Chapter 9: Classy

A thousand pairs of eyes seemed to be on her—everywhere she went. Despite her father’s reassurance that everything was going to be fine, and she’d fit right in, Everly had yet to experience that part of coming to Cook High School. So far, she’d never felt more like an outcast than she did when she walked into the building.

People were whispering, holding their hands in front of their mouths, some of them even blatantly pointing at her. And not a one of them had had the decency to even introduce themselves to her, at least not through third period. Now, she was on her way to her fourth-period class, history, trying to make it down the hallway without bumping into anyone, but it was difficult. The building was fairly old, and it was clear there were more kids attending the school than they’d planned for whenever it was built, so there wasn’t a lot of room in the hallways.

After history class, she had lunch, and that would definitely prove to be the hardest activity of the day, she was certain. Chances were, she’d have no place to sit, no one would ask her to join them, and she’d end up eating an apple on the floor in the bathroom or something.

Gross.

To top it all off, some of the room numbers made absolutely no sense whatsoever, which had almost made her late for second-period biology, and now she was wandering around looking for her history class, like an idiot.

“Hey, can I help?”

At first, Everly wasn’t even sure the girl was speaking to her. No one had said a word directly to her since she’d left the secretary in the office who’d given her her schedule. Other than the teachers telling her where to sit.

“What class are you looking for?”

The girl was beautiful, with big green eyes and caramel blonde hair that framed her face perfectly. She was a little shorter than Everly but looked like she could hold her own in a fight. Even in a sweatshirt and jeans, she looked muscular.

Did everyone around here take steroids?

Not every person she’d seen was buff, but a few of them were unbelievably strong-looking.

For a moment, she was reminded of another pair of eyes just about the same shade as this girl’s-- and a brick wall.

“Oh, uh, Mr. Donald? History?” Everly said, still glancing around.

“You have Mr. Donald for history fourth period?” the girl asked and then snickered.

Everly raised an eyebrow. “Is that bad?”

The other three people standing with this girl didn’t seem to get why it was funny either. They had tight-lipped smiles on their faces but said nothing. Only one of them, a guy who was fairly young looking, like maybe he was a freshman, looked at all interested in what was going on.

“It’s fine. Mr. Donald’s great,” the girl said. Everly got the feeling there was still something she was missing. “His class is down the hall, second door on the left past the water fountain. You’ll see it. He has a giant map of Montana by the  door.”

Everly nodded. She thought she’d seen that earlier but hadn’t been looking for history then. “Thank you.”

“Sure, Everly.”

Again, her eyebrows arched of their own accord.

The girls shrugged. “Everyone knows who you are. We don’t mean to be… weird. It’s just, getting a new kid doesn’t happen very often around here.”

“Yeah, and the last one was super disappointing. Total nerd,” the smaller boy said, getting a laugh out of everyone but the green-eyed girl.

Everly wanted to ask how she was doing so far but was afraid to hear the answer. “Well, thank you, uh—”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t introduce myself.” She rolled her eyes. “I’m Alyson. These are my friends, Troy Birch, Samantha Smith, and Ricky Taylor.” Each of them lifted a hand, but no one looked that friendly, except for maybe Alyson. “We’re all juniors, so we probably won’t have many classes together.”

“Oh, that’s too bad.” Everly would’ve at least liked to have one friendly face in a class or two.

“You’ll make friends,” Samantha told her. “You’re so pretty, the boys will be all over you.”

Samantha’s light blonde hair looked like it had to have come from a bottle. She was quite pretty, except for her nose tipped up slightly at the point, and Everly got the impression it made her self-conscious. The way she was standing next to Troy, a tall guy with skin the color of mocha and deep brown eyes, Everly had to imagine they were a couple.

“Well, I definitely don’t need any boys all over me,” Everly assured her.

Alyson chuckled. “Don’t mind Sam. She missed her coffee this morning. Anyway, good luck, Everly. If you need anything, search me up.”

“Right,” she said with a nod, thinking that she couldn’t see herself tearing through the hallways looking for the girl, but it was nice of her to offer. “Thanks, Alyson.” She wasn’t so good at names. If she didn’t repeat them as soon as she heard them, she was bound to forget.

Alyson lifted a hand, and Everly did the same, waving at the other three as well. Politeness compelled them to lift their hands without even thinking about it.

As she was walking down the hallway, she heard Troy ask Alyson, “Why were you worried about her having that class?”

“I wasn’t worried.” Alyson sounded defensive. “It’s just… Jack’s in that class.”

Everly was far enough away now that if more was said on the subject, she couldn’t hear it. She was confused. Who the hell was Jack? And what difference did it make if he was in her history class? Was Jack the school bully or something? Did he hate new kids and eat them for lunch?

Holding her notebook and folder to her chest, her pencil in her hand, Everly wound through the last remaining kids in the hallway as everyone else had already made their way to class.

Sure enough, Mr. Donald’s class was exactly where Alyson had said it would be. She should’ve asked the junior to tell her where the rest of her classes were while she had the chance. A giant map of Montana greeted her.

Never in her life had Everly missed Colorado more than at that moment. Montana was huge, covered in forests she wasn’t allowed to go into, and to top it all off, it had swallowed up her mother.

Why was she here again?

“Well, come on in, young lady,” the older gentleman standing at the front of the room called, seeing Everly standing in the hallway. “Are you my new student?”

“Yes, sir,” she said, taking her schedule over to him. The woman in the office had said she’d need all of the teachers to sign it, and then she should bring it back at the end of the day.

“Perfect,” he said. “Everly Harrison.”

He said her name like the first part was pronounced the same way as Adam’s wife from the Bible, which it wasn’t.

She didn’t correct him.

Some other girl, one she’d never met before, a redhead with glasses sitting smack dab in the middle of row one, raised her hand but then said, “It’s Everly, Mr. Donald. Like forever.”

“Oh, is that right?” he asked Everly.

She nodded, but her eyes were on the girl who looked so proud of herself. Who was she, and why did she care how the teacher pronounced her name? Was she just one of those know-it-all kids who always had to stick their noses into everyone else’s business?

It seemed like everyone in this town had a hard time deciding what was and was not their business.

“All right, Miss Harrison. You can have a seat right back there.” He pointed to one of the only empty chairs in the room. “Next to Jack.”

Jack? That name sounded familiar. Oh, yeah. Alyson had said he was in this class. Was it a bad thing that she was supposed to sit next to him?

Everly lifted her eyes and looked from the empty chair she was aiming for to the guy sitting in the chair next to it, and her eyes almost bulged out of her head.

It was the firefighter from the grocery store.

And he did not look happy.