I Wish You All the Best Page 4
“I went out, got you a few things.” She starts unpacking the bags. There are packs of underwear, socks, a razor, some deodorant. I can’t help but notice the last two items are lacking in the “For Men” category. I don’t know if Hannah did that on purpose, but God, I love her for it.
“Oh …” I stare at everything laid out for me.
“I don’t really know what kinds of clothes you’re into.” She starts balling up the empty bags. “We can go shopping together this weekend if you want, but I figured I could get you the essentials for now.”
“Thank you.” I can actually feel myself smiling.
“No problem, kiddo.”
“You get everything?” Thomas asks, strolling in from his office.
“Close to it,” Hannah says. “How’d enrollment go?”
“They’ll start tomorrow.” Thomas is grinning, looking at everything on the counter.
I’m still looking through the things Hannah bought for me. “Thank you,” I say again. I don’t want to let go of any of it, scared that it might slip away from me at any moment.
“It’s no biggie.” She starts rubbing my shoulder again. “You’re going to be okay.”
I start nodding, and I really hope I’m not crying or anything.
“Ready for your first day?” Thomas asks me the next morning, mug of coffee already in hand.
“I guess.” I look around the kitchen. “Do you mind if I have a cup?”
“Oh, yeah.” He moves over to the cabinet and pulls out this mug that says “Donut Tell Me What to Do,” along with a picture of a half-eaten donut. “Creamer’s in the fridge.”
“Thanks.” I pour my cup slowly, savoring the smell of the coffee for a few seconds.
“Nervous?”
“A little.”
“You’ll be okay.” He chuckles. “Nathan’s a good kid, though I can’t really speak for his tour-guide abilities.” Thomas takes a sip from his mug, leaving this awkward silence. “You’ll need to go to the office first thing and get your schedule.”
“Okay.” I wonder what classes they’ll put me in. Hopefully the same ones I was taking at Wayne.
I also can’t help but wonder if any of my classmates back home will even realize I’m gone. I wasn’t exactly super popular there, and I didn’t really have anyone I could call a friend. But someone has to notice, right? At least my teachers. One of your students can’t vanish over Christmas break without you realizing it.
Thomas drives us to school with some local talk show blaring over the radio. He chuckles at a joke every few minutes, but other than that, he seems quiet. Until he isn’t.
“Hey, Ben.” Thomas turns down the radio.
I guess we could only go for so long.
“Yeah?” I say.
“How long has it been since you’ve seen Hannah?”
Out of everything he could’ve asked, I wasn’t really expecting that. I also feel like he should already know the answer to that. “About ten years, why?”
“You don’t know much about her, do you?”
“Not anymore.”
“Did you even know we were married?”
“Kinda,” I say, and he waits for further explanation. “I found her on Facebook. Your wedding pictures were up there.”
“Oh, makes sense.”
“You said that Hannah talked about me a lot?”
“Yeah.” He laughs like he told a joke with himself. “She’d tell me stories about you two all the time, the trouble you’d get into.”
I don’t particularly remember getting into a lot of trouble with Hannah. Most of my memories of her involve loud music, slammed doors, yelling. Sometimes at Mom and Dad, sometimes at me, but okay I guess.
I want to ask Thomas if Hannah ever mentioned coming back for me, or even wanting to come back for me, but that feels like an inappropriate question for the brother-in-law you really just met.
My classes are almost exactly the same as they were at Wayne High: English 4, Chemistry Honors, Calculus Honors. The only difference is Art 4. I don’t really know what that is though. In Goldsboro we just had normal art classes.
North Wake has different lunch times too. They’re scheduled closer to actual lunch instead of being spread between ten and eleven thirty in the morning.
“You can just wait here for Nathan, I’m sure he’ll be here soon,” Kev the secretary tells me. I wonder if his name is actually Kev, or if it’s just short for Kevin, or maybe something else? I take the same seat I had yesterday, still wishing that I had a phone to kill time with. Hannah promised me we’d go get a replacement this weekend.
