Nyx (ON HOLD)

First Day, Part V

Sydney was as good a guide to Marblehead High School as any I could've hoped for, equal parts knowledgeable and unobtrusive, capably shuttling me between classes while somehow making it seem like she wasn't babysitting me. Of course we both knew exactly what she was doing, but at least she was gracious enough not to let on about it.

The first two class periods were punctuated by the obligatory stares and introductions of being the new kid in a too-small school. I'd been through this whole ritual enough times that it should've been old hat, but a few of the eyes watching me seemed unduly hostile or inquisitive — maybe both. Study hall came as a mercy after the stuttering mess I made of myself in English Lit, which left me slinking back into my seat with burning cheeks after the demanded initiation. At least during that second period people only stole glances at me from my peripheral vision, and I buried my nose deeply enough in a borrowed copy of Cat's Cradle that I could pretend not to notice.

Sydney was waiting outside the study hall room — a borrowed mathematics class — like an auburn-haired psychopomp, and her hazel eyes sparkled behind her heavy glasses frames. "Ready for some lunch?"

I parted my lips, on the verge of asking Already? when my stomach audibly snarled. It didn't feel late enough in the day to warrant it, but I checked my phone, surprised to discover that more than three hours had passed since classes started.

My redheaded companion giggled kindly. "C'mon, let's get you fed before whatever you're smuggling in there busts out and kills us all!"

The cafeteria was as dingy as the rest of the building, lit by sallow fluorescent lights that seemed to be on the verge of giving up — and I was almost so put off by the way the place looked that I didn't notice the delicious smell wafting from the steamy kitchen. A daily blackboard declared in simple letters that the strange concoction filling the chrome bins was "Egg Roll in a Bowl," and both my self-appointed escort and the wonderful aroma assured me that the food was more than palatable.

"So what's with the sketchiness of this place?" I asked Sydney after we'd picked out a table near the windows. The day had turned cold and foggy, and the strange peaked roofs of the town shone sterling against the slate sea. The wan light made the stained, pockmarked ceiling tiles look positively sickly, as though the school had been left to rot from its guts outward. The juxtaposition with the delicious food was jarring.

"For such a small town, things here are...complex," Sydney said after a moment.

I wasn't sure if her slow, deliberate tone was due to reluctance or something more, but decided to probe a little anyway. "Oh?"

Sydney's hazel eyes narrowed at me. "How much do you know about Marblehead?"

"I know it's in Maine."

She giggled a little, probably assuming I was joking, and I shrugged, smiling awkwardly. It was basically true; beyond being able to find the town on a map, I hadn't picked up anything in the last eighteen or so hours that gave me any sense of the town's history.

"Fair enough," Sydney answered after another moment, as her laughter died. She pushed her glasses further up the bridge of her nose, and as she pursed her lips, her pale brow furrowed in thought. "So, there's basically two big groups of people in town: the people who're descended from the town's original settlers, and everyone else who came here later on."

"You mean, like, that whole thing about flatlanders?" I asked. Though we'd never lived closer to Maine than western New Hampshire, Mom had complained loudly and often enough about Mainers' insular nature that I wasn't surprised.

"Well...sort of," Sydney admitted. "See, Marblehead just kinda did its own thing for about two hundred years, and it wasn't until a hundred years after that that the Industrial Revolution brought the railroad through town."