Five minutes later, hair in something of a ponytail, and I was geared to leave.
“You don’t have to rush,” Paige said as she smeared purple eye shadow on her lids.
“I know.” I refused to bounce in my step.
Messenger bag, check.
Tablet, check.
Wait, did I charge it? I rummaged into the Academy-provided bag. Check. Full charge.
Water bottle, journal, notebook, and a few pens…check.
“You don’t have anything else you want to do?” Paige set her eyeliner down and checked her watch. “We still got time.”
“Are you suggesting I do something here?” Jeez. I had this stupid uniform on—which was more comfortable than I’d thought it would be—shirt tucked in and all. What else was there? Besides, I was kinda hangry for breakfast.
“Well, you know.” She shrugged and turned back to the mirror to study her purple makeup. “I mean, Flynn’s in half your classes.”
I closed my naked, un-makeup-caked eyelids and groaned. “So?”
“Just saying.”
I crossed my arms and narrowed my eyes at her. “Just saying…?”
She pulled her lips in and smiled. “Nothing.”
“I’m not here to flirt with boys, Paige.”
“I can tell.” She stood up and grabbed her bag from her desk. Good. If she could tell I meant business, as in straight-A business, then maybe everyone else would as well. Teenage crushes did not apply. Ha. As if I’d ever have that problem. Only normal teenagers had time for that.
“Are you?” Was Paige going to be another Sabine?
“Nah. It’s not like they’d even notice me, anyway.”
Gosh. Insecurity? This early in the day? Normally, that was my job. Still, I had to say something wise. “Well, good. If you had boys chasing you…you’d be too distracted from getting good grades.”
Paige’s smile was back to her usual full wattage. “Maybe.” She led the way to our door and faced me. “Ready?”
I nodded, and we were off.
Paige and I didn’t have homeroom together, but Sabine and I did. She barely glanced my way, and I took that to mean she didn’t want to be associated with me. No different from home. Okay. Carry on. Still, I wondered how she was faring over in her house. Just curiosity. That was all.
Mrs. Kelling led our homeroom, which reiterated all the facets and guidelines we were supposed to have absorbed from reading the etiquette handbook the night before. As with the uniforms, we were expected to present ourselves professionally, with polite manners, and deference to our superiors.
At least we don’t have to curtsy.
From there, I was too rushed and anxious with first-day jitters to truly slow down enough to even notice my surroundings.
Mr. Chan, with omigod-so-awful coffee breath in Biology.
On to Miss Comeau in Dendrology. She only seemed about one hundred years old.
Then Mrs. Dutra with Weather Studies. I ended up seated next to Flynn because I’d gotten lost on the way there and was late. Which, by the twist of his smirk, he found hilarious.
Next, a spirited young man named Mr. Souza for Latin.
Mr. Alwin for Botany.
Over to Mrs. Possolo for Gym.
And on.
And on.
And on.
I could barely keep up with the instructor names and class titles, and for not a couple of moments, I wondered how I was supposed to balance such a long day of material. I guessed that was one more way that a private academy could be tougher than ordinary schools—longer days since we were always there.
The brightest parts of my taxing agenda were Reading and Linguistics. These were almost treated as electives. Mandatory, but all at your own pace. Books were electronic, and the work related to them was also virtual. What an innovative way to knock those standard classes out of the way outside of the normal hours of classes.
After the third day—the first day I’d managed to find the cafeteria and still have enough time to eat something for lunch with Paige—I was exhausted. Perhaps it was still the newness of the place and having to adjust to so many life changes, but that night after dinner in the dorm’s cafeteria, I lay down on my bunk and sighed heavily.
“What’s that for?” Paige asked from her bed below me. She’d been plugging away at a Bio assignment, her mechanical pencil clicking as she thought out answers.
“Tired, I guess.”
I was ready for a good night’s sleep, but it wasn’t all that was tying up my mood. As much as I didn’t want to dub it homesickness, I felt a little adrift. This was the first time since we’d left Coltin that I’d had a chance to truly stop and think, feel a little.
