Winter White (10 page)

Forget the Coke. Suddenly Mira wanted that painting back so badly, she was willing to steal it right off the wall. She looked both ways to make sure no one was coming before she unclipped the paper. Then she quickly rolled up the painting and placed it carefully in her bag before hurrying away.

“Nothing like a little petty theft to start the school year off on a high note,” said a deep voice.

Mira spun around, gripping her bag. A cute guy, wearing a messy clear smock, stood in a doorway a few feet away with his arms folded smugly across his chest.

“It’s not stealing if you’re taking what’s already yours.” Mira tried to sound sure of herself even though she was shaking. She pulled the painting out and unrolled it again, pointing at the elegant script of her signature. “That’s my name. I painted this, so technically I should be allowed to take it back.”

His green eyes glinted mischievously as he pushed his sandy blond hair off his forehead. “I’m just messing with you. Those pictures were coming down later today anyway. Let’s see if yours was worth the heist.” Before she could protest, he took the painting from her hands and studied it. She couldn’t help but notice his fingers were covered in dried green paint. “Not bad,” he said, then frowned. “You could have used a little more yellow in that sunset, though.”

Mira snatched the painting back. “No one asked you.”

“Touchy.” He smiled. “You’re good. You’d be better if you took classes. Are you in watercolors or drawing this fall?”

“I can’t waste time on art classes,” Mira said. Who was he to judge her painting?

The boy shrugged. “Your loss. I’ve got to get back to my own work. See ya.” He started walking away, which only made Mira madder.

“And you think your painting is better?” Mira followed him into the classroom, ready to critique. She stopped short when she realized where they were. This was one of the specialty art rooms, where you could take classes like sculpting and drawing. Mira had opted to get public speaking over with instead. A dozen easels were set up alongside one another, and there was a small stage in the front of the room where models probably stood. The boy was already back at his easel with his paintbrush and a small palette of paint in his hand.

“Wow, that’s really good,” Mira admitted, coming closer. His work was much more realistic, with sharp angles and dark colors. It was so clear she would have thought it was a photograph of the dolphin fountain right outside the classroom window. “When did you paint that?”

“Just now.” He grinned. “Okay, more like in third period and now. I have study hall, so I figured I’d come in here and finish it.”

“You can come in here during study hall?” Mira asked curiously.

He nodded. “If you take art classes, yeah. But like you said, you can’t waste time on that sort of stuff.” He smirked. “What grade are you in, anyway?”

“Tenth,” Mira said, sounding standoffish. This guy unnerved her. “You?”

“Eleventh.” He laid a long blue-green brushstroke through the fountain pool he was painting. He looked at Mira and she felt her heart stop just a little. He was really cute. “I’m Kellen Harper. I’d shake your hand, but you can see I’m sort of in the middle of something.”

“Mira,” she said, stopping short of her last name. Once people heard that, they tended to treat her a little bit differently.

“Well, Mira, maybe if you sign yourself up for a real art class sometime, instead of the standard one where you make papier-mâché heads, we can square off for real.” He looked at her seriously. “You’d be pretty good if you worked at it.”

Mira blushed. He really thought her painting was good? It didn’t matter. Only the Goth theater kids took art electives, and she definitely didn’t fit in with that crowd. Kellen didn’t look like he did, either, though. She looked longingly at his easel. “I don’t have the time, but thanks.”

Kellen shrugged. “This is EP. No one has free time. But somehow I manage to mentor for Big Brothers, run cross-country, and do something I really like—paint. Go figure.”

Kellen ran cross-country with Hayden? How come she’d never noticed him before? And he did charity work, too? This guy didn’t seem like some of the other art freaks, but still, she just couldn’t see herself diving into this world. No matter how much she wanted to pick up a paintbrush. She backed out of the room, almost afraid she would be glued to the floor if she didn’t. “Nice meeting you, Kellen.”

“You, too. And Mira? Don’t let me catch you stealing any more paintings,” Kellen teased.

