Generation Misfits

by Akemi Dawn Bowman

  Millie pressed her lips together and shook her head. “School is fine. And I did all my homework yesterday.” The homework she knew about, anyway. She couldn’t be completely sure she hadn’t missed something, but now wasn’t the time to explain that to her mom.

  Maybe there’d never be a good time. Not when Brightside was at risk.

  Jane’s gaze softened. “I’m glad to hear it.” She pointed a finger at Millie and scrunched her nose. “Just a few more minutes, okay?”

  Millie hummed in agreement, and her mom disappeared back through the doorway.

  Almost instantly, Millie’s shoulders began to relax, like she’d been holding all the tension in without even realizing it. And then her eyes drifted to the framed photograph sitting beside the computer monitor. Even though their faces were slightly blurred and brimming with youth, the teenagers in the photo were unmistakably younger versions of Scott and Jane.

  Scott was holding a flute; Jane was holding an oboe. And even in their arguably dorky and outdated marching-band uniforms, they still smiled like their faces were drinking up the sun.

  It had always been like that—Scott and Jane, the unbreakable duo. They’d been together since they were teenagers, and for most of their lives, it was them against the world. It was no wonder they didn’t understand the importance of making friends. They had been each other’s best friend since practically the beginning of time.

  Millie refreshed the forums again and again, trying to sink back into the excitement rather than the bubbling frustration behind her rib cage. It was hard, but she managed.

  When the countdown hit zero and the newest Generation Love music video appeared, Millie lost herself in the music, and the colors, and the joy from strangers all over the world.

  And for the next ten minutes, she felt like she was a part of something beautiful.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The cafeteria smelled like overcooked cheese and slightly burned pizza crust. Millie took a small bite of her slice, trying her best to pretend she wasn’t the only person in the cafeteria with an entire table to herself.

  She rummaged through her notebooks and found a pair of bright green earbuds. After putting them in, she scrolled through her most recent Generation Love playlist. There was something comforting about listening to music in a crowded room. She was still alone, but she didn’t feel as alone, and maybe that was the magic of a good personal soundtrack.

  She was about to play her favorite ballad—“Lost Star,” from Generation Love’s most recent album—when the laughter coming from a nearby table caught her attention. She looked up and saw Luna Acevedo tuck a dark curl behind her ear and lean toward her best friends, Ruby and Annabelle, the three of them looking over their shoulders at the same time before bursting into a wave of giggles.

  Millie followed their gaze across the cafeteria and saw Rainbow Chan, her oversize red glasses and argyle socks making her stand out in the crowd. She was a sixth-grade theater major, which Millie found peculiar. Rainbow seemed like the kind of person who would rather take part in a disappearing act than a stage performance.

  Millie knew her from English class—before her schedule had been switched to accommodate Wind Ensemble II. Rainbow was the first person Millie thought she might get along with, mostly because Rainbow was always so flighty and nervous. Millie thought at the very least they’d have that in common.

  But the moment they made eye contact in class, Rainbow’s face had turned a startlingly deep shade of red, and she never looked Millie’s way again.

  Rainbow shuffled through the aisle, her arms cradled around herself awkwardly and her eyes darting about like she was lost.

  And maybe she was. Because if there was one thing Millie had learned pretty quickly about school, it was that lunchtime was the one hour of the day when everyone was completely predictable. People sat at the same tables, with the same friends, eating more or less the same food. They were creatures of habit.

  But Millie had never seen Rainbow in the cafeteria before. She wasn’t even sure this was Rainbow’s lunch hour.

  “Rainbow!” Ruby shouted from a few yards away.

  The sound made Rainbow stiffen. When she looked toward the voice, her entire body recoiled. She didn’t just look lost—she looked like an animal caught in danger.

  Even though the exchange had nothing to do with Millie, curiosity got the better of her. She couldn’t look away.

  Ruby’s smile stretched across her face. “I didn’t know you still went to this school.”

