Turned (Book 1 in the Vampire Journals) by Morgan Rice (2 page)

She clutched her journal, the one thing that grounded her. It had been with her everywhere. She kept notes and drawings in every place she went. It was a roadmap of her childhood.

She finally reached the entrance, and had to squeeze in just to walk through. It was like entering a train at rush hour. She had hoped it would be warm once she got inside, but the open doors behind her kept a stiff breeze blowing down her back, making the cold even worse.

Two large security guards stood at the entrance, flanked by two New York City policemen, in full uniform, guns conspicuously at their side.

“KEEP MOVING!” commanded one of them.

She couldn’t fathom why two armed policemen would have to guard a high school entrance. Her feeling of dread grew. It got much worse when she looked up and saw that she’d have to pass through a metal detector with airport-style security.

Four more armed policemen stood on either side of the detector, along with two more security guards.

“EMPTY YOUR POCKETS!” snapped a guard.

Caitlin noticed the other kids filling small plastic containers with items from their pockets. She quickly did the same, inserting her ipod, wallet, keys.

She shuffled through the detector, and the alarm shrieked.

“YOU!” snapped a guard. “Off to the side!”

Of course
.

All the kids stared as she was made to raise her arms, and the guard ran the handheld scanner up and down her body.

“Are you wearing any jewelry?”

She felt her wrists, then her neckline, and suddenly remembered. Her cross.

“Take it off,” snapped the guard.

It was the necklace her grandmother gave her before she passed, a small, silver cross, engraved with a description in Latin which she never had translated. Her grandmother told her it was passed down by her grandmother. Caitlin wasn’t religious, and didn’t really understand what it all meant, but she knew it was hundreds of years old, and it was by far the most valuable thing she owned.

Caitlin lifted it from her shirt, holding it up, but not taking it off.

“I’d rather not,” she answered.

The guard stared at her, cold as ice.

Suddenly, a commotion broke out. There was shouting as a cop grabbed a tall, thin kid and shoved him against a wall, removing a small knife from his pocket.

The guard went to assist, and Caitlin took the opportunity to slip into the crowd moving its way down the hall.

Welcome to New York public school
, Caitlin thought.
Great
.

She was already counting the days to graduation.

*

The hallways were the widest she’d ever seen. She couldn’t imagine that they could ever be filled, yet somehow they were completely packed, with all the kids crammed in shoulder to shoulder. There must have been thousands of kids in these halls, the sea of faces stretching endlessly. The noise in here was even worse, bouncing off the walls, condensed. She wanted to cover her ears. But she didn’t even have elbow space to raise her arms. She felt claustrophobic.

The bell rang, and the energy increased.

Already late
.

She scanned her room card again and finally spotted the room in the distance. She tried to cut across the sea of bodies, but wasn’t getting anywhere. Finally, after several attempts, she realized she just had to get aggressive. She started elbowing and jostling back. One body at a time, she cut through all the kids, across the wide hall, and pushed the heavy door open to her classroom.

She braced herself for all the looks as she, the new girl, walked in late. She imagined the teacher scolding her for interrupting a silent room. But she was shocked to discover that was not the case at all. This room, designed for 30 kids but holding 50, was packed. Some kids sat in their seats, and others walked the aisles, shouting and yelling at each other. It was mayhem.

The bell had rang five full minutes ago, yet the teacher, disheveled, wearing a rumpled suit, hadn’t even started the class. He actually sat with his feet up on the desk, reading the paper, ignoring everyone.

Caitlin walked over to him and placed her new I.D. card on the desk. She stood there and waited for him to look up, but he never did.

She finally cleared her throat.

“Excuse me.”

He reluctantly lowered his newspaper.

“I’m Caitlin Paine. I’m new. I think I’m supposed to give you this.”

“I’m just a sub,” he replied, and raised his paper, blocking her.

She stood there, confused.

“So,” she asked, “….you don’t take attendance?”

“Your teacher’s back on Monday,” he snapped. “He’ll deal with it.”

