Some other kids turned around to say hi to me then. A girl named Hannah with blue stripes in her long golden hair. A guy named Ryan who looked like a jock with glasses. Danielle, who had super short brown curls and big hoop earrings. I introduced myself to all of them, but any real chitchat was cut off when the bell rang and Mr. Ciullo took attendance. He seemed like a nice enough guy, cracking some pretty awful dad jokes as he checked us all off and gave us first-day instructions. These essentially boiled down to get to class on time, don’t be a dick and remember that any and all cell phones spotted out during class would be confiscated until the end of class per school policy. They could, however, be used to take pictures of boards and homework assignments at the end of class, but had to be put away at the beginning of the next class. They were also allowed in the halls between classes and at lunch.

They were really explicit on the phone thing. Almost as explicit as they were on the fact that Friday we’d have what-to-do-in-case-of-a-school-shooter practice during our first two periods. They didn’t mention shooters, instead saying “standard safety procedures” but this was not my first time on the high-school-panic-button bus.

Beware white dudes with guns, rehearsal at seven thirty.

The bell rang and I headed off for my first class, Advanced Placement English, hoping I’d read enough of The Grapes of Wrath on my skim to be able to talk about it. They’d assigned it and The Great Gatsby as summer reading for the AP curriculum, but unlike other kids who’d had months to get through the slog of old-timey words, I’d had less than a week. Gatsby had been easy enough, but I was so depressed a third of the way into Grapes, I’d done myself the service of reading online talking points and watching the movie with Henry Fonda.

This had been before the great baby blowout, so Mormor had been more than happy to be my copilot on the viewing. Too bad she’d talked through the whole thing, so my only takeaways were something-something-Rosasharn and everything sucks forever because Dust Bowl.

These thoughts plagued me as I got lost in the hallway on my way to my first class. I was spinning in a circle, frustrated I couldn’t figure out the layout when everything was so plainly numbered, when Leaf came gallantly to my rescue.

“Where to, Serendipity?” He said my name like he was making music, exaggerating the syllables and playing with sound. It made me smile despite my usual knee-jerk reaction to correct him that it was Sara.

“Uhhh, Mrs. Weller’s class? 233?”

“This way, down around the corner,” he said, plucking at my backpack strap and leading me down the hall.

“Thanks. Appreciate it. Being the new kid sucks.”