by Wendy Mass
“The same old school, the same old faces,” Jenna says with a sigh.
We watch two cheerleaders run up to each other and embrace with a squeal.
Jenna shakes her head. “I really don’t think they need to wear their cheerleading outfits on the first day of school. I mean, it’s not like they have a game yet.”
“School spirit and all that,” I tell her as we make our way through the crowd and into the school. “I forgot about your cheerleader phobia.”
“I don’t have cheerleader phobia,” she insists. “I just think the whole concept is sexist and stupid.”
At that moment, two boys from our grade run by, hitching up their jeans as they pass us. “Did you see that new cheerleader?” one of them says to the other. “She is h-o-t. Hot!”
Jenna opens her mouth to respond, but the boys are already down the hall. What could she say anyway?
“I hate school,” Jenna grumbles as we arrive at her locker.
“No, you don’t.”
“Well, I at least hate the first day of school. Everyone’s trying to impress everyone else.”
“Is that why you’re wearing a dress?”
“Is it that bad?” she asks, smoothing her skirt.
“No, it’s nice,” I tell her. “I just haven’t seen it before.”
“My father bought it for me,” Jenna says, tossing her bag lunch into her locker. “You know, as a first-day-of-school thing. I brought shorts and a T-shirt to change into.”
“No, you should keep it on,” I tell her as the warning bell rings. “And don’t go into lunch without me.”
“Do I ever?” she calls out, hurrying down the hall to her homeroom.
My first class after homeroom is American history. History is one of my favorite subjects because I’m good at it. Once I learn the date of a certain event, I can easily remember it by its colors. I remember names the same way.
I’d heard rumors about the serious strangeness of Mrs. Morris, the American history teacher, and I can now say that those rumors are fact. She has a bizarre fear of germs, and as soon as she walks in, she lays down the law.
First she stands by the blackboard and peers at us over her bifocals. Then she says, “Everyone in the front row of desks pick up your books and move to the back. You are to leave the front row empty.” The kids in the front row follow her orders, one boy grumbling under his breath that he didn’t have cooties the last time he checked.
Mrs. Morris then moves over to her desk and points to two wire baskets. “You are to make two separate piles of homework each day. If you have a cold, you are to place your homework in the pile marked ‘ill.’ You are to wash your hands before class. With soap. This may sound extreme, but cleanliness is next to godliness.” The worst thing about her speech is that her voice is so high-pitched and squeaky that rust-colored spirals rain down behind her.
My next class is English. I like my English teacher, Mr. Siedler, right away. This is his first year teaching, and he seems pretty nervous. Michelle, the girl who sits behind me and whose father owns the biggest hardware store in town, cracks her gum in my ear. While the teacher is digging through his drawers to find the attendance list, she taps my shoulder and shows me a book on her desk. All I can make out are the words English Class written on the brown-bag book cover.
“Did we have a summer reading assignment?” I ask, worried.
She shakes her head and grins slyly. “It’s not a schoolbook,” she whispers. “It’s a dirty book. I put the cover on to fool people.”
Relieved, I say, “How nice for you,” and turn back around in my seat. Note to self: Don’t ask Michelle to be a study partner. The teacher has us all file up to his desk to pick up the first book on our reading list — Lord of the Flies. Why he’d want us to read a book about flies is beyond me.
At lunch a group of boys dare each other to eat the most disgusting combination of cafeteria food. After that, one of them swallows a dime and has to be taken to the school nurse. Jenna and I sit with the same group of girls we’ve been eating with since fourth grade. Kimberly and Molly, who are best friends but very competitive with each other, and Sara, who is quiet and very serious. As usual, Sara already has her nose buried in a book when we sit down. Kimberly is talking about how she got moved into the honors math class and how next year in high school she’s going to be ahead of all the other ninth-graders. I glance at Molly to see if she’s going to counter that with anything and am surprised to notice that she was busy over the summer growing breasts. Her tight tank top tells me she has no plans to hide them either. I see Jenna staring too. Molly stands up to find a straw, and I swear at least one boy from each table looks up as she passes. Kimberly sticks out her pointy chin and doesn’t look happy. Sara has an amused little smile on her face.