What’s Dad doing?
Is he eating enough? Will he be able to afford enough food without my help? Well, he should, because Sabine isn’t there to demand all her junk food.
I hope Susan’s all right at the shelter. Wonder if they replaced me. God. Darren. What did he think when Sabine just up and left him?
More than anything, I felt…disconnected.
“Come on, tell me what’s wrong.” Paige stood and propped her chin on the edge of my bed. She must have been standing on the frame to her bed because she was just that short to reach me up here. Brown eyes blinked at me, concern flickering across her face in the absence of her usual smiles.
“I miss—”
“Home?” Paige smacked her palm on the bed. “I knew it. But what about Sabine? Doesn’t having your sister here help?”
“No, and I hardly see her.”
She huffed. “You’re in the same classes.”
“Only a couple. Besides, we’re better off when we…avoid each other.”
Paige crossed her forearms on the bed and rested her chin atop them. “Don’t get along?”
I shook my head.
“I’m an only child.”
“Lucky you.”
She smiled a little then. “You missing your old place, then? Your parents?”
“Our home was nothing special, and it’s just my dad. I’m sure he’s staying busy. It’s just…”
“What?”
I sat up and swung my legs over the bed to dangle my feet midair. She reared back to face me.
“I miss…the animals.”
Paige deadpanned. “Excuse me?”
“The animals.” Sheepish, I shrugged and rubbed my hands on my thighs.
“Like pets?”
“No, no. We never had any. No room in the trailer.” But the last animal I’d interacted with was a three-legged poodle at the shelter in Coltin. It was the final dog I’d dealt with on my last shift before I walked home and met Mr. Suthering. I hardly saw any wildlife around campus. Maybe it was too cosmopolitan for critters. “I used to work at the animal shelter.”
“Right!” Paige nodded then, like a world mystery suddenly made sense. “The dogs you helped rescue in the video.”
“Yeah.” I folded my hands together, feeling silly to admit I missed them. “I just…I miss them all. I’m an animal lover.”
Paige’s laugh was short and almost cocky. Like I’d cracked a lame joke. “Well, I might be able to help you there.”
“How so?”
“Come on. Animals? At Olde Earth. We’ve got tons of them!”
I gaped at her. Oh, right. “Oh. You mean the guard dogs at the dorms?” I still had yet to see them. Which, I shouldn’t. I wasn’t about to break rules and sneak out.
“No.” Paige jumped down to the ground. “Good God, girl. You’re… You’re a trip. Mom took you on the ‘freshman’ tour, didn’t she?” After her air quotes, she popped a hand to her hip.
I slanted my head to the side. “Uh, not sure what level of a tour it was.” I slid down to the carpet too. There was more to campus that I hadn’t seen yet? Other than the off-limits upperclassmen floors?
Paige snorted. “Well, technically, she showed you everything you needed to see. For now. But still, even with your…uh…well, I’m sur
prised she didn’t fudge the rules for you.”
My what? Why would I have been someone to get special treatment? “What didn’t she show me?”
Another snort-laugh. “Obviously, the animals.” She plopped into her chair and shook her head. “Underclassmen aren’t allowed to visit the Menagerie.”
“What’s in there?”
She grinned. “More like what isn’t there.”
“There are kennels here?” I sat in my chair and scooted it closer to her. Damn. Of course, Olde Earth would have animals. If they were so heavily focused on the sciences, they’d have animals somewhere here! Mr. Suthering had mentioned field cases, after all. Excitement and a sense of returning home bumped up my excitement.
“Yeah, yeah. We’ve got dogs. Kennels and the usual boarding rooms for smaller species.”
Smaller? What larger things could they have? “Stables?”
A nod. “The deeper wings of the Menagerie are heavily monitored. Only upperclassmen get in there. So I’ve heard.”
I leaned back, a stupid smile on my face.
“Maybe I can sneak you in to see the horses.”
