Chapter 1
Avalyn
I crouched beneath my table as sirens blared loudly
throughout the school. All around me, students were doing the same, some taking
the lockdown more seriously than others.
“Can’t they just turn the siren off?” one girl asked
loudly. I looked over at her. Hope something or other, I couldn’t remember her
last name. Rather than crouching, she sat with her legs crossed beneath her
desk, her cell phone on her lap.
“Not until the lockdown is lifted,” Mrs. Taylor said, her
voice tinged with annoyance. She had her cell phone in hand, monitoring the
situation. Apparently, a bomb threat had been called in at our rival high
school in the next county.
“It’s
not even us that got threatened,” one boy complained. “Why do we gotta stay in
lockdown?”
Mrs.
Taylor ignored his question. I could tell that she was getting fed up by the
students’ attitude about the situation. “The entire valley is on lockdown,
Owen. I don’t make the rules, I just have to enforce them.”
“Why
do we have to stay under our desks?” the boy continued. “It’s hot and
uncomfortable.”
“Because
the bomb threat in Sequatchie isn’t all we’re dealing with right now,” Mrs.
Taylor snapped. “There’s also a rumor of a group of people with guns
threatening people in the area, and we’re not sure who they are or what’s
happening with that, so until we get the all clear from the police chief, we’re
going to stay right here, do you understand me?”
This
set off another buzz of conversation among the other students. I was appalled
by some of the comments I overheard, especially among the football players.
“Hey, maybe we’ll get lucky and the bomb will go off,”
one of them said, causing the others to laugh raucously and high-five the speaker.
“Yeah, or the group of gunners will catch them off guard.” I ignored them, as
usual. Just one more month and this will
all be over, I thought. I’ll be
getting ready to leave for a college far, far away and will never have to see
any of these redneck idiots again.
We have been under our tables for over an hour now, and
my back and knees hurt from kneeling. I settled down into a position similar to
Hope’s. It was a bit more comfortable, but not much. I placed my hands over my
ears to drown out the wail of the siren. Beside me, Chastity Vargas gave me a
weird look. Even over the siren and with my hands over my ears I could hear her
rude comment. “She’s such a freak. It’s just a siren.” Glaring, I removed my
hands from my ears and crossed them in front of me.
Why
did we have to go into lockdown in English class, where we sat four people to a
table rather than in individual desks? I hated being stuck under here with
Chastity and her two clones, Brittani with an “i” and Brittany with a “y”. They
all looked the same to me, with slick, flat-ironed hair with too many
highlights, thick black eyeliner, and glossed, pouty lips. The only difference
was that Brittani with an “i” was bustier than the other two, and got more
attention from guys. My best friend Bryn and I called them “The Bodies” behind
their backs, because they didn’t have much personality or intelligence to boast
of, but flaunted their assets wherever possible. In fact, even now Chastity was
leaning forward and tugging at the low-cut neckline of her shirt, exposing her
cleavage to the football players. “Oh, it’s so hot in here,” she complained,
her gaze trained on one of the players. “Yeah, it is,” he responded. “Maybe you
should take some clothes off.” She giggled, and I rolled my eyes.
And they think I’m the weird one,
I thought to myself. At least I didn’t have to cake my face with makeup and
torture my hair into submission before I could leave the house. I don’t get
praised for my looks the way they do, but I was satisfied with my wavy, dark
brown hair and wide blue eyes. “Like a deer in the headlights,” my dad had once
said to describe them, but I didn’t mind. I didn’t feel the need to own every
article of clothing from Aeropostale, either, like most of the girls at this
school. Even among the different social groups, whether they were jocks, band
kids, preps, or nerds, there was a sort of unspoken uniform of jeans, Aero
shirts, Carrhart jackets, and either Sperrys or Toms. I looked around. A heated
argument over which singer from some band was hottest was raging in one corner,
and in the center of the room, the football players were still discussing the
consequences if our rival school got bombed, and how it would affect football
season next year. Mrs. Taylor tried to redirect the discussions by bringing up
the government shutdown and asking our opinions on it, but it didn’t work.
