“You’re the girl with the Prius who almost rear-ended my truck this morning,” he says.
“Oh, sorry about that.”
He looks me up and down. I feel myself blush for probably the hundredth time that day.
“From California, right?” The word
“Tucker,” Wendy warns, pulling at his arm.
“Well, I doubt that I would have done any damage to your truck if I’d hit you,” I retort.
“It looks like the back end is about to rust off.”
Wendy’s eyes widen. She seems genuinely alarmed.
Tucker scoffs. “That rusty truck will probably be towing you out of a snowbank next time there’s a storm.”
“Tucker!” exclaims Wendy. “Don’t you have a rodeo team meeting or something?”
I’m busy trying to think of a comeback involving the incredible amount of money I will save this year driving my Prius as opposed to his gasguzzling truck, but the right words aren’t forming.
“You’re the one who wanted to chat,” he says to Wendy.
“I didn’t know you were going to act like a pig.”
“Fine.” He smirks at me. “Nice to meet you, Carrots,” he says, looking directly at my hair. “Oh, I mean Clara.”
My face flames.
“Same to you, Rusty,” I shoot back, but he’s already striding away.
Great. I’ve been at this school for less than five hours and I’ve already made two enemies simply by existing.
“Told you he was a pain,” says Wendy.
“I think that might have been an understatement,” I say, and we both laugh.
The first person I see when I come into my next class is Angela Zerbino. She’s sitting in the front row, already bent over her notebook. I take a seat a few rows back, looking around the classroom at all the portraits of the British monarchy that are stapled to the top of the walls. A large table at the front of the room displays a Popsicle-stick model of the Tower of London and a papier mache replica of Stonehenge. In one corner is a mannequin wearing a suit of chain mail, in another, a large wooden board with three holes in it: real stockades.
This looks like it could be interesting.
The other students trickle in. When the bell rings, the teacher ambles out from a back room. He’s a scrawny guy with long hair pulled back in a ponytail and thick glasses, but he somehow comes off as cool, wearing his dress shirt and tie over black jeans and cowboy boots.
“Hi, I’m Mr. Erikson. Welcome to spring semester of British History,” he says. He grabs a jar off the table and shakes the papers inside. “First I thought we’d start by dividing up. In this canister are ten pieces of paper with the word
He glances toward the back of the room where a stu-dent has just slipped in the door. “Christian, nice of you to join us.”
It takes all of my willpower not to turn around.
“Sorry,” I hear Christian say. “Won’t happen again.”
“If it does you’ll spend five minutes in the stocks.”
“It definitely won’t happen again.”
“Excellent,” says Mr. Erikson. “Now where was I? Oh yes. Five pieces of paper have the words
He holds the jar out to Angela.
“I’m going to be queen,” she says.
“We shall see,” says Mr. Erikson.
Angela draws a paper from the jar and reads it. Her smile fades. “Lady.”
“I wouldn’t whine about it,” Mr. Erikson tells her. “It’s a good life, relatively speaking.”
“Of course, if I want to be sold off to the richest man who offers to marry me.”
“Touche,” said Mr. Erikson. “Lady Angela, everybody.”
He makes his way around the room. He already knows the students and calls them by name.
“Hmmm, red hair,” he says when he gets to me. “Could be a witch.”
Someone snickers behind me. I steal a quick look over my shoulder to see Wendy’s obnoxious brother, Tucker, sitting in the seat behind mine. He flashes me a devilish grin.
I draw a paper. Cleric.