Stupid smile, meet idiotic grin. Horses. I’d never had many opportunities to work with them, and Coltin’s animal shelter wasn’t exactly equipped for equine care. But, boy, oh, boy. Horses! “You can?”
“I said maybe.”
“Ah. The curfew guards.”
She looked up at the ceiling in a decidedly not-innocent way. “Maybe I know a way around them.”
“Oh?”
“But I’ve got this Latin quiz tomorrow and a Bio sheet to do. Not tonight.”
I’d already done my homework, but I could get ahead on reading. And laundry. “Tomorrow?”
Paige stood then and glanced at our closed door. “Tomorrow. And you can’t tell a soul.”
I nodded. A secret? Puh-leeze. Keeping them was my specialty. “Not a soul.”
“Wait!” Paige winced. “Tomorrow night won’t work.”
“How come?”
“There’s something I’ve gotta do with my mom.”
Huh. That was odd. They both lived here and had their jobs to do. Her as a busy student and Ethel in the library. Maybe it was some kind of family tradition? Dinner?
“The next night,” she added. “I promise.”
Hey, it could be like an early birthday adventure! I’d turn fifteen in only three days.
“Deal.”
Chapter Ten
With the promise of Paige showing me the stables, I was too excited to sleep well that night. Crappy news for my mood the next morning, but I was able to stay wide awake and get way ahead in my Reading assignments, plus some Botany homework.
Classes seemed to drag on throughout the morning, and it was soon time for lunch in the cafeteria. Getting to the huge dining hall the day before had been a fluke accident. Today, though, I knew where I was going and snagged an empty table before students trickled in. The low quiet in the cafeteria quickly escalated into a roar of many conversations all at once. With the noise, my anxiety returned.
So far, I hadn’t needed to truly interact with my peers and classmates. The way the campus, houses, and coursework were set up, I had low chances of running into exactly the same faces throughout the day. Flynn and Paige were repeats, but I didn’t mind them. Being in a general space like the cafeteria, though, with a lumped-in population of all of us hungry students, I felt the old fear trickle in and take over.
Were they going to know I was an outcast?
Did they know I’d basically been admitted to a psych ward?
Would they laugh and know I wasn’t normal?
Were there really royals and celebs walking these grounds?
I’d never paid attention to media and current culture. I wouldn’t be able to spot a prince or a toad regardless. Everyone looked the same in these uniforms. Guess that’s the point.
Sabine’s face popped through the incoming traffic to the cafeteria and I groaned to myself.
Had she already spread rumors about me?
To my surprise, she made a straight path for me. Paige was at her side, and that relieved me a little. She’d be in my corner, right? We were practically sisters as roomies, according to her math. Paige, as my fake sibling, was preferable to spending time with my real one.
“Hey!” Paige hurried forth and slid onto the bench next to me. “God, Souza just would not dismiss us from Latin earlier, huh?” She slumped and rested her head on my shoulder like she was defeated.
“You getting anything to eat?” Sabine said as she sat on the bench opposite us.
No hello. No sign of inquiry about my wellbeing.
Should I ever expect anything else? I shrugged. “I was thinking about grabbing a tray.”
“Then while you’re at it, get me a salami and prosciutto sub. No olives. Extra cheese.”
“That sounds good,” a guy said as he approached the table.
I glanced to my right and saw not just Flynn coming to our table, but also a redheaded boy. He had to be a freshman, too, if he was in the cafeteria with us now. While Flynn was busy scouting out the line and narrowing his eyes in the direction of the menu on the wall, this new guy offered a smile and wave for me. “Hey, you’re Sabine’s sister.”
Oh. God. Here we go. The way I was always referred to. Sabine’s sister. Sabine’s twin. Sabine’s crazy relative. Never just me.
I checked a quick glimpse at Sabine only to see her scrolling down on her tablet.
“Yep,” I told the guy.
“I’m Lorcan.” Another wave. It was almost cute, like he wanted to please me with a welcome of over-waving, as if I’d missed the first one. Or maybe he was nervous and didn’t know what to do with his hands.
