I hate to admit it, but I don’t look half bad.
“What about my old clothes?” I glance back at the dressing room where I left my leather jacket, concert shirt, ripped jeans, and boots.
“They will be taken to your quarters,” Ms. Skelter says.
“Quarters? What are those?”
“Your room in the Convent.”
“The what?!” I laugh. “Who said anything about me becoming a nun?” I’m horrified by the idea.
“No one. The name is merely a historical holdover from the earliest days of the academy. During the Civil War, the Convent was exactly that. A refuge for young women in trouble, women such as yourself who chose to devote themselves to a higher purpose. Then it was the lord’s work, now that purpose is learning and service.”
“Oh. Right. I can do that.”
“I should hope so,” Ms. Skelter chortles. It’s a warning, a veiled reminder of where I’d be if she hadn’t shown me mercy not once, not twice, but three times.
I roll my eyes and sigh.
Before leaving, Barbara also gives me an official Castle Hill Academy leather book bag. It has buckles and straps and looks vintage but isn’t. I also get a Castle Hill notebook. The unlined paper is practically parchment, bound in a booklet, and removable from the soft leather cover that has its own leather belt to keep it closed. I guess so you can put in a fresh one when you fill the first. Last, I get a Castle Hill fountain pen kit with extra nibs and ink cartridges.
It’s quite the haul for a foster kid like me.
I guess this place has some perks.
We’ll soon see if they’re worth it.
Chapter 12
Now that Ms. Skelter has beaten the rebel out of me (or so she thinks), I think she’s comfortable not hovering over my shoulder because she hands me over to one of her underlings back at the administration offices to set up my schedule.
Yes, everyone there pretends not to stare at my bald head. I refuse to ask Ms. Skelter if it’s a violation of the student code for me to wear a wig. I’d rather walk around bald. In a place like this, with its ridiculously cisgender uniforms, it doesn’t get any more punk rock than that.
The woman sitting behind her typewriter tells me her name is Joan and says she’s preparing my schedule. She slips a fresh sheet of paper into her typewriter and twists the clicking dial thing before typing.
Tikka-tikka-ding!
I wait while she does her thing, sitting in the leather chair in front of her desk. I pull out my Cricket from my backpack to check it out of habit. The battery is dead. I put it back. Wait. And wait. And wait. Is this what people did back in the day? Wait all the time for every little thing? The weird thing is… it’s kind of relaxing not checking my phone obsessively. Who knew?
Eventually, Joan looks up and says, “And what would you like for your elective, Mary?”
“I don’t know. What do you have?”
“How about computer science?”
“Ew.”
“Personal finance?”
“I don’t have any money.”
Joan snickers at that. “There’s always public speaking.”
“After the day I’ve had, I need to do less of that,” I joke.
“How about drama?”
“You mean theater? Like plays and musicals or whatever?”
Joan nods, “This year’s big production will be Romeo & Juliet.”
“That’ll work.” Knowing I have to work twenty hours a week, maybe they’ll give me one of the minor parts. No, the chorus. Then I won’t even have to talk. I can just move my lips while everyone else does the talking for me. No, I’ll be backstage crew. I hate being in front of an audience. I can do lighting or stage-handing or whatever.
Joan clacks a few keys, then spins the typewriter dial, ejecting the paper, and hands me a freshly typed schedule of my classes for this term.
Period 1 - Physical Education
Period 2 - AP Physics
Period 3 - AP US History
Period 4 - AP English
Period 5 - Trigonometry
Period 6 - AP Spanish
Period 7 - Drama
“Are you shitting me?” I groan.
Joan frowns.
“Sorry. I mean, um, what’s the Skelter-approved word for, um, S-ing?”
“Kidding, I would venture,” Joan offers.
“Right, Kidding. Are you kidding? I have to do all this and work twenty hours a week?”
Joan smiles, “Ms. Skelter said this course load is similar to what you were enrolled in at your previous school.”
