Trading Faces (4 page)

“And so it begins,” I said. “Our first twin question of middle school.”

We walked past a case full of trophies. I vowed to
add to that collection. Then we passed the boys' bathroom.
Oh, no. I just remembered something
. I looked at Payton, and she was smiling.

Payton, don't even go there.

“Remember that first day of kindergarten, when you got the doors to the boys' and girls' bathrooms mixed up?” she said. “And you walked in on Joseph Jones when he was going into the bathroom?”

Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. She went there.

Thanks, Payton.
I'm nervous enough without remembering my past school trauma.
Do not show weakness!
I told myself.

Here's a secret: I was so scared about being in a class without Payton. Of course, she never helped me with schoolwork. And I was looking forward to being in advanced classes instead of just doing advanced work in a class with everyone else. (Joke!) But . . . (this is embarrassing) when Payton is in my class, then I can count on having at least one friend. So the more classes we have together the better.

Uh, not like I didn't have friends at my old school. Well, friend. Lakisha and I had study dates at each other's houses on a regular basis. And it wasn't all work and no play. We mixed in some Othello and snacks, too.

But having my sister around always makes my life easier.

The Payton Advantage:

If I get too serious, she knows how to crack me up.

She invites me into her group of friends so I never have to feel left out.

Another thing I can count on from Payton is reassurance. She understands me. So if I tell her I'm a little nervous, she'll say something like,
Silly Emma. You'll have nothing to worry about. You'll be the school genius, as always, and everyone will admire you.

“Payton, I'm kind of worried about today,” I said.

“Okay,” Payton said seriously. “I'll give you some important advice.”

See? I knew I could count on her.

“The boys' room will say ‘Boys' on it,” she said. “Use the
other
one.”

Oh, ha ha. Very amusing. Shall I remind Payton of her past fiascos? Yes. I shall
. The Great Burp of Fifth Grade. The Third-Grade Stairs Incident. The—

“Okay, okay!” she laughed. “No more school embarrassing moments!”

Past, present, or future, I hoped. Moving onward. Down these stairs and around the corner should be the gym. I slowed down on the stairs, just to be on the safe side, so Payton wouldn't trip and fall again. Payton followed me down the hall and around the corner. And then—

I saw it. On the wall. A sign.

Hee hee! Primed? 103 and 23 are prime numbers.
Those mathletes are so hilarious. I'm definitely going to be there.
Clubs don't start until the third week of school, the school manual had said. How could I wait that long? Well, it'll give me extra time to prepare. I also planned to join GeoBee and Spelling Bee and Science Olympiad. Woo-hoo!

We walked a little further and then . . .

“Payton,” I said. “PAYTON! We're here!”

The gym was filled with students anxiously awaiting their schedules. We walked over and stood in the
L-M-N-O line. Payton got in front of me. As I waited, I thought about how important this moment was. My schedule would organize my life for a whole school year. What if I had Math first period? That would be so great. I'd be bouncing into school each morning. Although if it were last, I could look forward to it all day! And Science? Woo-hoo! I'll take that any time of day. Thinking about my favorite classes started to cheer me up.

We reached the table. This was it. The moment of truth. Well, first it would be Payton's moment of truth. I poked her in the back.

While Payton got her schedule, I looked around. I saw Ahmad from the robotics tournament! And I recognized a girl I'd seen in the paper winning the Young Scientist Challenge. Jazmine something. Her science was pretty impressive, but I bet I could have beaten her. Gosh, I wished that the science challenge hadn't been the same day as the spelling bee. It had looked like a blast.

I'd never spoken to these people before. They'd always been on other school teams. They'd been the competition. That would all change this year! We were all on the same team now. This was great! I almost felt a little popular.

“Emma Mills,” I said to the lady behind the table, after Payton had stepped away. The woman handed me my schedule and gave me directions to homeroom.

“Let's get to homeroom,” I said, checking the clock. We only had three minutes to get there. We could compare schedules on the way.

“The lady said room 224 is down the hall to the left,” I told Payton, starting to head out of the gym.

“You mean Room 220, to the right,” she said.

What? I double-checked my card. Then I looked at Payton's.

