Special Sneak Preview

Praised as a modern and edgier “Lolita” meets “The Catcher in the Rye,” award-winning “White Chalk” is the eye-opening realistic look into the minds and actions of adolescents. Far from sugarcoated and rose-colored, this novel captures the raw, dark side of growing up.

I knew it the moment he first walked into Northwoods Secondary School. I watched, transfixed, as he glided right through the crowd of popular kids who hung out by the front door—like someone used to being ignored, slicing through the throng like a ghost. He had a black Mohawk pulled tight into a ponytail, and smelled like cigarettes and delinquency. A black T-Shirt and long-sleeved hoodie clung to his hunched shoulders.

He looked up only once and, by the smirk on his wide full lips, I knew I’d been caught staring. It didn’t really matter. I’d fallen instantly and obsessively in love, but not the kind of teenage drama crap you might expect. No, this was the real soul-wrenching kind of love. I’d never be the same again.

The whole school trilled with gossip. Morgan heard he’d moved here to live with his dad after his mom got arrested. Sebastian said he’d been in Juvie and just got out.

I knew better, having spent that entire day wandering the high school between classes, getting more tardies in one afternoon then I’d received so far that year. But I didn’t care. I was determined to figure out a way to talk to him, whatever it took. Something about the way he’d looked at me, the way the world fell away, taking with it the dread sitting in the bottom of my stomach. Like getting shock therapy, or jumping in the lake in winter, suddenly I felt alive—thanks to him.

Two days later at lunch—one of the few events not segregated by grade—I finally saw him.

I’d been held after class in Algebra; too many days of missing homework. Teachers seemed to think we possessed this unlimited amount of time between getting home and going to bed for all this work, and every one of them gave enough homework to fill the whole night. This assumed I bothered to even try. Between cleaning up the house, trying to keep the reality of my life from caving in, worrying about Dad coming home drunk or Ma crying over bills, Earth Science homework just didn’t seem like that big of a fucking deal. At least I didn’t have to worry about homework in History—it paid to be Mr. Harris’ star student.

When I finally got out of there, I trudged down to the cafeteria, ignoring the insults the boys tossed, or their occasional moo call. Fuck them. I retreated to my usual spot in front of the vending machine, looking for something sugary before finding Morgan on the front steps with her friends.

Cheetos or cupcakes or a Rice Krispies Treat... the options for processed fat and sugar proved endless.

“The machine gave me two, you want one?” A low rumble came from around the corner.

I stepped to the side and looked around the clunky machine blocking my view. There, on the ground with earbuds dangling around his neck and one hand offering up a HoHo, sat Troy Christiansen.

I took the treat and shifted my weight to the other foot. I wanted to tell him I’d seen the way he’d looked at me, that this place didn’t suck too bad, that I could be something—maybe something special—if he wanted. Instead, I just crinkled the plastic wrapper between my fingers.

He shrugged, put the earbuds back in, and picked up the book on his lap—something old, with tan pages and a cracked spine.

A swelling in my chest made it difficult to breathe, and, for a minute, I floundered. I wasn’t even sure if I could find the strength to sit, but when he glanced up and raised one eyebrow, I shivered and stepped closer.

“Um... yeah... sure.” My mouth went dry and my tongue felt stiff as a diving board, but my legs managed to lower me to the floor without falling. Little miracles shouldn’t be taken for granted.

The waist of my jeans cut into my middle and made it tough to figure out just how to sit, but I didn’t want to fidget too much. With one leg bent and the other curled under me, it wasn’t comfortable, but I couldn’t cross the other leg. I left it bent, my knee poking out at an angle.

“Thanks.” I peeked through my hair, afraid to look right at him. When he smiled, a thrum of excitement started in my chest, speeding up my breath.

He nodded. “I’m Troy.” His eyes shone in the florescent glare of the cafeteria, and he passed me one of his iPod’s earbuds. When I took it, he leaned his head back and closed his eyes, not bothering to eat the HoHo balanced precariously on his knee.

The earbud was still warm, and shrill, fast music crashed into my brain. It clamored around in my head, abusing the parts of my mind normally reserved for coherent thought, but I didn’t care. Troy Christiansen and I listened to the same thing, shared the same sensations.