“Yeah, but not AP classes. Can’t I take non-AP classes?” I know the best colleges and universities expect you to take AP classes, but at no point in my high school life did I ever think I could afford one of those. I don’t care what Mr. Ralston said, I just want to get my diploma and associates or whatever, get out of here, get a job, and never look back. I only keep my grades up to keep my mind off everything else. The point of school was never to work my ass off. That’s what jobs are for. They pay you for your hard work, unlike school.
Joan smiles apologetically, “We don’t have any non-AP classes here at Castle Hill.”
“Oh? Okay,” I sigh. “This is a lot, Joan. Erm, Mrs. Joan? Miss Joan? Sorry, I don’t know what to call you.”
“Joan is fine,” she smiles.
I whisper, “I don’t know if I can do all this and keep my GPA up. Ms. Skelter says I need to keep a 3.5 or you’ll kick me out. If I didn’t have to work, I could totally do it. But I don’t know.” I’m really and truly worried. Ms. Skelter hasn’t cut me any slack so far, and she sounded serious about me keeping up my GPA. I really really don’t want to go back to jail because I flunk one math quiz or can’t remember my Spanish vocab.
Joan leans across her wood desk and whispers, “Ms. Skelter wouldn’t give you anything she thought you couldn’t handle.”
“Okaaaaay. If you say so.” I look over the schedule again. At least I won’t have to work hard for drama if they put me on curtain duty like I hope.
“You can do it, Mary. You’re smart, I can tell.” Again she whispers, “Only the smartest ones get under Ms. Skelter’s skin like that.”
“Thanks.” I want to say Skelter doesn’t have any skin, only bones, but I don’t.
Joan offers a friendly wink, “Don’t worry. If you need help, we have plenty of student tutors ready and willing to help out.”
“Are they cute boys?”
Joan blushes, “I’m sure some of them are.”
I almost ask if Prince is a tutor, then decide I don’t want him to be, for obviously asshat reasons.
Joan says, “Now let’s get you to class. The day’s almost over.”
“What period is it now?”
“Seventh is about to start. I’ll have one of the work-study drama students show you the way.” Joan picks up an old phone receiver from the old black phone on her desk. It has a dial. She spins her finger around the circle of numbers so many times I get dizzy, and it takes her like twenty minutes to place one call. How did people manage back in the day? It’s ridiculous. When she’s done, she hands me my very own copy of the student handbook (Yay! Not yay!), and asks me to sit down and wait in one of the square chairs near the door.
So I do.
I know period six is over when I hear a church bell ring, and coming through the open windows in the administration office, the sounds of students flooding the courtyards between buildings. I can practically feel the excitement. I’ve always liked school. No matter how bad any school was, it was always better than foster care with people like Dwight and Shayla. Let me tell you, they weren’t the worst. The worst was—
((((it hurts!))))
((((please not again!))))
—I forget what the worst was, but this place?
As bad as it’s been today, it’s actually pretty good.
“Hi,” someone says shyly.
I look up into the eyes of Eliza-bitch herself. She’s my escort to drama cl
ass? Somebody made a mistake. I’m not going anywhere with her. No, no, no! Not after how she treated me and Rob.
In a demure voice, she says, “You must be Mary. My name is Azielbeth, but you can call me Azzie.”
“Um…” I say, totally confused. I glance over at Joan. She smiles and gives me a nod like everything is on the up and up. When I look back at Elizabeth, I finally notice she’s wearing a gray work-study academy uniform like mine. Instead of her boobs hanging out like before, she’s buttoned up to her neck. I blurt, “When did you change?”
“I’m sorry?” she giggles.
“Your clothes. You were wearing a burgundy plaid skirt earlier and a navy jacket.”
She frowns, “I was?”
“Yeah. When I saw you in the parking garage. With your… friends,” I say with disdain. “Victoria and Jacqueline.”
Her brows go up and she giggles like a bashful anime heroine, holding her fingers over her mouth, “You’re thinking of my twin sister Elizabeth.”
She’s totally lying. I mean, she has to be. This person is Eliza-bitch. I got a great look at her earlier and this is her. I’m not buying it. I admit, her nose ring is gone, and so is her tongue stud, but those are as easy to remove as her smoky makeup. I narrow my eyes, “What did you say your name was again? I mean, your full name?”
