by Dean Murray
Chapter 2
The sound of my alarm pulled me from an uneasy sleep, full of dreams where I was running in terror from some unseen horror. I couldn't decide whether I was happy to be free of them, or mad I had to get up.
My radio hadn't been in any of the boxes we'd unpacked last night, so I knew I'd have to get ready in silence. I forced myself out of bed regardless. Mom wouldn't be in to wake me up; she might not even be home.
It still wasn't light by the time I finished showering. The fact that my body was, at least partly, still on Minnesota time should have helped, but the morning was just as unbearable as normal.
Fighting back a yawn, I flipped on my bedroom light and examined the half-dozen boxes that might contain my clothes. I debated searching through them all, but it would just mean another fight if I did find them.
With a sigh of resignation I walked over to the chair where I'd left my selections from the night before, and pulled the faded jeans up my frail-looking legs. I finished up with a tank top, covered by a light blue blouse. All Cindi's stuff. Thoughts of her were just as dangerous as they'd been last night, but maybe I was getting a little better. Feeling like a traitor, I headed my skittering thoughts off before they could start affecting me physically, and focused on the next step in getting ready.
There was a lot more at stake this morning than last night. If I fell apart now I might not make it to school, and then I'd have all kinds of trouble calming Mom back down when she returned from wherever she'd gone.
My hair hung as limp and straight as always. No amount of styling ever made it look any better, just more contrived. Makeup was the same way. A touch here or there made me look marginally better, but I sincerely envied the girls who were skilled enough to transform their faces into something breathtaking after a session in the bathroom. Mom wasn't any help. Most days she didn't even put on mascara.
With the most depressing part of my routine now done, my mind wandered forward. It seemed only a second later that I was on the bus. I ignored the thought that Mom would be mad if she knew I'd skipped breakfast and hadn't brought any lunch. I pulled out my old, unabridged copy of Les Misérables.
Every so often I'd try to make it through Victor Hugo's weighty classic, but so far I'd never made it past Marius' introduction. Having just finished up Pride and Prejudice for the third time, I was once again due to try and make it through the written inspiration to some of my favorite music.
I hardly noticed the slow journey into town, instead caught up in a different time and place as Valjean's story started to unfold.
All too soon, the bus pulled up to a medium-sized, two-story brick building, and five kids my age stood up to leave. I followed them, my heart beating a little faster with each step. Other kids were trickling over to the door, either from one of the other two buses, or from the smattering of cars in the parking lot.
Before we'd even made it inside I'd realized just how much I stuck out. Shorts seemed to be the order of the day, knee-length khakis for the boys, and everything from mid-thigh on up for the girls. The only people in jeans seemed to be the debate-club types.
Silently groaning at my fashion faux pas, I located a sign pointing towards the office, and slipped around a couple of jocks who paused in their manly mock boxing match just long enough to check out the new girl. I silently hoped they slipped and hit each other in the nose.
I wandered down the white-walled corridor until I found another sign and turned left. There was a tall brunette already waiting, so I took a seat in one of the hard-plastic chairs. The other girl had shorts on just like everyone else, but hers were the shortest I'd seen yet. In Minnesota you could always pick out the alpha females by the length of their shorts, and this one seemed to think she was at the top of the food chain. That or a complete slut, but with her tan skin and perfect wavy hair, I figured it was probably the former. She didn't look like she had to put out to get attention.
Two minutes later, a smiling blond secretary came waddling out of what was probably the principal's office. I spent the time wondering if I should try to make small talk; the gorgeous girl spent it staring out the window.
The secretary took in the two of us, frowned almost imperceptibly at the length of the shorts and then signed a form for the other girl.
Determined to at least try and make friends, I started to smile as she turned towards me on her way out, but the expression died as soon as I met her flat green eyes. My heart immediately started to race, but she was already gone, moving with grace and confidence out of the suddenly too-small office.
I'd expected some degree of cliquishness from such a small-town, but this was bad. I'd never seen her before, so there wasn't any way it could be some kind of misunderstanding.
The secretary smoothed her blouse down over an ample stomach and smiled at me. I told myself I was just imagining that the smile never reached her eyes. She seemed to know who I was, and after identifying herself as Mrs. Pendely, proceeded to quiz me about which classes I'd been in at my last school. She stumbled a bit when I told her I hadn't enrolled in classes before moving. I didn't offer any additional information, so she tried to defuse the awkwardness by asking about electives.