Realizing the conversation was over, Caitlin took back her I.D. card.

She turned and faced the room. The mayhem hadn’t stopped. If there was any saving grace, at least she wasn’t conspicuous. No one here seemed to care about her, or to even notice her at all.

On the other hand, scanning the packed room was nerve-wracking: there didn’t seem like any place left to sit.

She steeled herself and, clutching her journal, walked tentatively down one of the aisles, flinching a few times as she walked between unruly kids screaming at each other. As she reached the back, she could finally see the entire room.

Not one empty seat.

She stood there, feeling like an idiot, and felt other kids starting to notice her. She didn’t know what to do. She certainly wasn’t going to stand there the entire period, and the substitute teacher didn’t seem to care either way. She turned and looked again, scanning helplessly.

She heard laughter from a few aisles away, and felt sure it was directed at her. She didn’t dress like these kids did, and she didn’t look like them. Her cheeks flushed as she started to feel really conspicuous.

Just as she was getting ready to walk out of the class, and maybe even out of this school, she heard a voice.

“Here.”

She turned.

In the last row, beside the window, a tall boy stood from his desk.

“Sit,” he said. “Please.”

The room quieted a bit as the others waited to see how she’d react.

She walked up to him. She tried not to look up into his eyes—large, glowing green eyes—but she couldn’t help it.

He was gorgeous. He had smooth, olive skin—she couldn’t tell if he was Black, Spanish, White, or some combination—but she had never seen such smooth and soft skin, complimenting a chiseled jaw line. His hair was short and brown, and he was thin. There was something about him, something so out of place here. He seemed fragile. An artist, maybe.

It was unlike her to be smitten by a guy. She’d seen her friends have crushes, but she’d never really understood. Until now.

“Where will
you
sit?” she asked.

She tried to control her voice, but it didn’t sound convincing. She hoped he couldn’t hear how nervous she was.

He smiled wide, revealing perfect teeth.

“Right over here,” he said, and moved to the large window sill, just a few feet away.

She looked at him, and he returned her stare, their eyes fully locking. She told herself to look away, but she couldn’t.

“Thanks,” she said, and was instantly mad at herself.

Thanks? That’s all you could manage? Thanks!?

“That’s right, Barack!” yelled a voice. “Give that nice white girl your seat!”

Laughter followed, and the noise in the room suddenly picked up again, as everyone ignored them once again.

Caitlin saw him lower his head, embarrassed.

“Barack?” she asked. “Is that your name?”

“No,” he answered, reddening. “That’s just what they call me. As in Obama. They think I look like him.”

She looked closely and realized that he
did
look like him.

“It’s because I’m half black, part white, and part Puerto Rican.”

“Well, I think that’s a compliment,” she said.

“Not the way
they
say it,” he answered.

She observed him as he sat on the window sill, his confidence deflated, and she could tell that he was sensitive. Vulnerable, even. He didn’t belong in this group of kids. It was crazy, but she almost felt protective of him.

“I’m Caitlin,” she said, reaching out her hand and looking him in the eye.

He looked up, surprised, and his smile returned.

“Jonah,” he answered.

He shook her hand firmly. A tingling sensation ran up her arm as she felt his smooth skin envelop her hand. She felt like she melted into him. He held her grip a second too long, and she couldn’t help smiling back.

*

The rest of the morning was a blur, and Caitlin was hungry by the time she reached the cafeteria. She opened the double doors and was taken aback by the enormous room, the incredible noise of what seemed like a thousand kids, all screaming. It was like entering a gymnasium. Except that every twenty feet there stood another security guard, in the aisles, watching carefully.

As usual, she had no idea where to go. She searched the huge room, and finally found a stack of trays. She took one, and entered what she thought was the food line.

“Don’t you cut me, bitch!”

Caitlin turned and saw a large, overweight girl, half a foot taller than her, scowling down.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know—”

“Line’s back there!” snapped another girl, pointing with her thumb.

