CLAIRE

On Monday I was grateful to have the distraction of school. Now that the monorail was back in motion, it was like the crash on Thursday night had never even happened. For that, I was grateful.

But a part of me was aware that it wasn't the case for every family who knew someone that was on the tram that Thursday evening. That's all I could think as I entered the monorail. It was a little emptier than it usually was, even for a Monday morning.

I supposed that not everyone was comfortable riding it again given what had happened— and I didn't necessarily blame them for that decision.

Heaven knows Dad was worried the night before at dinner.

"Are you sure you don't want me to drive you in?" He asked as he passed the vegan potato salad Holly had made. "I'm not sure I'm comfortable with you being on the tram again, especially so soon. . . "

I'd just bravely smiled and assured him that I would be fine as I repressed the questions that felt as if they burned, trying to ignore the secrets I had uncovered. I noticed that Julien also wouldn't look at me for the rest of the day.

I had gone too deep, and I wouldn't dare go further, lest I end up in over my head.

Or at least, that's what I'd told myself.

...

The day was going as well as could be expected. I was going to go interview one of the bio teachers since her planning period was at the same time as my journalism class, so I could go and ask her questions for her teacher's profile on the Princess North's website.

I was reviewing my psych homework as the others filtered in the classroom when Malcolm McQueen got up out of his seat to come see me. He hovered over me awkwardly for a moment before I noticed him and he gave me the ol' charmer smile.

"Oh, hi," I said. "Do you need something?"

"Oh, no, I just wanted to see how you were doing," he said. "I think sometimes we don't do enough to meet people outside of our cliques and social circles. It's a pity, because sometimes the most interesting people are the ones who are not like us."

Ah, so it's about seeing what the masses are like.

"That's true." I searched for the words to say next. "However, it's not like we're all Mean Girls at North Kingsbury. The popular kids aren't mean or oppressing the rest of us. Who knows, maybe society's changed since like, 2005 or whatever?"

"That's true, but I sometimes wonder what it would be like to be less visible." Malcolm trailed off.

"Thanks," I retorted sarcastically. "I was thinking of picking up some more camouflage, so I could be less visible."

"It wasn't meant as an offense," Malcolm said quietly. "You're not a target if you're invincible. You can just live, y'know."

"I guess there are some advantages to being invisible," I agreed. I wasn't thinking of anything as petty as stupid high school stuff that wouldn't be relevant in as little as a year. "I hadn't thought of it like that, but I must imagine it's difficult, being watched all the time."

It was hard enough, after all, coping with only feeling watched, not actually being watched.

"I shouldn't complain." Malcolm's cheeks flooded with red. "I'm sorry— you probably must think I'm acting like some whiny jerk—"

"No, no, it's fine." I even managed a smile. "I don't mind hearing about your problems, either."

They're much simpler than mine, after all.

His smile widened. "Thanks, Claire. You're cool."

The teacher walked in, and so he returned to his seat just as Charlotte took her spot.

"What's got him so interested in you?" There was a mix of jealousy— presumably because he was pretty cute— and disdain because he was a popular student athlete.

I just shrugged, unable to put into words what had just happened.

That wasn't the only bit of weirdness, either, but that didn't come till third period, history class.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

It started as soon as we walked in the door, on the whiteboard a section of black-and-white footage projected. One that all of us knew.

"Welcome to our unit on the 1970s!" Mrs. Jennings clapped her hands together from where she perched on the edge of her perfectly-organized desk. "I decided to start with what was admittedly the end of the era, but far closer to home— but don't sit down yet, you have a project and you'll need to sit next to your partner!"

I groaned as I went to find a section of the wall to stand next to.

To my surprise, I saw Tristan hanging out in the corner.

"I didn't realize you were in this class," I said as I approached.

"I sit in the back," he explained, not taking his eyes off of the whiteboard. He was transfixed by the soundless footage, replaying over and over again.

"You do that a lot." I watched, too, for a moment. The colorless recording of trails of people fleeing their homes, leaving behind older spires.

"It's easier for me to observe," Tristan admitted. "Besides, it's been harder to talk to others, since. . . "

"You can talk to me," I reminded him, knowing why he trailed off at the end of his sentence.

The corners of Tristan's mouth flicked up in the closest he ever got to a smile after his father had died.

"Well, you're different than the others," he said, as if it were an obvious fact.

"Oh come on, I'm sure there are others that are cooler than me," I assured him, lightly elbowing him in the ribs.

He let out a short exhale— the closest he got to laughter— as his face turned to a real smile. He looked down, his cheeks turning pink.

