Broken Beautiful Hearts(38)

I wish someone had asked before saddling me with AP English. I’d rather be in a regular section—easier homework and shorter novels.

The classroom door opens and I look up.

Owen walks in.

Maybe AP isn’t so bad. Owen seems nice. Just because I’m not dating, it doesn’t mean we can’t be friends.

Owen trudges down the center aisle. I wait for him to notice me, but he doesn’t even glance in my direction. I’m hard to miss—especially when he reaches the back row. I’m sitting two seats away from the aisle. It seems like he’s trying not to look at me.

He sits down and takes out a notebook.

“Sorry I’m late.” A slender black woman about Mom’s age breezes into the room, carrying an armload of books. She’s wearing a fitted black sweater with wide-leg black pants that would be considered classic and understated in DC. But there is nothing understated about her hair. It’s amazing. She has long dreadlocks, dyed a rich shade of yellow-blond that almost looks gold. Thin braids are layered between her locks, and the sides are gathered on top of her head in a loose bun.

The teacher drops the books on her desk.

“Miss Ives? Are we starting a new novel?” asks a perky girl in the front row.

“Not today.” Miss Ives puts on a pair of cat-eye glasses and I wait for the inevitable moment when she notices me.

Here it comes.

“Forgive me. This morning has completely gotten away from me. Class, we have a new student.” She sweeps her arm in my direction, and the other students turn around in their seats.

My classmates stare, and I sit frozen in place like a deer in headlights.

Miss Ives purses her lips. “Miss Lonnie told me your name this morning.… Wait. Don’t tell me.”

Seconds pass and she doesn’t seem any closer to figuring it out. A few students lose interest and go back to whatever they were doing. It’s taking her too long. I have to say it or this will drag on forever.

“Peyton,” I finally tell her.

“Peyton. That’s it.” Miss Ives snaps as if she remembered on her own.

Owen has his leg in the aisle and his knee bounces at record speed. His eyes dart from the notebook to the floor before they finally land on me.

Miss Ives launches into a boring recap of the way she introduced The Stranger, the novel the class finished last week.

I tune out.

This is the time when I’d normally text my best friend to report every embarrassing detail of the hallway incident with Titan. Instead, I try to pretend that Owen isn’t sitting two seats away from me. I’m hyperaware of his every move. I can’t look up without catching glimpses of him in my peripheral vision.

“We’re doing something a little different today,” Miss Ives says, and I refocus my attention.

“Initially, it might sound strange, but it’s part of a larger activity.” She seems more excited than the class. “And we’ll be working in pairs. So I want everyone to find a partner.”

Working in pairs on my first day?

What’s next? A blood drive?

The class isn’t big enough for much decision-making. A few people partner up right away, while the rest of us linger in our seats as if we think Miss Ives will forget about whatever she has planned if we don’t move.

It’s down to four of us—a guy with a fade, who is wearing a T-shirt with GO BIG OR GO HOME printed on the back; a girl smacking a wad of gum, whose sunburned skin looks leathery; Owen; and me.

I’m going for the gum smacker. Before I swing my leg toward the aisle to get up, she’s already bouncing over to the guy in the clever T-shirt.

“Owen, it looks like you and…” Miss Ives taps her temple.

“Peyton,” Owen says.

“Of course.” She waves a hand in the air as if she was just getting to that part. “As I was saying, why don’t you find a seat closer to Peyton so we can get started?”

Owen grabs his notebook and a pen and crosses to my side of the room. He catches the back of the chair in front of my desk and flips it around so it’s facing me and he drops into the seat without a word. He doesn’t seem like the same friendly guy I hung out with at the party.

Maybe he’s upset about his mom.

“What now?” the gum-smacking girl asks midchew.

Miss Ives clasps her hands together. “Ladies, I’d like you to empty your purses on your desk. If you don’t have a purse, take everything out of your backpacks except textbooks, binders, and class supplies. Gentlemen, go ahead and do the same thing. You may also empty your pockets.”

“For real?” the guy in the GO BIG OR GO HOME T-shirt calls out.

“As real as it gets, Jordan,” Miss Ives says. “Let’s get everything on the desks.”

Owen takes out his leather wallet and drops it on my desk. I match his wallet with my own and raise him a keychain and an energy bar. He steals a look at me, and I pretend not to notice.

An Asian girl with long, shiny supermodel hair sitting in the front row throws our teacher side-eye. “What if we have stuff in our purse that’s inappropriate to take out?”

“Like what?” Miss Ives crosses her arms. “Are you referring to cigarettes or other contraband?”

The comment gets Miss Ives side-eye from everyone.

“I think she means girl stuff,” Supermodel’s partner, a cute guy in a plaid button-down, adds. “For when her cousin visits.”