I watch Molly stroll through the maze of tables, but I’m viewing her through a jumble of colors that come together like lumpy oatmeal. The voices and laughter of a hundred kids and various CD players echo off the linoleum walls and fill the air with a collage of colors. It makes it hard to relax and talk to my friends, but the only other option is to sit outside alone and I don’t want to do that either.
After lunch I walk with Sara to our pre-algebra class. I have to hurry to keep up with her. “Hey, Sara, wouldn’t it be fun if for every two steps we took, we took one backward?”
She doesn’t slow her pace even a tiny bit. “Why would we do that?” she asks. “Then we’d be late. Honestly, Mia. You only have one chance to make a first impression.”
Who says things like that? I slow down, but she keeps up her breakneck speed. I make it to class right before the bell rings, and the teacher is already writing an equation on the board. I’m sunk already. I just can’t grasp how to solve it. Normally an x is a shiny maroon color, like a ripe cherry. But here an x has to stand for an unknown number. But I can’t make myself assign the x any other color than maroon, and there are no maroon-colored numbers. Without the color, I don’t know how to proceed. I’m lost in shades of gray and want to scream in frustration. I pretend to work on the problem in my notebook. All I write is x = HELP while all over the room hands shoot up to give the answer.
That all-too-familiar combination of confusion and anger is starting to bubble up inside me again. Gurgle, bubble, sputter.
Spanish class isn’t any better. I try to match the colors of the English words to the new Spanish words. Hello and hola works fine. Mother and madre is a bit of a stretch, but it is close enough that I can remember it. Boy and chico doesn’t work at all. Neither does girl and chica, good and bueno. Adiós and good-bye to the honor roll. At least I know that one.
The only good part of the day is my last class. As soon as I walk into the art room and pick a stool at one of the worktables, I feel like I’m home. All of the art students had to be approved by the teacher before they could get into the class, just like last year and the year before. The same kids always make it. While I’m looking around the room, a young woman walks in carrying a huge pile of books in her arms. She tells us to call her Karen. Just Karen. A smooth plum-colored name with little yellow specks. It takes me a minute to figure out she’s the teacher. The girl next to me raises her hand, and Karen looks up from passing out the books.
“Um, what happened to Mrs. Simpson?” she asks tentatively.
I am wondering the same thing. Mrs. Simpson had been the art teacher for something like thirty years.
Karen looks around and then says with a sigh, “Mrs. Simpson went on to a better place.”
“She died?” the girl exclaims in horror.
The class emits a collective gasp. I grab onto the edge of the table.
Karen shakes her head. “No, no. She went to the high school. She teaches there now. My teaching methods are a little different from hers, but I have a feeling you’ll enjoy yourselves.”
Now everyone lets out a sigh of relief. I think Mrs. Simpson will be happier at the high school. She was always muttering about middle-school hormones runni
ng amok. Although I would think high-school hormones were even worse.
Karen tells us to look through the new art book and pick an artist whose style we want to imitate. She says we’ll learn a lot about our own style by studying others. I’d like to think I have a style already, but I guess it couldn’t hurt to study someone else’s. I flip through the pages, but nothing jumps out at me.
When school is over I meet Jenna at her locker, the same as I’ve done every day after school since we were old enough to have lockers. She’s still in the dress, but she’s wearing her sneakers from gym instead of the sandals.
“This has got to go,” she says. In one motion she rips out the poster that had been inside her locker door for two years. “Boy bands are so over. What was I thinking?”
We pass my history classroom, and Jenna ducks in and throws the crumpled poster in the garbage can. A plan forms in my head. I lean close and whisper in her ear. “PIC mission.”
She nods and awaits instructions.
