Ms. Perez asks.
“Um, yeah,” Yaz says, distracted. She shakes her head to clear it. “I mean, yes, ma’am.” She glances at Katie-Rose as she rises from her desk, but Katie-Rose won’t meet her eyes, or anyone’s. Katie-Rose is a scowl in the shape of a girl. Or a girl in the shape of a scowl? Preston just embarrassed her, and now Katie-Rose is hunched over her notebook, scrawling away like a madman. Or a mad girl. Her body is tiny. Her spine is curved. Fury radiates from her like scary blue sparks of electricity.
Yaz goes to the front of the room. “Do you need help with something?” she asks Ms. Perez. Yaz is kind of like Ms. Perez’s teacher’s assistant, an arrangement that suits them both. “Do you want me to grade yesterday’s math quizzes?”
“Thanks, sweetie,” Ms. Perez says. “But I need you to deliver another note for me. Can you do that?”
“Of course,” Yaz says. “To Mr. Emerson again?”
Ms. Perez blushes, which Yaz finds extremely interesting.
“Ah … yes,” Ms. Perez says. She lowers her voice. “To Mr. Emerson. Right.”
Yaz lowers her voice to match her teacher’s. “Okay. You look really pretty today, by the way.”
Ms. Perez’s blush deepens.
“What? You do,” Yaz says, indicating Ms. Perez’s crisp white blouse with shiny silver buttons. The top two buttons are unbuttoned, and Yaz catches a glimpse of … um … the fact that her teacher has a figure that is hugely different than a ten-year-old’s.
Yaz feels guilty for peeking and immediately looks away. She hopes Ms. Perez didn’t notice.
“Well, that’s nice of you to say,” Ms. Perez says, attempting a businesswoman tone. “You look lovely yourself. And here’s this.”
She hands Yaz a note, which, like yesterday’s, is folded over four times, making it roughly the size of a pack of gum. Ms. Perez doesn’t let go of the note after Yasaman grasps it, however, so for a few seconds they hold the note together. Suspended between them, it makes Yasaman think of a bridge. A bridge to what? she wonders.
Finally, Ms. Perez releases the note. “Be sure to come right back!” she calls as Yaz heads out of the room.
The air in the hall feels fresher, more open, and Yasaman enjoys herself as she strolls past the water fountain, the snack cabinet, the preschool rooms. The walls outside the preschool classrooms are bright and cheerful, plastered with taped-up art projects depicting sprawling rainbows and kitty cats and stick figures with round heads and crazy-big eyes. The girl stick figures wear triangle dresses; the boys wear rectangle pants and block-shaped shirts. Yaz scans the names on the bottom of each drawing, looking for one made by Nigar.
Ooo, there! Yaz smiles. To the left of Nigar’s preschool classroom is a piece of pink construction paper. Pink is Nigar’s favorite color. At the top of the paper is the title of Nigar’s drawing: I Am Grateful for Many Things! This was obviously written by Nigar’s teacher, as Nigar has barely learned her alphabet, and the only words she can spell are “Nigar,” “cat,” and, disturbingly, “Justin Bieber.” Beneath the title are a wobbling tower of line drawings, each drawing labeled by the teacher because that’s the way it works in preschool.
The base of the tower consists of four jelly-bean shapes with pokey-fingered arms and pokey-toed legs jutting out of them. The jelly-bean shapes are arranged in order of size, and the third-shortest jelly bean has long hair covered by what Yasaman knows is supposed to be a hijab, though it looks more like a doughnut with curtains.
It’s me! Yaz thinks happily.
The smallest jelly bean is Nigar. She’s drawn herself with her hair in doggy ears, each doggy ear embellished with a cute hair bow. Hair bows are Nigar’s trademark, according to Nigar.
Next to the clump of jelly-bean people, Nigar’s teacher has penned the words “My Family.” It’s beautiful. It’s beautiful, and it’s true, and Yasaman hopes Nigar will hold on to that trueness inside of her forever. Knowing who she is. Not being afraid to share it with the world.
Yaz peeks inside Nigar’s classroom but doesn’t spot Nigar. She’s probably over by the cage of the class hamster. She used to hate that hamster, but recently she’s grown fond of him, mainly because she likes to watch him nibble lettuce.
