The Talents by Inara Scott

Jack. He had on his headphones, and his eyes were closed. I wasn’t surprised. Jack tuned out whenever he got in a crowd. He hated crowds. He wasn’t much of a people person in general—he hadn’t made many friends since we’d started school—but he really hated crowds.
    I thought about how certain I’d been, just five days ago, that he was trouble and to be avoided at all costs, and then how I’d just told Hennie that we’d been hanging out all week.
    I slipped past him and headed for the back of the bus. Hennie and Esther had saved me room beside them. Esther patted the edge of the seat and grinned. I stole a look back toward Jack, and then Catherine, before I fell into the seat. There wasn’t quite room for three, so I balanced on the edge with my feet in the aisle.
    â€œYou’ll have to give me your phone number,” Esther said. “So we can talk this weekend.”
    Hennie pulled her backpack onto her lap. “Give me your number. We can have a three-way call.”
    The bus started abruptly just as Hennie was pulling on the zipper, and her fingers slipped. She knocked herself in the nose, and Esther giggled. Hennie glared at Esther and then laughed when, a second later, the bus jerked again and I fell into the aisle. The bus driver hollered at me to get back in my seat, and I did, practically hoisting myself onto Esther’s lap.
    It was then, laughing as the bus pulled away from the Main Hall, with the green lawns of Delcroix stretched out on either side of us, and all the other freshman shouting and calling to each other, that something inside of me unwound.
    I had friends. Esther and Hennie were my friends. Jack, troublemaker or not, was my friend. And, as hard as it was to believe, even Cam was becoming a friend. No one knew better than me how dangerous this state of affairs could be, but it seemed silly to keep fighting the inevitable. I’d have to make myself into a jerk or a pariah to keep it from happening, and I just didn’t have it in me to do either of those things.
    Life was changing. I wasn’t sure where it was taking me, but I had a feeling things would never be the same.

THE UPPERCLASSMEN started school on Monday, and the Res and the Main Hall felt more like a regular school as they filled with students and teachers. I started eating meals with Esther and Hennie. Jack said he didn’t like the cafeteria because Trevor was always hanging around staring at him, and I had to admit, it did seem that way. Even after he didn’t have to eat with our team anymore, Trevor still made time to look for each of us at every meal.
    I tried to tell Jack that Trevor was just being nice, making sure none of us got lost in the crowd, but Jack had it in his head that Trevor didn’t like him. So after checking in, Jack would scarf down some food and head for the library, or go outside somewhere on the playing fields to eat. We still hung out between classes and during free time, and we started studying together too, because we had all the same assignments. It turned out Jack was really smart, and when he bothered to finish his homework, he got good marks.
    Of course, he usually didn’t bother.
    On Thursday they had tryouts for cross-country. Actually, tryouts isn’t really the right word. They let everyone join the team who would agree to attend practices. The school was so small it wasn’t like the turnout was overwhelming.
    Esther and Hennie decided they would join the team with me. Esther’s mom thought it would be good for her to do some sports, and Esther thought she’d be able to chat more while she was running than while playing volleyball or swimming. I thought this was rather naive on her part, or maybe she just didn’t pant as much as I did when I ran. Hennie said she needed to do a sport that didn’t require too much coordination, which was wise. I had never seen someone trip quite so often, with so little