by Paul Mosier
Dedication
To Harmony Sea Mosier
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Books by Paul Mosier
Back Ad
Copyright
About the Publisher
1
TODAY IS THE first day of school, and it’s gonna be fantastic.
I think this as I sit on the toilet in the second-floor bathroom of the Village Arts Academy in New York City, looking at a page in my tiny journal with a list of things to say to all my new classmates. The carefully crafted phrases on my list are sure to make me a big hit with all these new kids.
Technically the kids aren’t new. They’re just new to me. I’ve been going to public school my whole life, but now I’m starting seventh grade at this private arts academy.
I’ll make all kinds of new friends as long as I stick to the list of things to say and don’t allow conversation to stray into dangerous subjects, like money. The kids at this school generally have much more money than my family does. We can barely afford to live here in Manhattan, even though my mom is a semi-famous dress designer. The other kids mostly have rich parents who work on Wall Street. They probably all get dropped off in limousines, while our plan is for Dad to walk me to school every day.
I’m not sure why everything is so expensive in the city, because the apartments are tiny and falling apart. Or at least ours is. My dad says that the correct term for expensive and tiny and falling apart is charming. Mom seems to agree with him. I guess our neighborhood, which is called Greenwich Village, is kind of pretty with its trees in the sidewalk planters. Before Mom and Dad had me and Echo—my little sister—it probably felt much roomier. Now there’s four of us crammed into an apartment we can barely afford and which we can’t afford to leave.
Seventh grade is obviously the luckiest grade, so I’m sure that the Village Arts Academy won’t crumble to the ground, even though it’s, like, 150 years old. At least not while I’m in seventh grade, the luckiest. And there’s really nothing wrong with this school that a million dollars’ worth of disinfectant couldn’t fix. Particularly in the bathrooms. This is foremost in my thoughts as I sit on the toilet reviewing my list of things to say to make a good impression on my new classmates.
In addition to Don’t mention money in any way, my list says Don’t compliment anyone’s clothes. Everyone here wears the same uniform, so obviously that would sound stupid. And if I complimented another girl’s clothes that would also be complimenting my own clothes, which would make me sound conceited.
My list also says Don’t ask where the bathroom is. That’ll be perfectly easy to not do as I’m already here. I just need to remember how to get back once I leave. Sitting in the stall is a good place to collect one’s thoughts and gather one’s courage, as long as nobody thinks I spend too much time in here, like there’s something wrong with me or something.
It’s not that I’m embarrassed that I’m, like, a physical human being who has to use the bathroom. It’s just that in books and cartoons and movies the characters never have to pee. So it seems weird to bring it to anyone’s attention.
One of the most important items on the list is Don’t introduce yourself as Laughter, which is the actual name my parents gave me. Instead I go by “El,” as in the sound of the letter my name begins with. When other girls hear it they’ll just think my name is Elle, which immediately makes me sound like I’ve stepped from the pages of a fashion magazine, even if I’m wearing exactly the same thing as every other girl in school.
But maybe it isn’t good to sound like I’ve stepped from the pages of a fashion magazine? I turn back to an earlier entry in my tiny journal and add it to my list of things to wonder about.
Seeing Laughter on the list reminds me that I need to tell my first-period teacher that I go by my nickname before he does the roll call. I only have about three minutes before the bell rings, so I flush the toilet even though I didn’t pee, so the other girls in the bathroom won’t think I was just hanging out in the stall like it’s a magical unicorn vortex.
Before closing my tiny journal I notice that everything listed is things not to say, except Hello!
That’s easy enough to remember.
Hello!
I strike the exclamation point with my pencil so I don’t sound too eager.
Hello.
It occurs to me I’ve just said “Hello” out loud twice while looking at the list, so I now must pretend to be having a telephone conversation in the stall so that the other girls in the restroom don’t think I’m someone who sits on the toilet saying hello to herself, which apparently I am.
“Yeah, I’m at school, just getting ready for first hour. Uh-huh. Yeah. Okay. Really? No way! Yep. All right. Smashing. That’d be delightful. Okay. Ciao!”
I might have overdone it with my conversation, which is all kinds of make-believe. In my mind I was pretending to have a conversation with Maisy, my best friend from my old school and my whole life, but I haven’t actually spoken to her in weeks because she was in France for most of the summer.
Also I want Maisy to think that everything is going to be great with me at my new school, and I’ve had a hard time feeling like I could sound convincing. I’ve been really worried that I won’t make any friends, and I’m sure Maisy will be able to tell I’m worried if she hears my voice. My parents won’t even let me take my cell phone to school because they think I’m famous for losing things.
Finally I close my tiny journal and tuck it away in my shirt pocket, then wait a half minute to give everyone in the bathroom a chance to forget what they’ve just heard. I stand, straighten my uniform skirt and button-up shirt, put my book bag over my shoulder, slide the lock in the stall door, and exit with an air of nonchalance.
