What Nanni Wants

1

15 Years Ago

I had never, not once in my entire life, been sent to the headmaster's office. I had taken the utmost care to avoid that, even when I was in kindergarten and Sarah with her ruffled white dress and consistently sticky fingers, took my cookies during recess. I muffled down my ire when Danisha Sharpe in sixth grade who I had fifth period PE with decided she wanted to fight me because she'd heard a rumor that her boyfriend was interested in me.

I'd managed to keep my ire down all the way up until now, my sophomore year of high school, because I was aware that people like me couldn't afford to make noise. My mother had drilled that into me at an early age. I understood, from the time I was old enough to really understand anything, that black girls with two parents who have to work their asses off just to meet their rent payments every month can't afford to get into trouble.

Five year old Nanni couldn't afford to get into a big altercation with Sarah and make her give the cookies back anymore than eleven year old Nanni could afford to punch Danisha Sharpe in the nose the way she had wanted to.

And twelve year old Nanni definitely, one thousand and one percent, cannot afford to be sitting in the headmaster's office.

My heart is in my throat as I study my hands, only glancing up through my lashes at the headmaster every once in a while. His hair is oil black save for save for the gray gradience along his edges and on his sideburns.

My heart calms down a little when I realize he's not looking at me. He's looking at the two boys I'm sitting in between. Casey Torres and Nikolai Belkov.

"Do any of you want to tell me why the three of you are here?" asks the headmaster only to be answered with silence. "Okay, then. Why don't I refresh your memories?" There's the sound of papers shuffling and I glance up through my eyelashes to see him fiddling with papers on his desk. "You two boys got into a fight and you, Miss. Stanley, seem to be the cause of the fight. According to some of the other students, that is."

My eyes squeeze closed and my stomach churns. I taste the bile rising in the back of my throat and it's all I can do to force it back and not empty out the pepperoni pizza I had for lunch all over the headmaster's too-clean carpet.

Mom and Dad worked hard to pay for the test that allowed me to get a scholarship to Sword&Stone Academy. It's prestigious and it only has a one percent acceptance rate. Most of the kids who attend are from influential families. Those are the only kids who can afford to take the K-12 test. Taking the test was twenty-five hundred dollars. Dad had to pull double shifts at the mechanic's shop and Mom had to work graveyard at the diner to afford to let me even take the test.

My intelligence had gotten me in and had kept the scholarship that had been offered to me so my parents didn't have to worry about supporting me financially. But now I was here, sandwiched in between two guys who had gotten into a fight because of me and I feel so uncomfortable and ashamed and embarrassed that I want to die.

And the fight wasn't even my fault.

"I'll tell you what happened," says Casey, his voice congested. He's holding bunched bloody tissues to his nose. The nurse stopped the bleeding a couple minutes ago but I'm pretty sure he's doing it to sway the headmaster to his side. "He punched me for no reason. I didn't even do anything."

I bristle at that but I bite my tongue. Hold it in, Nanni. Hold it in. He doesn't matter. All that matters is making sure the headmaster doesn't expel you.

Beside me, Nikolai Belkov snickers. I cut a glance at him. I've only ever seen him in passing before and even though we're in the same grade and we have chemistry together, I don't really know much about him. He's the tortured loner type who barely attends his classes but still manages to get second—the place right after me—on all the school rankings. Whenever I do see him, it's when he's in the line getting lunch or napping underneath the giant tree in the courtyard.