Page 18 of Flickerstate

My smile twists. If I don’t pass this screening, how will I face Jo?

“I’m also not your mom,” Candace says. “We’re peers. Technically.”

A confused frown puckers Bree’s forehead. She seems not tounderstand why Candace might resent her after yesterday.

I get that Candace is mad at everyone who shunned her. But Bree, unlike everyoneelsewho shunned her, is now happily sitting at our table. Besides, given what else I have going on, I’d like my block to stay drama-free. So I change the subject: “How was your mentor dinner, Bree?”

She beams. “Great. Antoine’s super nice, and—”

Another door opens. Dr. Langmore walks through, flanked by two men.

“Attention!” she calls.

The command is unnecessary. We all shut up when she walked in.

“You know me. This is Mr. Davis.” Dr. Langmore gestures to the man on her left, fiftyish with a sad bulldog face. “And this is Dr. Ortega.” She gestures to the man on her right, a gangly thirtysomething with hipster glasses. “Mr. Davis will pass around the syllabus.”

In my other classes, the syllabi clocked in around ten pages, crammed with class policies and day-by-day breakdowns of the semester. This syllabus is a single sheet:

Monday, 8/16: Introduction, Syllabus

Tuesday, 8/17–Friday, 8/27: Siphoning

Screening, Break into Clinics A, B, C: Friday, 8/27

Monday, 8/30–Friday, 9/24 Unit 1: Channeling

Archive Trial 1: Friday, 9/24

Monday, 9/27 – Friday, Unit 2: Advanced Occlusion

Archive Trial 2: Friday, 10/22

Monday, 10/25–Friday, Unit 3: Summation

Archive Trial 3: Friday, 11/19; Archive Assistants Announced