I avoid eye contact with the six or seven other girls chatting in front of the mirror as I wash my hands at the sink. I glance at my face in the mirror, my light brown hair and green eyes, then wipe the chocolate from the corner of my mouth ’cause it won’t do to have everyone jealous that I had a chocolate doughnut for breakfast.
Then I hurry down the hall, keeping my feet close to the wooden floors so I won’t sound like I’m running, though I practically am. Then inside room 211 and to the front of the class, where there’s a really good-looking man standing. But I don’t care that he’s gorgeous because boys don’t have any effect on me.
“Hello,” he says.
“Hello,” I say. He’s got wavy dark hair and a smiley smile. He has patches on the elbows of his sport coat.
“Are you in my first-hour class?”
“Yes,” I begin, then take my voice down a few notches. “And I wanted to alert you to a mistake with my name.”
“Oh? What mistake is that?” He tilts his head.
I lean in closer. “The record says my name is Laughter, but it’s actually El.”
“Laughter?” he asks way too loudly.
I wince. “Please just call me El when you take attendance.”
He smiles. “How about I just laugh and you can wave at me from your desk?”
I try not to smile, because he needs to know how serious I am about this.
“All right, Miss El,” he says. “Please take your seat, it
’s almost time for—”
The bell rings long and loud, interrupting him. He smiles, and I smile back, not because he’s good-looking and charming but because it’s what you do when someone smiles at you.
When I turn around every desk is taken except for one in the front row, which is exactly where I was hoping not to sit. It would be one thing if the last open seat was in the front row but nearest the door, but it’s right in the center, like I’m the hood ornament of the class.
“That one isn’t taken.” It’s a girl, smiling and pointing at the seat to her right. The hood ornament seat. I furrow my brow. I’m not sure whether she’s smiling because she’s nice or because she’s mean and fully aware that it’s the very worst seat in class.
I sit in the chair, which is connected to the wooden desk, and sink down as low as I can without drawing attention to myself.
Teacher-man turns his back to the class and begins writing on the blackboard, which may possibly be as old as this building. The chalk taps and squeaks.
Then he turns to the class and smiles. I see the name he has written on the board and my jaw drops. There’s a low murmur from the class behind me.
“Good morning, class, and welcome to seventh-grade English. My name is Mr. Dewfuss, an unfortunate gift from my ancestors, who made lives for themselves finding things to eat in the swamps of central Europe. Generally the enunciation of my name is followed by a chorus of . . .” He pauses and glances beneath raised eyebrows directly at me. “Laughter. So instead I’d prefer it if you called me Mr. D.”
He returns to the chalkboard and erases everything in his name except the letter D.
I sit up straight. This is definitely gonna be the best year ever, and—worst seat or not—seventh-grade English with Mr. D is gonna be my favorite class.
The rest of English class is pretty much perfect. We’re beginning with a unit on Emily Dickinson, who is maybe my favorite poet ever. Her poems are surprising, even when you’ve read them a million times. But I don’t let anyone in class know I’ve already read them a million times, ’cause I’m not sure if my classmates realize how cool it is that I have.
The bell rings, the class rises with the sounds of backpacks zipping and chairs and desks dragging on the wood floors. Having been totally absorbed in the discussion, I am the last to pack my backpack, the last to leave the class. I smile at Mr. D and he smiles back as I leave the room and enter the rest of the school day.
I glide down the hall past trophy cases, which don’t have figures of athletes because they don’t really do sports much at this school. So if I’m gonna keep winning tennis trophies it’s gonna have to be at the racquet club, where Mom and Dad signed me up at the beginning of summer. Instead this school has cases with black-and-white photographs of bow-tied teachers standing beside children of earlier generations who won academic decathlons and art scholarships, and trophies that have no balls or bats or racquets at all.
I catch a glimpse of an old photo showing my high-school-aged dad standing before a giant canvas with a big paintbrush in hand, looking smug, but I don’t stop to examine it. I pretend not to notice a photo of my pretty teenage mom smiling beside a dress form featuring one of her early designs from high school. I pretend not to notice these things because I don’t want to draw attention to the fact my parents went to school here, which might make it obvious they can only afford to send me here because of the discount given to legacy students. I’ve already seen the photos anyway, when I took the tour early in the summer, so I keep my nose pointed down the hall in the direction of my next class.
The rest of the day is almost perfect. Math is, like, a whole year behind what I was doing at public school last year, so I’ll be able to skate through it.
In history class we talk about the Minoan civilization, where kids our age had to survive jumping over a bull’s horns as a rite of passage. I think the teacher, Mr. Grimm, wants us to feel like we have it easy since we don’t have to jump over a bull’s horns to get a passing grade, and I’m pretty sure he’s going to try to make it as hard as possible for us. But I sit next to a nice girl named Emy, who invites me to sit with her at café fourth hour.
