One
I look up to the last place I wanted to be—another new school, in another new town. I secure my frayed backpack over one slumped shoulder, not because it looks cool but because the other strap snapped two schools ago, or was it three? Didn't matter.
I let my gaze rove over the old building slowly. There is nothing special about the bland square box that is the home of the Franklin Comets, whose last feat of anything worth mentioning was twenty years earlier—if I'm to believe the crooked sign half hanging near the front doors.
Cinderblock walls, cobbled together with gray mortar, leach every bit of life from the surrounding area.
The grass that grew in scarce patches might have been green if there was enough of it to create a lawn. But in the shadow of the utilitarian building before me, it looks as dull as everything around it.
I drop my head and study the cracked sidewalk that leads up to a short flight of stairs, and ultimately to four dark brown doors at the entrance of the school.
I'd walked here early yesterday morning just to get an idea of how long it would take me to get here from the RV.
Twenty-three minutes was all that stood between me, and the only place I had to call home. The walk wasn't bad, not compared to how far we were parked from the last school I attended.
I'd arrived early enough that only a few cars are parked in the small lot adjacent to the school. I wanted enough time to slide past the other students without notice. That's one thing I'm exceedingly good at, being invisible.
My muddy blonde hair is pulled back in a loose ponytail at the nape of my neck, letting the sides cover my ears and shield part of my face. My skin is clear but unexceptional I don't wear makeup, other than my trusty cupcake chapstick that is.
I'm not overly thin or thick. What girlish features I have are swallowed by my clothes that I've fashioned into a uniform of teenage acceptance of jeans and long sleeve tees ranging in shades of dull brown to drab blue. Never bright or fresh, not even black or white. Those colors draw attention, whether it be the dingy off-white that fabric seems to favor while being laundered at the coin wash or the inherent indecency that black seems to assume.
My goal is to remain unremarkable. I fight to keep my grades on an even keel of low Bs. In some classes, like literature or language arts, I try hard not to let myself strive for the grades I'd get if I applied myself. To draw attention would only expedite my mother’s need to “move on.”
A few years ago, when I hadn't yet grasped the reality of our nomadic existence, when I was still starry-eyed and naïve of my mother’s wanderlust ways, I’d thought our life was an adventure.
I'd let my mouth and thoughts flit about freely for all my classmates and teachers to hear. That was back when I actually thought I could do something with my life, that I could be something more than my mother's daughter.
I'd shown off how easily schoolwork came to me. I even tested out of middle school, guaranteeing early graduation and an easy scholarship. But as soon as mom found out, we packed up our 1970’s motor home and blew out of Tulsa faster than she could lecture me about the importance of anonymity.
For weeks after she drilled me about the art of invisibility.
It didn't matter that my scores could have gotten me a ticket out of this meager existence she seems to favor.
I learned quickly it was so much easier to fake mediocrity than it was to console my flighty mom when someone took the time to notice either of us. So, I embraced my forgettability.
Gathering my errant thoughts much like a child tugs a dandelion from a lawn, I shuffle over the broken slabs of concrete to the crumbling stairs, which will inevitably lead to depressing linoleum tiled hallways and a predictable nondescript office with uninterested staff trying to make it through another Monday.
Grabbing the first door handle, I'm surprised to find it locked tight. Unsure, I begin to move down the line, tugging each door lightly before the last one finally gives way, allowing me into the quiet halls.
It only takes a second to notice the overly large wall of windows spanning from waist high to the ceiling. As I make my way