitely Pop. Or was it Pip? Shoot, now she's second guessing herself.

"Right!" Lana said, determined now. "Come on, Abbie!"

Abbie yelped as Lana ran off, and he scrambled to catch up to her.

Claire giggled a little, and turned a corner.

"Hey, Claire!"

It happened that Engel and Bubble were also in Miss Circle's third period class. The two had been walking to the classroom from the other direction, and came face to face across the hall to her. Claire smiled as she saw Engel wave, and met them by Miss Circle's door in the middle of the hall.

"Find everything okay so far?" Engel asked Claire.

"So far, yeah," Claire said.

"Do you like your classes?"

"Mister Demi was nice," Claire recalled. "Miss Bloomie was... uh..."

Bubble laughed a little. "Yeah, her class is hard. I don't think teenagers our age learned that stuff even before the pandemic."

"I wish I could say this class was any better," Engel sighed. "Miss Circle is... the worst. Just pay attention, okay?"

Claire nodded, and followed them as they walked into the classroom.

Unpleasantly, Claire was immediately met by a paper airplane mid-flight as she stepped into the math classroom. It hit her right on the forehead, rebounded, and took a few spiraling circles before crash-landing on the ground. Claire blinked and flinched in surprise, standing still as the initial shock wore off.

Immediately laughter burst from the other side of the room, from a group of kids at a table group. There was a boy with long hair, tied in a small ponytail at the bottom of it. He had two black horns and an A+ circled near his forelock. Next to him was a girl with half white, half black hair, the equation "2 + 2 = 8" written in her hair as well. It was tied back, and she was wearing a poncho with multiple childish drawings on it. She also seemed to have a dinosaur tail. The third was a boy with goggles and two horns on his head, his white hair long and spiky. He also had a tail, a whiplike, spaded one.

Engel just rolled his eyes. Bubble picked up the paper airplane and tossed it in the trash.

"Ignore them," Engel sighed. "They're just trying to get a reaction out of you. Usually they'll leave you alone if you're not visibly annoyed."

"Who are they?" Claire asked, not being able to hide a pissed-off glare that she shot at the group.

"That's Oliver, Zip, and Edward," Engel said. He sat down at a group of desks, and Claire and Bubble joined him. It was as far away from the very loud group as it could be, but the classroom wasn't quite that big. The ceiling did appear to be taller than the ceilings of other classrooms for some reason, though, Claire noticed.

"They're just bullies," Bubble rolled her eyes. "They think they have all the rights to do whatever they want because they're the favorites, for whatever reason."

The class chatted a little more before suddenly they were interrupted by a loud,

"In your seats, everyone!"

It was a higher-toned voice than what Claire had expected when Miss Circle first walked in the door, but it was commanding and powerful enough to silence even the three giggling goofballs in the back corner. The teacher ducked in the doorway (did she... shrink a little as she did that? And then grow back?) and stepped into the classroom, sharp, almost feline eyes catching the gazes of everyone in the room.

Miss Circle, Claire recognized, was the same teacher she'd seen that first day in the office. She could never forget that giant compass on her left forearm if she tried - it almost scared her, the point of that pencil. And although the needle seemed to be retracted, Claire didn't doubt that it was much sharper. Miss Circle wore a black button up shirt with a white collar, and had white pants rolled up to her knee. And she was tall. Claire guessed she must've been close to at least ten feet in height.

Without another word she continued,

"Get out your homework and pass it up."

She had a sort of Japanese accent, making her words sound quite aggressive - or maybe she actually was trying to be aggressive. By the looks of her, Claire didn't doubt the latter. Engel and Bubble both retrieved their homework - Claire recognized it as the worksheets the two had been working on that morning - and Bubble brought them to the front of the room where Miss Circle was standing. After collecting all the papers, the teacher set them down.

"Alright, clear all of your desks and get out a pencil. It's a test day," Miss Circle announced.

The entire class groaned.

Someone was brave enough to speak up. "But you never told us about the test, shouldn't we have time to study?"

Miss Circle's eyes snapped to the kid that had said it - it was Edward. His earlier goofy expression now looked very annoyed.

"You will take the test, and you will not complain." Miss Circle seemed to be holding back irritation, though it appeared quite clearly on her face. "I'll pass out the test, and you will start when I return to my desk."

Edward scoffed, rolling his eyes. Claire was a bit surprised that Miss Circle had just let him off. Maybe she wasn't as bad as she'd been described.

She grabbed another stack of papers and began passing those out. To Claire's surprise, she also received a test. It wasn't that she felt she shouldn't take the test - she was a student, after all. But it was also her first day, and she had no idea what the test was over.

"Um, excuse me, Miss Circle?"

Miss Circle stopped and turned towards Claire. Claire had her hand partially in the air, a nervous attempt at a smile on her face. The teacher's eyes narrowed, mouth tightly pressed into a line on her face.

"Uh... well, it's my first day, as you probably know..." Claire started. "And... I was wondering... shouldn't I at least see the material before getting a test thrown at me first..."

She trailed off as she glanced at Engel, who was staring at her with a panicked expression, chopping his hand in the air and mouthing "no! Shut up!" silently.

Miss Circle inhaled and exhaled softly.

"You got into this school. That means you're smart enough to figure it out. Don't expect special treatment simply because you're the newbie here."

"But-"

"Speak again and I'll send you right to detention myself, you ungrateful wretch."

As she snapped, the needle of her compass unsheathed itself, making a shing sound as the metal tip whipped out about a foot from the compass itself. Claire's face paled, and immediately she fell silent. She heard some soft "oooooh"s from Oliver, Zip, and Edward, followed by a lot of giggling. Miss Circle didn't ask them to quiet down, only finished passing out papers with a bit of pissed-off muttering beneath her breath. Finally she sat back down, and everyone could begin the test.

-

3147 words

No Claire does not play the clarinet because CLARinet or the fact that I named my own clarinet Claire she just gave me clarinet vibes

Hehe corcl :>

I wanted to incorporate Circle's oreo love but I couldn't figure out how so I'll get to that later :,v