I answered numbly, picking out classes nearly at random. I already knew a school this size wouldn't have anything truly interesting. I'd never been willing to dedicate the time required to learn a musical instrument. I've always been passable at drawing scenery, but anything more complicated than a stick figure gives me fits, so art was out too. Unless possibly the teacher liked Neolithic cave drawings.
By the time I surfaced from my musings, Mrs. Pendely had printed my schedule out on an ancient piece of machinery, handed me a map of the school and a locker assignment, and then dashed off a handwritten note to my first teacher.
I somehow found my first class before the bell rang. Mrs. Sorenson, my biology teacher, was a skinny old woman with curly white hair that looked like Greek paintings of Medusa. She made me introduce myself to the class and then let me slink over to my assigned seat.
I left the class even more depressed than I'd been when I woke up. I'd kind of known I'd have an incredible amount of material to catch up on from the first part of the semester. I hadn't anticipated that every other student was going to spend the class carefully ignoring me.
I'd never really fit in, but this was unbelievable. New students could always count on someone to offer to be their friends. I'd seen it a dozen times before as people had moved in. The really attractive people got drawn into the popular circles, less cool people were offered a place with the punks, the nerds, or at least with the drug users, who didn't care as much what you looked or acted like as long as you were hooked on something illegal.
I knew I had serious problems, but I didn't think they were obvious to everyone that looked at me. English was next, and odds were it would be a nearly exact repeat of Biology, possibly minus the awkward introduction.
The thin, distinguished looking teacher absently accepted my proffered form, starting a little when I didn't leave. "Right then, I suppose you need a signature?" The accent was so British I half-wanted to ask him how he ended up in Sanctuary.
I nodded, scanning his desk while I waited. Whethers, Mr. Whethers.
"Right then, I believe there is a vacancy next to Ms. Samuels in the back."
People were still trickling into the room, so at least I was spared the full gantlet, but the few gazes I met were still unfriendly until I reached the last table.
The skinny-ish blond girl already at the table smiled at me as I sat down. "Hi, I'm Britney."
I didn't know what to make of her. She looked like the type who was always on the fringe of the popular crowd. She was the girl who was the first to follow whatever fad happened to be in, and the first to turn on someone if it would make her just a tad more acceptable to her peers.
I mumbled a response, something that wasn't rude, but which couldn't be mistaken as pleading for friendship. Those kinds of girls loved to l
augh at the 'poor, desperate, friendless' types behind our backs.
"You must be Adri Paige. I hope people haven't been too terrible to you."
"Adriana." I spent too much time correcting my mom. It came out a little rude. I would have tried to smooth things over but I was too busy trying to brace myself against the panic attack I was sure was coming. My vision swam for a moment, but all the practice compartmentalizing my mind seemed to be paying off.
I looked up. Britney looked a little crestfallen. She was probably deciding to ask for a different seat assignment after class.
"Sorry about that. I don't really like it when people shorten my name. Bad associations with nicknames and all that."
Britney's smile was only a pale imitation of the brilliant thing she'd flashed a few moments previously, but it signaled a willingness to try and make small talk at least.
"How did you know my name?"
"Oh, that's easy. Sanctuary is the smallest town on the face of the world. Anything out of the ordinary is instantly gossip fodder. I'll bet half the town knew you and your mom had purchased the old Anderson house before the ink was dry on the mortgage. The other half learned about it at church the next day."
I tried to smile, but I found it more than a little unnerving. Big city life hadn't been so intrusive. I hadn't even known my neighbors growing up. In Minneapolis the people you lived next to and the people you associated with were always kept properly segregated.
I tuned back into what Britney was saying just in time to answer a question with something safely non-committal. She didn't seem to need much in the way of responses to keep her talking. Probably for hours if she could get away with it.
"I'm glad you feel the same. You'd think they'd be a little more welcoming. Instead it's like they go out of their way to make sure you know you don't really fit in. We've been here a year, and I still can't get invited to any of the really cool parties."
I'd never been invited to any parties, let alone cool ones. I'd never felt the lack too strongly, but I smiled and let Britney keep talking until Mr. Whethers realized it was time to start class.
I quickly gathered we'd be reading Wuthering Heights, a prospect that both elated and disappointed me. After seeing how far behind I was already in Biology, it was nice to know we'd be working on something I'd already been through twice. On the other hand I hadn't liked the novel the first time I'd read it, and when I'd gritted my teeth and sat down for a second attempt I'd found I liked it even less. Maybe I just lacked the maturity to appreciate Bronte's so-called masterpiece, but I couldn't stand that her characters were almost all really nasty people.
