The first day of school dawned quiet and cool. The morning sky was still dark when Charlotte carried her school bag out to Aunt Sheena’s car.
As she walked down the front flagstones, Charlotte was struck by the newness of everything. The newness of the dark morning air, of her starched clothes, her shoes, even her backpack. The bag was still so stiff – Emi had chosen it during their big shopping spree – and it was too small to fit about 60% of Charlotte’s books. (“Big bags are so unseemly,” Emi had explained.)
Charlotte thought it was ridiculous. What was the point of having a bag if you had to carry all your books in your arms anyway? It was especially difficult since she only had one good arm to work with.
In fact, she almost dropped everything when she saw Mr. Kerrigan standing with his back to her a few feet away. He was putting something into Aunt Sheena’s car.
Ever since Emi had shared that story about Mr. Kerrigan’s daughter getting killed, Charlotte had found it difficult to look at him the same way. Yesterday, when he’d passed through the Kapono’s kitchen during lunchtime, she had barely been able to return his “hello.”
She kept picturing what had happened to his daughter. Like a movie in her head, she could perfectly imagine Mr. Kerrigan backing his car out the garage, feeling that dreaded “bump” as the wheels struck an unexpected obstacle.
What did he think he’d hit? Did he know right away?
Then she pictured him stopping the car. What was going through his mind right before he saw the truth?
He stepped out, as if in slow motion, and walked to see what it was. What did he find there? Was she covered in blood? Did she still look human, or was she completely unrecognizable? Did she die on impact?
Charlotte blinked back to the present moment. Mr. Kerrigan was a few feet away, turning around at the sound of Charlotte’s footfall. He was smiling. She felt flustered.
“Your aunt agreed to drive me to work until I get my new car next week. Hope you don’t mind,” he said. He was loading two large burlap sacks into the trunk of the SUV.
Charlotte put her own stuff into the car, too.
“Art books,” Mr. Kerrigan said when he caught Charlotte eyeing the burlap sacks. He pulled some out for her to see. “Van Gogh. Vermeer. Modigliani. Nothing inspires an artist like the great masters.”
Another book in the sack caught Charlotte’s eye. On the cover was a painting of a city diner. The artist had painted little people inside the restaurant sitting at a counter. They were wearing old-fashioned 1950’s clothes.
“I’ve seen this before.” She tapped the picture.
“Ah. Nighthawks,” Mr. Kerrigan said. “Do you like it?”
“No,” she blurted out. “I don’t. I think it’s a horrible picture.”
The words jumped out of her mouth before she could stop them. Charlotte felt instantly embarrassed.
“That’s a very visceral response,” he said.
“A what response?”
“Visceral. From the gut,” he said, patting his abdomen. “So. Why do you hate it?”
Charlotte hesitated before answering. Did Mr. Kerrigan actually care about her opinion, or was he making polite conversation? She couldn’t be sure, but he seemed actually interested.
This was bizarre to Charlotte. She was not a bright girl – at least, if her school grades were any indication. Nobody, let alone a real artist, had asked for her thoughts about a painting before.
Suddenly shy, she started stammering through her explanation, feeling idiotic. “I don’t know…it’s…”
She expected him to lose patience, but he stood there looking at her attentively. As if her ideas were worth waiting for.
“It makes me think about death,” she finally said.
“Wow,” Emi’s voice came from behind causing Charlotte to flinch. “It’s a painting of a bunch of people drinking coffee. I think maybe you’re reading a little too much into that.”
Emi stuffed her violin case into the trunk and stalked away.
Mr. Kerrigan laughed so loudly that even Charlotte smiled, puzzled. She had no idea what was so funny.
At first she thought he was laughing at her stupid response, but then he said, “Isn’t it wonderful?” He was still chuckling a little. “That two people can look at the same image and have two completely different reactions? I love that.”
He put the books back into the bag, and added, “And I think your interpretation is thought provoking, Charlotte.”
Then Aunt Sheena came clattering out with her car keys and a tote bag full of manila envelopes.
“Come on. Pile in! We’re going to be late,” she said. She moved like a tornado of energy.
