Trading Faces

by Julia DeVillers

  We reached the table. This was it. The moment of truth. Well, first it would be Payton’s moment of truth. I poked her in the back.

  While Payton got her schedule, I looked around. I saw Ahmad from the robotics tournament! And I recognized a girl I’d seen in the paper winning the Young Scientist Challenge. Jazmine something. Her science was pretty impressive, but I bet I could have beaten her. Gosh, I wished that the science challenge hadn’t been the same day as the spelling bee. It had looked like a blast.

  I’d never spoken to these people before. They’d always been on other school teams. They’d been the competition. That would all change this year! We were all on the same team now. This was great! I almost felt a little popular.

  “Emma Mills,” I said to the lady behind the table, after Payton had stepped away. The woman handed me my schedule and gave me directions to homeroom.

  “Let’s get to homeroom,” I said, checking the clock. We only had three minutes to get there. We could compare schedules on the way.

  “The lady said room 224 is down the hall to the left,” I told Payton, starting to head out of the gym.

  “You mean Room 220, to the right,” she said.

  What? I double-checked my card. Then I looked at Payton’s.

  “We’re in different homerooms?” I tried not to panic. “But homeroom is alphabetical!”

  We’d been split up. Okay. Okay. I’d handle different homerooms. I looked at the schedule. Homeroom was only fifteen minutes.

  “It’ll be okay.” Payton tried to make me feel better. “We’ll be together for . . .”

  I consulted the schedule. WHAT?!

  “For nothing!” I said. No classes together? “NOT EVEN LUNCH!” I wailed.

  “Did you see those twins?” some girl said. “They look exactly alike.”

  Now people were staring at us.

  “Yeah,” another girl said. “Except that one has a bigger nose.”

  Oh, boy. It was true. Payton got the nose. I got the ears. I patted down my hair to cover them.

  Clang! The bell.

  I couldn’t hear anything Payton was saying.

  “Payton, I can’t hear you amidst this chaos,” I said.

  Then I saw her hand reach out. I smiled. Our twin hand-slap. We high-fived, low-fived, bumped fists . . .

  Then I took a deep breath. We had to go. I watched Payton turn around and leave. I headed out the gym door after her.

  And turned left.

  Three

  HOMEROOM

  I was the last person, alphabetically, in Homeroom 220, which put me in the last seat in the last row. This was my favorite place to sit. I could hide from the teacher and scope out everything going on in front of me.

  But this was just homeroom, so it didn’t really matter much. It’s not like the teacher was going to call on me to answer anything I couldn’t handle.

  “Mills, Payton?” the teacher called out.

  “Here!” I said. See? That’s the kind of question I don’t mind if teachers call on me for. But usually I hate when teachers call on me. And if I felt pressured before in school, then I really felt pressure now. Because for the first time Emma wasn’t in my classes. Before, if a teacher called on me and I didn’t know the answer, Emma was always there to wave her hand around and rescue me.

  I had no one to rescue me now.

  “Mills, Payton? Mills, are you here?” the teacher was saying.

  Huh?

  “Yeah!” I said, holding up my hand. “Yeah, I’m here!”

  “Next time, please speak up when I call on you,” the teacher said. “Or you’ll be marked absent.”

  Okay, great. Apparently, I had to feel pressured even getting called on for attendance. People turned around to look at me, but they lost interest and went back to what they were doing.

  I positioned myself behind the person in front of me so the teacher wouldn’t notice me again. The girl in front of me had seriously great hair. I thought my hair was shiny, but hers was like a shampoo commercial. It was long, and razor sharp at the ends.

  The girl turned around and passed back an envelope with my name on it.

  “Thanks!” I said with what I hoped was a friendly but cool smile that would lead to her introducing herself. We’d talk a little bit, walk to our next class together, date best friends . . .

  The girl turned back around.

  Or she could turn back around and blow me off.

  I busied myself opening the envelope. It had my locker number in it, 33638 and my combination, 18-25-22. Great, because I seriously needed to put my things in my locker. I hoped I had time before my next class.