I wondered what else we'd be reading. I could always ask Britney, but the odds of her knowing anything useful seemed pretty slim. When the bell finally released us from an analysis of Heathcliff's early depravity, Britney asked what my next class was.
She was elated to find we were both headed to Algebra. As we trailed the other students out of the class, I wasn't so sure I was equally enthused. Nobody had said anything to either of us. It was starting to look like Britney was receiving just as much of a cold shoulder as I was. And she'd been here an entire year.
It was bad enough not fitting in because you preferred your own company over that of your peers. It sucked a lot more when you didn't have a choice.
I tried to amuse myself by people-watching with the half of my mind that wasn't paying attention to Britney's chatter as we went back to our lockers. We passed one of those gorgeous, skinny redheads who always look good without looking like they spent much time in front of the mirror, then Britney exchanged smiles with a couple of artificial blondes. I'd seen the type before in Minnesota, girls who have a perfectly acceptable figure, but who throw money into their wardrobes, makeovers and accessories in an effort to achieve the cutting-edge look, when they'd be much better off just picking outfits that didn't try to compete with the anorexic-looking beauty queens.
A surprisingly adorable-looking nerd in jeans and a tee-shirt ducked out of our way, and I felt a pang of sympathy. He was the kind of boy Mom pointed out when she surfaced from one of her projects. She hadn't ever managed to really pique my interest in any boy, but I could see how a few years from now, he'd probably be fairly popular among college girls.
Britney stopped before one of the top lockers and started spinning the tumbler. She was still relating some story about her old school, but suddenly I couldn't hear a word.
The crowd of students had drifted to the sides of the hall, like worshipers making way for a pair of pagan gods. Even so, there still wasn't quite room for them to walk side by side. The girl was leading. Her dark, wavy hair and flawless skin would've made her pretty in any crowd, but she also had perfectly symmetrical features and one of those bodies that required hours each day in the gym to maintain. I wanted to hate her. It didn't make any sense, she could hardly be blamed for taking care of herself, but it just didn't seem fair. Simply by being in the same town as us, she automatically made every other girl in school feel like bloated, heifers. Surely she was somehow cheating to be doing so well in the subtle, nasty game in which every high-school girl ranked herself against every other female.
I probably would've spent the rest of the day depressed, but once she was out of my line of sight I was able to see the boy following her. He was incredible. Just looking at him drove every other thought out of my mind.
If the girl who'd just walked by me without acknowledging the existence of any of us lesser beings was every boy's ideal physical specimen, the boy was every girl's dream. A gorgeous fantasy breathed into life by some merciful goddess, one who wanted to give us each a glimpse of what awaited good little girls in the afterlife.
Skin that was a gorgeous shade of tan, not at all artificial-looking, disappeared into the collar of a thin, light-blue button-down shirt. The cut of his clothing hinted at designer origins, but the garment was mostly notable for the way it stretched over a pair of broad shoulders that looked like they'd been chiseled from marble, or possibly cast in bronze.
My eyes made it as far as the equally impressive chest before I forced them upwards. Anyone built like that should be ugly to keep things in balance. Not him. His square jaw and even features were nothing less than perfection. If he ever chose to model, the editors of every major fashion magazine would have pulled out all the stops to land the contract for his debut appearance. The whole issue would have to be pictures of him though. No amount of airbrushing would suffice to allow other men to ever share the same magazine with him.
I expected to begin hyperventilating any second, but my lungs seemed frozen. My body should have been screaming for oxygen. Instead every part of me was screaming for more of that divine face. He'd been looking to his left; I pried my gaze away from his profile just long enough to take in a casual tangle of dark, curly hair, and then he was turning towards me.
Vague, traitorous hopes that the other side of his face was marred with a birthmark, or a series of ghastly scars evaporated away as I took in eyes just a few shades darker than the blue of his shirt. Somewhere a cosmic force was trying to fix a pair of large, intangible scales. Scales that'd been twisted into a mangled mess and then torn into two pieces.
I'd expected the shallow, narcissistic eyes of a runway model. Instead, the eyes that connected with mine hinted at depths I'd never even imagined existed.
My lips, acting of their own volition, started to pull back in a tentative smile, but before they could complete the action, the heart-wrenching eyes narrowed. The emotions swooping across the surreal face were too quick to identify, but the way he turned slightly away as he passed all but proved they'd been a close cousin to distaste.
