I stuffed my half-finished math workbook in my new backpack. Well, it wasn’t new new. Mama got it used on eBay, but it was a limited-edition Oya backpack that came out a year ago. My school uniform, a white shirt and blue pants, clashed with the bag. It had nine strips of different colors across the front. Nine was Oya’s favorite number. My favorite number was four, a number you could count on one hand and still have a finger left to spare.
I jetted downstairs, inhaled breakfast, and headed to Eli’s house. The cranky Johnston twins, who lived next door, were out and prowling the sidewalk already.
“Try to behave yourself, Maya,” Miss Ida said, leaning on her cane. She didn’t need it. It was a cover to make people think she and her sister were two innocent old ladies. They were old, way over the two-thousand-year mark, but they were also godlings like me. Miss Ida had saved me from writhing shadows one night. Miss Lucille had rescued Frankie, Eli, and me from a group of darkbringers in the park. Both had kicked darkbringer butt when the Lord of Shadows sent his cronies to rough up our neighborhood.
“Yes, ma’am,” I replied, giving her a winning smile. “You too.”
Miss Ida shook her head as if I was a lost cause, but Miss Lucille only huffed out a little laugh. She bent over their flower bed and pulled up weeds. I passed kids from Jackson Middle, messing around on their way to school. Priyanka was climbing into the back of her parents’ SUV. Mr. Patel always dropped her off at school on his way to work.
I rang the bell at Eli’s house, and the door creaked open. There was no one on the other side. “Um, hello?” I said to the empty hallway. Eli had discovered his godling power to turn invisible, which was golden for a kid who loved ghosts. He said that our neighborhood was haunted, but I had my doubts. The evidence was inconclusive. “Eli, stop messing around.”
I jumped when I saw vines crawling across the floor, retreating away from me. I had no problem with moving vines, but in the half-light of the hallway, they looked like writhing shadows. I had a big problem with shadows, on account of them trying to kill me more than once.
“Come on in, Maya,” Nana hollered from somewhere in the back of the house, then she raised her voice. “Eli should be ready!”
I kicked off my sneakers and walked into the living room. Nana had decorated it in brown, green, and orange for the fall. Vines inched along the walls like holiday lights.
“Maya, Maya, pants on fire!” Jayla, Eli’s little sister, sang at the top of her lungs from upstairs.
“Stop jumping on my bed!” Eli groaned at her. “Go jump on yours.”
“Jayla, get down here,” Nana said, materializing in the living room.
I tried not to flinch a second time and failed. Nana Buruku, aka Nana, Mother Earth, stood in front of me in a white T-shirt and purple tights. She had a comb, a jar of hair butter, and a tub of barrettes in her arms. Eli’s grandmother was the head of our local orisha council.
“How’s training going, Maya?” she asked me as if she hadn’t appeared out of thin air.
“It’s going good,” I said, not wanting to get into how Papa had to help me fix the tear this morning.
“I’m sure Elegguá could use the help,” she said. “He’s done it by himself for a long time.”
Nana was right. Papa had been keeping the veil from failing forever, and I needed to be better with helping him. It was too much work for one person with so many tears cropping up.
Jayla ran down the stairs giggling. She clutched something black in her hands and slipped behind Nana.
“Give me back my wave cap!” Eli said, hot on her trail.
A wave cap was a glorified headscarf for sleeping, so your hair looked good when you woke up. A lot of the boys at Jackson Middle wore them outside of school. By the time Jayla leaped from behind Nana, she’d crammed the cap on her head. It half covered her eyes, and she peeped from underneath it, smiling. “I’m like you now, Eli,” she said, excited, puffs of her hair sticking from underneath the cap. She stroked her chin and tilted her head to the side, giving her best Eli impression.
Eli had looked annoyed when he first came down the stairs, but he grudgingly broke into a grin. “Since you’re so inclined to mimic my handsome face, I guess you can keep it until I get back from school.”
“I’m going to school, too,” Jayla said, proudly. “Kindergarten.”
“Not if you don’t sit down and let me finish doing your hair,” Nana said.
“I talked to Mom this morning,” Eli said to his grandmother. “She said to tell you hi.”
“How’s she doing?” Nana asked, her voice softer than usual.
Eli exhaled a deep sigh. His parents had divorced after Jayla was born. His mother moved away, and his father, Nana’s son, had decided he needed some space. “Good, I guess.”
I didn’t remember much about their parents, but Eli and Jayla had light skin and light eyes from their mom. Even when their parents had been around, they’d spent almost all of their time with Nana.
“Does your mom know about your powers?” I asked as we headed out the door on the way to meet Frankie.
“Nope, and neither does my dad.” Eli tried to play it off like he didn’t care, but he kept adjusting the straps on his backpack and glancing at his shoes. “I don’t think my mom could handle it—she’s got a lot going on. My dad will just say I’m making it up for attention.”