  I pulled out the school map and my schedule. I was in luck! My locker was in this hallway, and so was my study hall!

  Study hall being first was excellent, because I could do any last-minute homework. And even more excellent, PE was last! That was major—I wouldn’t have to feel sweaty all day.

  I looked at my locker combination: 18-25-22. There was no way I’d remember that. I’d write it somewhere I wouldn’t lose it, like . . . um, not on my hand . . . on my shoe. I took out a gel pen and wrote it along the side of my flip flop: 18-25-22.

  I stuck my foot out to check it out. But I accidentally kicked the tote bag of the girl in front of me, and my flip-flop flew off.

  The girl turned around and looked at me.

  “Um, sorry,” I said. “I’ll just pick that up.”

  I leaned over to grab my shoe.

  “That’s cute,” the girl said. She looked me up and down. “And that’s a cute skirt, too. Where did you get it?”

  Well. Actually, I got it after I swept our cabin like Cinderella, but I didn’t think that was the right response.

  “It’s from a boutique in New York City,” I told her.

  The girl nodded. She didn’t turn back around, so I took the chance.

  “I’m Payton Mills,” I said. “I’m new and—”

  “Excuse me,” the teacher’s voice rang out. “This is homeroom, not a chat room. Enough talking, girls in the back.”

  The girl in front of me whipped her head back around.

  “Sorry, Mrs. Galbreath,” she said sweetly.

  Great. My first attempt at conversation with someone who looked remotely cool, and I had to get her in trouble. Now she’d probably never speak to me again, and—

  The girl smoothed her hair with her hand. And a note dropped onto my desk.

  Don’t let Mrs. Bad Breath get to you. My sister had her and said she’s evil. Destroy this. —S

  Mrs. Bad Breath. Heh. I smiled. If she really wanted nothing to do with me, she wouldn’t have passed me a note, right? That was promising. I ripped the note up into teeny pieces. And I got ready to write her back. What should I say that would be cool, but not trying too hard?

  Bad Breath! Ha! That’s funny!

  No, that was stupid.

  I’m new and don’t know anyone—

  No, too desperate.

  “Class, I need to step out for a moment,” Mrs. Bad Breath announced. “Sit quietly and behave yourselves.” She went out the door.

  “Party time!” some guy called out.

  Everyone started talking noisily.

  “So.” I cleared my throat to talk to the girl in front of me. But I didn’t have a chance.

  “Sydney!” Some other girl slid out of her chair and perched herself on the girl’s desk. “What do you have next period?”

  Suddenly there were girls surrounding the desk in front of me.

  “Sydney, I looove your bag,” another girl gushed. “It’s so fabulous!”

  “Syd!” some guy called out from the other side of the room. The girls all squealed and ran over there. I watched Sydney hug him.

  I looked around for someone else to talk to, but the girl on my other side was talking to someone else. The guy on my other side had his head back. I think he was asleep. I leaned down and pretended to be engrossed in the contents of my tote.

  My bag was
stuffed full. I had a lunch box in there. Inside my lunch box was a paper bag full of food. That way, if everyone looked like they carried lunch boxes, I was good. But if everyone had paper bags, I’d junk the lunch box. I also had a few dollars in case it was cooler to buy hot lunch.

  I also had stuff to decorate my locker with. I was seriously excited to finally have a locker of my own. I was ready for a serious locker makeover. Emma had made fun of me.

  “What theme is your locker going to be?” I’d asked her.

  “Theme?” Emma said. “How about gray and metal?”

  “No,” I said. “The inside. How are you going to decorate it?”

  “A locker is a place for storage of serious academic materials,” Emma replied. “Decorating it is a distraction.”

  She was crazy. My locker would be like my own room at school! My own little piece of the world! I was going to make it mine!

  My locker theme was sheer genius. I’d thought of it at camp. The fashionista girls in my bunk would get these packages from their parents with new clothes in them. The shopping bags the clothes came in were so cool—light blue, chocolate brown, black and white . . . So I’d asked them if I could have them.

