Ramon's jacket. I wonder how he's doing?
She felt smugly proud at having achieved black leather superiority over the other students.
Kayla walked to the school secretary's office. The gray-haired woman assigned a student worker to escort her to her first class, who also introduced her to the instructor of the English Literature course. The dark-haired man with the handlebar mustache gestured for Kayla to take one of the empty chairs, then continued his detailed explanation of the relationships in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.
Kayla listened in spite of herself, fascinated by the teacher's command of language and the way he stopped every few minutes to recite a few lines from the play, becoming that character for several seconds, bringing the play to life. "And tomorrow we'll watch a film version of Romeo and Juliet, and then compare that to West Side Story," he concluded, just as the bell rang. Kayla blinked, realizing that the hour had gone by without her even noticing it.
Now all I have to do is figure out how to get to Building 12, Room 3, Kayla thought, gathering up her notebooks. She waited until the rush of students leaving the room had died down a bit before walking out into the hallway.
"You looked like you were really into that Shakespeare stuff," someone said from directly behind her.
Kayla glanced back and saw a young man with an unruly mop of wild red hair. He was grinning at her.
"Yeah, I thought it was pretty cool," she said. "Listen, maybe you can help me out. I need to figure out how to get to my next class."
"Hey, no problem," the redhead said. "My name's Mike, what's yours?"
"Kayla," she said. "Kayla Smith."
"Oh, you've got Tokugawa next for biology, too," Mike said, leaning over to look at her class schedule on top of her notebook. "She's a killer, probably the toughest teacher in the whole school. And you've got Wilson for English Grammar after that. Looks like we've got pretty much the same schedule, which makes sense if you're in the Honors program, too."
"Honors program?" Kayla said. "I didn't know Elizabet signed me up for that."
"Who's Elizabet? Your stepmom?"
"No, my . . . uh . . . my guardian. It's a long story," she added at his confused look.
"Yeah, well, tell it to me over lunch. We'd better get ourselves to class." They walked quickly across the quad to another building, where Mike introduced her to two of his friends, Stephanie and Bert, just before the bell rang to begin biology class. Miss Tokugawa, a tiny Oriental woman, began her lecture on genetics. Kayla realized that Mike was absolutely right: this class was going to be a killer. But an hour later, she knew a lot more about genetics than she had before.
English Grammar was almost a relief after that, and Kayla was rather pleased when Mrs. Wilson turned out to be a cheerful, exuberant young woman who obviously loved what she was teaching.
After the class ended, Kayla caught up with Mike and his friends in the hallway. He saw her and smiled. "Hey, Kayla, we're thinking of going and getting burgers for lunch. Do you want to go?"
"I thought you needed a lunch pass to leave the school," Kayla said. "At least, I thought that's what the secretary told me."
"Well, yeah." Mike shrugged. "Or you could just climb the fence, which is what we usually do. It's no big deal; they don't really care all that much. We should all take journalism next semester. That way you get an automatic gate pass. Let's go, guys."
Kayla followed them out the building and around the school auto shop to a deserted area of fence. I hope Mike's right about this. I'd really hate to get busted on my first day at a new school.
Mike scaled the wire fence with the ease of someone who's been practicing it for a long time, and Steph and Bert started up as well. Kayla sighed and began pulling herself up the chain links. She jumped down lightly to join the others on the other side. This isn't too bad<M>,<D> she thought. First day here, already making some friends, some cool guys who aren't afraid of a little adventure. Though I bet they wouldn't believe the kind of adventures I've had lately.
"We usually go to the Burger Shack just over there across the street," Mike said, starting across the wide boulevard.
"Mike, watch out!" Steph yelled. Mike looked up, too late.
The oncoming driver slammed on his brakes, but not fast enough.
He's going to hit him! He's going to—
Mike yelled once, a hoarse sound, and then the blue car hit him, knocking him up the hood of the car. He landed hard against the windshield. The blue car squealed to a stop a few feet further down the road. Mike slid off the hood onto the asphalt, lying very still on the street.
"Oh, shit . . ." Kayla was kneeling next to him a minute later. He was still conscious, staring at her, his mouth moving but not making any sound.