For now, I’ll just have to settle for staring at the clock, awkwardly smiling at anyone walking into the office who I happen to lock eyes with, until Nathan finally gets here.
“There he is.”
He.
I try my best not to let my face show anything, because this is something I need to get used to. I wanted this. It’s simpler. And I can’t be mad at him for it.
Nathan claps his hands eagerly. “You ready for the grand tour?”
“Yeah,” I say, grabbing my backpack. Another Hannah purchase.
“Got your schedule yet?”
I hand him the folded piece of blue paper and listen to him read off the classes. “Nice, we have the same homeroom, and the same Chem class, so we’ll be in the same lunch period too!”
“Oh, nice.”
“Let’s start with English.” Nathan leads me down this sterile white hallway, with lockers against the walls that alternate between dark blue and a dull gold. “You’ve got Mrs. Williams. I had her last year and she’s tough, but if you do your best and need some extra credit at the end of the year, she’s usually good for it.” He points to the empty classroom, filled with desks; hopefully I won’t have trouble remembering which classroom is which.
There isn’t much to distinguish it from the others, save the “Room 303” marker above the door. I repeat the number in my head. 303, 303, 303.
“Calculus?” Nathan asks. Clearly I’ve missed his question.
“Huh?” I shake myself out my trance. “Sorry.”
He smiles again. “You’re in Honors Calculus? Pretty advanced stuff.”
“Oh. I like math,” I say.
“Really? I have to say in all my seventeen years, that’s a first.” He grins.
“Well, I don’t like it really,” I correct myself. “But I’m good at it.”
“You’ll have to be more than just ‘good’ for honors classes here, even with the transfer.” He adds, “We don’t get too many new kids, so you’re going to be a hot commodity around here.”
“Really?” Great. Just what I need.
“No worries. As long as you keep your head down around the rough and tough football team, you should be good.”
I don’t know what to say next, so I keep quiet.
“Oh, and stay away from the bathrooms near the music room, the band kids aren’t afraid of PDA.” He shivers a little. “Some things you’ll never unsee.”
“Hmm,” I hum, hoping he’ll take that as an answer.
We stay mostly quiet as he leads me to Chemistry. “The thing about Chemistry is that it’s at the back of the school, so you really have to run to the cafeteria if you want the edible stuff. Mr. W’s pretty cool though, he’ll let us out early sometimes.” Nathan reads over my schedule again. “Do you know him? I saw you two in the office yesterday.”
“He’s my brother-in-law.”
“Oh, wow. I’m surprised they let you into his class.” I don’t mention it, but I have a feeling Thomas orchestrated that. Nathan knocks on Thomas’s open classroom door. “Morning, Mr. Waller.”
Thomas is sitting at his desk in the far corner of the room. “Morning, Nathan, still showing Ben around?” he asks, scribbling something down.
“Yeah.” Nathan leans over the long counter at the front of the room, balancing one knee on a stool.
“Is he as good of a tour guide as he claims, Ben?�
�� Thomas marks something on one of his papers before spinning his chair to face us, hands propped up on the armrests like some sort of supervillain.
“Yeah.” I gaze into this small aquarium situated on the counter at the front of the room, where I watch the biggest tadpoles I’ve ever seen swim around in the murky water.
“He’s not a talkative one,” Nathan adds.
“No, Ben isn’t.” He sighs. “You two better move along, you don’t have much longer.”
“Right. Guess we’ll see ya in a few, Mr. W.” Nathan waves, leading me back into the hallway. We walk toward the cafeteria next. I’m seriously doubting I’ll ever bother coming here; I never did in Goldsboro. “So, do you have any questions? Concerns? Thoughts or opinions? Complaints? You haven’t really said much.”
I can’t think of any off the top of my head. Of course, my brain is so rattled right now. Last night I passed out around midnight, but woke up about two hours later, unable to fall back asleep. So far this doesn’t seem that much different from my old school. But with the way Nathan is looking at me, I feel like I need to ask something. “Are you a senior too?”
