Five years. And it’s still so raw.
Ms. Porter starts class as soon as we slip into our seats. While my fingers dutifully copy her notes off the board and I nod as if I’m fascinated by her insights on Thomas Hardy, my other hand is clenched into a fist in my lap.
I take a deep breath and uncurl my fingers, straighten my ring, smooth out my capris. It’s two weeks till the end of school and the last period on a Friday, so no one’s paying much attention. Ms. Porter even breaks off her lecture early and tells us to start reading the next few chapters aloud. I try to focus—turning pages when I notice the others doing so and staring at the book like the words make sense, but my mind is miles from Tess and her misfortunes.
Evy’s coming home from Glenn Mary University tonight. The relatives descend tomorrow.
“Brighton, next page.”
I blink at my book, blood rushing to my cheeks. Someone coughs. Someone shifts in a chair.
“I’m sorry, I lost my place. What page?” I squeak.
“Three seventeen.” There’s a week’s worth of exasperation in the number, and I cringe under the weight of it.
I stumble over a word, one I know. Then, like an avalanche gathering snow, my mistakes double and triple—collecting and muting me so my last paragraph is read at a whisper.
I finish to silence and stares. Even Ms. Porter has lowered her book to study me.
Amelia clears her throat. “Can I go next?” Without waiting for an answer, she starts reading.
Slowly all the eyes turn back to their books, the blood drains from my cheeks, and the clock ticks its way to dismissal.
Five years.
5
Jonah
1:24 P.M.
HOW DO YOU SAY “FIFTY MINUTES OF TORTURE” IN SPANISH?
Group work. Like we’re eight.
As soon as Se?ora Miller gets to the word “partner” in the English repetition of her directions—“estudiantes, I’m going to let you work with partners—” eyes go wide, darting around the room looking for others whose eyes are darting too. Then faces flush with relief. I wonder if they miss the rest of her directions: “—on this assignment. It’s a review for the final. Come get one worksheet per group. Pass it in at the end of the period.”
I watch their reactions but look away whenever anyone glances in my direction. I don’t want a partner, and if I make eye contact some idiot might feel obligated to ask me out of pity. The threesome on my right is looking at me and having a whispered conference. Before they can decide they’ll do me a favor and subdivide to include me, I grab a worksheet off the stack on Miller’s desk and return to my seat.
Writing “Jonah Prentiss” large enough to fill the whole name line, I scan the worksheet. It won’t be hard. Despite the boasts that “Cross Pointe is a top-tier school—our grads go to such prestigious colleges”—it’s no harder than Hamilton. The difference is the teachers here are younger, dress in labels, drive nicer cars, and spend more time coddling my classmates. I glance at the threesome, relieved to see they’ve gotten to work. The other pairs are scattered around the classroom, gossiping and occasionally jotting down answers.
Thirty-four filled-in blanks later, I stand to hand in the worksheet. I’ve checked my phone under my desk after nearly every question; it’s only five minutes to the bell and Carly still hasn’t responded to my text. Which could mean I’ve done who-knows-what to annoy her, or her phone battery’s dead, or— “Se?or Prentiss, uno momento por favor?”
I pause halfway to my desk and turn back toward the teacher.
“This looks muy bueno, but you forgot your partner’s name. You don’t want to steal all the glory, do you?” She’s smiling an overly cheerful teacher smile, expecting a chuckle and an “oops.”
I meet her eyes. “I did it by myself.”
Her smile dims a bit. “By yourself?”
“Si, Se?ora.”
“You know our school emphasizes the importance of collaborative work.”
I think: Our school? Not so much.
I say: “I know.”
She leans forward. “In the real world, people don’t work in isolation.”
I resist the urge to point out a dozen jobs where people DO, in fact, work pretty much alone: artists, plumbers, postal workers, forest rangers …
Se?ora Miller isn’t ready to let this go. She’s counting the students in the class. “There are dieciocho estudiantes in here. Even.”
The threesome is shooting dagger glances at me, daring me to rat them out for being exclusionary. About half the class watches with passive curiosity.
There’s a copy of the Cross Pointe High Educational Philosophy hanging in every classroom. I’ve spent way too many hours using it as a hypocrisy checklist for my classmates’ actions; I have the damn thing memorized, which is an advantage right now. “I thought I’d find it more personally meaningful if I worked by myself.”