  Annabelle looked smug beside her. Luna busied herself with a slice of pizza.

  Rainbow tugged at her sweater-vest, her eyes tracing the space surrounding the girls. It was obvious she didn’t want to talk to them.

  But Ruby didn’t seem to care what Rainbow wanted. “What brings you to the cafeteria? Did you finally get sick of living off tofu and rice crackers?” She smirked at Annabelle, whose laugh practically bubbled with venom.

  Rainbow shifted her weight, fingers tapping against her leg. When she spoke, her voice was barely audible above the lunchroom chatter. “I forgot my lunch at home.”

  “I’d use that excuse, too.” Annabelle snorted.

  Luna adjusted the built-in straw on her water bottle, seemingly too preoccupied to notice what was happening beside her.

  Rainbow tugged the straps of her backpack and pushed forward toward the lunch line, but Ruby’s voice stopped her.

  “You’re going to eat outside, right?” Ruby asked innocently.

  Rainbow looked over her shoulder, confusion swirling through her glazed eyes.

  “It’s just that you smell like patchouli oil or bug spray or whatever it is your parents wash your clothes with. It’s going to make everyone sick, and I mean, we’re trying to eat.”

  Rainbow’s cheeks flushed with color, and she didn’t waste a moment before lowering her head and hurrying back out of the cafeteria doors as Ruby and Annabelle laughed cruelly beside Luna.

  “Did you see her socks?”

  “She is so weird.”

  Millie wanted to turn the music up, to drown out the noise of their meanness. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t unsee what had happened, and no amount of J-Pop was going to morph the room into something other than what it was.

  The cafeteria was terrifying. How was Millie ever going to fit in? Rainbow Chan had been at Brightside Academy for years and never bothered anyone, and she was being picked on for something as minor as her lunch.

  Millie shoved her earbuds back into her bag, dumped the rest of her uneaten lunch into the trash can, and headed for her next class. She’d get there too early and would have to wait in the hall, but anything was better than having to listen to the horrible things Ruby and Annabelle were saying at Rainbow’s expense.

  But when she reached the doors, a flyer on the nearby bulletin board caught her eye. It was bright blue, like cotton candy at a carnival, with big, bold lettering.

  Do you love Japanese pop music? Want to make new friends?

  Then come and join J-Club! We meet in Room F-206 every Thursday at 3:15 p.m.

  Millie had to read the flyer three times because she was convinced her eyes were playing tricks on her.

  A club. For J-Pop.

  She felt her soul explode from her body until it was flying ten thousand feet in the air. Because this was the answer. This was going to change everything.

  All she had to do was get her parents on board.

  * * *

  Jane took a bite of potato salad. Scott reached across the table for a second helping of green beans.

  Millie stared at the chicken leg she’d mostly left untouched. She’d loved them when she was younger, but now she hated the grease and the mess. Except her parents didn’t seem to notice her face fall every time they carved a roast chicken and put the leg on her plate.

  They hadn’t noticed how much she’d changed over the years. How much she was still changing.

  And it was more than just her distaste for chicke
n legs.

  Millie shuffled anxiously in her chair, catching her parents’ attention.

  “You okay, sweetie?” her mom asked with round, happy eyes.

  “You’ve been acting strange since you got home from school.” Her dad paused. Creases appeared between his eyebrows. “Did something happen in band?”

  “No,” Millie said irritably, though she tried to hide it. It might help her cause more if her parents didn’t know how frustrated she was with them. “I—I just have something I want to ask you.”

  “Oh yeah?” Her mom’s face settled into a smile and she took a drink of water.

  Her dad chewed a mouthful of green beans, his eyes watching Millie curiously. “What is it?”

  Millie sat up straighter. “Well, you see, there’s this after-school club—”

  “A club?” her mom repeated.