His face sort of twists, like the question surprises him, but he just laughs it off with a grin and the shake of his head. “Well, I meant about the school.” He tucks his hands into the pockets of his hoodie. “But yeah. I am.”
“Oh.”
“So, what do you do in your free time? You’re in Art 4, so I’m guessing you like to draw?”
“Sometimes.”
“Oh, nice, you’ll like your teacher. Everyone loves Mrs. Liu. I’ll show you your Calc class next.” We cut across this walkway outside. From here I can see the parking lot already filling up. “Don’t you want to ask me another question?”
“Is that what we’re doing?” I ask.
“If you want to. It’s only fair, Benjamin …” He unfolds my schedule again. “De Backer?” He reads off my last name. And he gets it right on the first try. “How about that? A question for a question, answer for an answer?”
“Okay,” I say.
“Is that last name German?”
“Belgian. I think.” Mom and I actually spent a good amount of time tracing our last name. She was really into that genealogy sort of stuff, so when Hannah and Dad were having one of their huge arguments, she’d take me to the library, and we’d sit and read all the books they had about our family. After a few visits, we ran dry though and just started finding names and making up backstories about them and what they were doing now.
Then one day we sort of just stopped going. Guess it wasn’t fun for her anymore.
I stop walking, my heart twisting in my chest.
Nathan gestures to me. “And now it’s your turn.”
“Huh? Oh, are you from here?”
His mouth folds into a smile. “Nothing more interesting?”
I shrug.
“My family moved here the summer before I started middle school.”
“Where from?”
“Nuh-uh.” Nathan wiggles a finger back and forth. “I get a question.”
I wonder if there are any limits to the kinds of questions he’ll ask. “All right.”
“What do you like to draw?”
“Oh, um.” And suddenly everything I’ve ever drawn just vanishes from my brain.
Poof! Gone.
“Um, anything really, I guess.” I have a few characters I like to draw; landscapes are always fun to paint too, but I hardly get a chance to do that.
“Anything?” Nathan raises an eyebrow like that’s supposed to mean something. “Maybe I could take a look at your sketchbook one day?”
“Yeah …” I rub my arm. “Maybe.”
Definitely not going to happen. Not in a million years.
“Excellent! Now come on.” I feel Nathan’s hand on my elbow. “Let’s go to the art room, I have a feeling you’re going to freak!” He leads me outside and we walk along the breezeway to the front of the building. “Technically it’s its own building, they added it on a few years ago, and before that, it was where the drama room is now. Mrs. Liu is really cool too.”
“Yeah?”
“Definitely, there’s no way I should’ve passed last year. Even my stick figures are hideous. But she passed me anyway. Guess Mrs. Liu could tell I was trying at least.” Nathan stops at this outside door, propped open with a huge can of paint. “Oh, Mrs. Liu,” Nathan sings, tapping on the door.
There’s a loud crash somewhere near the back of the room. I try to rush to help, but Nathan hangs back, so I figure I should too.
“Oh, crap in a basket!” someone hisses, followed by a long groan and the sound of approaching footsteps. Mrs. Liu is a short Chinese American woman, with her hair tied into a messy knot and a pen tucked behind her ear. The apron she’s wearing is stained with paint splatters, and so is the white blouse underneath. At least it looks dried.
“Nathan!” She rushes toward us when she realizes who’s here, wrapping Nathan in a hug. “What are you doing here so early?”
“Showing the new guy around.” He hugs her back. “Ben, this is Mrs. Liu.”
“Nice to meet you.” I hold out my hand.
She shakes it so quickly that I’m pretty sure my arm’s going to pop right out of the socket. “It is so good to meet you too! How are you liking North Wake so far?”
“It’s fine,” I say.
“Well, I look forward to having you. Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough kids for an Art 4 class this year, so you’ll pretty much be by yourself.”
