I cling to the words “up to” in hopes that I can do the project alone, in my own group of one. Everybody else is scrambling to claim their friends and avoid being the fifth wheel. I’m just trying to hold my lunch down as Mr. Braxley reads off a list of cheerful topics like Attila the Hun and the Black Death.
“Okay, I’m going to say them again.” Mr. Braxley peers at us over the top of his reading glasses. “Raise your hand if you want the topic, and you can form a group with the others who want that topic, too.”
My heart rate has doubled at this point, and I can feel the sweat circles forming. I’ll just wait and see if there’s a topic left over. The smartest kids in the class are suddenly very popular, as everyone wants them to do all the work for their group. Nobody’s particularly excited about any of the topics. They sort of look to their friends every time one is named, and half-heartedly raise their hands.
Except Lipton. He nearly leaps out of his seat to claim the Battle of Thermopylae as his topic. Adam shrugs and raises his hand, too. Mr. Braxley looks around to see if anyone else wants it.
Lipton smiles at me.
I quickly look down, and Mr. Braxley moves on.
Lipton has a very nice smile, I realize. His teeth are straight and exceptionally white and there’s a little gap between the front two. I should’ve joined his group because now I’m going to be the only one without a group and Mr. Braxley will probably make a big deal about who needs help and it’ll be worse than if I just raised my stupid hand for the Battle of Thermopylae.
He calls out three more topics, which get taken amid nudges and hand-raising, and it’s finally down to the Siege of Jerusalem. Nobody claims it because there’s nobody left but me. Mr. Braxley looks up from his list and says, “Vicky Decker?”
He obviously has no idea who I am, even six weeks into the school year. But he at least recognizes me as the only person who hasn’t raised a hand. He lifts his eyebrows and I give a quick nod, then he writes down my name and starts telling us what we need to do for the project.
I practically go limp with relief that he didn’t force anyone to join me or take me onto their team, even though it means I have to do the entire project by myself. I’m getting used to that.
There are still a few minutes of class left, and everyone is chattering with their group members when the intercom starts crackling. A voice is trying to be heard over the noise. “Mr. Braxley? Mr. Braxley?”
In the few seconds it takes him to answer, my stomach lurches into my throat and back down to my feet again, because I suddenly know exactly what this is about. It’s almost nine thirty.
My guidance appointment was at nine fifteen.
“Could you please send Vicky Decker to the guidance office?” the voice on the intercom says.
Mr. Braxley answers in the affirmative, and then he and every single other person in the room stare at me. I don’t move. I really want to. There is nothing I want more than to be gone from this room, but I am momentarily “deer in headlights” frozen.
Finally, after what seems like hours, Jeremy Everling breaks the silence. “Frankie, you going?”
For a second I think he meant to say “Vicky” but forgot my name, but then everyone’s snickering and I realize it’s short for Frankenstein.
I really can’t move now.
Lipton reaches over from his desk and touches my arm and whispers, “Vicky. They called you to the guidance office.”
I glance at him, at his kind eyes and his badly cut bangs, which remind me a little bit of Jenna’s that first time we met. I hadn’t noticed before. And that somehow releases me from my paralysis. I nod at Lipton and begin gathering my things and everyone goes back to talking to one another. I walk to the end of my aisle and around the side and escape out the door.
“You’ve been missing some classes lately,” says Mrs. Greene. She sits at a desk, but swivels to face toward the room, which is furnished with comfy chairs, twinkly lights, and scented candles. She wears her hair in neat, shoulder-length dreadlocks, a patterned scarf wound around her neck. “I just wanted to check in with you and make sure everything’s okay.”
“Okay.”
“Everything’s okay?”
“Yes, fine.” I try to make my voice calm and unshaky, but my knee keeps bobbing up and down. I force it to stop with the palm of my hand.
“And the missed classes?” She opens a folder in front of her. “Two last week, one Monday, and three yesterday.”
“I, um, I wasn’t feeling well.”
“Did you go to the nurse?” She searches the folder for nonexistent excuse slips from the nurse.
“No, just the bathroom.”
“Ah.” Mrs. Greene closes the folder and looks at me, a warmth in her eyes. “You know, if something’s troubling you—”
“Everything’s fine.” My knee is jackhammering again. I lift my backpack from the floor and set it on my lap to weigh my leg down. “I’m fine.”
She inhales deeply. “How about the next time you feel like skipping a class, you come see me instead. Okay?”
It’s way better in here than the girls’ bathroom. But she’ll want to talk about what’s wrong with me. Or call a parent-teacher meeting. They do that sometimes. Gather all your teachers and your parents and the counselor and go around the room describing what you’re doing wrong and how you can do better. I overheard a kid talking about it once, how it was like an ambush and he just told them whatever they wanted to hear so he could make it stop.
The zombie vacuum cleaners are starting to roar in my head again, and I feel dizzy.
“Hey.” Suddenly Mrs. Greene’s hand is resting on my arm. I didn’t even notice she moved from her desk to sit in the chair next to mine. “Vicky. Breathe,” she says. “You don’t have to come if you don’t want to. It’s completely voluntary, and confidential. You don’t even have to talk.”
I nod and take a few deep breaths. “Okay. I’ll do that.” No, I won’t.
She seems satisfied and moves back to her desk to pull some papers from her file drawer. “I thought you might also like to consider joining a club or activity.” She hands a few stapled pages to me. “It’s not a requirement, but I’d like to get you into at least one extracurricular. It will be good for your college applications, which we need to start thinking about.”
I scan the list. Book Club. Chinese Club. Drama Club. Feminist Club. BPA, EAC, AFS, OTM. So many impossibilities. I had no idea.
“Anything of interest?” she says.
“Not really.” I pass the list back to her.
She scans it herself. “Math league?”
I shake my head.
“Handbell choir?”
I shake my head harder.
“Why don’t you tell me what does interest you, and maybe I can suggest a match.” She sits on her desk corner.
I rest my eyes on Mrs. Greene’s hands, which are clasped in front of her. She leans forward, her whole body urging me to speak. “What do you like to do in your free time?” she prompts.
I can’t tell her what I did in my free time last night, Photoshopping myself into Jenna’s new friendships. And I can’t tell her how I spend most other nights, lurking on the social media pages of kids at school who have the kind of life my mother wants for me. It makes me sound like a weirdo stalker.
Which I guess I am.