  Millie flinched at the interruption, but kept her voice steady. “Yeah. And I’d really like to join. It would be perfect for me. And there’s a late bus so you wouldn’t have to pick me up from the school or anything.”

  Jane looked at Scott, who lifted his shoulders like the decision was up to her.

  “I mean, we would definitely support any extracurricular activity that would help with your studies. Or band—is this a band club?” Jane asked.

  Millie felt a tremor in her stomach. It felt like the world was a few seconds from splitting apart. “Not exactly…”

  Jane barely seemed to hear her. “Or a flute club! Do they have that already? If they don’t, I bet you could try to start something like that yourself.”

  Scott nodded encouragingly. “You kids could probably even try out for solo ensemble as a group. Along with your own solo, of course. A flute ensemble—imagine that!”

  Millie swallowed. She could imagine it, all right. The added pressure. The extra time spent practicing. And all the hours she’d have to spend with Kelly and Dia, who would probably never in a billion years agree to a flute ensemble in the first place.

  And worst of all, it felt like the complete opposite of J-Club.

  Millie bit her lip and tried to steady her breathing. “Why does everything always have to be about flute?” She could feel the weight of her dad’s disappointment already starting when he lowered his chin. Like not wanting to play the flute was hurting him somehow. Her voice cracked, but she fought to get the words out. “I just thought—if I joined a club where it wasn’t about work or a competition—maybe it would be easier to make friends.”

  Jane set her fork down and folded her hands together. “Honey, we aren’t sending you to school to make friends.”

  “Socializing is a huge part of school,” Millie tried. “And I just want to fit in.”

  “You’ll fit in by being yourself,” Jane said. Her voice was full of love, but it didn’t reach Millie through the walls of frustration and annoyance she’d been building for months.

  Millie made a face. “You don’t go to Brightside. You don’t know what it’s like.”

  Scott narrowed his dark brown eyes. “Hey. Watch your tone.”

  Millie sank into her chair. They weren’t even pretending to listen to her.

  Jane sighed and ran a finger over the silver chain around her neck. “We just don’t want you to get distracted. You’re at school to learn, not to worry about making friends. It will happen naturally; maybe even in band. Just give it time.”

  Millie opened her mouth again to argue, but she couldn’t find her words. They were probably hiding out with her bravery, which she could never seem to find when she needed it most.

  Her parents went back to their meal as if nothing had happened. Millie didn’t even get the chance to bring up J-Club, because what would be the point? They’d never let her join. It wasn’t academic enough, and it would do nothing to help with chair placements, honor band, all-state, and whatever other expectations her parents had of her.

  Millie felt her stomach knot over and over again. It wasn’t fair. She wished they cared more. She wished they could at least try to understand her.

  But neither of them could see why this was so important to her. Why making friends felt like everything.

  They believed so deeply they were doing the right thing.

  How was Millie ever going to compete with that?

  CHAPTER SIX

  “Everyone, please pass your homework to the front of the class,” Mrs. Devon said, marking the whiteboard with swooping blue letters.

  Millie looked nervously to the side, hoping her classmates would look as confused as she felt. They were rummaging through their backpacks and binders, pulling out stapled pages at almost exactly the same time. Like everything else at Brightside, they were moving too fast for her to keep up.

  A girl with copper hair tied back in a ponytail sat to Millie’s right. She seemed friendly, or at the very least approachable. It was enough to make Millie think it was safe to ask her a question.

  Leaning to the side, Millie kept her voice as low as possible. “What homework did we have?”

  The friendliness in the girl’s face disappeared instantly. “Vocab,” she replied, and busied her eyes in her notebook.

  Frowning, Millie pressed on. “What vocab? I don’t remember Mrs. Devon saying anything about an assignment yesterday.”

  “It’s on the whiteboard,” the girl answered curtly. And then she sighed, a twinge of pity in her eyes. “No offense, but we have vocab every day. It’s not that hard to remember.”