“Layla,” I said and gave him a single wave. Heck, I was nervous with a cute boy’s smile directed straight at me, but my furious blush burning my cheeks did a dandy job of showing that.
Flynn sat then and folded his hands on the table. “He’s my roommate. You getting anything to eat? I can get a tray and grab it all if someone else does tomorrow.”
Was he ever not in a rush to get to it? He’d just gotten here. Lines were barely forming. Then again, he could simply be hungry too.
“Uh, just a chicken salad for me. Thanks,” I said.
“That’s it?” He smirked at me.
What was wrong with a salad? Jeez. I could eat whatever I wanted to. Chicken was tasty.
“Layla likes ‘clean’ food.” Sabine didn’t even look up as she spoke, quoting her fingers in the air.
“Well, I wouldn’t want dirty food either,” Paige said. Lorcan joined in her laughter.
“I can be a health nut sometimes…” I tugged at my earlobe.
“All the time.” Sabine set her tablet aside and sighed as she faced us. “She can’t risk even a dot of grease because she’ll explode in zits.”
How nice and relaxing these past days had been.
“I’m just going to hit the vending machines.” I stood to leave, already knowing how this number would pan out. I’d get more and more humiliated, and with the increasing redness of my skin, Sabine would get nastier and nastier. I’d long since refused to cry in front of her, but it was no fun just sitting there and taking the torment.
“Vending machines?” another new voice said as it neared. “Nah. That crap is probably stale.”
Standing, I was nearly at eye level with another stranger. I’d seen him in several of my classes, but I had yet to meet him. Impossibly thick black hair covered his head, and his light blue eyes were like lasers on me. I thought Flynn had an intense and confident air. This boy’s gaze was cocky and too probing. “I’m Ren.”
I nodded. “Layla.”
“I know.”
Um, awkward? None of our instructors had done the stupid let’s all stand up and introduce ourselves routine during our first day.
Did he know me because of that video? I still had yet to look at it, to see how my so-called fame could have
such far reach to faculty and students way out here at the Academy. Especially with the encrypted communications between Olde Earth and everywhere else. While we could get on the internet and all that it held, contributing to it was carefully safeguarded and tracked. We had signed those NDAs. Turned out it meant we were free to look at the rest of the world, but we were limited from making any true, live-time comments or virtual actions about it.
He sat to the right of where I’d been seated. “Come on, sit. You’re in the Green House? Like Flynn?” He gestured a finger to Flynn and flicked his head to toss his too-long hair back. I had yet to see him truly smile, and for that reason alone, I wanted to tread carefully. Well, the lack of warmth and him knowing where I slept at night. Sorta creepy.
Were house assignments common knowledge or something?
I glanced down at my uniform. Ah. Idiot. I had green on my tie, and he had… I looked closer. He had blue stripes within the gray. So Sabine’s house. I wondered what the colors signified. I bet Paige could explain.
“Ren, do you want anything to eat?” Paige asked. “Flynn’s about to get a tray for all of us.”
In a flicker of movement, Flynn frowned at her announcement. What, he didn’t like being dismissed?
“No, I’m good.” Ren patted the seat I’d vacated. “Come on. You’re not leaving, are you?”
Actually, I had been planning on ditching this crowd—or at least Sabine. Specifically, Sabine. I glanced at Flynn and found him studying Ren. Hmm. Was there some kind of antagonism there? From what I could tell, Flynn was direct. If he had an issue with Ren, I’d imagine he’d just come out and say it. Perhaps it’d be more entertaining to stay.
“Okay.” I lowered back to my seat.
“Hey,” Sabine called out. “Aura, over here.”
A tall redhead with curves came over to our table at my sister’s call. This gal wore a blue tie as well. Seemed Sabine hadn’t wasted time finding friends.
“Hey there yourself, roomie.” She grimaced. “I’m starving.” She plopped her bag to the table with a thud and shook out her hair, letting the long locks dance over her shoulders. Some smacked my forehead. Was she practicing modeling? Check your blind spots.
Secrecy: Olde Earth Academy: Year One Page 8
