EMILY DICKINSON
My mother lost her mind today, and I’m going to prison.
Some people call it North Ridge High School, but believe me: it’s this girl’s worst punishment. I drive past it every week on the way home from my counselor’s office. Sparkly girls with sun-kissed cheeks spill out its front doors. Boys with shaggy haircuts surround them, toting lacrosse sticks, backpacks, and the occasional band instrument. They look comfortable in their skin, like they walked off the cover of Seventeen or like they’re ready to burst into a peppy musical number at a moment’s notice.
“Emilie.” My mother’s voice interrupts my thoughts, and I jump, cracking my knuckles on the passenger-side window. Shaking off the pain in my hand, I glance over at her in the driver’s seat without speaking. Her white fists clench the steering wheel. A muscle twitches in her jaw. Good. She’s on edge. She should be. She and Dr. Wellesley are ruining my life.
“Honey, please try to keep an open mind.” She studies my face. “Public school won’t be that bad.”
“The light’s green.” I point to the stoplight swaying in the breeze. Someone behind us honks, and we lurch forward. I’ve lived in Crystal Cove on the coast of North Carolina for sixteen years, and I’m still not used to sharing my home with tourists like the one behind us in the expensive convertible. Apparently, neither is my mother.
Mom readjusts her death grip, exhaling through gritted teeth. “And stop biting your fingernails. They look awful.”
Like I care about appearances when my life is crumbling around me. I chew another hangnail, wincing when a drop of blood forms at the cuticle. When Hitch paws at my seat, I unbuckle and crawl into the backseat with him. His tail swishes the sandy floor mat.
“You’re going to cause an accident,” Mom snaps.
Biting my tongue, I run a hand through the thick fur behind Hitch’s right ear. My shoulders relax a tiny bit. When he rests his blocky head on my thigh and flashes his toothy golden retriever grin, a smile tugs at the corner of my mouth.
“Dr. Wellesley has your best interests at heart. He doesn’t think homeschooling is meeting your social and emotional needs.” She sounds like a recording, repeating word for word what my therapist said less than an hour ago.
“I don’t care what he thinks.” I enunciate each word, careful not to let the emotions rising in my throat escape my mouth. I don’t mean to be difficult. Really. It’s just sometimes I feel like I’m about to explode. And with no dad, no siblings, no real friends, there’s no one else to explode on.
Hitch raises concerned eyes to my face while I rub tiny circles on his floppy ear. “I’m not going to North Ridge next Monday.” My voice cracks on the last word. So much for sounding tough.
“Yes, you are.” Mom pauses—the scary pause, reserved for when she’s reached emotional meltdown. Now she’ll either cry to make me feel guilty or switch to her serious-mom voice to pressure me into doing whatever she wants.
“Emilie, please. I only want what’s best for you.” Her eyes glisten in the rearview mirror.
Here we go. All aboard for a ride on the guilt train.
Seventy-two hours’ worth of crying, bargaining, and promising I’ll go to Harvard accomplish almost nothing. All I can do is convince Mom to send me to school on a trial basis—three months and then we’ll reevaluate. In three months she’ll probably just force me to go back, so it’s not exactly a win. But it’s a speck of light at the end of the tunnel. I’ll endure ninety days without forming attachments and prove to her that my social and emotional needs are just fine. At least that’s what I’m telling myself.
We’re back in the Honda this morning, heading south on the beach road. I study the teetering cottages to my left. Their lives are like mine. They’ve survived countless hurricanes, but no one knows if they’ll survive the next big storm. They could make it another hundred years, hunched like gnomes on the dunes with nothing to protect them but sea oats, or the next big wind gust could wash them into oblivion.
But unlike the cedar-sided shacks, I’ve got a mom to protect me. A mom who cares a little too much about my well-being sometimes. A mom who’s sending me to school today for my own good. No matter what.
“It’s going to be all right.” She nods and tucks a wisp of hair behind her ear with a shaky hand. “And we agreed to give it three months.”
Easy for her to say. She’s not the one with epilepsy. She’s not the one with grand mal seizures. She’s not the one at risk of convulsing in front of a bunch of strangers, of puking all over herself with her eyes rolled back in her head . . . or worse. For me, three months might as well be a lifetime sentence in Alcatraz.