Yasaman keeps walking. When she arrives at Mr. Emerson’s room, she raps lightly on the open door and then steps inside. Milla and Violet see her, and Yaz wiggles her fingers at them. Milla waves back. Violet smiles at her.
Yaz notices the girl in the desk beside Violet’s: It’s the new girl. Hayley. Her body language … She looks aloof, as if she couldn’t care less what anyone thinks of her. And yet there’s something that makes Yaz wonder if the aloofness is just an act. Or not. Maybe Yaz is seeing what she wants to see because she hates the thought of anyone being alone, regardless of whether the aloneness is on purpose.
She forces herself out of her trance and goes to Mr. Emerson’s desk.
“From Ms. Perez,” she whispers. She nods to say, Okay? Note delivered, mission accomplished?
“Ah-ha,” Mr. Emerson says. He unfolds the note. “Why, thank you, Yasaman.”
“You’re welcome.”
She moves to go, but he stops her, saying, “Hold up, tiger.”
Tiger? Yaz thinks. But she turns around.
“The ambrosial musings of a lady most enchanting,” he murmurs.
“I’m sorry … what?”
He doesn’t respond. His eyes move over the note. Then he grins at Yasaman, and Yasaman has a fleeting image of what he might have been like as a boy. Like Preston, maybe, but not quite as annoying. Hopefully.
“Allow me a moment to inscribe a communiqué in return, hmm?” Mr. Emerson asks. Except he’s not really asking. He’s telling. He smacks a fresh piece of paper on his desk, sets a rock on the top left corner to hold it down, and scribbles away. Yaz is surprised by the rock until she takes the time to think about it. When Yaz writes, she steadies her paper with her left forearm. But if she didn’t have a left forearm …?
Well, there you have it.
Mr. Emerson is humming by the time he finishes his communiqué, which he signs with a flourish. Yaz is dying to know how he signed it—John? Mr. Emerson? Yours forever?—but he folds it in half before she can see. Then half, and half, and half again. Four times he folds his note, just like Ms. Perez.
They’re note-folding twins, Yaz thinks.
Mr. Emerson hands her the compact rectangle of paper. “Thar she blows,” he proclaims, “and a mighty vessel she is, too!”
Yaz doesn’t know what to make of his remark. Is he saying that Ms. Perez is a vessel? And not just any vessel, but a mighty one at that? He better not be.
“Off you go, slugabed,” he says, shooing Yaz away. “Can’t stay in my classroom all day, although I understand the appeal.”
Yaz returns to her classroom feeling both mystified and muddy-headed. She wants very much to read Mr. Emerson’s note, but she is Yasaman, so she doesn’t.
You wouldn’t get anxious when they were having a hard time, you wouldn’t cry when they cried, you wouldn’t get an upset stomach wondering if the way a person looked on the outside—tough or vulnerable, happy or sad—matched the way she actually felt on the inside.
Then again …
You wouldn’t get to laugh so hard you almost peed when your friend reached over out of the blue to pluck from your nose what you suspect was a nonexistent nose hair. You couldn’t bask in the sun and just be warmed by the company of your bestie even if you and she were simply being quiet together.
If you had no one’s back, then no one would have your back.
If you cared about no one, no one would care about you.
You would know nothing of love.
And there it is: Violet’s fatal flaw. She does care about others, and so she has to swallow the good and the bad that comes with it.
Her notebook is open on her desk. Her purple pen is ready at the go. She’s supposed to be working on her “Where I’m From” poem, but her mind is s
pinning in a different direction, and if she put her thoughts on paper, here is what she would write:
When I was the new kid at Rivendell, sometimes I felt invisible. Other times, I felt too visible. And I don’t know what was going on with me, but I did bad things. I wasn’t my best self, and sometimes I was … cruel … and Modessa somehow helped that cruelty come out. It was still my fault. I can’t blame Modessa, because I knew better. But Modessa played a role, and I let her.
Why? What was wrong with me?
If someone had come right up and warned me that doing anything with Modessa would make my life worse, would I have listened?
She sighs.
She’s thinking about all of this because of Hayley, of course. Yaz told her that Modessa is probably going to try to make Hayley be one of her stupid Evil Chicks, and Violet knows deep inside that even if she doesn’t want to get involved, she kind of has to. If she doesn’t, how could she live with herself and feel proud to be a flower friend and all that?
