Around us, groups lock together and push upstream toward the exit like mini tornados, probably trying to get from the classroom to the library without losing any members.

“We’re really sorry, but my thesis coadvisees want to join and that would make us five,” Chad says. “You’re the only undergrad, so it’s only fair if you’re the one we cut.”

“Sorry!” Rebecca shrugs sheepishly.

I nod and say thanks anyway. Looking around the room, I count group members, looking for any that have an opening. But in a flurry of business cards and iPhones, the room has thinned. Just as quickly as it exploded with sound, the auditorium is quiet. Practically empty.

Sara is stalking a group of three headed toward the exit, yelling her high school GPA as the door swings shut in her face. She turns on her heel, her shoulders falling.

I stand in the aisle, mystified.

Braden, who has taken a seat in one of the last rows, looks up from his phone, “Well, I guess it’s just us then.”

Chapter Two

Braden

I stand slowly and make my way toward the other guy. The hot blonde is charging toward us, crossing half the auditorium in the time it takes me to move past a couple of rows.

“Sara Jones,” she says, sticking out her hand for a firm shake as if this is a job interview. I half smile in return, unable to tell yet if she is overenthusiastic but tolerable, or going to be a real pain in the ass.

She pivots to the other kid, who seems rattled by her wall of energy. “Robbie,” he responds quietly. He is broad shouldered, and definitely over 6’, since he’s significantly taller than me, and I’m exactly 5’ 10 and 3/4”.

I straighten my posture, not wanting to lose any height to slouching.

“All right then, looks like we’re a team.” She punctuates her sentence with a sharp nod and a smile.

I roll my eyes. As if we aren’t the intellectual equivalent of the last kids picked in gym.

She pulls something out of her Longchamp bag and thrusts it into my hand. I turn it over. An honest-to-god business card.

Sara Jones.

Co-Founder: EduConnect.

“EduConnect?” I look at her, studying her face closely.

“My school used that,” Robbie says, taking a card as well.

“Half the schools in California do,” I mumble, looking back at the card. I read an article awhile back about the students in some place in the Midwest, Wisconsin or Minnesota or something, who quadrupled the efficiency of their high school’s software system, then refused to sell their work, instead donating it to every school in the country. My father sent me the article. Asked why he was paying so much for my private school education when public school kids were doing that. Public school kids like my new partner, it seems.