A little Blue Locker

A Little Blue Locker

I was walking into the school on the first day of school. It was a good day; everything felt positive. It had that “new year, new start” feel to it. I wasn’t sure what to expect. They always said Junior year was the hardest, but I didn’t really know what that meant. I came up to my locker and tried to open it. I messed up, as everyone must at least seven times on the first day.  After I had wrestled my narrow blue locker open, a tall girl with long, dark hair, wearing a loose shirt tucked into jeans cautiously approached the locker two down from mine. The fact that she wore jeans and this shirt was significant because I went to a school with a uniform. I watched as she fumbled with her locker, attempting to open her locker, looking down at the piece of paper in her hand, and trying her locker again.

After about seven attempts, she looked up at me.

“Can you help me with my locker?”

An exchange student. I had guessed before, but her accent confirmed it.

Nodding and stepping over to her locker, I asked for the combination.

“39-34-04. I tried over and over.”

I got it open in one attempt.

“Thank you.”

“Of course. If you need help again, just ask.”

I asked her where she was from, and she said Russia. I asked her her name, and I heard three syllables. Seeing as it might be rude—or, rather, embarrassing on my part—I didn’t ask her to clarify what she had said.

She needed help again later that day. When school got out, we were at our lockers again and while I had already prepared my backpack for the night, she was struggling with her locker, giving it a focused frown.

“Do you need help?”

She’s the one that seemed embarrassed now. “Yes,” she said, smiling as if ashamed.

I asked her to remind me of her combination, and then opened it for her.

I felt it was long enough that I could ask her her name again.

Two syllables –za. That’s all I caught. Her name was three syllables long and ended with a –za.  She thanked me again, we bid each other a good evening, and we went our separate ways.

Bright and early the next morning, walking down the hallway, I came to my locker and she was standing there at hers, staring at her lock. She saw me and her frown turned to a smile.

“Good morning,” I said.

“Good morning.”

“Do you need help again?”

She seemed embarrassed at the word again.

“Yes, please.”

I opened her locker three times that day, and two more times the next. The last time I did it, I had her watch me and explained that to register the second number, she had to rotate the lock past the first number again before going to the second. Once she knew this, she never messed up again, and even helped another exchange student with the same problem later in the year. I managed to learn her name by the end of it all. Her name was Alfiza.