my way out of the university cafeteria, I accidentally bump into a thin, frail girl hovering over the food bar.
The force knocks the serving tongs out of her hand and into a nearby tray of thick, mayonnaisey tuna salad. Splats fly everywhere. One clump hits my capris, just above the knee.
“Oh! I’m sorry,” I say, and then catch myself staring into the girl’s take-out box with fear and concern. Strips of fake bacon are piled high. They look like plastic play food, technicolored in an entirely unconvincing way.
“The vegan entrée has been contaminated!” the girl screeches to no one in particular, but glares at me through her thick shaggy hair like I’ve just slaughtered a pig right in front of her. A cafeteria lady in a white apron and black hairnet rushes over and pushes me out of the way.
Oh well. So much for good first impressions.
I walk through a door, up a set of stairs, and out onto the street. Philadelphia feels huge. If I squint, I can see City Hall in the distance, dead center in the middle of Broad Street. It’s a really ornate building, a stone-colored wedding cake. A statue of William Penn is perched at the very top, watching over the whole city. It was probably the tallest building at one time, but now it’s dwarfed by the surrounding skyscrapers.
My very first class, Drawing, is held in the main art building directly across the street from the atrium. It’s a totally uninspiring location, where you might expect the office of an accountant, except that it has a huge, empty gallery space in the lobby. I walk to the corner and wait for the traffic light to change while other kids dart across the street when they see holes in the oncoming traffic.
I flash the security guard the college ID dangling around my neck, even though he’s too busy talking on his cell phone to notice, and head down a long hallway to a set of elevators. There’s a bunch of people already waiting. I delicately squeeze my way onto an elevator and reach out to press the button for the seventh floor, but it’s already lit up. As the doors shut, a girl with a corncob blond pixie cut, tight pencil-leg jeans, and a red silk scarf knotted around her neck runs toward us. No one holds the door for her, though, and she looks annoyed as it closes right in her face.
The elevator moves incredibly slow. I’m stuck in the corner near the buttons, and can’t see the people behind me. But I hear two iPods playing different songs in a musical mess, and someone smells like they haven’t learned what deodorant is yet.
I think the first stop is a photography floor, because the chemicals make my eyes water as soon as the doors open. That, and one of the kids who steps off the elevator turns around and, with his camera dangling mid-chest, takes a picture of us.
“Idiot,” a boy next to me mutters as the doors close. His long hair is split in two pigtails. Fake white plastic flowers are tucked into each elastic.
I try not to stare. Maybe he’s sweet or secretly good at sports, but I can’t help but wonder how exactly a boy like that survives in high school.
By the time we stop on the seventh floor, there are three kids left in the elevator beside me. I smile at one freckly girl with thick tentacles of auburn dreadlocks. She nods her head at me, not exactly in a friendly way, but not meanly either.
It’s slightly encouraging.
Room 713 is a large studio that smells of turpentine. There are twelve sets of easels and stools arranged in a circle, surrounding a tall pedestal made out of stacked white plywood boxes in the very center. The long tables across the back of the room are covered with half-finished assignments from the undergrad students — heads carved out of clay, wooden sculptures, plaster casings.
Shadow Girl is near the window, sitting on a stool. She scrapes her purple nail polish off with her teeth. Her shorts are dusted in chalk powder of all different colors, like the clouds in a summer sunset.
I wonder if Shadow Girl knows how many people were looking at her tracings in the courtyard. But I’m not going to tell her. I don’t want her to remember that I was staring, so I put my head down and walk quickly past her.
She grabs my arm and pulls me to stop.
“I love your shoes,” she tells me. “They’re like . . . princess slippers or something.”
“They’re not mine,” I admit. Though as soon as the words leave my mouth, I regret it. I should have said they were. After all, I do have practically the same pair.
She presses her lips together. “Umm, all right then,” she says, followed by an awkward laugh, because I didn’t leave much room to expand the conversation. “Well . . . make sure you pass along my compliment to their rightful owner.”
“Okay.” I stand there for a second, in case Shadow Girl says something else. Only, she doesn’t, and neither do I, so we just kind of stare at each other. Then I head toward a seat on the other side of the room. It isn’t until I sit that I realize I’ve been holding my breath.
I unload a few supplies, like a big drawing pad and the red plastic art box that holds my pencils and brushes. Glancing around the room, I notice I’m the only one with brand-new, untouched materials — paintbrushes wrapped in plastic, tubes of paint that need to be peeled open, unsharpened pencils. I’m a screaming newbie. I decide not to put on my smock, since no one else is wearing one.
Five more minutes and the classroom is practically full. Pixie Girl with the red scarf enters the room huffing and puffing, I guess because she had to take the stairs. She climbs onto a stool right next to Shadow Girl. Their eyes scan each other briefly before they nod and roll their eyes, as if they’ve just shared a silent joke. They are the only ones in class not wearing their IDs on the provided lanyards. They seem like they should be friends.
I’m sad that there doesn’t seem to be the person like me here, the person I am so obviously supposed to hang out with while I’m here. Someone like Meg. But someone like Meg wouldn’t exist in a place like this.
I grab my phone and pound out a quick text, just to tell Meg hello. I wonder what she’s doing right now. Maybe lying by her pool, working on her tan. Actually, since it’s Tuesday, she’s probably walked to the town farmer’s market to get some of that grilled summer corn we both love. Meg likes plain butter on hers, but I use paprika and garlic salt. Maybe Rick took the afternoon off to go with her. Probably.
The teacher comes in, a tall, skinny old man wearing frumpy brown linen pants and a raggedy black T-shirt. His head is full of wild white hair, jutting out from all angles like the bristles of an old toothbrush. A tall boy follows him, toting two bags of supplies — and holding a very familiar cup of coffee.
He spots me right away and stops at my easel.
“Wow,” he says, shaking his head. “You’re in my class.”
“Yeah,” I say. The realization makes my eyes go wide.
I accidentally flirted with my teacher this morning.
The boy still has toothpaste in the corner of his mouth, but it doesn’t detract from his smile one bit. But when the older teacher glances back at him, the smile drops right off his face.
Shadow Girl and Pixie Girl both stare at me, shocked. I feel their eyes.
My phone twitters, a charm of beeps that sounds like glitter. A signal I’ve gotten a text. I’m sure it’s from Meg, probably saying hi back. But it’s not worth it to check, because now everyone’s staring at me. The boy winces, like I’m in for it.
“Rule number one! No cell phones on in my class!” the old man barks. He’s got a bit of an accent. Maybe Russian. I can’t tell. “Absolutely none!”
“Sorry,” I whisper and shut off my phone.
The old man walks in the center of our easels, climbs up on the platform, and stares at us with big dark eyes. He signals for the tall boy to shut the door. He does not smile. “I am Mr. Frank.”
We murmur hello back to Mr. Frank. He still doesn’t smile. In fact, he looks pained to be