Katie was walking through her new house, roaming the dark, calm hallways looking for the best room that she could call her bedroom. She was thinking of how the move was a big mistake. She already missed her best friend Emily from California. Katie had no idea how she was going to fit in New York City: at school, making new friends in her new neighborhood, and just in general. California was so far away. She was so far away from everyone and everything she ever new. They left California four days ago and it seemed like forever. Her parents said they had to drive instead of fly so they could bring their cars and take their time. They would make an adventure out of their trip across the country. To Katie all it meant was that she had to leave her best friend three days sooner.
Katie would not talk to her parents on the three long days of traveling to New York. She was angry. She blamed the whole move on them. Katie thought her parents were trying to ruin her life by moving her away from Emily. Katie didn’t know how her and Emily were going to stay in touch anymore or if their friendship would end. Her dad Charles received a great job offer for accounting in New York City and he took it. This decision devastated Katie. She didn’t understand why her parents would do such a thing to her. Her mom Cindy tried to talk to Katie about her feelings but Katie ignored her especially since the moving truck arrived. It’s the weekend and Katie didn’t want to start school on Monday. She feared she would not make any new friends. Katie didn’t know what she was going to do with her life anymore, especially when she walked into the building of St. John’s High School the next day. She thought her life couldn’t get any worse.


“Hey what’s up?” “What is your name?” “I think you are going to like it here”, said some of the kids.
Katie was really surprised that everyone was so nice. The number of people coming up to her and trying to be nice made it a little easier to be in this new place. Katie had a totally different view of how the new school would react to her as the new student, starting in the middle of the year. As she walked through the hallway the principal greeted her and took her to the office to sign her in and get her freshman schedule along with a map to find her way around the school. The principal showed her to her first class which would soon become her favorite class of all. It was P.E. and they were playing basketball and she loved the sport. She met many new people. She especially liked one girl, Lucy. Lucy seemed to like Katie too. They both liked basketball very much and had a few other classes together too. Katie liked Lucy a lot. She had blonde hair like Katie, but it wasn’t as bleached by the sun as Katie’s was from living in California. Lucy had bright blue eyes and was an only child too. Katie’s first week of school got better each day. She would go to her locker at the end of each day and then hurry to catch the bus on time. She would get home and eat a snack and then she would go straight to her room to start her homework. At night is when she missed Emily more than ever. She still was not talking to her parents because she wanted them to know how much she was hurting because of the move to New York. She still blamed them for making her have to leave California. She didn’t even tell them about her new friend Lucy because she didn’t want them to think that she would ever like it in New York. One night while she was in her room finishing up her homework, her mom came into the room.

“How’s school been coming along, you haven’t said much about your first few days”, Katie’s mom said.

Katie replied, “Mom it has been terrible. I hate it. I haven’t made any friends, and I miss Emily”
Katie’s mom shut the door and left Katie’s room with sorrow, shame, and feeling helpless for her daughter’s pain. After Katie’s mom left her room Katie felt sad too for lying to her mother and not telling her about her new friend Lucy. Katie thought to herself, things weren’t as bad as they could have been here in New York. She was just mad at her parents, and she couldn’t let them know that really she was doing fine. She just missed Emily and when she wasn’t at school with her new friends she thought of Emily and how much fun they had together.

Two weeks had gone by and Katie was doing great. She was talking more to her parents and her parents knew about some of the new friends she had made. They knew she liked Lucy but they also knew she still missed Emily terribly.

On Monday morning Katie’s alarm went off for school. Katie was thinking about her birthday in a week. She didn’t know what she was going to do. Should she have a birthday party, a sleepover, or just go out to eat? She couldn’t worry about that right now, she had to get up and get ready to catch the bus for school. She got to school and had another wonderful day.

Time flew by and Katie’s birthday was finally here. She decided that she was going to have a sleepover at her new house with all her new friends. Katie’s friends started to arrive at her house. The party began. Cake, Ice Cream, cookies, pizza, you name it they had it. Everybody kept saying that the party was so much fun and that they were having a great time. The best part of the party came when it was PRESENT TIME! Katie had a ton of gifts and didn’t even know where to start. She started with a pink bag from Lucy. It was a scarf with cute matching gloves.

Katie said, “I can’t wait to wear them”.
The presents went on and on and finally her mom and dad’s gift came, it was the last one. Katie was expecting money from her parents, but when she opened the card she read it out loud. It was a plane ticket to go visit her best friend Emily back in California. She started screaming and got excited! She gave her parents a hug, and apologized to them for how she behaved since they had moved. Katie was really excited about the trip to California that she would take this summer. She started to think she may like it here after all. Now she had friends in both places. She was a very lucky girl.