Chasing Sunrise

Fourteen

A few bad things had happened, in fact. The bus hadn't come to get us because one student had stabbed another on board. Three days ago I'd boarded the bus like a wide-eyed kid at Disneyland, all wrapped up in the gleeful sense of living that American teen movie. The following day I'd figured out that was shallow and had noticed how many kids fell asleep, or glared at other bus-riders, or ate their lunch before school had even started.

Today, that bus full of real people with real lives had been required to make a detour to rendezvous with an ambulance to take a stabbing victim to the hospital, and a police cruiser to take a stabbing suspect into custody.

Right now, there was no word about the condition of the stabbee.

"Um, so my mom's gonna come give me a ride," said one of the girls. "You guys can come if you need."

The other girl nodded in a way that told me these two knew each other.

I thanked her and, for the third time this week, climbed into the car of a stranger. This time it was an aged SUV with cracked vinyl upholstery that had no trouble with the snow, and the driver was a kind, blond lady who knew my aunt.

We arrived at school about fifteen minutes late, and despite our perfectly valid excuse, we were all marked tardy.

Yet another reality that weighed on kids without reliable home lives or transportation. It took a few tardies to rack up a detention, but that still meant people sat in detention because of situations they couldn't control.

I also didn't see why we had to be penalized, because rather than going to class, everyone had been called into a last-minute assembly in the gym. There, people were seated by class in the bleachers, and Mr. Martinez's class was at the back, so it was pretty easy for me to slip into a seat on the hard bench beside Gina and behind Amy, whose jaw tensed in a slow rhythm as she chewed gum.

"—unacceptable behavior," the principal was saying when I arrived. "Someone here knows why this happened, and we're not leaving until they come forward. If you're too embarrassed to stand up right now, pass a note to your teacher and your teacher can let me know you're willing to talk. I don't want to be here all day, so start talking." Her face was somber, her gray hair pulled primly up in a bun and her slight figure commanding everyone's attention.

"How's the kid who got stabbed?" I whispered to Gina.

"Who got stabbed?" she whispered back.

She looked like she'd been paying attention to Principal Garcia, so I asked, "What's this assembly about?"

"The vandalism last night. A group of students broke into the library and tried to set it on fire."

"What?"

"But someone saw the flashlight beams and called the police and Principal Garcia is trying to shame us into giving up whoever did it."

I blinked. "Does stuff like this happen often?"

"No."

Amy leaned back to look up at me. "No," she also mouthed, shaking her head.

"And if they dust for prints," Gina said, "it'll look like a big ol' gang of the nerdiest kids over the past ten years did it."

I stifled a laugh at that. I would certainly have fit into that category at my old school.

"The world has gone crazy," Amy added.

Mr. Martinez had come a few steps down the aisle and made a shushing gesture at us.

I put my hands in my lap and pressed my lips together. I'd never been chided in an assembly before. It was rather exciting.