Most godlings didn’t show any powers, so they had no clue about their celestial family members. The orishas had kept their existence a secret, so I wasn’t surprised that his father didn’t know either.
Eli looked like he’d rather be talking about something else, so I blurted out, “Ugh, I’m not ready to go back to school. I didn’t finish my homework from Ms. Vanderbilt.”
“A crying shame, I tell you,” Eli said, waving his arms around. “You should get a break for saving the world this summer with a lot of help from Frankie and yours truly.” He flashed me a big smile as he pointed at himself.
“Couldn’t have done it without you,” I said, bumping my fist to his.
“Hey, don’t forget that we have the kickball final after school,” Eli said, changing the subject. “Don’t be late again.”
Ugh, I already had forgotten about it. I was definitely going to be late if I couldn’t convince Ms. Vanderbilt to let me out of math tutoring.
When we arrived at Frankie’s, her moms were debating whether life existed on other planets. Dee and Pam wore glasses almost identical to Frankie’s yellow frames. The three of them had upgraded their glasses after Frankie got hers scratched up in the Dark. Dee was short and round, and Pam was tall and always wore big hoop earrings. Both of them worked at the University of Chicago. Dee was a scientist studying bacteria, and Pam was a biology professor.
“I’m not convinced that the radio waves CHIME picked up mean anything at all,” Dee was saying as she opened the door. “More than likely, they’re a naturally occurring phenomenon.”
“Babe, you’ve got to be kidding,” Pam said, shaking her head. “There is a clear pattern of intelligence that suggests life.”
“Uh, sorry to interrupt, but is Frankie ready for school?” I asked, looking between the two. Pam was shoving books and a laptop into her leather messenger bag.
“Morning, Maya and Eli,” Dee said, slipping into her white lab coat. “Frankie’s been up for hours—studying the properties of force fields in her room.”
“Electromagnetic fields,” Pam corrected in her teacher’s know-it-all voice. “She thinks that force fields sounds too science fiction.”
“Have you considered that all the science rules go out the window in the face of magic?” Eli asked, butting into their conversation.
Both Dee and Pam cocked their heads at Eli like he was proof that aliens did exist. They might’ve accepted gods and magic, but it didn’t replace science in their eyes.
“Oh, you’ve got jokes early this morning,” Dee said, laughing. “Good one.”
Eli and I climbed up to the second floor to get Frankie. She was bending over a table, scribbling down notes. “Ready to go?” I asked, pausing at her open bedroom door.
“Almost,” Frankie said, not looking up. “Come in.”
Eli pushed into the room first and let out a long whistle. “It’s nerd heaven up in here.”
Entering Frankie’s room was like walking into a laboratory. She had two desks—one with her laptop and one with her latest experiment. A box of beakers and test tubes sat in a corner by the door, near a pile of notepads she used to log her findings. But it wasn’t all science stuff. Posters of her favorite bands were plastered on the walls, and she had a drool-worthy Lego collection.
Frankie stood in front of the desk with five jars of different sizes on it. Three of the jars were empty, but two of them sizzled with what looked like lightning. “I’ve been making electromagnetic fields all weekend. They seem to fluctuate in and out at random intervals before losing stability.”
“You can keep them going without physical contact?” I said, picking up one of the jars. “That’s a new trick.” The lightning bounced off the glass like a Ping-Pong ball, sending a shock wave up my hand. I put the jar down fast, afraid that it might shatter. It was like the magic was desperate to free itself.
“Yes, but it takes a lot of concentration,” Frankie said, biting her lip.
At least she was making progress. I wasn’t any better at closing tears without my staff after weeks of practicing with Papa. I tried hard not to feel a little jealous, but I couldn’t help it.
“I promised Nana that I would not get detention on the first day of school,” Eli said. “We need to go before we’re late.”
“Right,” Frankie said, reaching for her backpack. “I can’t get in trouble again so soon after this summer. My parents only have so much patience.”
Fifteen minutes later, we strolled through the front doors of Jackson Middle School. Even if I’d seen a lot of the same kids at the park this summer, everyone looked different in their school uniforms. Kids were sifting toward the crowded halls to find their friends.
“Welcome back to JMS, students,” came Principal Ollie’s smooth voice over the intercom. “We’re looking forward to another exciting year!”
“Bulldogs, Bulldogs,” a group of basketball players chanted as they pounded on the lockers.
JMS had so many sport teams and clubs, it was hard to keep up. We had the Bulldogs for basketball, the Jaguars for soccer, and the Bearcats for football. Baseball, swim, chess, robotics, drama, gymnastics. What we really needed was an official comic book club, that would be awesome.
“Hey, little Maya,” Candace said, stepping in my path. “I see you forgot to grow this summer.”