Mira just shook her head, but she couldn’t stop thinking about what Kellen had said. He seemed pretty cool—okay, for the five minutes they were together—and he took art classes. Would it really be so weird if she did as well? She put a dollar in the vending machine and a Diet Coke tumbled out. No one even had to know, she realized. She headed outside and sat down at the fountain Kellen had just painted. She wondered if he could see her sitting there. Savannah came flying into her, sitting so close she was practically on Mira’s lap.

Savannah gasped. “Mira, you look so pale out here! What happened to having a tan—fake or otherwise—for the first day of school?”

Mira’s hand went to her face. “I used self-tanner.” Didn’t she? Did Kellen just see her with a pasty, white face? Why did she care? She had a boyfriend! Savannah’s face, Mira noticed, was the perfect blend of blush and bronzer glow even after several hours in the heat. Mira didn’t know how she did it.

“Oh, you did?” Savannah asked, looking at Mira with a critical eye. “I guess I didn’t notice.” She put a hand on Mira’s shoulder. “You look so white. But it’s no wonder, with everything going on at your house. Are you freaking out?”

“Yeah,” Mira admitted, grateful for the chance to finally unload on someone. “One minute I was with you at the club, and the next Izzie was at my house and I was giving her a tour of her new room. My parents didn’t even know she existed till a few months ago, and now she’s living with us permanently! Apparently we’re her only family.”

“Yeah, that’s what they said on the
Today
show,” Savannah told her.

“It’s weird having a complete stranger in the house, especially someone our age who I have zero in common with,” Mira complained. “I always have to be ‘on’!”

Savannah nodded appreciatively. “I can’t believe your parents did that to you! They’ve totally bought into that rags-to-riches story Izzie’s peddling.”

“Well, actually, Lucas is the one selling the story,” Mira admitted.

“So? It’s got to be a sham. How could you be her only family? How’d she even find you?” Mira opened her mouth to explain, but Savannah rarely let another person get a word in. “She wants fame! She thinks she’s going to ride your dad’s coattails all the way to D.C. and make everyone at this school feel sorry for her. Well, she’s wrong. The publicity will die down when another sob story hits the news. That’s what happened to Miss Teen USA.” That girl, coincidentally, went to their school, and Savannah hated her, too. “It doesn’t matter how famous she becomes. No one is going to let her into our crowd, you know.”

“I don’t think Izzie really cares about being popular,” Mira said thoughtfully. “I think she’s sort of quiet, but then sometimes I’ll catch her with Hayden, joking and laughing, and she’s a completely different person.” The whole situation was still confusing almost a week later. “Did you know she’s this incredible swimmer and a lifeguard?”

Savannah’s eyes glinted sharply. “I read that, but it doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t mean our friends are going to trust her.”

What does trust have to do with it?
Mira wondered. But she knew better than to question Savannah. Her best friend’s phone started to vibrate.

“It’s my mom. She’s away in Hilton Head. I’ve got to take this. I’ll see you at lunch, okay? Mom, hold on.” Savannah put a thin hand over her phone and looked at Mira. “Do you have to sit with her, or are you sitting with us?”

“Uh…” Mira hadn’t even thought about that. Would Savannah really ban her from the table if she brought Izzie?

“There’s no room for her.” Savannah winced. “I’m sorry.”

“No, I know, but…” Was she supposed to let Izzie eat alone? Even she wasn’t that mean.

“Like you said yourself, she has nothing in common with us. Izzie,” Savannah said, the name rolling off her tongue tartly, “will be better off when she realizes that. She’ll figure out where she belongs at EP.” Savannah smiled and started to walk away. “I’m sure the scholarship kids will love her.”

She always sounded so sure of herself, but Mira wasn’t. If anything, Mira worried she had just made things a whole lot worse—for Izzie and herself.

Seven

Izzie didn’t get it. She just didn’t get it.

She knew she had been uncharacteristically sullen the last week (Hello? World turned upside down, thank you!), but she really did want to give her new school a shot—even if said school was what she’d imagined Harvard might be like if it had been invaded by
Gossip Girl
. She had met dozens of people as she raced around campus with a map (EP actually needed a
map
!) and all of them were perfectly polite. And yet they seemed… what was the word she was looking for?