She rises from her desk. Mr. Emerson doesn’t notice (or doesn’t care—he pretty much runs a do-what-you-want classroom), but Cyril Remkiwicz does. His expression is impassive, though she knows his insides aren’t. It’s another reminder of how people’s insides and outsides match far less often than you might think, because Violet knows that Cyril both notices and cares what Violet does, practically always. Not in a bad way.
She shoots him a small smile, which he doesn’t return, because he’s Cyril. The corner of his mouth slants almost imperceptibly upward, however, and his almost-smile cheers her up. For Cyril, an almost-smile is pretty good. It’s a reminder that hearts can unclench.
She squats by Hayley, resting her hand on Hayley’s desk. It’s time she gave this a second try.
“Hi,” she says. “How’s it going?”
Hayley tilts her head, her expression as inscrutable as Cyril’s. Oh, great, Violet thinks. Why did I bother?
Then, bam, Hayley grins, making Violet think of a piece of sucking candy that suddenly reaches its bursting point, squirting out sweet strawberry-flavored syrup.
Violet grins back. Something passes between the two girls.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Hayley says. “Good enough, I guess. You?”
Violet considers. “I’m good, too.”
“Good!” Hayley replies. “Double good!”
Double good. Hayley’s phrase latches hold in Violet’s mind, and Violet’s spirits lighten. She’s glad she came over to Hayley. She’s glad she gave her a second chance, and she surprises herself by wondering if there is a flower somewhere in the world called a “Hayley.” Or if Hayley’s middle name might be a flower name, like … Chrysanthemum? Ha. Or Petunia. Hayley Petunia. Not the most beautiful of names, but funny, and sometimes being funny is even better than being beautiful.
“What are you smiling about?” Hayley asks.
“Am I smiling?” Violet says. “Oh, sorry. I mean, not sorry, but …” She gives an awkward laugh. “No idea. Guess I just spaced out for a sec.”
“I hear you. I do that all the time, and my uncle gets so mad.” Hayley leans closer. “He used to be a marine. Although he says he still is a marine, because once a marine, always a marine. Anyway, he’s way strict. Semper fi and all that.”
“‘Semper fi’? What’s that?”
“The marine motto. He has it tattooed on his biceps.”
“What does it mean?”
Hayley scowls. “‘Eat your vegetables! Get off the phone! Pay attention, young lady, or I will whip you!’” She smooths out her expression. “That’s not an exact translation, but pretty much.”
“Ugh,” Violet says. She checks to make sure they’re still flying under Mr. Emerson’s radar. He’s at the whiteboard, his back toward them as he scrawls out the day’s homework menu with a fat, squeaky marker.
“But why does your uncle care if you eat your vegetables or whatever?” she asks. Then she realizes how wrong that sounds. “I mean, that’s good that he cares. I guess. But is he over at your house all the time or something?”
“I’m over at his house all the time,” Hayley explains. “I live with him. Not my choice.”
“Oh. Just with him, or is your aunt there, too? Do they have kids of their own?”
Hayley scooches over on her chair and tugs Violet up so that Violet can sit next to her. It’s a tight fit and their thighs touch, but whatever. She’s allowed to share Hayley’s seat for a minute. It’s not against the law.
“No aunt. No cousins. Just my uncle. I have to do four hours of chores before I can watch any TV, and every weekend he drags me on a thousand-mile hike because he says it builds character. Can you say ‘fun’?”
Violet snorts. She’s had her share of family problems; her mom had a l-o-n-g stay in the hospital recently because she felt anxious all the time and didn’t know how to deal with it. But her mom’s doing so much better now. So much better.
“Well, is your uncle sometimes nice?” she asks Hayley.
Hayley shrugs. “Yes. No. Maybe.” She exhales. “He has a coin collection he’s always wanting to show me. Does that count as nice?”
Violet isn’t sure. “Is it a cool coin collection?”
Hayley eyeballs her. “They’re coins. Little pieces of metal.” She adopts the scowly voice that Violet now knows is her imitation of her uncle. “Here we have a Memorial Lincoln Cent, dated nineteen fifty-eight. Most people would call this a ‘wheat penny’. They would be wrong.”
Violet covers her smile with her hand.
“I know, right?” Hayley says.