I don’t answer. She squeezes my arm as I stare out the passenger window.
Less than twenty minutes later, she hugs me and abandons me in the guidance office. I’m like half of Hansel and Gretel, except I forgot to drop the breadcrumbs and there’s no way out. The hum of air from the ceiling vent is the only distraction in the dimly lit room as I wait for the secretary to return with a student ambassador to show me around the building.
As I pick at the cuticle on my index finger, the door bangs open. A boy with blue eyes and dimples barges in.
“You must be Emilie.” He scoops my backpack off the floor, slinging it over his shoulder as he offers me his hand. “Chatham York, at your service.”
His eyes and T-shirt match the color of the Atlantic Ocean on a cloudless day. He’s tall—really tall. I’m eye level with his chest and a shirt that reads Keep Calm. We’ve got this. It’s pretty much the exact opposite of what I feel.
“So what brings you to the Ridge?” His hand brushes my arm as he reaches for the door.
“I, uh . . .” My voice trails off. I blink, reminding myself he’s just a boy and I have bigger concerns today than melting into a puddle of goo at the feet of the first cute guy to cross my path.
He flashes me a bright smile that could be totally genuine or totally practiced. I have no idea which. The counselors probably chose him to give tours specifically because of that smile. If this were one of my favorite movies, there’d be clues to his intentions in the sound effects or the lighting or the background music or something. Here, I’m on my own—a fish out of water with no clues to guide me.
“I was tired of homeschool,” I say, because of course the first thing you should do when you meet a cute boy is lay a foundation of half-truths. I’m not about to tell Prince Charming that I’d gladly stay holed up in the safety of my own home for the rest of my life. That I’d rather hang out with my dog than my peers. That I’d rather be isolated than risk being humiliated.
He pushes open the door leading out to the rotunda. “Oh, man. I hear you.” He pauses, waiting for me to walk out ahead of him. “My mom and I would kill each other. I don’t see how people do that.”
“It’s not that bad.” I force a smile, avoiding the eyes of two perky girls hanging a banner for a canned-food drive. They watch us as we head up the right hall. The place is eerily quiet, but in less than half an hour it will swarm with hundreds of kids.
I hand over my schedule when Chatham asks for it, praying he doesn’t notice the moisture from my palm on the paper.
“Oh, cool.” He points at the second block.
The adjective cool hasn’t applied to anything in my life since my diagnosis.
I glance at the schedule clasped in his hand. He has nice hands. My stomach twists. The last real memory I have of my dad is holding his hand in the hospital before he died. Dad had good hands too—gentle but firm, with a few calluses to prove he wasn’t afraid of hard work.
Hands tell a lot about a person.
“We have second period together.” Chatham pauses, waiting for me to look up. “You’ll like Ms. Ringgold. She’s awesome.”
“Yeah?” I force what I hope resembles a smile. This guy is nice. Too nice—not at all like the guys on the mean-girl movies I binge watch.
The few students and teachers we pass greet Chatham by name. As we walk up the first hall, a girl in a strapless dress that has to be breaking every dress code known to public education stops to greet him. She glances at my face, then down at my bland T-shirt and shorts, sizing me up.
“Maddie, this is Emilie. She’s new,” Chatham explains.
“Cool. Where did you move from?” Maddie asks, her attention drifting to Chatham before I’ve ever answered.
“Nowhere,” I say to the side of her face.
Her head swivels in my direction. Now she seems intrigued. “Nowhere?”
“What I mean is, I’ve lived here all my life.”
Her perfectly tweezed eyebrows lift in a question. I answer it. “I’ve been homeschooled for a while.”
“Oh, that’s . . . interesting,” she says, clearly losing interest as she turns back to Chatham. I’ve been dismissed in a millisecond, which might be some kind of record. Obviously, I’m unworthy of her attention—not good enough to make friends and not threatening enough to be competition. Maybe the mean-girl movies were right after all. This place could be brutal.
She flips her hair, smiling up at Chatham. “Don’t forget you promised to help me set up for the debate tomorrow.”
“Got it.” He smiles back. It’s like he’s the sun. He’s this bright ball of light at the center of his own universe, and everyone’s drawn to his energy. I just met him, but somehow I know that if I’m not careful, I’ll be sucked into orbit too. As tempting as it feels right this second, I know better than to let it happen. If Chatham, or anyone else here, gets too close, they’ll learn my secret, and I’d just as soon keep my skeleton locked securely in her closet.