“We're in different homerooms?” I tried not to panic. “But homeroom is alphabetical!”

We'd been split up. Okay. Okay. I'd handle different homerooms. I looked at the schedule. Homeroom was only fifteen minutes.

“It'll be okay.” Payton tried to make me feel better. “We'll be together for . . .”

I consulted the schedule. WHAT?!

“For nothing!” I said. No classes together? “NOT EVEN LUNCH!” I wailed.

“Did you see those twins?” some girl said. “They look
exactly
alike.”

Now people were staring at us.

“Yeah,” another girl said. “Except that one has a bigger nose.”

Oh, boy. It was true. Payton got the nose. I got the ears. I patted down my hair to cover them.

Clang!
The bell.

I couldn't hear anything Payton was saying.

“Payton, I can't hear you amidst this chaos,” I said.

Then I saw her hand reach out. I smiled. Our twin hand-slap. We high-fived, low-fived, bumped fists . . .

Then I took a deep breath. We had to go. I watched Payton turn around and leave. I headed out the gym door after her.

And turned left.

HOMEROOM

I was the last person, alphabetically, in Homeroom 220, which put me in the last seat in the last row. This was my favorite place to sit. I could hide from the teacher and scope out everything going on in front of me.

But this was just homeroom, so it didn't really matter much. It's not like the teacher was going to call on me to answer anything I couldn't handle.

“Mills, Payton?” the teacher called out.

“Here!” I said. See? That's the kind of question I don't mind if teachers call on me for. But usually I hate when teachers call on me. And if I felt pressured before in school, then I really felt pressure now. Because for
the first time Emma wasn't in my classes. Before, if a teacher called on me and I didn't know the answer, Emma was always there to wave her hand around and rescue me.

I had no one to rescue me now.

“Mills, Payton? Mills, are you here?” the teacher was saying.

Huh?

“Yeah!” I said, holding up my hand. “Yeah, I'm here!”

“Next time, please speak up when I call on you,” the teacher said. “Or you'll be marked absent.”

Okay, great. Apparently, I had to feel pressured even getting called on for attendance. People turned around to look at me, but they lost interest and went back to what they were doing.

I positioned myself behind the person in front of me so the teacher wouldn't notice me again. The girl in front of me had seriously great hair. I thought my hair was shiny, but hers was like a shampoo commercial. It was long, and razor sharp at the ends.

The girl turned around and passed back an envelope with my name on it.

“Thanks!” I said with what I hoped was a friendly but cool smile that would lead to her introducing
herself. We'd talk a little bit, walk to our next class together, date best friends . . .

The girl turned back around.

Or she could turn back around and blow me off.

I busied myself opening the envelope. It had my locker number in it, 33638 and my combination, 18-25-22. Great, because I seriously needed to put my things in my locker. I hoped I had time before my next class.

I pulled out the school map and my schedule. I was in luck! My locker was in this hallway, and so was my study hall!

Study hall being first was excellent, because I could do any last-minute homework. And even more excellent, PE was last! That was major—I wouldn't have to feel sweaty all day.

I looked at my locker combination: 18-25-22. There was no way I'd remember that. I'd write it somewhere I wouldn't lose it, like . . . um, not on my hand . . . on my shoe. I took out a gel pen and wrote it along the side of my flip flop: 18-25-22.

I stuck my foot out to check it out. But I accidentally kicked the tote bag of the girl in front of me, and my flip-flop flew off.

The girl turned around and looked at me.

“Um, sorry,” I said. “I'll just pick that up.”

I leaned over to grab my shoe.

“That's cute,” the girl said. She looked me up and down. “And that's a cute skirt, too. Where did you get it?”

Well
. Actually, I got it after I swept our cabin like Cinderella, but I didn't think that was the right response.

“It's from a boutique in New York City,” I told her.

The girl nodded. She didn't turn back around, so I took the chance.

“I'm Payton Mills,” I said. “I'm new and—”

“Excuse me,” the teacher's voice rang out. “This is homeroom, not a chat room. Enough talking, girls in the back.”

The girl in front of me whipped her head back around.

“Sorry, Mrs. Galbreath,” she said sweetly.