I didn’t eat the HoHos he’d given me, despite a tingling at the back of my mouth anticipating the decadent mixture of chocolate and cream. I leaned against the wall, enjoying how every breath he took moved the air around me. The hairs on my arm reached out to him, and I vibrated with the fantasy that he might touch me.

When the warning bell rang, chairs scraped against the linoleum floor as everyone rushed to finish their conversation, stuff in one more bite of processed meat, and dump their trash before heading to class.

Troy and I just sat, him with his eyes closed, me trying desperately to look at him... without looking. His sharp features were symmetrical, and sitting side-by-side, we weren’t too different in height. But my figure was thick, his lanky, and where I curved, he stuck out in angular points. He wore the same tight jeans as the first day I saw him. His lip ring dangled from the center of his bottom lip, pulling it out into a pout that made me shiver and look away.

The class bell rang and even though I couldn’t afford another tardy, the mere idea of moving away proved inconceivable. I’d spent all week searching for him; no way I’d get up first. Every minute we sat—the cafeteria now cold and barren—the knot in my stomach grew. I tried not to fidget, to keep my hands still and not worry about needing to go to my locker before class.

Finally, he opened his eyes and pulled out his earbud. He set the iPod on the ground before standing up and stretching.

From where I sat I could glance at the swatch of skin above his pant line, pale and smooth. I fumbled with the earbud and gathered the cord around the iPod to keep from staring.

“Nah, I’ll eat later.” I hoped he couldn’t hear my stomach growl, or the crinkling of the plastic wrapper as my hand shook.

He shrugged and walked away, out of the cafeteria and down the long hall leading to the main door.

“Aren’t you going to class?” My voice reverberated in the empty hall, too loud as I rushed to keep up with his long legs.

“No. Why would I ask you to smoke if I was going to class?” His response made so much sense, I felt stupid for asking.

“Well, you can’t go out front,” I offered, lowering my voice a little, trying to make it sultry or something. I knew something he didn’t, and despite the fact I was essentially skipping class for the first time in my life, I desperately wanted him to keep me around. “We have to go out back, behind the loading docks. None of the teachers bother going there.”

“I don’t give a fuck what the teachers do.” He glanced down at me, his eyes cold before softening into a teasing smile. “But if you do, we can go.”

“Thanks,” I mumbled, embarrassed to have cared, to assume he would care about getting in trouble. He was a junior—he didn’t have to give a fuck.

We turned and walked back past the cafeteria, beyond the foreign language hall and out the side door. He followed me, not speaking as I jumped over a pile of unmelted snow left over from the last storm.

He chuckled—laughing at me or with me? Didn’t really matter, given the smile that brightened his face.

When we rounded the shed to the unofficially designated smoking area, he pulled out a cigarette, lit it and inhaled deeply. His thin face appeared even more drawn as he held in the smoke before exhaling through his nose.

I rubbed my hands on my pant legs. I didn’t have my bag with me, so no cigarettes.

Troy didn’t seem to notice, though. He just gazed out over the parking lot, tapping his foot as he smoked.

Skipping earth science turned out not to be the best decision I’d ever made, and it landed me in the office. I sat in the outdated green chairs with wooden arms that were too low for anyone on the planet to actually sit in comfortably, waiting for Ms. Perkins, the Vice Principal.

I thought about that stupid spelling trick they’d taught us in elementary school: principle... princiPAL... yeah, whatever. My mind ticked off all the adults who’d said they were my friend or my pal, or on my side, or some other bullshit they feed to kids, thinking we won’t realize it’s all nonsense. Even Mr. Harris wasn’t really on my side. Everyone wanted something.

“Chelle Whitney?” The secretary called out my name like a question, even though the other seats sat empty. I rolled my eyes and grabbed my bag from beneath the chair.

“Vice Principal Perkins will see you now. You can go on back to her office.” The small-framed woman didn’t bother looking up.

I ended up there a lot. I’d never been in much trouble. I usually got called in because someone else did something, like when Kiley Flynn threw an apple at me. Ms. Perkins had called me in to tell her what happened. I just sat there with a black eye forming and lied, so Kiley never even got detention. What was the point? If they got in trouble it would only make things worse.