I swallowed hard and clenched my teeth. It was a well-known fact that Candace liked to pick her victims on the first day. She’d single you out, and then she’d be demanding your lunch money for the rest of the year. I might not have grown by much, but that didn’t matter. I wasn’t going to let her bully me.
“Hey, Candace,” I said, ignoring the crowd of kids gathering around.
Instead of a snappy comeback, I decided to be what Mama called diplomatic. In addition to being one of Winston’s cronies, Candace was a chess wizard and allegedly good at Ping-Pong. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to give her a chance to talk about herself. “How was your summer? Win any chess tournaments?”
Every kid nearby cringed and the hallway fell silent. The fluorescent lights crackled over our heads. Zap. Zap. Zap. They might as well have been calling for a fight with the way today was playing out. I looked to Frankie and Eli, who both shrugged, not getting it either.
“Are you making fun of me?” Candace asked, her bottom lip trembling. I was close enough to see that her eyes had gotten all glossy.
“What happened?” someone whispered behind me.
“Didn’t you hear?” someone answered. “A kid from the West Side beat Candace in three games straight. She ain’t the chess queen no more.”
Ugh, of course, I would pick the exact wrong thing to ask. “Uh, no,” I said, scrambling for something else to say. “How’s Ping-Pong?”
“Are you serious?” Candace growled, then she pitched her voice so everyone else could hear. “I sprained my wrist playing, and that’s why I lost the chess tournament.”
“What’s a sprained wrist got to do with a game of strategy?” someone whispered, and Candace balled her hands into fists.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I said as I caught sight of something fishy going on with Candace’s shoes. Her laces were untying themselves. “Eli!” I yelped.
“You think this is a joke,” Candace said, taking one step forward. She stumbled over her feet and slammed straight into me. We both hit the floor hard.
Candace and I struggled to untangle ourselves in the middle of the hallway. Her elbow caught me in the ribs, and my knee connected with her side. She doubled over, her backpack slipping off her shoulder. It landed with a heavy thump next to my head. Two more inches to the left, and I would’ve been a cream puff. I wiggled from underneath her, my face hot from embarrassment. The first day of school was officially canceled.
“What do you have in there, a stack of bricks?” I groaned. The backpack was half open, and I saw, like, five books on chess. She was really taking her tournament loss this summer hard.
“Fight, fight, fight,” kids yelled as Candace climbed to her feet.
She gritted her teeth, her lips squeezed tight together, and gave me her death stare. It felt like standing outside on a boiling-hot day or being an ant under a magnifying glass. The hallway had gone quiet again, and all eyes were on me. Sweat trickled down my back.
I got to my feet and squared up, shifting my legs to a wider stance and drawing my shoulders back. If Candace thought she was about to kick my butt, she had another thing coming. I didn’t spend my summer fighting darkbringers to be shown up on the first day of school by a bully.
Candace held out her hand, and Dion James, a kid with thick glasses, clambered forward to pick up her backpack. He shoved it into her arms with a little grin, and I could’ve sworn Candace blushed. “You’re mighty clumsy, Maya,” she said, her voice thundering in my ears. “I don’t like clumsy people.”
I caught a glimpse of Eli, who’d reappeared in the crowd next to Frankie. He mouthed a silent “Sorry.”
The first homeroom bell rang, and to my surprise, Candace looked more relieved than me. Her big shoulders heaved up and down as she rolled her eyes. The death stare faded from her face like it’d all been an act. There was something different about her, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
“Saved by the bell,” she said, turning on her heels.
“That didn’t go at all how I expected,” Eli said as the crowd broke up.
“You know if you bully Candace, that makes you as bad as her, right?” I groaned.
Eli shrugged. “She deserves to fall on her face every once in a while on account on how awful she is to everyone else.”
“You’re missing the point, Eli,” I said, annoyed with him.
Frankie glanced around the hallway, oblivious to our conversation. “Have you noticed that kids are acting strange?”
I thought about how the darkbringers had pretended to be some of our classmates earlier this summer. They’d been acting strange too before they showed their real faces. “Strange how?” I asked. “Like a little strange or a lot strange?”
Frankie pointed to a boy staring up at the ceiling as he walked. He kept bumping into other kids, who shoved him out of their way, but he didn’t seem to notice.
“Why is everyone yelling?” asked a kid who had their hands shoved over their ears.
That was a weird thing to say because the kids who were usually the loudest in the hallway were extra quiet. Another kid was clutching his backpack like he thought someone would steal it.
“Get to homeroom, Ms. Abeola, Ms. Williams, and Mr. Flores,” said our history teacher, Mr. Chang. He stood next to his classroom as the last of the students filed inside. “You don’t want to start the school year on the wrong foot.”
“As opposed to the right or left foot,” Eli said under his breath before we parted ways.
Frankie was right, though. People were acting strange. I had a theory, but I didn’t want to speculate, not until we saw more.