Maddie’s agenda settled, we head farther away from the counseling office. Chatham points out my second- and third-period classrooms, which are still dark. Then we double back to the next hall.
“Swimming’s not on your schedule, but we have the best indoor pool in eastern North Carolina,” he explains, pointing to two sets of double doors at the end of the hallway.
“Really?” I say, trying to sound casual. I want to run. Me and water don’t mix.
“You’ve got to see it.” He swings open one of the heavy metal doors, waits for me to pass, then points toward the pool. “I’d swim every day if I could.”
I should keep my mouth shut, but I don’t. “Why can’t you?”
“It’s complicated.” His smile flickers. “I’m focusing on basketball. It’s a time thing.” He shakes his sandy-brown hair out of his eyes, his lips pushed together in what I think is supposed to be a smile.
A wave of chlorine fumes invades my nostrils, and I bite my lower lip. I know I’m supposed to be impressed by the high ceiling and the wall of glass spanning one end of the pool. But I can’t focus with the humid air filling my lungs. I’m suffocating.
“Nice,” I say, rubbing the back of my neck, trying to listen to what he’s saying about the locker rooms to our right. When I glance in that direction, I spy the high-dive platform and shiver. In addition to my phobia of drowning, I have a pretty serious fear of heights.
He glances at his watch, stepping away from the pool. “The first bell’s going to ring in a few minutes.” He opens the heavy door, and we step back into the hallway. “We better hurry.”
Cool, dry air brushes my cheek, and I remember to breathe as we move back toward the main hall, where he shows me the cafeteria and media center. The library is a bright spot on the tour, with floor-to-ceiling wood shelves and leather-like armchairs. It’s not Starbucks, but someone’s gone to a lot of trouble to give it that feel, and I’m thankful.
“What time does it open?” I ask, formulating a hideout plan for the time between drop-off and first bell.
“Seven thirty, I think.” He leads me back to the counseling office where we started, pointing to my first-period class on the way. “So that’s the grand tour.” He pauses, handing me my backpack. “You know where you’re headed, right?”
From what I’ve seen, the high school is easy to navigate. Four long hallways branch off at angles from the center of the building—one for English and history, one for science and math, one for elective classes, and the one I most hope to avoid that leads back to the gym, weight room, and pool.
“Yep, I think I’ve got it.” I reach for my schedule. When our hands touch, I pull back and look away. “Thanks.”
With a quick good-bye, I scurry toward the room marked on my sheet, thankful for a minute to myself. I’m pretty sure I won’t be getting many of those around here.
First period is a blur. My math teacher butchers my name. I pretend to take notes for a few minutes until the intercom on the phone interrupts his droning voice. When he points at me, my cheeks heat up.
“You. Clinic.” He hangs up, turning back to the equation on his fancy Smart Board without further direction. I decide then and there that the man’s got the personality of a cranky turnip.
I close my notebook, letting my dark side bangs fall over my face. Twenty-something sets of eyes bore into my back as I exit the room.
By the time the nurse finishes interrogating me about my meds and medical history, the bell is ringing for second period. I hurry toward Ms. Ringgold’s class on the English hall, praying for a seat in the back of the room. I need a minute to decompress; I’m on sensory overload. Everything moves so fast around here. At home, it was math, coffee, pj’s, and the occasional visit from the little girl next door who likes to play with Hitch when she’s not at school. Here, herds of students stampede from one location to another on a strict schedule.
Steadying myself, I take a deep breath and cross the threshold with my pink binder clutched to my chest. When I step into the room, my world tilts on its axis. This classroom is nothing like the military-style math class I just left. Here, clumps of people stand around everywhere. Guys in skinny jeans talk to a girl with purple hair by the whiteboard. Two girls sit in the corner, their noses in books. A group of girls with the whitest teeth and straightest hair I’ve ever seen chatter in back, and Chatham sits off to the side, surrounded by laughing friends.
My heart races as I veer toward an empty seat near the teacher’s desk.
I am clump-less. Alone.
And conflicted. I don’t know whether to be ecstatic or devastated that no one seems to notice me.