“Shit, Dr. Rich is here for the summer?” Jessica muttered.
Leila turned and caught sight of a man hurrying down the hall, another trailing behind him. One had a small belly and was dressed in red-and-black plaid and blue jeans like some kind of lazy lumberjack, the other was dressed in a tweed jacket complete with patches, a vest, and a bright-yellow tie.
The lumberjack hustled ahead.
“Just what the hell is going on here?” he asked, glaring at Jessica and then at Sarika. “Haven’t the two of you gotten into it enough?”
“She started it, Dr. Rich!” shouted Jessica, holding a hand up to her bloody nose.
“She’s lying!” shouted Sarika, struggling to free herself from Leila’s grasp.
“My dad and his lawyers will be down here so fast you won’t—” Jessica started.
“Cut it out!” Dr. Rich shouted, standing in between Leila, Sarika, and the three girls. “You three, get to your sensitivity class, or I swear to God, you’re finished in this school district, and no, I don’t give a damn who your father is, Jessica. And you two,” he started before his eyes settled on Leila. “Wait, who is this? Who are you?”
“Leila,” Leila said, letting go of Sarika, who brushed herself off. “I’m, uh, I’m new.”
“Clearly,” Dr. Rich said. “I’ll be keeping an eye on you. You too.” He nodded at Sarika.
“Are you two here for summer school or something?” the smartly dressed teacher asked, stepping up next to Dr. Rich and staring at Sarika and Leila.
“Chet, why?” Dr. Rich muttered, his hand slapping against his forehead.
“For your information,” Sarika spat. “We’re in the enrichment program. For fun. They’re the ones here for punishment. Don’t assume we’re in summer school just because we’re the first brown people you’ve spotted today.”
“Oh, damn,” Leila muttered.
“That’s not what . . .” the other teacher stammered, looking from Leila and Sarika to Dr. Rich, who shrugged his shoulders in response.
“Maybe you should consider sending your teachers to sensitivity training, too, Dr. Rich,” Sarika said, her voice oozing sarcasm.
“Okay, okay,” Dr. Rich said, his hands up. “That’s enough. You.” He pointed at Jessica. “My office. That goes for you, too.” He nodded at Sarika. “We’ll talk this out.” He turned to the teacher, and shook his head. “Chet, you’re a piece of work, you know that? We’ll have a conversation about this later. Sarika, Jessica, put your stuff away. See you in fifteen minutes.”
“You’re not going to call our parents, are you, Dr. Rich?” Jessica asked, her voice full of worry and concern, her eyes sad and pleading. In a flash her face turned dark and sarcastic. “Well, my parents, I suppose. Might be hard to find hers.”
Sarika lunged again and Leila pulled her back as she lashed about, though Leila had a serious urge just to let Sarika tear her apart.
“Sweet Jesus, make that FIVE minutes, you two.” Dr. Rich said, shooing Jessica and her girls towards the end of the hall. “I’ll be waiting.”
Jessica and the girls walked away, but not before turning around and smiling at Sarika and Leila. Jessica and Rebekah both gave them the finger as they twirled about, making their exit.
“Damn it,” Sarika muttered, pounding a fist against a hard metal locker and turning to Leila. She peered into Leila’s locker and scowled. “We should really decorate in here. I mean, I know you only have this locker for the next few weeks or so, but still, might as well make it feel like home.”
“Oh, no, you think you can get in a fight and curse off in front of a teacher, right next to me, and just change the subject to this?” Leila asked, leaning back against the lockers. Sarika shrugged.
“Listen, we’ve had years of life experience with prissy kids who think they can shove us around for being different from them. So to hell with them, not worth our time,” Sarika said, scowling again.
Leila gave her a look.
“Ugh, fine,” Sarika huffed. “Those three? I’ll give you the quick-and-dirty rundown, and then feel free to forget their names. They’ve only stuck with me because I’ve been around them for two years. Jessica De La Costa, the tall one of the bunch. She’s the leader, and the worst of them all. We got in a fight at the end of the school year, like right in June, and she and her friends are here for racial sensitivity training or some such bullshit that will inevitably fail.”
“Wait. You got in a fight?” Leila asked. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I don’t know.” Sarika shrugged. “I mean, you and the Klines? You had more important things on your mind.”
“You’ll always be first, you know that.” Leila smiled. “Just because things are complicated, doesn’t mean I don’t have room for more complications.”
“Well, get ready,” Sarika said with a scowl, “because it’s going to get more complex with those three rampaging around. So we got Jessica, and then there’s Rebekah Mamakas, she’s the shorter one with the freckles. And,” Sarika paused, as if collecting herself, her eyes closed.
“What is it?” Leila asked. Sarika lifted a hand.
“A moment, please,” Sarika said, clearing her throat. “For the third one. Dramatic pause: Gwenyffer Stillwater.”
A beat passed before Leila and Sarika erupted into laughter.
“Gwenyffer?” Leila sighed. “That’s actually an awesome name. Like she could be a singer or a model.”
“Too bad it’s wasted on her. She doesn’t talk much, just follows those two around. I don’t even think she likes them, but it doesn’t matter. Makes her just as bad as the rest of them for not saying anything,” Sarika said, the laughter fading. “Look, I didn’t go through all those shitty fosters and get my ass kicked back in the group home all those years to be kicked around now. Especially by girls like that who think they rule this place because oh look at me my father owns three homes with a million bathrooms or whatever. And neither did you.”
Leila nodded, surprised at this fury coming out of her best friend. She felt a familiar pang in her chest, remembering Sarika with the bruises all those times she hadn’t been around to protect her.
“For them, yeah, this is a fun excuse to goof off, maybe meet some boys, maybe give out a few hand jobs in a stairwell, and ignore this ‘training’ they’re supposed to get. Which, let’s be real, will never help anyway,” Sarika said, smirking and doing air quotes. “Don’t let them think they’re better than you. Or us. ’Cause they aren’t.”
Sarika reached into her backpack and slapped something against the inside of Leila’s locker, which clicked against the metal inside with a bang. She moved her hand to reveal a mirror, stuck to the metal with a magnet, covering up all the rainbow glitter stickers. It was bland, the frame made out of a sand-colored wood. Leila peered in and looked at herself, at the splash of pale beige that made its way up the side of her face like a handprint and the dark freckles that flecked the sides of her nose and flowed over the top of her cheeks.
“Maybe I should try some makeup,” Leila said, raising a hand over her face to block out the mark on the lower part of her left cheek. “What do you think?”
She looked at Sarika, who stared at her, aghast.
“I’m just saying,” Leila said, shrugging. “New school for the summer, new me. Who would know?”
“You would know,” Sarika said, sternly. “You would. That is not why I dramatically slapped a mirror inside of your locker. You were supposed to look at it and be all, ‘Wow, I’m hella beautiful the way I am. Fuck those girls.’ And then walk away with me to some kind of bad-ass friendship soundtrack.”
“Come on, I’m just—”
“Friendship. Soundtrack,” Sarika said, stressing each word. “Never change. What did we learn from Rappaccini’s Daughter in English last year?” Sarika grinned, and Leila scowled. She knew she hated that story.