The funny thing was, this was exactly how I felt as I sat in Ms. Castro’s office. She was the seventh grade guidance counselor, so obviously I couldn’t have been in her office before this very minute. All the details here were completely new to me: the cute baby animal posters. The puzzles and the fidget toys. The red geraniums along the windowsill. So there was no reason to feel that the room was against me; really, I could tell it was trying hard to welcome me.
“Norah Levy?” A tall, plump woman with shoulder-length no-color hair and complicated earrings suddenly burst in and was giving a damp hug that smelled like coffee. No reason to still be sensitive to smells, the doctors said. It’s just in your head by now, Norah.
The woman finally released me. “I’m Ms. Castro, your guidance counselor. And let me say I couldn’t be happier to see you back here!”
Which was an odd thing to say, considering she’d never seen me before this minute.
“Thanks. I’m really so glad to be back. Well, not back,” I corrected myself. “I mean, back at school.”
“Yes,” she said, fixing large, sympathetic eyes on me. “I can’t even imagine what the last two years have been like for you.”
I nodded. If it wouldn’t sound snarky, I’d tell her she was right: Yes, you couldn’t imagine. But probably better just to nod.
“And how are you?” She cocked her head. I knew this question and the head-cock from several moms in our neighborhood. It meant: But how are you REALLY? You can tell ME.
“Okay,” I said. “Maybe a little tired.”
“Oh, and how could you not be! With what your body has been through.” She shook her head, jangling her earrings. “Well, it’s all behind you now.”
All behind me. I kept nodding, because what else could I do?
“Although let me give you some advice, Norah: Take it slow. Anytime you need to rest during the day, just go to the nurse’s office or come here. Everybody understands! And if they don’t, tell me, and I’ll be happy to explain, all right?”
“Thanks,” I said.
But I was thinking: You haven’t said it yet. How could you explain me to anyone if you couldn’t even say the word?
I had CANCER, Ms. Castro. The gods don’t zap you with it if you say it out loud.
“It’s no problem, Norah, believe me.” She clasped her hands on her chest. “And you’re finding everything all right?”
“Well, my map got me to the guidance office. So yeah.” I tried a smile. On the long list of Weird Things I Had to Deal With, one was the fact that while my classmates had been here since fifth grade, I’d spent the last two years either at the hospital or at home. So while I wasn’t new to most of the other kids, I was new to this building. Also new to middle school in general, but that was another thing.
“Ah, perfect! So you won’t need this map I printed.” Ms. Castro swiveled her chair toward her desk, which was crowded with family vacation photos: a bearded guy, Ms. Castro, and three kids hiking, swimming, skating, rafting. All of them flashed big white teeth as they squinted into the sun. They looked like they never even got the sniffles.
“Let’s see what other goodies I have for you!” Now Ms. Castro was sorting through a stack of papers. “Oh yes, you’ll be happy to hear I’ve arranged for you to have an elevator key!”
That surprised me, because my legs worked just fine. “What for?” I asked.
“Only to conserve your energy. Your homeroom is up on the third floor, and so are a few of your classes. And the stairs are always very crowded. So this way—”
“Oh, but I’d much rather use the stairs.”
“You sure, dear? There’s no shame in using the elevator.”
“I’m not ashamed. I just really don’t need it.”
Maybe my voice sounded too sharp. She blinked at me. “Well, I’ll keep the key card here for you, just in case you change your mind.”
But I won’t, I thought.
Ms. Castro opened a desk drawer and slipped the key card inside. Then she popped a mint Tic Tac into her mouth, offering me one, which I didn’t take. How did she not know that kids didn’t eat mint Tic Tacs, that they were a grown-up thing? If you’re a guidance counselor, you should know stuff like that.
“All right, next item,” she said. “On Friday, I had a long chat with your tutor. It sounds like Ayesha worked you very hard, especially in math and science.”
Just hearing my tutor’s name made me smile. “Yeah, but we read a lot too. The Golden Compass, everything by Rick Riordan, The Chronicles of Narnia, the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, Alice in Wonderland, a whole bunch of Greek myths—”
Ms. Castro smiled. “She says you ‘impressed the pants off her.’ ”
Now I was grinning. Working with Ayesha was the only good thing about the past two years. She was the coolest person I’d ever met, and ridiculously smart. Not only that, but she understood me. She’d been me, or a patient like me, when she was thirteen, so everything I was going through—all the is-this-a-bad-dream-or-am-I-awake stuff—was totally familiar to her.
“Anyway,” Ms. Castro continued, exhaling mint fumes, “after taking a long look at your test scores, and considering what you covered with Ayesha, we’re wondering if it makes sense for you to start the year in eighth grade math and science.”
“Wait,” I said. “What?”
“Norah, you’ve always been an extremely strong student. And it does appear that while you were out”—she said “out” instead of “sick”—“you’ve completed the curriculums for seventh grade math and science. Don’t you think it would be silly to repeat it all?”
“But I don’t mind!”
“Well, but shouldn’t you mind? You’re a very bright girl. Why would you want to waste a whole
