Sarah Mackey
Synopsis
Excerpt
I made my way carefully over the school entrance. What I hadn’t noticed the day we’d been here was that the student entrance was at the top of a not insignificant flight of stairs. There was at least a railing, but it felt like the worst possible way to start my first day.
I set off up the stairs, but despite the practice I’d had in the weeks since I’d fallen, the backpack threw off my centre of balance, and I nearly tipped over backwards. Just as I felt my balance give way entirely, a pair of arms righted me, and a concerned looking boy appeared next to me.
“Are you ok?”
I blinked, confused. He looked strangely familiar, but I would have sworn I didn’t know a soul at this entire school.
“Hey, you’re the girl who fell in front of my house! How are you doing?”
Oh, great. Now the only person I knew at this entire school had rescued me from my own klutziness not once, but twice. This is just the kind of impression you want to make on cute boys at your new school, especially when you’ve recently been dumped.
“I’m finding it’s slowed down my mile by about 10 seconds, but I’m working on some strategies to compensate for it.”
The cute guy laughed, and I felt my stomach flip over briefly. In the long, lonely summer, I’d kind of forgotten how to be funny. It was a relief to know it wasn’t a permanent condition.
“Listen, I’ve got to get inside. Are you going to be ok? Did you know there’s a ramp on the side entrance?”
I did not know. Thanks a lot, guidance counsellor. I so appreciate your guidance and counsel.
“You’re new, right? You should join my club.” He held a flyer out to me from the stack in his hand then frowned as he immediately saw the problem. After a quick analysis of the situation, he ducked back behind me and unzipped my backpack with one hand while steadying me with the other. I couldn’t see what he was doing, but I could only assume he was putting a flyer in my bag. He zipped my backpack back up again and then looked up at the remaining stairs in front of me.
“I’ve got a minute. I’ll just go up behind you. I don’t want to have to call an ambulance for you twice.”
“Oh, you don’t have to do that. I’ll be fine.”
“Listen…what’s your name, anyway?”
“Tilda.”
“Like Tilda Swinton? That’s cool. Anyway, Tilda, we’ve spent about 12 minutes together so far, and most of those minutes have consisted of you being critically injured or me preventing you from critically injuring yourself. You’ll forgive me if I don’t feel entirely confident leaving you to fend for yourself out here in the cold cruel world. You’ll get up the stairs, next time you’ll know about the ramp, and we’ll make sure you get an elevator pass.”
There was an ELEVATOR? Jesus, Ms. Harris really was the worst guidance counsellor of all time. I made a note to mention all of this to Dad. Maybe I could convince him to let me go back to my school in the city. It was close to a BART stop, and Dad or Morgan could drop me off at a BART stop in the mornings.
I made my way up the rest of the stairs without further incident, and after establishing that I was steady on my feet at the top of the stairs, he smiled at me, waved, and disappeared through the front doors. It was only when he’d already walked away that I realised I still didn’t know his name.
