Abandon - Meg Cabot [35]
At least the New Pathways counselors — especially Jade, the one I’d been assigned — had been really nice about making me feel welcome, despite knowing what I’d done (or allegedly done, anyway) to a teacher at my last school. Jade had never seemed scared when she talked to me during our orientation meetings, always making full eye contact and smiling a lot and even offering me strips of red licorice from the jar she kept on her desk. My necklace, I’d noticed, had never turned any color when I’d been in Jade’s office. It just stayed a steady, soothing gray…the same color as the coat of a retired greyhound.
But when I arrived on my first day at what was the only high school on Isla Huesos, to which hundreds of students were bused from neighboring islands — there are over 1,700 off the coast of Florida, Mom not so helpfully informed me one day while listing the various ways in which Dad’s company was slowly destroying their ecosystem — I did not feel soothed. I did not need to glance down at the color of my necklace (which I no longer had anyway) to tell me so, either.
I felt overwhelmed, despite Jade’s careful instructions about what to expect. I’d never seen so many kids, particularly so many guys, crowded into so many buildings…four enormous wings in all, all connected by a central, paved courtyard — the Quad, Jade said it was called — at the center of which were all these shaded picnic tables.
This, Jade had explained, was where we were supposed to have lunch every day. The cafeteria was outside.
This made absolutely no sense to me, no matter how many times Jade said it.
Only seniors were allowed to leave campus for lunch. I was a senior, but how was I going to leave campus? I had no driver’s license. The State of Connecticut had apparently agreed with my neurologist that it was not a good idea for me to drive.
I’d looked at the written test for the State of Florida online because Jade had encouraged me to, and there were even more questions on it than on the one for the State of Connecticut. It was hopeless.
Alex had said on the way to school, “I’ll meet you in the Quad for lunch. We’ll go grab a burger.”
But when lunchtime came, of course I couldn’t find him. He hadn’t told me where to meet him. This was typical Alex. Also, typical me, unfortunately, to forget to ask.
I selected two caffeinated sodas, a bag of nuts, a bag of chips, and a bag of cookies from the vending machines. Then I hid out in the library to eat them. This seemed like the safest thing to do.
The library was where Jade found me.
“Pierce,” she said, pulling out the chair from the study carrel next to me and lowering herself into it. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“I’m here,” I said stupidly. Obviously I was there. I took out my earbuds. “How’s it going?”
“Good,” Jade said. “How’s it going with you? Didn’t make it to the cafeteria for lunch, I see.”
“Not today,” I said. “Maybe tomorrow.”
What was I supposed to say? I didn’t have my necklace to protect me anymore? Not that I believed I needed its protective powers, necessarily.
I just wasn’t sure I didn’t need them.
“Hey, listen, I get it. It’s cool,” Jade said. Jade had very dark hair and many black leather cords that she wore around her neck and wrists. A tattoo on her wrist said Check Yourself Before You Wreck Yourself in fancy script. “But if you want to talk, maybe about that thing that happened with that teacher at your old school, or about that friend of yours who died…anything. You know where to find me.”
I did know where to find her. The New Pathways offices were located in D-Wing, which was also where all of my classes happened to be located. Convenient.
And really…anything, Jade? What about the guy I ran into last night in the cemetery? Can we talk about him? Because I’ve run into him before, actually during “that thing that happened with that teacher” at my old school. When “that friend” of mine died.
Or at least when I tried to make her death right.
And he put a teacher in the hospital.
“Thanks,” I said, not mentioning any of that.