Cara Lynn Shultz - Spellbound

Its always embarrassing to have someone take you to school. Your dad, your mom, anyone with her hair in rollers.

But for my first day as a junior at my new schoola ridiculously expensive private school on New Yorks Upper East SideI was being walked to school by my baby cousin. A freshman .

It really wasnt that terrible. Even though we grew up apart, Ashley and I were email buddies. She was a sweetheart, there was no doubt of that, but if my knowledge of the inner workings of my familiar old New Jersey public school, Keansburg High, meant anything, I knew that juniors did not hang out with the lower classes. It was like hanging out with a bunch of vegetarians and wearing a bacon necklace.

Talk about unwelcome.

But it was important to my aunt Christine that I got to school early and she was afraid Id get lost. My great-aunt had taken me in over the summer, and Id learned quickly that when she got an idea into her head, you were better off just going along with it. I didnt want to argue with herI owed her everything. My life, really. Shed been asking me to live with her ever since my mom died a year and a half ago, leaving me with Henry, my stepfather whose blood-alcohol content hovered somewhere between wasted and how is he even alive? But after he nearly killed me last June with his particular style of driving (i.e., blasted), I stopped resisting Christines offer.

Going from my aunts place at Park and Sixty-eighth Street to the school at Park and Eighty-sixth Street is fairly basic: walk eighteen blocks left. But since she had been pretty cool about everythingstepping in, giving me a place to stay and leaving me with a Youll talk to me if you need to instead of hovering over meI didnt press it.

Ashley was a bundle of excitement as soon as she stepped inside the door of Christines three-bedroom co-op, her pink cheeks flushed, red curls pushed back by a black-ribbon headband. Shes several inches shorter than meI wouldnt put her past five feet. And thats giving a generous allowance to her curls.

Hi Emma! Yay, first day! Are you excited? Do you like your uniform? I smiled back. Her joy was infectious. You couldnt help but like Ashleythe girl never said a mean thing in all of her fourteen years. Then a black thought crept its way in: What if no one did like Ashley, and that was why she was so happy to have an ally? What kind of evil place was Vincent Academy, where someone could dislike a sweet little munchkin like Ashley? Calm down, Emma, youre going to give yourself a panic attack.

My smile got weaker, and I smoothed out my long-sleeved white Oxford shirt and black, blue and green Scotch plaid skirt that mirrored her outfit.

You tell me, how do I look? I asked her.

You look fine, she chirped. But why the long sleeves? Its soooo hot out. Its going to be like, seventy billion degrees today! Dont you have any short slee

Ashley looked at the ground and blushed, her red cheeks now matching her flame-colored hair.

Sorry, I forgot about the scar.

The blazing scar from the car accident had made wearing short sleeves an impossibility. Thanks, Henry. Youre a champ.

Its okay. Im okay, I reassured her. Dont worry about it. Really! I added when I saw the expression in her eyes.

She had always looked up to me, even though she lived in the city and I lived in the country, so to speak. Being two years older had its advantages.

And now the city mouse was taking the country mouse under its paw.

After Aunt Christine had slipped me a twenty-dollar bill for emergencies and sent us on our way, I drew in Ashley conspiratorially and asked, So whats the real deal on this school? I know the basic stuff, like how practically everyone goes Ivy League after graduation. But whats this place really like?

How I hoped, prayed, that it was like all those shows about rich, fashion-obsessed, drama-crazy New York teens who dressed like they were twenty-five. All the easier to stay in the background. I just wanted to get through the next two years and disappear to college. Preferably somewhere far away. Maybe Siberia.

They like to say its exclusive but thats just a nice word for it being expensive. Ashley giggled, toying with her oversize hoop earring. Its the most expensive coed school in the city. Theres a few girls-only or boys-only schools that cost more. So were like our own little, I dont know, island, in the middle of it all. Everyone at Vince A more or less stays together.

Oh. I tried to not sound disappointed.

In my head, I began rehearsing what I would say about the reason behind my move. Ashley didnt understand why I didnt just say I moved from Keansburg, but then I told her how my high school paper insisted on doing a story on the dangers of drinking and driving, pegged to the incident with Henry. The editor was hoping to use her hard-hitting story as her one-way ticket into the journalism program at Columbia. I figured it doubled as her ticket to Hell. Those who hadnt heard about Henry through the gossip mill read about it, front and center in the Keansburg Mirror.

Google me. Google Keansburg. Guess what your first hit is?

Alcohol Turns Home Life Tragic and Ride Home Dangerous for Sophomore Emma Connor.

So moving from Philly was the story.

Ashley gave me a cursory rundown of the school and some of the things Id come to expect from high school. The principal wore horrible suits. The uniforms were itchy in warmer weather. The cafeteria food was comically terrible, but you were allowed out at lunchtime once you were a junior.

We crossed Eighty-fifth Street, racing against the yellow light and slowing our walk as we headed to the entrance.

Here we are! Ashley announced, throwing her arms open with a flourish.

I regarded the gray building in front of me. It was an old mansion that had been converted into a high school, and it sure looked the part, with cool stone walls and windows hugged by lavishly scrolled molding. Vincent Academy wasnt too talljust five floors, no taller than the stately, old-fashioned brick-and-marble buildings on either sidebut to me, it seemed massive and imposing, like it was some bully crushing his way through a crowd of old ladies.