Fake?

Every girl she’d met acted like Mira. They were cheerleaders on Red Bull. Real estate agents in training. It was like they had a secret manual on how to charm a new student. But the minute Izzie attempted to get beyond standard introductions, the room got so frosty she needed a sweater.

What could she have done to tick people off so quickly? She’d barely spoken! It felt like everyone she’d met was in on something she wasn’t and Izzie already felt out of place as it was. Her new home situation was a blur, she missed Grams, and now she was walking around a private school with hundred-dollar ballet flats on her feet and an itchy school uniform that made her break out in hives. Carrying a laptop in her messenger bag wasn’t doing anything to calm her down, either. She’d never owned a computer before. What if she dropped it? Or someone stole it? Okay, so she could already tell EP was not the kind of place where people got mugged, but still. She was nervous.

“Hey! You’re Mira’s cousin, right?” a blond girl in a high-pitched voice squeaked when Izzie approached her lab table in fourth period. “Welcome to EP!”

Izzie was starting to feel she needed pom-poms to keep up with all this EP enthusiasm, but maybe Blondie would turn out to be different. “Thanks,” she said in a voice that wasn’t nearly as high as the blond’s. “So do you happen to know anything about swim team tryouts?” Izzie asked tentatively. “I had heard they were next week, but…” She slid into the open seat next to the blond, but the girl stuck her hand out so fast Izzie almost sat on her palm.

“Oops! Sorry, it’s just, I usually sit alone.” The girl was sweating as her eyes darted around the room like she was being watched. “Because I, uh, don’t do well with lab partners.”

Izzie looked at her quizzically, but by this point she was used to the bizarre behavior. “Okay, but you’re missing out. I am great with a beaker.” Whatever that meant. Blondie looked at her strangely as Izzie placed her bag on a chair at the table in front of her.

Maybe Izzie didn’t get the way EP worked yet, but Blondie didn’t look like she was at the top of the food chain herself. Mira and her friends definitely held that honor. This Izzie knew by the time homeroom started. Hayden had to be at the top of the popularity ladder, too—and he deserved it. He seemed like a good guy. So then wouldn’t people go out of their way to be nice to someone related to the Monroes? She didn’t want special treatment, but a lab partner would be nice.

“Where is Ms. Scott?” asked Mr. Preston, her biology teacher, as he took attendance. Izzie raised her hand. “Hello, there. It’s nice to finally meet our most famous new student.”

“Famous?” Izzie repeated. Mr. Preston looked like Ichabod Crane and his smile was just as thin as he was.

“It’s rare I get to read the intimate details about my students’ lives before I meet them,” he said, staring at her over the rim of his glasses. “I enjoyed reading about your swim merits this weekend while drinking my espresso. Nice photo, too.” He held up the front page of the Sunday edition of the
North Carolina Gazette
. Izzie saw a photo of herself in a bathing suit followed by an article that took up the entire first page. She read the headline underneath:
Sweet Charity: Senator Monroe Adopts Impoverished Teen from Harborside.
The color drained from her face.

“We’re happy to have you,” Mr. Preston continued. Izzie could feel the entire room’s eyes on her. Suddenly the room felt very warm. “I know you’re living a fairy tale now, but don’t think you can rest on your new family’s name around here,” he teased with a wag of his finger. Izzie didn’t crack a smile. “Everyone has to pull his or her own weight. Even the Monroes.”

While Mr. Preston droned on about what they would be learning that year, Izzie stared at the newspaper on his desk. She couldn’t stop obsessing about that article. An article about her! When he finally asked everyone to get up and gather lab supplies, she made a break for it, swiping the newspaper and hiding it in her notebook till she could read it back at her desk. But when she did, she felt nauseated. Everything—
everything
—down to practically her Social Security Number was in there, from her mother’s death to her grandmother’s deteriorating health and poverty to how the community had been practically raising Izzie till the saintly Monroes stepped in.