“By myself?” I ask.
“At your level, you’ll pretty much have free rein, after I get to know you a little better, of course.” She beams. “But I’ll be teaching a freshman class in here. And—” She motions for Nathan and me to follow her through this small hallway. On the other side there’s another classroom. I can’t tell if this one is bigger since there aren’t any desks, but it feels that way. “You’ll be working back here.”
“Oh.” I take it all in. The walls are covered with paintings, cabinets left wide open, showing off tubes of paint and racks upon racks of canvases and easels. It’s all sort of marvelous. We probably had about half of this back in Goldsboro. “Wow.”
“Impressed?” I hear Nathan ask me.
“Yeah.” I nod slowly, taking it all in. Maybe this won’t be so bad after all.
First days are weird, especially when you’re the new kid. Walking into class isn’t this super awkward moment where everyone goes silent and just stares me down. But I do catch a few strange looks, and the people sitting beside me do try to talk to me. But I guess they give up when they realize I’m not as interesting as I seem.
Thankfully none of my teachers make me introduce myself to the class. They just pretend like I’ve always been here.
When the bell for lunch rings in Chemistry, I hang back in Thomas’s classroom, heading in the opposite direction of the cafeteria once the hallways are clear. There’s this really nice quad area that sort of resembles an amphitheater at the back of the school. A crowd of kids is already huddled at one end, but no one tells me to get lost when I take a seat at the other side, and for the first time in a long time, I can draw in peace and quiet.
Out here I can breathe.
Not that I don’t appreciate everything he’s done, but Nathan can be a little … suffocating. In a good way. If there really is a good way to suffocate. He just seems so eager to do everything. And Thomas decided to seat me next to him in Chemistry. So every day I’ll be getting at least an hour-and-a-half dose of Nathan Allan.
I flip open the brand-new sketchbook, a gift from Mrs. Liu after I said I lost my last one.
It’s weird to think this one is totally empty. My previous drawings and doodles and notes all gone. Probably forever. I stare at the first empty page and try to think of what I can draw.
“I can pay you back, when I get a job, I mean,” I whisper to Hannah when the guy at the store goes into the back to get my new phone.
On the message boards, I found many enby people asked their brothers and sisters to call them sib, short for “sibling.” I liked the idea myself but had never really played with the notion that someone might actually get to use it for me.
“Sib is good,” I say. “Instead of bro or whatever.”
“Sib. Got it. Well, sib, you don’t have to worry about paying me back, it’s fine.”
It feels good to have a phone again, even if I can’t help but feel slightly guilty. “Hey. I know what you can do to pay me back.” Hannah sort of looks at me funny when we get in the car.
Uh-oh.
“Just go to one meeting with Bridgette.”
“Bridgette?” I ask. I don’t remember any Bridgettes.
“Dr. Taylor. The psychiatrist I told you about?”
“You can have your phone back.” I pull the box out of the bag and hand it back to her.
“Ben, please.” She pulls the car out onto the street. “Just one meeting.”
I slouch down in the seat. “Hannah—”
“Just one. I really think she could help you.”
“Why?”
“Because this hasn’t exactly been the easiest time for you, and I think that talking it out with someone could help you.” She almost spouts all of this in a single breath. I’d be impressed if I wasn’t getting so annoyed. “Just one appointment,” she says again. “That’s all I’m asking.”
“Only one?”
“One, I promise. After that, you can decide if you want to keep seeing her.”
“Fine,” I say, resisting the urge to unbuckle my seat belt and roll out of the car. At least that’d buy me a few weeks in a hospital without having to meet with a therapist. Though Hannah’s case would probably get stronger if I did that.
“I’ll call her when we get home, okay? Maybe she’ll have an opening next week.”
“Great.”
“I just think it would help, maybe talk out the things that happened at home.”
“Yeah.” I stare out the window, carefully watching everything we pass by. I want to ask her if she went to some kind of therapy, but in my head that sounds like an insult.