“Azielbeth Morgan-Hearst.”
“How do you spell your first name?”
“A-z-i-e-l-b-e-t-h. It’s weird, I know.” Is she kidding? Azielbeth is so obviously an anagram for Elizabeth, and not a very good one. “It was the name of my great-great-great-great grandmother or something like that.” She giggles and smiles sweetly, the picture of innocence.
“Of course it was,” I say dripping with suspicion.
“I know what you’re thinking. My sister and I are alike on the outside, but not the inside. I promise.”
Okay, this is beyond bizarre. Either she’s crazy or I’m crazy for believing anything she says. Isn’t Aziel some ancient historical name for some devil or something? One of the ones from Dante’s Inferno or whatever? I’d check my phone if I had any minutes or battery, but I don’t. Not that I need to. This is Elizabeth or my name isn’t Mary Angerman.
“We should get to class before the bell.” She does another anime giggle that is only slightly insane when you see someone doing it for real. “So we’re not late.”
“Whatever you say…” Elizabeth. My words are fake sweet but my thoughts are not.
She doesn’t notice.
I follow her outside.
<(—)>
On the way to drama class, Azzie and I cross campus and pass hundreds of kids along the way. The girls in the colorful couture of the paying student uniforms generally ignore us. Like Eliza-bitch and her friends in the garage, their expensive outfits often make them look more like strippers than students. Their shoes in particular stand out. Gucci, Miu Miu, Alexander McQueen, Jimmy Choo, Christian Louboutin. I don’t know any brands by sight, but Azzie does and points them out like a jealous downtown shoe whore on her first trip window shopping uptown. Her shoes are the same academy-issued low-heeled numbers I wear. She says she’s dying to get her own pair of Manolo Blahniks some day.
I couldn’t care less. I’d rather have my old Docs back. For all I care, she and the rich girls can sit on their Manolo Blah-Blahs heel side up.
The only time the rich girls don’t ignore us is when we don’t get out of their way.
“Move it, skeeve,” says some beauty queen with utter disgust. The rich girls with her laugh like catty crows.
“No, you move, you…” I stand my ground, trying to think of a witty retort. I don’t need to read the student handbook to know fighting is off limits, but hurling insults isn’t. I should’ve had a retort at the ready.
Azzie yanks me out of the way before I can say anything.
The Skeeve Queen and her minions blow past.
“It’s not worth it,” Azzie warns me. “If you don’t do what they tell you, you’ll get in trouble.”
“For not getting out of their way?”
Azzie nods ominously. “This isn’t regular school.”
“Don’t remind me,” I grumble and we keep walking.
The rich boys don’t ignore us. They can’t stop staring at us. Obviously, Azzie-Elizabeth is stunning. Quite a few boys grab at her, tugging at her hair, her arms, even the hem of her skirt. She giggles demurely and does nothing. When the rich boys don’t listen, I shout at them to keep their hands off and swat them away. It doesn’t matter if Azzie is Elizabeth or not. Girls need to stick together when it comes to rapey boys like these. And I thought it was just that guy Prince. No, it’s all of them. They’re shameless with their grabbing. The rich ones, anyway. By contrast, the work-study boys in the drab gray uniform blazers and slacks are respectful, which is a huge relief.
“Thanks,” Azzie says, embarrassed, like she can’t stand up for herself or doesn’t know how or I don’t know what.
“Haven’t they heard of hashtag MeToo around here?” I whisper.
“It doesn’t apply to us.”
“Why not?”
“Because they know we can’t do anything.”
“Because we’re work-study?”
She nods. “Get used to it. They’re untouchable.”
Me they taunt, calling me Baby Bald, Virgin Vadge, Gray Gash (because my gray uniform?), Red Wendy Woundy. It’s disgusting, really. At least they aren’t grabbing me.
Until they are.
When I feel my skirt pull up in back, I spin around swinging.
A group of little rich boys laugh and jump back and I punch nothing but air. They’re young, probably fourteen year-old freshman, if that.