“Chelle, come in.” Ms. Perkins stood tall—taller than most men. I wondered if she was one of those post-surgery transvestites. She had big hands, too.

I sat in the chair across from her, but instead of remaining in her seat, she came around and leaned on her desk, brows pulled together as if some kind of pain had struck her. I studied her throat for an Adam’s apple as she talked.

“So what happened today? Mrs. Gibson tells me you weren’t in science.” She crossed her ankles and laid her hands on the edge of the desk, balancing her weight at an uncomfortable-looking angle.

“You know you had class? It’s not like there was some confusion about that, was there?”

“No.” My voice squeezed out at barely a whisper. I hated the way she looked at me, as if she expected something. I clutched the bag in my lap and stared at the pins attached to the shoulder straps, just wanting to get out of there.

“Chelle, if there’s something going on you want to talk about....” She leaned forward, bringing her man-face closer to mine.

“All right then.” She sighed and straightened her back. “Without some kind of explanation of where you were, I have to give you detention. This will be after school, and I’m also going to make a call to your parents about your behavior.”

Ms. Perkins stood up, went back behind her desk and pulled out a detention slip. “Give this to Mr. Harris. He’s in charge of scheduling your detention, but it must be done within one week from today. This isn’t a good way to make your transition into high school, Chelle. Do you understand that? You don’t want this kind of behavior to become something you’re known for, especially not next year.”

As I opened the door to leave, she spoke again. “Are you sure there’s nothing you want to talk about?”

“Where have you been?” she hissed. “I waited for you after lunch and was late for earth science.”

Sebastian leaned back in the seat in front of me, cocking his head in our direction. So very subtle.

“Yeah, I skipped.” I kept my voice nonchalant, like it didn’t matter, even though the news about Troy sat coiled, ready to burst from my lips.

“What? Since when do you skip class?” She pulled her seat closer to my desk, but Mr. Harris cleared his throat at the front of the room.

“Tell you later,” I whispered, with a mischievous smile, and both Morgan and Sebastian grumbled their complaint.

Class began with its usual tediousness: someone did something really important at some point in the past, and I totally cared. Really.

Mr. Harris barely looked at me. I could always tell when he wanted me to meet him on the back road, because he ignored me in class—about as subtle as a sledgehammer. Fortunately, my fellow eighth-graders were painfully stupid.

He’d talked to me. I hadn’t even had to chase after him or come up with something to say—guaranteed to embarrass myself. He’d just talked to me. So easy. Everything he did was so understated and he made it seem so natural. He probably didn’t even get in trouble for skipping. He was a junior, after all.

Class droned on and I stabbed a line of tiny red dots on the inside on my arm with the end of a stretched out paperclip. I traced the lines of old scars, pulling the raised flesh until it puckered and splotches of red appeared beneath the thin layer of skin. I mulled over my conversation with Troy, replaying it a hundred thousand times in a million different ways. Every time he looked at me, every time his hand extended toward mine, it took on paramount meaning. Troy Christiansen had talked to me. On purpose.

As soon as Mr. Harris gave the okay for us to start working on our assignments, Morgan slipped a piece of paper onto my lap.

Why did you skip class??

I was talking to someone.

She groaned at my response and glared at me before scribbling and passing it back.

WHO???

If Mr. Harris noticed, he didn’t say anything, but he probably didn’t—too busy not looking at me.

Troy Christiansen.

I liked the way his name looked printed in my handwriting. I didn’t have girlie writing—no curlie q’s or hearts over the i’s. It looked right, written that way.

The new kid? In HIGH SCHOOL?

My smile and blush were the only response she needed. Morgan vibrated in her chair, desperate for details.

Yeah, he’s nice.

Holy shit-balls, Chelle! How did you meet him? When did you start talking to him? Is he as gorgeous up close? DETAILS.

Mr. Harris raised an eyebrow in Morgan’s direction as she frantically scribbled on the ripped piece of paper we were passing back and forth.

We’ll talk later.

