I
elbowed my way
through the crowd,
ignoring my peers’
curious glances. Before
I
could get inside,
however, I heard
someone scream my
name.
“Maya! Mayaaaaaaa!
MAYA LINDBERG!”
The last utterance
was
yelled directly into my
ear, and I flinched a bit,
waiting for the ringing
in
my ears to stop before
I turned to face the
petite, pretty redhead.
“Hi, Venice,” I said with
a genuine smile.
“Hiiii!” She enveloped
me
in a crushing hug that
had me staggering
back
a few steps. For
someone so small and
thin, she sure weighed
a lot. “I missed you so
much!”
“I missed you too,” I
laughed, listening
patiently as Venice
rambled on about her
amazing summer eco-
tour of Costa Rica.
Venice France (yes,
that
really is her name. Her
parents, apparently
blessed with a sick
sense of humor, also
named her younger
sister Kyoto and her
older brother Frankfurt;
understandably, he
goes by Frankie) is one
of the few genuinely
nice, down-to-earth
people in this school. In
fact, she might be the
only one.
We became close last
year when we both
had
the unfortunate luck of
being stuck in fifth-
period AP Calculus with
Mr. White, who is as
albino-complexioned as
his name suggests and
who is way too pen-
happy with his
detention pad. Venice is
also the only person
who is privy to my
seething hatred of the
Scions and everything
they stand for: elitism,
superficiality, tyranny.
Suddenly, the entire
school, it seemed,
erupted into deafening
cheers and hoots. Oh
poo. I was about to slip
inside the school when
Venice grabbed my
arm.
“Where are you going?”
she hissed.
“The bathroom,” I
blurted. “I really gotta
go.”
“No you don’t. You just
don’t want to see
them,” she observed
shrewdly.
“Well, if you know,
why’d you ask?”
“Because I’m not going
to let you slink away
from them any more!”
“I don’t slink away,” I
protested. “I
strategically miss
them.”
She ignored me and
tugged on my arm,
forcing me to walk
down the steps with
her until we were
blocked by the crush of
students. “I don’t care
what you call it, it’s not
healthy.”
I eyed her suspiciously.
“I bet you only want
someone to gush to
about how amazingly
perfect they are.”
She shrugged, not even
bothering to deny it.
“They are,” she
insisted
somewhat defensively.
“Physically speaking,
anyway.”
“There’s more to life
than looks,” I
countered, wincing
when I realized how
annoyingly preachy I
sounded. Gotta work
on
that.
“Not if you’re in high
school. Now, shhh.”
I shut up, not because
she said so, but
because the crowd had
fallen silent, and I didn’t
want to speak and
bring attention to
myself.
Venice and I were
standing on the very
top of the stairs, and I
heard them before I
saw them—the sound
of screeching tires as
four very expensive,
very flashy cars turned
sharply at the same
time into their
respective parking
spaces.
I swear, if this was a
movie, there’d be some
dramatic soundtrack
playing right now.
Everyone except me
waited with bated
breath for the Scions
to
emerge, and when
they
finally did, the ensuing
swoons and screams
were a million times
louder than before.
To be continue