“Violet and Hayley?” Mr. Emerson says.
Uh-oh.
“Um, yes?” Violet says.
“Is there a reason you’re both sitting in one desk? Have you become conjoined?”
“No, not conjoined,” Violet says. Hayley ducks her head. A laugh squeaks out.
“Excellent,” Mr. Emerson says. “In that case, head back to your own desk, please, Violet.”
Violet does as she’s told, even though she has tons more questions for Hayley. Like, why is she living with her uncle and not her parents? Are her parents alive? (Gosh, she hopes so. How awful if they aren’t!) And why did Hayley start attending Rivendell yesterday, instead of at the beginning of the year?
Violet has never known anyone with a screwier family life than her own, or at least not until Hayley, and she isn’t quite sure how she feels about it. She’s slightly thrilled, but she’s also slightly … freaked out? Unnerved? Something.
She definitely relates, though. Sad is sad, no matter how you cut it.
and Sam. Sometimes they’re dreadful, like when they call Katie-Rose “shrimp” or say, “Leave, Katie-Rose,” when their friends are over and they’re having stupid video-game bonanzas. But other times, they are the best brothers in the world. Like the time Katie-Rose, Charlie, and Sam were hanging out at their neighborhood park, and another boy called Katie-Rose a shrimp. Katie-Rose didn’t even know the boy, and the boy sure didn’t know her. He was just a random jerk.
The random jerk’s Frisbee whacked Katie-Rose in the head, and while Katie-Rose was still reeling from the blow, he sneered and called out, “Hey, shrimp. Give me back my Frisbee.”
Well. Charlie strode right over to that jerk and shoved him in the chest. Sam followed on Charlie’s heels and shoved him again, for good measure.
“Dudes,” the bully said, pissed and baffled. “What’s your problem?”
“Shut it,” Charlie said.
“Yeah,” Sam said. “Don’t call her that, and if you’re going to come out here with your Frisbee, then learn how to throw it.”
“What the …?” the bully said. He wore a striped rugby shirt and a face full of arrogance. He was thicker than Charlie, but Charlie was taller. He was meaner looking than Sam, but Sam’s eyes were narrow and his jaw cut a sharp line in the bright sunlight.
The bully glanced from Charlie to Sam, from Sam to Charlie. “What’s it to you?”
“She’
s our sister, ****head,” Charlie said. (The bad word Charlie said thrilled Katie-Rose, but it was bad bad, so no way is she repeating it.) He shoved the bully again, and the bully faltered.
“Dude. Chill,” he said, backing away with his palms out.
“Make him apologize!” Katie-Rose told Charlie, tugging on his sleeve. He shrugged her off and gave her a scornful look, as if to say, Don’t push it, squirt. He and Sam returned to playing basketball with their buddies, and Katie-Rose watched them, her heart bursting with pride.
“Those are my brothers,” she whispered.
Before school this morning, as Charlie and Sam roughhoused their way through breakfast, Sam elbowed Charlie in the ribs in order to wrest the box of Frosted Flakes from him.
“Ow, you ****head!” Charlie cried, dropping the Frosted Flakes onto the floor. The liner bag burst, and Frosted Flakes scattered everywhere. Snow in November! Crunchy, sugary snow!
Sam laughed triumphantly, and Charlie scowled. He went to the junk drawer by the telephone, yanked it open, and grabbed a fine-point black Sharpie. He did something mysterious with said Sharpie, turning his back to Sam (and by default to Katie-Rose) and muttering under his breath. He chucked the Sharpie into the drawer and took two big steps toward Sam, Frosted Flakes crunching beneath his oversize sneakers.
“You mess with me, you mess with this!” he said, clenching his right hand into a fist and thrusting it two inches in front of Sam’s nose.
“With what? With what?” Katie-Rose said, scrambling out of her chair at the kitchen table.
Sam pushed Charlie’s fist away—Charlie would never hit Sam for real, or their mom would have his hide—but not before Katie-Rose saw what Charlie had done. He’d used the Sharpie to write the letters “T,” “H,” “I,” and “S” on his knuckles. Katie-Rose giggled helplessly. You mess with me, you mess with THIS, with Charlie’s knuckles actually spelling out the word “this.”
“Geez-o-criminy,” Sam said. “And you’re the older, more mature brother? Really?”