I had been to six schools in my life.
Two of them had mold on the ceiling tiles. One did not have a cafeteria, just a room with vending machines. One had a security guard at the front door who looked through your bag every morning like you were boarding a flight.
Anchor Beach was not those schools.
Lena dropped me off Monday morning and I just stood there for a second. Real campus. Actual trees. The kind of school that shows up in movies where the kids have problems but the problems are not about the building falling apart.
Okay, I thought. Different.
* * *
They put me in a room off the main office for the placement test. Just me, a proctor who looked like he would rather be anywhere else, and a packet of questions.
It was not hard.
The math was straightforward, the reading was fine, and the writing prompt was about a time I overcame a challenge. Given recent events I had material. I kept it clean though. Did not go full CPS origin story on them.
Forty minutes later the proctor looked it over, made some marks, and said I passed.
I had not been worried but I exhaled anyway.
* * *
Then came the class selection sheet.
I had never really gotten to choose before. Whatever school I landed in, I took whatever they had open. So this was new.
AP English. Easy yes. I read a lot, always have. Something to do when home was not somewhere you wanted to be.
Regular math. I was good at it but not AP good and I did not feel like finding out the hard way in a new school.
Biology. Fine.
Spanish. I already knew some and it made more sense to build on something real than start over with a new language.
Art. Obviously.
Then the woman at the desk got to PE and slid a separate sheet across.
"We require all new students to try out for at least one sport their first semester," she said. "Baseball tryouts are this week. If you do not want to go out for the team, you get placed in standard PE."
I looked at the sheet.
"What is standard PE."
"Fitness testing. Rope climbing. The pacer."
I picked up the pen and circled baseball.
"Smart choice," she said.
* * *
She said someone would come show me around. I sat back down and waited.
The someone who knocked on the door frame a few minutes later was not what I expected.
Auburn hair, wavy, a little messy in the way that takes effort. Glasses sitting low on her nose, the thin wire kind, reddish brown frames. Green eyes looking at me over the top of them. Pearl earrings, pearl necklace, little flower pendant. Cream colored sweater falling off one shoulder.
She looked like someone who had very specific opinions about things.
"Sean?"
"Yeah."
"I'm Vanessa. I'll show you around."
I stood up. Then I noticed the keychain on her lanyard. Small. Demon Slayer.
"Nice to meet you," I said. "I'm Sean."
"I know. Green hair Sean."
"Already?"
"Small school."
She turned and walked and I followed.
* * *
She gave the tour like she had done it before but was not bored by it. Main building, gym, science wing, arts building. I already had my eye on the arts building.
In the main hallway there was a wall of student work. Paintings, drawings, all mounted and framed. I slowed down without meaning to.
"You draw," she said. Not a question.
"How do you know?"
She nodded at my bag. The corner of my sketchbook was sticking out.
"A little"I said, looking back at the wall. "But I will a lot more soon."
She smiled at that. Real one.
We kept walking.
"So you're into anime?" she asked, touching the Bleach keychain.
"That is what I draw mostly. Started there, do original stuff now too."
"What series?"
I told her. She had opinions. Strong ones. We went back and forth for half the tour and I forgot I was supposed to be paying attention to where things were.
"What do you listen to?" she asked as we turned into the art wing.
"Depends on what I'm drawing. Hip hop mostly. Lo-fi when I need to focus."
"Same," she said. She pulled out her phone and showed me her current playlist without me asking.
Half of it I knew. Half I did not but could tell I would.
"I'll send you some stuff," she said. "If you want."
"Yeah. For sure."
She stopped in front of a door and pushed it open. The art room. Wide windows, long tables, a wall of supplies, work drying on a rack in the corner. It smelled like paint and charcoal and something I could not name but recognized immediately.
The smell of a room where people actually make things.
I stood in the doorway.
"Good?" Vanessa asked.
"Yeah," I said. "Good."
* * *
By the end of the tour I had a schedule, a locker combination, and her contact in my phone.
She had to get back to class. She pointed me toward the office for my ID and said she would see me around.
"Hey," I said before she turned.
"Yeah?"
"Which series has the best art direction. Not story. Just the visuals."
She actually thought about it. I liked that she took it seriously.
She gave me her answer .
I disagreed and told her why.
She pointed at me like I was wrong but also maybe a little right and walked away.
I watched her go.
Okay, I thought.