“You wait here at the door,” I tell her. “Drop your book bag if someone’s coming.”
“Okay, but hurry. I don’t want to miss the bus on the first day of school.”
I look both ways, dash into the room, and head straight for the teacher’s desk. In one swift maneuver, I switch the sick and healthy baskets.
“Mission accomplished,” I announce upon my return. We turn and run outside to where the buses pick us up. We figure out which is ours, and Jenna gets on first. When I reach the top stair I hear a small voice yell out, “Hi, Mia!” I turn around in time to see Billy Henkle waving excitedly from the window of a passing car. He must have an older brother or sister in middle school! By the time I collect my senses to wave back, the bus driver has shut the door behind me. Jenna picks a seat in the back, and I slide in after her. I have a hard time paying attention to what she’s saying. It would be easier to pretend I never met Billy and to forget about my colors. As the bus rolls out into the country, I decide to try. I’m going to be so normal that when people look up normal in the dictionary, my name will be there.
Chapter Four
Only two weeks into school and I’ve already failed two math quizzes. Failed with a bright-purple capital F. The note from my teacher is burning a hole in my back pocket, and I know I should give it to my parents. Instead, I’m sitting at the kitchen table forcing myself to finish the rest of my homework. Zack is actually humming as he does his sixth-grade long division. Beth claimed she didn’t have any homework and is outside gathering herbs in the moonlight. I can’t remember ever seeing Beth in the woods before. She isn’t the outdoorsy type, which is pretty pathetic considering our house is surrounded by fields and woods. Mango is on my lap, purring away as I pet him.
I finish reading the third chapter of Lord of the Flies, which, it turns out, is not about flies at all. I can’t help yawning. Reading always makes me tired because sometimes I get so caught up in the rainbowlike colors of the words that I have to read passages over and over.
“You really should cover your mouth when you yawn,” Zack says.
“Why? We’re not in public.”
He shrugs and resumes his homework. “It’s your soul, not mine.”
“My soul?” I ask. “Since when do you know about souls?”
“Oh, I know about souls,” he says gravely. “And I know that if you yawn and don’t cover your mouth, your soul can jump out.”
I stare at him. “Where did you hear that? The Internet again?”
“It’s common knowledge,” he says.
“You’re as strange as they come, Zack.”
“Thanks.”
“It isn’t a compliment,” I assure him.
“It is to me,” he says.
I return to the sheet of math equations in front of me. After staring at the swirls of gray for five full minutes, I finally throw my pencil across the room in disgust. Mango jumps off my lap and chases halfheartedly after the pencil before lying down to wash himself. I am not a stupid person. I know I’m not. Why can’t I figure out this basic math problem? Zack peers at me in surprise.
“Something wrong?” he asks. At least that’s what I think he says. The frustration blots out everything so that all I can focus on is this weird heaviness in my chest. The bubbling up inside me has gotten too strong. I can feel it rising to the surface. Bubble, bubble, simmer, fizz, and BOOM! So much for trying to be normal. That didn’t last long.
I push back my chair, ignore the rusty-red scraping sound that reminds me of dried blood, and march into the living room. My parents are sitting together on the couch trying to decide if they should be worried about Beth’s new hobby. They stop talking when they see me.
Okay. Deep breath. Here goes. Just blurt it out. I wish Grandpa were here. He would know exactly what to do.
“I have to tell you guys something.” Once the words are out, I am unable to make my lips work again.
They wait for me to continue, and I almost chicken out. But the BOOM is still ringing in my ears. I have no choice but to remind them of the one incident in my life I’d hoped everyone had forgotten. I take another deep breath. “Remember in third grade when you guys had to come to the principal’s office to get me?”
They think for a few seconds. Then my father says, “Something about chalk?”
“Right,” I say. “Chalk.” And at that moment I taste the chalk in my mouth, feel it tickling my throat.
“What about it?” my mother asks.
“Well, remember I told everyone I made the whole thing up?”