“We’re on lockdown, we don’t have to focus on that crap
right now,” a heavyset boy with widely set eyes and thick lips said. Several
others raised their voices in agreement. I shook my head. As if Ryan ever thinks about politics, or anything even remotely
intelligent, for that matter. Apparently Mrs. Taylor echoed my sentiments,
because she told the class that if we weren’t going to discuss that topic, then
we weren’t going to speak at all. That didn’t stop most students though, who
just slipped their cell phones from their bags and their pockets and began
texting. Mrs. Taylor saw, but didn’t say anything. I guess as long as no one
was talking she was fine with cell phone usage. I looked around at the
assortment of students around me and grimaced, not for the first time.
I
couldn’t wait to get away from this Podunk little town. The only colleges I had
applied to were at least fifty miles from here, and one was even in Hawaii. In
another town, another state, I could start over without the NatureFreak
stigmata over my head. In Parkville, everybody knows everybody, but not in a
friendly Mayberry sort of way. There are only 410 students enrolled in the high
school at this point in the year. We started out the year at 476, but as people
turned 18 here many of them dropped out of school to go to work at one of the
nearby factories. I knew of one girl that had dropped out just a week ago,
despite there being only five weeks until graduation. I couldn’t imagine
throwing everything away like that. The rumor was that she was probably
pregnant and wanted to hide it, but I wasn’t sure. It’s probably a good thing I don’t fit in here, I thought to
myself.
I
really wished Bret and Bryn were here today, though. Bret has this class with
me, and sits at the table closest to mine. If he were here, I know he would be
cracking me up by pantomiming a conversation, or doodling silly pictures of the
other students, or passing notes to me as though we were third graders. That
was how we had passed the last lockdown, though it had only lasted an hour. I
still had the origami frog he had made for me tucked into my folder. Granted, a
frog isn’t the most romantic gift a girl could get, but I loved it. Hey, if I kiss it, maybe it will turn into a
prince, I thought to myself goofily. I grinned at the thought. I don’t need a prince. I have the best guy
friend a girl could ask for. Thinking about Bret definitely made the time pass
a little faster. Even though we have been friends for ages, I feel like maybe
our friendship could be shifting into something more. I could feel the heat
creeping into my face at that thought. Ok,
brain, change the subject!
I
didn’t have a cell phone to entertain myself, so I reached up and groped around
on the top of the table for my sketchbook. I felt the edge of it with my
fingertips, but couldn’t reach it from this position. I sighed, dropping my
hand back down and burying my face in the crooks of my elbows, drawing my knees
into my chest. The Bodies were worriedly discussing whether or not we would be
able to have a graduation ceremony. The government shutdown cut funding to a
lot of the programs in our county, and a lot of money from the school budget
was being used to run the police department and Emergency services in town until
everything starts back up. The only thing guaranteed for the school was the senior
field trip to Dollywood tomorrow, because the money had come from fundraisers
rather than from the budget. The Bodies weren’t discussing that aspect,
however. Their main concern was not being able to wear the extravagant dresses
they had already purchased. Sometimes their shallowness amazed me. Gas prices
were rising daily, the country has stopped exporting goods, and there are at
least three other countries threatening the United States, and their most
pressing concern was clothes. Amazing,
I thought sarcastically. These people are
the future of this country.
I
felt something tap my shoulder and whipped around, ready to snap at someone.
Instead of some jerk picking on me to pass the time, however, I saw Mrs.
Taylor’s black slacks beside my head. She held my sketchpad down to me
silently, and I whispered “Thanks.”
“Teacher’s
pet,” someone called out, and Mrs. Taylor’s head whipped around but didn’t
catch the perpetrator. I ignored them and slipped my pen, a black Pilot G2, out
of one of the pockets on my pants. Bracing my back against one of the legs of
the table, I turned away from the Bodies. Opening to a fresh page, I began to
sketch.
On
the page, a tall, beautiful girl with long, flowing hair ran through the
forest. I could see her in my mind’s eye as she ran effortlessly, rushing to find
out the source of the cry for help she had heard. I showed a new panel, in
which a tall, strong, handsome teenage guy was slipping beneath the water in a
deep, crystalline pool. The girl, who I called Star in my head, bounded from
panel to panel, diving off of a steep cliff and into the water, and pulled the
mysterious stranger to the side of the pool. She laid him on the bank and
turned back to fight the long, manicured hands of the evil mermaids that had
been trying to drag him to their lair. She won, of course, driving them away
empty-handed. The handsome stranger rewarded her with a sweet, tender kiss at
the edge of the pool, water dripping from their hair, lips locked passionately.