  Millie’s entire face began to boil. She could feel her classmates turning to stare. They all thought she was lazy, or forgetful, or a bad student.

  But that wasn’t it. Millie was just confused. She felt like an alien from outer space who had accidentally ended up in an earthling school. She felt like someone who didn’t understand how anything worked.

  The girl with copper hair looked away, uninterested. Because nobody wanted to be friends with the person who never did their homework.

  The whiteboard wasn’t much help either. The middle section was covered in Mrs. Devon’s neat cursive. There were some page numbers to the left—maybe something to do with today’s lesson. And on the right was a section that read Planner, with a list of more page numbers.

  Nothing said Homework or Vocab or THIS IS DUE TOMORROW. Shouldn’t something as big as a homework assignment be clearer?

  Millie’s muddled thoughts were forced aside when the boy behind her waved a stack of lined paper near her shoulder.

  “Here,” he said impatiently.

  “Sorry,” Millie mumbled, taking the pages and avoiding eye contact with the teacher when she stopped in front of her.

  “Millie, where’s your homework?” Mrs. Devon asked, her eyes peering over the top of her glasses. They felt like lasers, making Millie shrink into her chair.

  “I don’t have it,” Millie said quietly.

  Mrs. Devon shook her head and lowered her chin. “That’s the second assignment you’ve missed this week.”

  Millie opened her mouth to tell Mrs. Devon she was confused, but she couldn’t conjure up the words. Not in front of the whole classroom.

  She was too embarrassed to draw any more attention to herself.

  So Millie stared at her clasped hands in shame and waited for Mrs. Devon to walk away.

  In band, Millie could hardly focus on the notes. She kept seeing Mrs. Devon’s disapproving face in her mind, and all the students turning to stare. She was attracting bad attention, and she didn’t know how to stop.

  She’d rather be invisible than noticed for all the wrong reasons, like poor Rainbow Chan and her argyle socks.

  “It’s not that hard to remember,” the copper-haired girl had said. But she was wrong. Everything about school was hard for Millie to remember.

  Mr. Thomas tapped his baton against his podium stand. “Flutes, you aren’t quite getting this section right. Can I hear each of you play the line—starting at measure twenty-three?” He motioned toward the first chair.

  Kelly lifte
d her flute and played the line perfectly.

  Millie’s heart was caught in a storm, pounding angrily against her chest. It didn’t matter that she’d been playing the flute since she was six years old. Playing in front of people didn’t just make Millie nervous—it did something to her entire nervous system.

  Mr. Thomas nodded toward her. “Millie?”

  She placed the mouthpiece below her lip and played the line. First her fingers wouldn’t cooperate and she hit a wrong note. And then her breath quivered, causing the notes to sound weak and airy.

  She sounded like someone who could barely play the flute at all.

  “Hmm,” Mr. Thomas said when Millie finished. “Make sure you’re holding the G for the full two beats. Let’s practice that line at home, okay?”

  Millie’s cheeks burned. Beside her, Kelly and Dia snickered.

  Mr. Thomas continued down the line, and each flute player hit all the right notes in the right tempo.

  Millie wished a sinkhole would open up right below her and swallow her into the earth so she could disappear forever.

  She spent the rest of band moving her fingers over all the keys, hoping the rest of the flute section would hide the fact that she wasn’t playing a single note. It wasn’t because she didn’t know them—she could play the entire song without even looking at the sheet music. But she was distracted.

  For weeks, everything had been going horribly wrong.

  Millie was embarrassing herself practically on a daily basis. She had just proven to the entire band that she was the weak link. Most of her teachers thought she was a bad student. Nobody wanted to be her friend. And J-Club was meeting tomorrow, and Millie didn’t have permission to go.

  She felt like every door in the world was slamming in her face at once.

  And maybe she couldn’t change what people already thought about her, but J-Club? It was an opportunity for a fresh start with people who would understand her. Maybe they could even help her.