It’s the early afternoon and there’s one more class before my free period, then I can call it a day and tell my parents, See? Nothing has changed. In the hall, a jock double takes at the sight of me, then another. Self-conscious, I wrap my arms around each other, rubbing the itchy hives that now blotch my forearms. These raised bumps are supposed to fade within a couple of hours. Still waiting. And how on earth did I get them after being sequestered inside my car and then the back row, the darkest row, in all my classrooms: calculus, Spanish, and the senior seminar I’ve waited four years to take—Asian American literature to explore my roots.
No matter. New plan: I’ll borrow a sweatshirt from the lost-and-found and hide my arms, but halfway to the front office, I realize it’s the first day of school. I want to weep. Nothing’s been lost—at least nothing that anyone realizes is missing.
I take a deep breath before I approach the double doors, leading to the square. I’ll need to run across it to get to the science building, all of a minute, max, in the sun. That couldn’t possibly make me worse, could it? I hug myself tighter, then spy familiar khaki coveralls.
Just the person I need. “Aminta!” I call, hurrying to her.
My best friend turns around, but her huge smile contorts into horror. Her wavy hair bobs around her shoulders, like she herself is my life buoy, as she runs to me. “Oh, my gosh, Viola! What happened?”
I duck my head fast at her (loud) alarm, which I know is drawing more stares. Aminta shrugs out of her blue satin jacket and holds it out to me. My first instinct is to tell her no, I don’t need it, but I do. Gratefully, I slip it on, welcoming how the billowy fabric swallows me whole.
She asks, “Should you even be here?”
“I’m okay.”
“I don’t know.”
Me, either, to tell you the truth. As if my mom knows how my skin is erupting, she texts me roughly a billion heart emojis, and then a symphony of pings:
Mom: Are you okay?!
Mom: Please check in.
Mom: Now.
Mom: Update, please.
Mom: Skin status report, please.
Mom: Love you, honey!
Before I can even complain about my text-happy Mom to Aminta, let alone share all the gory details about photosensitivity that I’ve researched, Caresse, the new treasurer of Geeks for Good, strides down the hall toward us. She is a blur of purple bohemian skirt that she’s designed and sewed. Every little part of me wants to surge ahead of this moment, this conversation, this attention, but: my future. I say as much. “So we’re good for Friday’s makeup bake sale, right?”
When I tug my hair out from under the messenger strap, they both get a good look at my hands, one now bubbling with an ice floe of a blister. Aminta actually flings her hand up to her mouth.
“You need to go to the doctor,” Aminta orders me. “I’ll drive you.”
“Yeah,” says Caresse, scrutinizing me like she’s on a scientific expedition, discovering a new subspecies of teen girl in the wilds of Liberty Prep. She brushes back her black dreads. “Those are hives. An oatmeal bath could help.”
Aminta pulls out her phone. “I’m calling your parents.”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Auntie Ruth, then.”
“I’m good.”
“Well, there is no way we’re having the bake sale on Friday,” says Caresse like she’s the official Bake-Sale Coordinator, not me.
When I start to protest, Aminta cuts in, “Next Friday, maybe, if your skin clears up by then. Are you sure I can’t call your parents?”
“Ack, I got to get to class.” I rush out the double doors of Jacobsen Hall as if I’m heading to physiology in Robinson-Iqbal across the square. Once outside, I dash to the senior parking lot to the side of the school. My quick escape is foiled by my messenger bag, which spills onto the gravel. Everything falls out. Everything.
Of course it does.
“Honestly?” I yell as I bend down to pick up my daily planner, splayed open to a hidden note I’d never seen, marking up the very last page.
“SET YOUR LIFE ON FIRE.”
—Rumi
Auntie Ruth’s handwriting feels intrusive when she herself torched our travel plans. The sun is taking care of my skin. What else could possibly be burned?