"Maybe, but that doesn't mean you aren't the best of us," he said with a tone of admiration that made my own face feel warm. "Don't know how I could settle for less."

"Turner! Browning! The bell has rung!" Mrs. Jennings clapped, and we all came to attention like the JROTC kids at their drills. "Good thing you're so chatty, because you're one of the partner pairs for the project, go sit toward the front where I can see you!"

Tristan groaned—barely audible because even with his high school anti-authority stint, he too feared the wrath of Mrs. Jennings. We took the seat at the table that Mrs. Jennings pointed to with her yardstick.

I looked back up at the whiteboard as I pulled my stuff for history class out of my messenger bag. I recognized the photos from the presentation immediately.

This was the evacuation of Old Kingsbury after the Atomic Energy power plant had failed.

This was the accident that had changed our history and trajectory forever. We rebuilt in our new art-deco futuristic dream city, and would have heroes, villains, and all the cancer afterwards.

It was strange, seeing it with the knowledge of how I'd been affected by it.

And Mom, and Dad. . .

I felt like I was going to be sick, so I put my head between my hands, taking care to keep it up so that Mrs. Jennings wouldn't yell at me while I was nauseous.

"You okay?" Tristan whispered, with that sincerity that I only really ever received from him.

"I'm fine." The biggest and most common lie ever told.

"I don't like seeing it, either."

"I'd imagine."

His own father had died from cancer, one of the less spectacular results of Atomic Energy's mistakes. I couldn't imagine the way he felt, seeing the reason his dad died played out over and over again, like it was nothing, merely a cool piece of history.

I wondered if anyone else had felt the same way in the room as we did.

However, I didn't have long to muse on this, because the drill sergeant had left her desk and was ready for battle.

"Does anyone know what this is?" She jabbed the image with her yardstick.

"With all due respect, Mrs. Jennings, all of us would know what that is," Tristan said.

"We raise our hand in this class, Turner."

He rolled his eyes and raised his hand with all the enthusiasm that could be expected.

Mrs. Jennings surveyed the classroom with her hawklike eyes, but was unable to find another willing victim, so settled for Tristan.

"Yes, Turner?"

"It's the nuclear factory's meltdown in Old Kingsbury in the spring of 1979," he said, clearly reciting facts from memory. "The reason we're all here, and the reason New Kingsbury has one of the highest cancer rates in the country."

"And the reason we are the birthplace of superheroes and supervillains."

I flicked my eyes towards Tristan with the shared disdain— even if I wasn't sure where I stood with them anymore. The way Stephanie fangirled over them had more to do with the novelty, whereas Mrs. Jennings had grown up in New Kingsbury all her life and should have known better as to the consequences, given that she was about to teach us about them.

"As we talk about the seventies over the next month, I want you all to keep in mind how history can affect us, even generations later, and why we should keep in mind how we are living in history," Mrs. Jennings said. "Hence why I have given you all a project. I will be assigning you all a hero or villain— often someone who was both— and I want you to study their importance and what their whole story was."

She then grabbed an old cracked fishbowl with scraps of notebook paper off of the top of her filing cabinet.

"Browning, since you seem to have such high regard for the subject matter, you can draw first."

I reached into the fishbowl and pulled out a scrap of paper. My stomach lurched. "Heretic?"

"Well, write it down." Mrs. Jennings then moved on to the next group.

Tristan blinked at the scrap of paper in disbelief. "Hey, wait a sec, Mrs. Jennings!"

She turned back to us, clearly irritated. "What? I have other students to get through, you two."

"Mrs. Jennings, you can't do this to Claire, not that villain—"

"Turner, if I took every little incident everyone had with every villain into account, then we wouldn't be studying this at all." Mrs. Jennings sighed deeply. "Now let me finish passing these out and do your work. I will not be changing your assignment."

With that, she continued, casually as anything, while I felt like I was drowning at the desk. I clung to it for support, just to keep breathing.

"This is such bullshit," Tristan muttered, glaring over his shoulder at Mrs. Jennings. "We should go to the principal, or someone—"

"Don't." I grabbed the sleeve of his trenchcoat. "I don't want to make a scene."

The last thing I needed lately was more attention on me. Seemed like nearly everybody had their eyes on me now.

"Are you sure?" Tristan's voice went quiet, softer. "Can you handle. .."

I sat up straighter, letting go of his sleeve. I brushed my hair behind my ears, tried to keep from thinking of that fateful afternoon.

"I'll be fine." I was used to that lie, and it rolled all too easily off my lips.

Even though I knew that Tristan could see right through it.