Morgan’s disappointment produced a pout as amusingly palpable as her excitement. She huffed in my direction.

When we were younger, Morgan’s mom would watch me when my mom had to work. Now I was old enough to stay home alone, so we didn’t see each other as much. Morgan lived in the nice part of town, and walking from my house would take forever. I could take a bus, but we saw each other every day in school and she always made time for me, even though her other friends were cooler and more like her. Somehow, she always managed to include me in everything she did. Almost like she wanted me there.

The bell rang and the class broke into chaos. Nothing like the chance to get the fuck out of school to motivate a group of teenagers.

I packed my things quickly, wanting to get out of the classroom before Morgan started her barrage of questions. Mr. Harris didn’t need to know who I spent time with, so long as I kept meeting him after school.

I hoisted my bag over my shoulder and walked out the door. In the small hall, where the majority of the eighth grade classrooms were located, I waited for Morgan.

Sebastian approached with a smile, shuffling his feet until Chazz walked up behind him and smacked the back of his head. The two degenerated into a wrestling match on the carpet until Chazz’s bag opened and his books went cascading down the hall.

“So spill it, seriously, how did you meet Troy Christiansen?” Morgan spoke so fast she would have been unintelligible if I didn’t know her so well. I hadn’t even heard her approach; she was a virtual teenage gossip ninja.

“He was sitting by the vending machine. We just started talking.” I shrugged, trying to be casual about what had to be the single most exciting thing that had happened to me since I stopped believing in the tooth fairy. It was amazing what the sight of your father passed out on the floor of your room, with your tooth in one hand and a dollar bill in the other, would do to a girl’s faith in magic.

We started making our way through the throng of students. At the stairs leading up to the locker bay, Troy’s tall and thin frame leaned against the railing. His perfectly structured face looked at something on the ground. The way he held himself, like nothing in the world mattered, took my breath away.

“Oh, my God! Is that him?” Morgan squealed, grabbing my arm with both hands.

“No, no way. Why would he be here for me?” I shook my head and tried to look away, not wanting to act like I expected him to talk to me. Who was I, anyways? Just some eighth grader who went out to smoke without a cigarette. Stupid.

“Hey.” Troy stepped away from the wall and lifted his eyes to mine. With casual perfection, he shrugged his shoulder and hiked his backpack higher.

“Hey.” I looked down, unable to meet his gaze. If my bangs were longer they’d hide my face completely, and I kind of wished they were.

I shrugged. What did he have to be sorry about? It wasn’t like he did anything.

“I’m here for one week and I’m already getting a call home. My dad’s going to flip.”

His appearance turned hard. Something about the lines of his face solidified and his jaw clenched tight.

“Um, hi! I’m Morgan.” My best friend nudged me aside and batted her eyelashes at Troy in a pathetic play for attention.

“Hey.” He didn’t look at her, just nodded in her direction. His eyes were still focused on me.

“So, what are you doing now?” he asked. For once, someone wanted to know more about me than Morgan.

“Ok... umm... I’ll call you later, Chelle.” Morgan pouted and walked away. Once she’d retreated to a safe distance behind him, she turned around and winked with a smile.

We made our way up to the locker bay and my hands shook as I spun in the combination. It took me two tries to get it right. I pulled my books out and stuffed them in my bag, not sure which ones I’d taken, too distracted by Troy’s proximity to care.

He looked so casual, leaning against the lockers next to mine, as though his bones didn’t have the same density as everyone else’s.

When I pretended to be done, and pulled on my backpack, he headed toward the front of the school where the buses lined up. As much as being with him thrilled me, I trailed behind. Mr. Harris expected me to meet him, and I’d never not shown up before.

“So next week I’m getting a truck. It’ll probably be some piece of shit my dad gets from the junkyard, but it’ll be freedom from the bus.”

“All right, umm, yeah....” He shuffled his feet for a moment. “So, give me your number and I’ll call you.”

Flushed and about to hyperventilate, I wrenched my backpack off my shoulder and dug in the front pocket for something to write on. A WaWa receipt. Classy.

After folding my number into quarters and stuffing it into his pocket, Troy ran off to catch his bus.