The Nowhere Girls(9)

Grace takes a deep breath when she locates the main office. She has accomplished her first task. She has made it through the front door. Now to acquire her class schedule. If she breaks the day down into small parts, it won’t seem so scary.

Please God, she prays silently. Give me strength. Guide me through this torment.

She stands at the front desk for what seems like a very long time. An androgynous-looking girl with a shaved head sits on the other side, eyes glued to the screen of an ancient computer. Grace knows the girl can see her, even though she’s acting like she doesn’t.

“Um, hello?” Grace says.

The girl looks at her for a moment, then back at the computer screen. “I’m not supposed to be at the front desk,” the girl says flatly. “The computer I’m supposed to use is in the back of the office, but it’s broken.”

“Oh, okay?” Grace says. The bald girl shifts from side to side, looking nervous, saying nothing. “Um,” Grace continues. “I’m here to pick up my class schedule?”

“You were supposed to get it in the mail two weeks ago.”

“Um, I just moved here? So I didn’t really have an address two weeks ago? So they told me to come to the office to get it.”

The girl finally looks up. “Who is they?”

A heavyset woman hurries out of an office in the back. “So sorry, honey,” she says. “I had to run back here for just a second.” She looks at the bald girl with what seems like a worried expression, then back at Grace. “Was Erin helping you?”

“Um, sort of?”

“The way you talk is called ‘upspeak,’?” the girl named Erin says. “It sounds like you’re asking a question even when you’re not.”

“Erin.” The woman sighs. “Will you please focus on your task and let me help this young lady?”

“I was trying to be friendly,” Erin says softly. She takes a deep breath and moves her hands together as if she’s trying to rub lotion into them.

“Okay, Erin,” the woman says. “Calm down.”

“Never in the history of the world has telling someone to calm down actually helped them calm down,” Erin says.

“How can I help you, dear?” the woman says to Grace, with a look in her eyes that says they’re in on something together, which Grace suspects is supposed to be a mutual exasperation with Erin. But what Grace thinks is that Erin seems stressed out, so shouldn’t this woman be trying to help her? If you work at a school, isn’t it your job to help kids?

“My name’s Grace Salter. I just moved here. I’m supposed to pick up my schedule.”

“Of course,” the woman says with far more friendliness in her voice than when she spoke to Erin. “Welcome to Prescott! I’m Mrs. Poole. I run the office here. How do you like Prescott so far?”

“It’s okay, I guess?”

“We are exactly eighty-one point seven miles from the nearest beach,” Erin says. “Which is not okay.”

Mrs. Poole ignores Erin. She flips through a file on the desk and pulls out a paper. “Here we go. Grace Salter’s class schedule. Homeroom is American Literature with Mr. Baxter.”

“Mr. Baxter is the football coach and only assigns books by dead straight white men,” says Erin.

“Erin, that’s enough!” says Mrs. Poole with a huff, then turns to Grace with a pitiful face. “She’s going to be here every first period for the entire semester.”

“I can hear you,” Erin says.

“You know what?” Mrs. Poole says. “The bell is about to ring. Erin, will you show Grace to her first class? We don’t want her to be late on her first day.”

Erin stands up, and even though she’s wearing an oversize flannel over a baggy white T-shirt and ill-fitting jeans, Grace can tell she has a model’s body, and she wonders why she’s trying so hard to hide it. Grace thinks if she had a body like that, she’d want everyone to know it.

“Let’s go,” Erin says, and walks out the door without checking to see if Grace is coming with her.

Grace wants to ask Erin why Mrs. Poole thought it was okay to be so mean to her, why she seemed to think it wouldn’t hurt, but what Grace says instead is “Have you lived here long?” to the back of Erin’s head.

“More than two years,” she says.

“Where’d you live before?”

“Seattle.”

“Oh, was it cool there? I heard it’s cool.”

“You have an accent.”

“I’m from Kentucky.”

“Here’s Mr. Baxter’s classroom.” Erin stops in front of an open door, her eyes tilted toward the ground. Grace realizes that except for that first glance up from the computer when she first entered the office, Erin hasn’t looked her in the eyes once.

“Thanks.”

Erin’s eyes dart across the floor. After a long pause, she finally says, “You’re welcome.” Then she walks away.

Grace enters the noisy classroom and finds a seat in the back. She keeps her eyes on the floor and can’t tell if anyone’s looking at her. She doesn’t know which would be worse—if they were looking, or if no one noticed her at all. The bell rings. The teacher is nowhere in sight.