  I’d cut up the cutest bags and was going to stick them as a collage on my locker. I’d also brought:

  A light-up mirror with a pink boa frame

  A little pink holder for lip gloss, breath mints, and perfume spray

  A beaded curtain just like I had in my room at home, but mini-size

  Cute little magnets

  A picture of me and Emma on the first day of camp. I was going to leave some space for new pictures—hopefully ones of me and my new friends from school!

  I also had some other stuff at home on standby—for Emma’s locker. Once I found out where her locker was and snagged her combination, I was going to sneak in and decorate it for her! I know she said she didn’t want to, but I was sure once she saw mine she would change her mind.

  “ . . . Max is looking hot!”

  I looked up. Sydney and the other girls were back.

  “Ew, he’s all yours,” Sydney said. “He’s so sixth grade. I’m looking for something new, fresh, you know?”

  I tried not to look obvious as I watched Sydney and the other girls talking. I wished I had a group of friends that would be all excited to see me. I thought back to my friends from my last school. They’d been my friends for a long time. But even then things felt like they were changing. I hadn’t told anyone, but I didn’t feel like I fit in.

  I wondered if I could find a place to fit in here. I wondered if Sydney would be interested in a new, fresh friend. Like me.

  “I can’t believe I’m only in one of your classes, Syd,” a girl sighed. “At least we have Science together. We can be partners!”

  “Wait and see,” Sydney said. “If Jazmine James is in there, I’m ditching you. Last year she was my science fair partner and totally annoying but did all the work. Easy A.”

  I wondered if I should tell her to keep an eye out for Emma. Emma had won our school science fair and would have gone all the way to state, but it was the same day as the state spelling bee, which was in our town. So my parents thought it would be easier to go to the bee. Even though we’d have gotten a free overnight at a hotel for the state science thing. With a pool and a hot tub . . .

  “Bad Breath is coming!” someone hissed, and everyone scrambled back to their seats.

  I fastened my tote bag and tried to memorize my locker number. 36—no wait, 306 something . . .

  Clang! The school bell rang once. Okay! I was ready to get to my locker! I stood up and picked up my tote bag. Then I noticed I was the only one standing.

  “It’s just the warning bell,” Sydney turned around and whispered to me.

  Oh. I sat back down. But Sydney didn’t turn back around. She looked me up and down.

  “Let me see your skirt,” she whispered.

  I leaned out of my chair and showed her.

  “Sweet,” she said.

  Sweet! She said it was sweet!

  “Let me see your shoes,” she said.

  I held out my foot. I felt like I was being inspected. Would I pass? Would I fail? Sydney gave me a long look but didn’t say anything. How could I keep the conversation going?

  “I like your shirt—,” I started to say, but—

  Clang! Clang! Clang!

  Everyone jumped up and went for the door. Sydney stood up and smoothed down her hair. Then she was swallowed up in a crowd of people. But before she disappeared, she turned around and waved at me.

  I grinned. I picked up my tote bag and went to find my locker.

  Four

  HOMEROOM

  I was the first person, alphabetically, in Homeroom 224, which put me in the first seat in the front row. The front row is my favorite place to sit. Preferably in the center seat, where I could focus on the teacher and the board. Plus, the teacher couldn’t miss my hand waving to answer the questions, tee hee!

  But this was just homeroom.

  “Mills, Emma?”

  “Here!” I raised my hand and smiled at the teacher. Sure, it was just homeroom. But it was always smart to make a good impression. The teacher didn’t look up from his attendance sheet.

  “Milton, Samuel?” he said.

  Obviously not impressing the teacher, I lowered my hand and turned off my smile.

  Then someone tapped my shoulder.

  “What locker did you get?” a girl with reddish hair asked.

  This was it! My first middle-school social interaction!

  “Number 33639,” I told her. “Isn’t that cool? All the digits are divisible by three.”

  The girl gave me a weird look and turned to the girl on her right.