Caitlin looked and saw that the line stretched back at least a hundred kids. It looked like a twenty minute wait.

As she started heading to the back of the line, a kid on the line shoved another one, and he went flying in front of her, hitting the ground hard.

The first kid jumped on top of the other and started punching him in the face.

The cafeteria erupted in a roar of excitement, as dozens of kids gathered around.

“FIGHT! FIGHT!”

Caitlin took several steps back, watching in horror at the violent scene at her feet.

Four security guards finally came over and broke it up, separating the two bloody kids and carting them off. They didn’t seem to be in any hurry.

After Caitlin finally got her food, she scanned the room, hoping for a sign of Jonah. But he was nowhere in sight.

She walked down the aisles, passing table after table, all packed with kids. There were few free seats, and the ones that were free didn’t seem that inviting, adjacent to large cliques of friends.

Finally, she took a seat at an empty table towards the back. There was just one kid at the far end of it, a short, frail Chinese boy with braces, poorly dressed, who kept his head lowered and focused on his food.

She felt alone. She looked down and checked her phone. There were a few Facebook messages from her friends from her last town. They wanted to know how she liked her new place. Somehow, she didn’t feel like answering. They felt so far away.

Caitlin barely ate, a vague feeling of first-day nausea still with her. She tried to change her train of thought. She closed her eyes. She thought of her new apartment, a fifth floor walkup in a filthy building on 132
nd
street. Her nausea worsened. She breathed deeply, willing herself to focus on something, anything good in her life.

Her little brother. Sam. 14 going on 20. Sam never seemed to remember that he was the youngest: he always acted like her older brother. He’d grown tough and hardened from all the moving around, from their Dad’s leaving, from the way their Mom treated them both. She could see it was getting to him and could see that he was starting to close himself off. His frequent school fights didn’t surprise her. She feared it would only get worse.

But when it came to Caitlin, Sam absolutely loved her. And she him. He was the only constant in her life, the only one she could rely on. He seemed to retain his one soft spot left in the world for her. She was determined to do her best to protect him.

“Caitlin?”

She jumped.

Standing over her, tray in one hand and violin case in the other, was Jonah.

“Mind if I join you?”

“Yes—I mean no,” she said, flustered.

Idiot
, she thought.
Stop acting so nervous
.

Jonah flashed that smile of his, then sat across from her. He sat erect, with perfect posture, and put his violin down carefully beside him. He gently laid out his food. There was something about him, something she couldn’t quite place. He was different than anyone she’d ever met. It was like he was from a different era. He definitely did not belong in this place.

“How’s your first day?” he asked.

“Not what I expected.”

“I know what you mean,” he said.

“Is that a violin?”

She nodded to his instrument. He kept it close, and kept one hand resting on it, as if afraid someone might steal it.

“It’s a viola, actually. It’s just a little bigger, but it’s a much different sound. More mellow.”

She’d never seen a viola, and hoped that he’d put it on the table and show her. But he didn’t make a move to, and she didn’t want to pry. He was still resting his hand on it, and he seemed protective of it, like it was personal and private.

“Do you practice a lot?”

Jonah shrugged. “A few hours a day,” he said casually.

“A few
hours
!? You must be great!”

He shrugged again. “I’m OK, I guess. There are a lot of players much better than me. But I am hoping it’s my ticket out of this place.”

“I always wanted to play the piano,” Caitlin said.

“Why don’t you?”

She was going to say,
I never had one,
but stopped herself. Instead, she shrugged and looked back down at her food.

“You don’t need to own a piano,” Jonah said.

She looked up, startled that he’d read her mind.

“There’s a rehearsal room in this school. For all the bad here, at least there’s some good. They’ll give you lessons for free. All you have to do is sign up.”

Caitlin’s eyes widened.

“Really?”

“There’s a signup sheet outside the music room. Ask for Mrs. Lennox. Tell her you’re my friend.”

Friend
. Caitlin liked the sound of that word. She slowly felt a happiness welling up inside of her.