It took three full pages in my sketchbook and another two hours to finish, but
as there was nothing else to do during a lockdown, I was entertained. I rarely
had time to finish a full page at home, much less three pages, so I ignored the
siren and the people around me and made the most of this unexpected down-time.
Finally,
after three and a half hours, the siren stopped. The principal announced over
the intercom that we should stay in our current classes and not rotate to our
final block. Mrs. Taylor let us go out to our lockers to get our things
together. Since there was only half an hour left of school, we were allowed to
have free time, as long as we stayed quiet. I slipped my sketchbook into my
backpack and pulled out the book I was currently reading, a teen romance called
Destiny about a Mormon girl that fell for a Baptist boy. Bryn had recommended
it to me, and I was about halfway finished already.
When the bell for dismissal rang, I hung back as the
other students filtered out of the room. When everyone else had gone, I brought
my sketchbook up to Mrs. Taylor. She flipped through the pages, exclaiming at
the details. When she got to the page showing the mermaids, baring their
pointed teeth at Star as they disappeared back into their lair, she laughed
aloud.
“As a teacher, I probably shouldn’t mention that you portrayed
these girls perfectly, should I?” she asked guiltily.
I grinned. Capturing “The Bodies” on paper hadn’t been
difficult in such close quarters.
“You know,” Mrs. Taylor said thoughtfully, “The Chicago
Art Institute has a mixed media scholarship right now. The deadline is this
week, but you have plenty of material in here that could showcase your
abilities. You could enter under the graphic novel category.”
I hesitated. The Art Institute was an amazing school, but
I wasn’t sure about entering my sketches. They were pretty personal. Star was
everything I wanted to be: confident, brave, self-assured. Handing over the
sketches would feel a bit like handing over a bit of myself. I didn’t mind
sharing with Mrs. Taylor, since I knew her really well. She was head of the
Book Club, of which I was an active member, and she also taught the gifted
class at school during first period. She had been my “GAT”, or “Gifted and
Talented”, teacher since second grade. I trusted her implicitly, but the
thought of other people seeing my sketches, judging them, made me feel sick to
my stomach.
“I’ll think about it,” I told her, and she nodded
understandingly. She knew how shy I was.
“Can you let me know by tomorrow?” she asked. “I really think you have a chance at it.”
I nodded, taking my sketchbook back and holding it
tightly against my chest. The warning bell rang, and I waved goodbye to her as
I darted out the door to catch my bus. “Think about it,” she called after me. I
slouched down into my seat at the front of the bus, sticking my earbuds in and
cranking my music up. Normally I would sit with Bryn, but she and her brother
Bret had doctor’s appointments today. I set my iPod to my Shiny Toy Guns
playlist and settled in with my book for the hour-long bus ride up and across
the mountain to my house.
“Have a good evening,” the bus driver said when we got to
my house, the second to last on the line. Rather than go straight to the house,
I slipped my backpack on and disappeared into the woods surrounding the
Homestead. Our house was nestled in the middle of almost seventy acres, so
there was plenty of forest to explore. I wandered aimlessly, plucking a
sassafras leaf from a sapling and chewing on the stem to release its calming,
lemony scent. I lay down on a bed of soft moss beside our large, bubbling creek
and slipped my book from my backpack, determined to finish it before I went
home.
I
knew I would have to do my chores as well before going in, which included
gathering eggs, feeding the chickens, ducks, rabbits and our three turkeys,
gathering any ripe vegetables from Mom’s garden, and checking on Starfire, my
Tennessee walking horse. She was the only animal I bonded with, considering
most of our others were destined to end up on the table. I had stopped naming
those animals when I was four and Mr. Snuffles the pig ended up in our freezer.
Starfire, on the other hand, was my pride and joy. I got her from another
farmer on the mountain when she was a year old, in exchange for tutoring his
two daughters in math and English. It was hard, but she was definitely worth
it. She is a beautiful horse, with a chestnut body, black legs, mane, and tail,
and a white star in the center of her forehead, above a thin white vertical
stripe on her nose. She was an incredible runner, and I rode her most evenings
when I got home from school. Today, however, I just wanted to read.
