“I thought you kids kept your phones glued to your palms,” she muses and then briefly shrugs her shoulders. “No matter. Let’s pop down to the office, shall we?”
She guides me down the cavernous hallway as I lift my gaze to the vaulted ceilings and the leaded glass three stories above our heads. Early morning sunshine filters in, making the stone floors shine prettily.
We pause outside a small elevator, and I watch in surprise as Yuki—er, Ms. Miyamoto—pulls out a keycard and swipes it before pressing the call button.
We head down to the basement level and step into an office with stone walls that look so oddly medieval against the desks and bookcases arranged neatly near the front of the room that I stop right where I am.
Ms. Miyamoto asks me a few questions—name, birthday, the usual—and then frowns when she can’t find me in the system.
“You might be listed under Mia Patterson,” she adds apologetically, and my heart drops. Even then, she can’t find me in the computer.
That’s when it occurs to me: my birthday is probably wrong, too.
“I …” I start, but the words won’t come out. I can’t seem to make myself admit that I have no idea what my real birthday is. For my entire life, it was October twenty-fourth, just a week before Halloween and usually involving costumes and skeleton decorations and candy. Well, except for last year. Last year, we partied at the cemetery. My grandparents were not pleased.
“No matter,” Ms. Miyamoto says, and after a moment, she finds me in the system anyway and prints out a paper schedule. Just looking at it makes me sick. The school day here is arranged so differently that I may as well be in a different country; the culture shock is real.
Without another word about the birthday and name mix up, Ms. Miyamoto starts the tour by taking me up in the elevator to the first floor.
We’ve barely begun when I hear someone yelling from down the hall.
“Mia!”
The voice is frantic, almost shattered. Just the sound of it makes my head and heart ache. I don’t need to turn around to know that it’s Tess.
Shit.
If I’d thought the students were staring at me before, they were really just glancing my way. Now, they’re all outright gaping.
“Mia!” Tess almost stumbles in her haste to get to me, throwing her arms around me as a relieved sob overtakes her. She grabs my face, mascara bleeding down her cheeks. I notice her husband, Paul, striding down the hall toward us. “Oh my god, I’m so relieved,” Tess breathes, breaking away from me to brace a hand on the wall.
My cheeks flush with heat and my skin prickles with goose bumps. I can’t bear to look at any of the other students, so I flick my attention over to Ms. Miyamoto instead.
The bell rings as she turns her attention to the gathering crowd.
“Alright, that’s enough of that. Off to class,” she commands, her voice sharp and authoritative. “She repeats herself in another language, and it only takes me a second to recognize that she’s speaking Japanese.
My excitement at that—Ms. Miyamoto teaches the only foreign language class offered on-campus which I just so happen to be enrolled in—fades as soon as I catch sight of Parrish and Chasm at the edge of the crowd.
“Is everything okay, Mrs. Vanguard?” Ms. Miyamoto asks, turning her attention back to Tess.
She’s breathing heavily as Paul rubs her back in small circles, his lips thin and tight. Tess, on the other hand, looks like she’s on the verge of a full-blown panic attack.
“I …” Tess begins, turning her familiar brown eyes over to mine. The fear shadowing them almost staggers me, and I take a small step back. My own fear takes root in my belly, crawling up my throat in the form of acid reflux as I start to realize something so terrifying, I can barely put a name to it. “Mia disappeared from the house, and she wasn’t answering her phone …” Tess trails off and, as if she’s realized what a spectacle she’s making, stands up straight and lifts her chin proudly. “I apologize for my behavior, Ms. Miyamoto.” I watch as her face shifts from fear and melancholy to anger. “It’s just … the last time my daughter went missing, I didn’t see her for fourteen years.”
Yuki’s face softens slightly as my heart thunders and blood roars in my ears. I glance over to find that the hall has emptied of everyone but Parrish. Even Chasm is gone.
Our eyes meet and he briefly smirks at me before moving up to put a hand on Tess’ shoulder.
“Don’t cry, Mom,” he says, the cruelty and derisive apathy stripped from his voice for a brief moment.
The look she throws him makes him take a step back.