“What is wrong with you?!” I shout at them. Honestly, I can’t believe this sort of behavior is tolerated. The worst part? None of the rich girls get treated this way. From what I’ve seen so far, the rich boys are super respectful when it comes to them. “Go away!”
One of the rich boys sneers, “Not until we check your panties!”
“Check them for what?!” I bark.
“If you’re wearing any!” the lead boy snivels.
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Did I get time-warped back to the Dark Ages or Ancient Mesopotamia or whenever?
“We want to see!” they plead.
A commotion draws their attention.
Rounding a Spanish-tiled and stuccoed building walks Prince Lancaster surrounded by an entourage of adoring and giggling beautiful rich girls. From the way they shamelessly vie for his attention, you’d think Prince is an Emmy-winning pop star fresh off his latest world tour. In actual fact, he’s telling some story about surfing. I can’t quite hear all the words because he’s not close enough, but it involves a very large wave off the north shore of Oahu, and him chasing the barrel while being chased by a great white shark swimming in the wave with him.
He is such a liar.
His gaggle of admirers “Oohs!” and “Aahs!” and they tell him how brave he is.
Azzie whispers, “He is so dreamy.”
“He is a walking cliche,” I complain and roll my eyes because I refuse to admit out loud I somewhat agree with her. As it is, I’m barely willing to secretly admit it to myself. But my feelings don’t lie. Seeing Prince like this makes me all fluttery inside, and jealous because he’s showering these bimbettes with attention but not me. Like everyone else, I’m a victim to my traitorous hormones.
“I wouldn’t bother with these ants,” Prince says as he approaches me and Azzie and our boy tormentors, the Panty Checkers, who paused their perverted pursuit of our panties the moment they heard Prince and his giggling bimbettes coming around the corner.
I mutter to Azzie, “Did he just call us ants? Like, bug ants?”
“That’s what we are,” she whispers.
“Ants?”
“Sort of. It’s short for either peasants or servants, I’m not sure which. Both, I guess.”
“Oh.”
My jaw drops. Is he serious?
One of Prince’s rich bimbettes says, “Why does Castle Hill need criminal ants anyway? Can’t we hire maids that aren’t slutty drug whores?”
“We could,” Prince smirks, “but if we did, we would have to treat them with some measure of respect. I’d much rather be at liberty to abuse them however I see fit.”
I expect his bimbette to giggle dumbly and say, “Tee-hee, what?! Big words are hard!” She doesn’t because she probably takes AP classes like everyone else here at the academy.
Instead she says, “Oh, right. I’d much rather treat them like trash.”
“Or step on them like insects if they get in our way,” warns another rich bimbette, glaring expensive jewel-encrusted designer eye-daggers at me, or is that just her eyelash extensions and colored contacts?
Prince smirks at me in disgust and says, “Let this human filth clean up your filth for you, ladies. Filth is what they know best. When they outlive their usefulness, dispose of them as you see fit.”
“Totalleee,” they laugh as they leave and Prince starts on another surfing story.
For obvious reasons, the Panty Checkers heed Prince’s words of wisdom and disperse. They obviously look up to him. You could almost call what he just did chivalrous, intervening on my and Azzie’s behalf, except for the part where he blatantly insulted and demeaned me and her as less than human, dirty ants to be smashed underfoot without concern.
I was foolish to think earlier in the office that Prince has a hidden softer side underneath his shiny candy shell. I’m over it, it as in him, because I don’t think he qualifies as human after this. He’s just a shitty it.
Whatever.
<(—)>
Azzie and I continue toward class, passing more kids. Overall, there seems to be a similar ratio of rich kids to work-study kids. That’s good because the work-study kids aren’t jerks. Quite a few smile and greet Azzie as we pass. She introduces me to a several of the girls (but no boys for whatever reason). I don’t remember the girls’ names because I’m laser-focused on whether or not any of them call her Elizabeth.
Rich Boys vs. Poor Boys (The Cruel Kings of Castle Hill Academy, Book 1) by Devon Hartford kd103 Page 10