  “Did you see Luke and Bryce in the hall?” Reddish-head said to the other girl.

  “Yea. Sooo cute,” the other girl responded. “Did you hear Luke and Raiya broke up at the pool? I’m so going after Luke.”

  “You wish,” Reddish-head said. “He’s so out of your league.”

  I tuned out. I missed Payton. Why wasn’t she here in the seat behind me, like I’d planned? I stared ahead, and heard the voices of the class talking behind me. Were they talking about me? Were they saying, What a snob; she won’t even turn around?

  I could do it. I could do it. I forced myself to smile, and I slowly turned, this time to the left. A boy with brown hair was talking to the blond boy behind him. They ignored me. I glanced around, still grinning like an idiot. Nobody even acknowledged my presence. I whipped my head back around and faced front again.

  Payton would tell me to chill out. I took a deep breath. I had more important things to do than chat right now, anyway. Like organize. I had my schedule now. Yay! I opened my backpack and took out my organizer and binder. I neatly placed my schedule on the desk beside them.

  Science was first! I woo-hooed silently. That would start the day off with a bang. I placed my green folder (Science was always green) into the first slot of my case. I closed my eyes and pictured the science room. I was sure science in middle school would be in a real lab. Test tubes, measuring scales, safety goggles. So fun.

  “Excuse me?” The boy turned from my left. Was he talking to me? I opened my eyes. He was! Oh, jeez. Did he think I was sleeping? That was embarrassing.

  “You dropped your schedule,” he said, handing me my paper.

  Oh, I must have knocked it off my desk.

  “Don’t want to lose your schedule,” he said. “That would be a nightmare; you’d have no clue where you were supposed to be.”

  “Oh, I’d know. I have it memorized,” I blurted out.

  “Already?” he said. “So then, what do you have fourth period? No peeking.”

  “English/Language Arts,” I said, confidently. “Burkle, 266.”

  Oh. Burkle. As in Mrs. Burkle from the hallway outside the janitor’s closet. Well, being in her class would give me a second chance to show how wrong her first impression of
me was. I looked at the boy on my left.

  “Next question?” I said.

  “Seventh period,” he challenged me.

  “Spanish Two, Kane,” I said.

  “Man, you’re good,” he said. “How about third period?”

  “Lunch,” I said. “Cafeteria, of course.”

  “I have third-period lunch, too,” he said. “What a joke.”

  I looked at the boy. I suddenly realized that he had nice green eyes. And that he was a boy.

  When I got around boys, it was usually like my mouth had a mute button. I opened my mouth to say something else. I looked at his green eyes and . . . nothing came out. I felt my face turn as red as my folder. Red = Social Studies. I turned back to my binder and popped the red folder into slot two.

  The boy started talking to someone on his other side.

  Well, three sentences spoken out loud to a boy. That was practically my record!

  Yellow folder, ELA . . . PE? Don’t even think about that one. . . . Moving on to study hall . . . always good for doing extra-credit assignments. Then it hit me. What the green-eyed boy had said. Third-period lunch? Third period was at 9:23. I had to eat lunch at 9:23 in the morning? Lunch?

  The warning bell rang once. Oh no, only three minutes before homeroom ended. Lunch at 9:23 in the morning was almost as bad as Choir 2. I didn’t sign up for Choir 1 or 2. This mathlete doesn’t sing. I’d have to get Choir changed.

  Next, Spanish. White. Blanco. La folder into el file. Finally, Math.

  math math math math math math math math math math math math

  I tenderly tucked my turquoise-blue folder into the last opening. Why turquoise? Because this summer at camp Payton had informed me that “To form separate identities, we needed to be seen as separate people.”

  “Payton,” I’d said. “We’re identical. Not Siamese. What are you talking about?”

  “Signature colors,” Payton said. “Mine is hot pink. What’s yours?”

  I knew Payton wouldn’t drop the subject until I chose a stupid color. She got really stubborn about her crazy ideas. “Gray,” I told her.

  “You can’t have gray!” she squealed. “It’s so blah! So nothing!”