“Vaguely,” she says. “What’s this all about, Mia?”
“Well, the thing is,” I begin, knowing there is no turning back now, “I wasn’t lying. Numbers really do have colors for me. So do letters and sounds.”
They are staring at me with that familiar Mia-sprouted-another-head stare, but I keep talking. I bounce around the room as I speak. Each word lightens me a bit more.
“I used to think everyone saw these colors; then in third grade I figured out it was just me.” My mind flashes to Billy for a second, but I don’t want to confuse things even more. Not until I figure out what his story is. “I thought I should tell you about it before I get two F’s on my report card.” I dig into my pocket and hand my mom the crumpled note. “You have to sign this.”
I plop down on the armchair across from them, waiting for their reaction as they read the note together. I don’t have to wait too long.
“Is this whole story some kind of joke to justify your difficulty with math?” asks my mother with a frown. “Because it wasn’t funny in third grade and it isn’t funny now.”
“It isn’t a joke, Mom,” I reply, gritting my teeth.
My father studies me for a minute. “Do you mean to say you hallucinate?”
I shake my head. “It’s not like that.”
“Hallucinating means you imagine you see things that aren’t there,” my father adds.
I try not to lose my patience. “I know what the word means, Dad. But I’m not imagining things. My colors are as real as this house.”
“What kinds of colors are these, exactly?” my mother asks. I can tell she’s still not sure whether I’m lying.
I try to think of the easiest way to describe it. “Each letter and number has its own color,” I explain. “Like a k is turquoise blue, whether I think of it, read it, or hear it. It’s just there, inside my head, plain as day.”
They continue to stare at me, and I begin to squirm.
“Sounds have colors too,” I add, figuring there’s no use holding anything back at this point. “High-pitched sounds give the sharpest colors. When I hear a noise, I’ll see the color and shape that go with —”
“Shape?” my father interrupts.
“Yes, shape,” I say. “The colors appear in geometric shapes like spirals or balls or zigzags, that sort of thing. Or sometimes just a hazy patch of colored air.”
“Does this block your vision?” my mother asks hurriedly. “Does it
hurt?”
I shake my head at both questions. “No, it’s not like that really. It’s more —”
“This is all your fault,” my mother informs my father before I can finish my sentence.
“My fault?” He jumps up from the couch. “How are you blaming this on me?”
“All those drugs in the sixties,” she says accusingly.
“What drugs?” he sputters. “I never took drugs in the sixties.”
“Well, neither did I,” she says.
“I never said you did.”
This conversation has taken an unexpected turn, and my head is going back and forth like a Ping-Pong ball.
“Your brother used drugs,” she says matter-of-factly, unwilling to give up this line of reasoning.
“What does that have to do with me? Or Mia?” he demands.
“Maybe you inhaled something and passed it on to her,” she says. “Or, or —”
“Or, maybe this is your crazy aunt Polly’s fault,” my father responds. “Maybe Mia inherited something from her.”
“My aunt Polly isn’t crazy,” my mother says defensively. “She’s just a little eccentric. That has nothing to do with —”
“I figured you’d think I’m crazy,” I say, trying to keep my voice steady. They glare at each other, and then both their faces soften.
“We don’t think you’re crazy, Mia,” my father says, sitting down again. “We just don’t understand.” He reaches over and takes my hands in his. “Do you remember when this started?”
“It’s always been there,” I tell him, still stinging from their words.
“I bet I know what this is all about,” my mother says excitedly. “I bet it’s those building blocks you used to play with. You know, the ones with the colored letters on them?”
“Huh?” I say.
“You probably memorized the colored letters when you were a baby,” she says. “And you’ve been associating colors with letters and numbers ever since.”
I think about that for a second, then shake my head. “That can’t be it,” I say. “That doesn’t explain —”
“I’ll run down to the basement and get them,” she says, ignoring me. “I’m sure they’re still in the old toy chest.”