Mom packed the best-ever lunch, an almond butter and blackberry jelly sandwich, tahini coleslaw, and mango slices. I eat it with Emy in the basement cafeteria, which has tall windows through which you can watch the people walking by on the sidewalk. I share my mango with Emy and remember not to stray from my list of safe topics for conversation. I can expand that list after she and I have become inseparable. And when I get home I’ll call Maisy and tell her how wonderful everything is turning out to be, and how I made a great new friend, but not to worry, as Emy will never take the place of her.
In physical education I score a goal in street hockey, which we play outside on the actual tree-lined street while bright orange barricades at either end keep cars away.
In science, a dark-haired boy who would be considered cute—by girls who care about that sort of thing—keeps looking at me, which is a good thing only because it’s better than not attracting the notice of any of them. I mean, boys can’t really help themselves at this age, and being noticed by one of them means that there’s probably nothing terribly wrong with me physically.
Unless of course he’s looking at me because there is something terribly wrong with me physically. I pull out my tiny journal and find the list of things to wonder about, and add that to it. But I’m pretty sure he’s looking at me because I activated his girl-crazy radar. Boys can be so clueless they often fail to notice serious imperfections. Like one ear being way higher than the other.
I guess that’s kinda sweet of them.
One ear being way higher than the other is actually one of several items on the list of serious imperfections from which I suffer. This list is also found in my tiny journal, but I try not to spend too much time looking at it. It’s bad for my morale.
Seventh hour is art, and the teacher is a woman named Miss Numero Uno, who actually knows my dad from way back when he painted a lot. Miss Numero Uno doesn’t embarrass me too much by drawing attention to her knowing my dad. This is fortunate because she is potentially quite embarrassing, the way that artists sometimes are. She has tattoos all over her arms and black hair with frighteningly sharp bangs, and today wears jeans with paint splattered all over them so everyone will know she’s legit. She has a way of looking at you like she’s deciding whether you’d be a good subject to paint, which takes a little getting used to.
Also, Miss Numero Uno isn’t an actual name. I’m pretty sure that’s, like, an Art World name. Her real name is probably Betty Johnson or something like that. But obviously I’m completely okay with it if she wants to be called something other than the name she was given. I totally get it.
Miss Numero Uno has us do something she calls “free expression on newsprint” while she stares out the windows of the fourth floor, which is the top level of the Village Arts Academy. I draw her staring out the windows, and as I look from Miss Numero Uno to my paper and back she strikes a pose. Her profile is backlit, like the emperor Napoleon tasting victory in the painting on the cover of our history book from third hour. She just stands there holding the pose like it’s perfectly normal, even though I’m the only one drawing her and everyone else seems to be avoiding looking at her. I draw her in deep gray charcoal, and it looks pretty good.
But I start to regret my choice of subject when it occurs to me that we will be turning in the newsprint for her to evaluate. Maybe she never knew how ridiculous she looks posing against the window, in which case it’s probably not good to be the one to bring it to her attention. When I’m done I give the drawing a goofy smile to disguise the drama of the pose, and so she won’t think I’m very good. I don’t want to draw attention to myself as particularly talented, either.
When the final bell rings I already have my book bag packed and ready to go. I leave my newsprint on my table as instructed and drift out of the art room, out of the smells of clay an
d linseed-oil paint, and into the hall.
I feel dreamy. It’s been the best first day of school ever, and it’s gonna be an amazing year.
I scan the throng of students moving down the hall, down the wide stairs, down the main hall toward the front doors, but I don’t see Emy. Nor do I see the boy who stared at me in science class. But I’ll see them again tomorrow. Because this school is now my school, and these will be my classmates and friends, more and more each day.
Out the doors I go, into the warm September afternoon. Down the wide gray steps, onto the sidewalk.
My dad is standing there.
I stop cold.
“Why are you here?”
He smiles awkwardly, bounces on his heels. “Just wanted to see how your first day went.”
I frown. This is not part of the plan. He wasn’t supposed to meet me. I was supposed to walk home myself.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
My classmates stream past. A terrible feeling descends upon me, like the sky is falling.
“What?” I ask.
“Come on.” His arms reach out to me, ready for an embrace.
2
DAD STEERS ME into a fast-food Indian place a half block from school. While he’s at the counter ordering for us, I sit at the greasy linoleum table reviewing a list in my tiny journal of bad news I’m expecting to eventually hear. Because I’m more than pretty sure I’m about to hear something along those lines.
I’m a big fan of using my tiny journal to make lists. My dad says that they are my unique attempt at imposing order on a chaotic universe. By that he means I’m trying to make a crazy world less crazy. When he says universe, he holds out his hands like he’s putting the word in quotation marks, because when he says chaotic universe he’s talking about my brain.
At the top of the list is Mom and Dad are getting a divorce, though I should probably move that down the list. They haven’t been stressed out lately, and I haven’t had any friends whose parents are getting a divorce in a while. Not that other kids’ parents divorcing should make me worry that mine will, but that’s how it seems to work in my head.