Mr. Kerrigan rode shotgun and chose the music. Much to everyone’s chagrin, he chose a happy, upbeat jazz CD. Charlotte had never heard of the artist before. Sometimes, Mr. Kerrigan would hum along with the melody, even though there were no words. If he was sad inside, he didn’t show it. He hid it very well.
They soon reached Staley and Aunt Sheena parked the SUV in the faculty lot. “If you don’t mind waiting till 4:00, we can all drive home together,” she said. “Unless Emi’s changed her mind about ballet class…”
“Bye mom,” Emi said, cutting that line of thought short. “We’ll see you at 4:00.”
Charlotte followed her cousin up a pathway to the school’s grassy quadrangle. It was teeming with teenagers, most of them grouped already with their friends.
The most unusual thing was that they all seemed happy to be at school.
There was nobody chain smoking behind the restrooms. No crude graffiti on the walls. No wary security guards waiting to break the next fistfight.
Instead, there were students lounging under trees, reading books or laughing with friends. It was more like a brochure for a school than a reality.
Who were these people? Had they never known sadness? Were they androids? Charlotte felt distinctly separate from them, like she was living on a plane of reality that did not touch theirs.
“Where’s your first class?” Emi asked. She grabbed the schedule from Charlotte’s hands. “Oh. Ka‘iulani Hall. I can walk you there. Come on.”
As they passed through the crowds, Charlotte felt like people were staring at her, but that was absurd. To be sure, she double-checked. Interestingly, there really was a group of girls and boys lingering next to a tree staring at her.
“Hey, those are my friends,” Emi said, pointing to the same gathering of people. “Do you mind if we say hello?”
“Okay.”
They cut across the sloping lawn and stopped in front of seven or so other people seated around a green picnic bench.
“Hey,” Emi said in an oddly strained voice. “Wow, I feel like I haven’t seen you guys in forever.”
There was a brief pause where nobody returned her greeting. Then one of the boys smiled politely. “Hi, Emi.”
The other girls in the group also smiled at Emi and Charlotte, but they didn’t say anything at first. It was not the friendliest reception.
“We should get to class,” said one of the girls suddenly. With that, four of them walked away in a glittering clatter of strappy sandals and dangling jewelry.
“Oh yeah. We should go too,” Emi said to the one boy who had said hello. “I’ll see you later.”
She walked very rapidly away, her long legs carrying her faster than Charlotte could keep up.
Emi muttered something under her breath.
“What?” Charlotte panted, jogging to keep up.
Emi slowed to a trot. “Nothing. Come on, or we really will be late.”
Ka‘iulani Hall turned out to be a forbidding stone building that looked like something from a horror movie. But it wasn’t the old-fashioned architecture that scared Charlotte most. It was the realization that she was fifteen minutes away from her first class at Staley. She was surrounded by smart, perfect people, whereas she couldn’t even pronounce the name of the school building.
“Here we are,” Emi sa
id, waving her hands with mock-grandiosity at the building. “Ka‘iulani in all its shining glory.”
Charlotte felt planted to the spot. She watched as a steady stream of students poured in and out of the building.
“I can’t go in there,” she said.
Emi was checking her watch distractedly. “Um, okay…Why not?”
“I don’t belong here,” Charlotte said definitively.
“You don’t know that,” Emi reasoned.
Charlotte shot Emi a knowing look. “Trust me on this. School and me do not get along.”
“School and I,” Emi corrected, which was the wrong thing to say, because Charlotte only felt that much more idiotic. “Anyway,” Emi said. “You can’t abandon me here at Staley. Wha would I do without you?”
“Abandon you?” Charlotte said with an edge of outrage in her voice. “You have friends.”
“You mean those insensitive louts back there?”
“I’m sure you have other friends, too,” Charlotte said.
“Not to sound pathetic, but not really,” Emi said frankly. “Come on. I’d love it if you stayed. We could sit together at lunch.”
Charlotte wasn’t sure if Emi was telling the truth, or if she was exaggerating to be more persuasive. But why would Emi do that?
Charlotte suspected that Emi could handle the Staley social scene perfectly well on her own. On the other hand, that run-in with her friends had been tense. Maybe Emi was being sincere.
“Go on, then,” Emi said, nudging Charlotte towards the front doors. “I’ll see you at 1:30 in front of the caf. You better be there.”