It was four in the morning when Miss Kaylee arrived to take Kenny to the Academy for Gifted Children. The air was so cold, the young girl's breath condensed into small clouds when she exhaled. She hugged herself and rubbed her hands up and down her arms in an attempt to warm her shivering body. It would no doubt be warmer later, but Kenny still wished she'd worn more layers.
"There!" Miss Kaylee closed the trunk of her car, finally finished packing Kenny's things away. "We should be ready to go now."
Kenny turned back to the foster home and waved goodbye. Ms. Greenwood waved back from inside, watching the two from the couch, but Kenny wasn't waving to her. She was really saying goodbye to her siblings who were viewing her from Andrew's room. They all waved back, and Emily covered her mouth with her hand. Both she and Jackson didn't take it very well when they found out Kenny was leaving, especially because she was going today. It was all much too sudden for any of them to process.
Write to us, Andrew mouthed. He pointed to Emily, who was no doubt crying by now, and Jackson. The usually hyperactive boy was still as he stared out of the window. Kenny nodded and turned to move into the car.
Miss Kaylee opened the door for the young girl. "In you go!" She beamed at Kenny, and for a moment, the girl could almost forget she was leaving her friend and family behind. It was as if she was in the K1 classroom again, going to recess on a slightly cooler day than usual. But then Kenny remembered the Darkness and the Calculus problem, and she knew there was no way to escape this or pretend it wasn't happening. This was real.
With that thought, Kenny stepped into the car and into her new life as an AGC student.
****
The plane to Lexington was delayed by forty minutes, and when it finally took off, the aircraft hit terrifying turbulence. Kenny read through the whole thing, barely noticing the steep dips of the airplane. On the other hand, Miss Kaylee was quite ill throughout the entire trip and felt relieved when the pilot announced they had landed. The two then waited in baggage claim for about half an hour, and Miss Kaylee bought Kenny breakfast.
"What happened to your book? Was that the same one you were reading on the plane?" Miss Kaylee asked Kenny as they waited for their taxi.
Kenny opened her jacket and took out two other books. She showed Miss Kaylee the one she'd left the house with, the one she had finished on the plane, and the one she was reading now. She'd carried two old classics (and one modern classic)—all books that she'd read before. Jane Eyre, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and The Perks of Being a Wallflower were the only ones that fit comfortably in her jacket—albeit Jane Eyre was taking up slightly more space than warranted.
Miss Kaylee blinked, nearly scoffing in disbelief. "The largest book you ever carried to school was A Wrinkle in Time, and that impressed me. Please excuse me if I get a bit surprised at your literary tastes."
Kenny gave the woman a tiny nod, and their short exchange ended in awkward silence.
The taxi soon came to pick the two up. Kenny watched from the backseat window as they exited the airport and drove onto the highway. The car passed large open fields with small areas plentiful with trees in between. They stayed on the highway for about an hour which allotted Kenny a brief period of rest. Throughout the ride, Miss Kaylee struck up conversations with the taxi driver. Her teacher, Kenny noted, couldn't seem to keep her mouth shut, and she always had something interesting to add to the discussion.
Just like Jackson, Kenny thought, though she soon wished she hadn't. Her heart ached and her eyes stung from just the memory of her brother. She pushed away all other thoughts and focused on the world outside her window. The world she belonged to now.
The taxi driver took the next exit, and Kenny found herself looking out onto a small street. The noisy sounds of the highway faded behind her as the car drove deeper into the heart of the city. There were few people cycling or walking on the sidewalk. Kenny wondered where everyone was when Miss Kaylee sighed and said, "I wished I'd been able to make it to church. We seem like the only ones who aren't there."
The taxi driver laughed. "We've got quite a few Baptists here, and they don't like to miss their Mass. They even let the kids down at the military institute go."
"You know, my father went to VMI...."
Kenny tuned out the rest of the discussion. She watched as the car flew past many small residential areas. Every time Kenny saw a large building, her heart beat faster in her chest. She sat on the edge of her seat, looking for the Academy for Gifted Children. Was that it? No, that was a church. Was that it? No, that was a supermarket. Was that it? No, that was the Virginia Military Institute.
She didn't think she'd ever been this anxious before.
"Here we are! This is the place, right?" The taxi driver asked Miss Kaylee. The woman nodded in response.
Kenny whipped her head around. She had been looking out the wrong window this whole time! The young girl climbed over the seats next to her to get a better view of the place that would be her home for the next year. She stared at the school in awe, letting go of a breath she hadn't realized she was holding.
This was it. This was the Academy for Gifted Children.
The taxi driver let Kenny and Miss Kaylee off by the large iron fence that surrounded the school. As Miss Kaylee paid the driver for their service, Kenny stared through the gate at the large structures in front of her. They were all towering, brownstone buildings with Gothic windows tinted just enough so that Kenny couldn't see inside. The school sprawled over several acres of land, majestic and intimidating at the same time. A small golden plaque on the fence proclaimed that the school had been standing there since 1952—almost a century.
Something caught Kenny's eye as she observed the academy. She looked up to the highest window in the centermost building only to realize that the curtain behind the glass was swaying as if it'd been caught in the fall breeze. Someone had been watching her. An unsettling feeling passed over Kenny, adding to the anxiety sitting like a rock in her stomach, and she turned away from the school.
Miss Kaylee stepped up to the gate and pulled a lanyard out of her pocket. She pressed what Kenny assumed was her ID card against a dark piece of metal on the fence, and the gate clicked open.
"Come on, Kendall," the woman said, inviting the girl in. "You've got a lot of testing to do, and if we hurry, you can finish by lunchtime."
Kenny's eyebrows furrowed. Testing?
Miss Kaylee noticed Kenny's confusion and went on. "We need to make sure you've gotten all of your shots and give you a medical check-up before you interact with other students. There was a measles outbreak in the 90s; it was horrendous, really. We're just trying our best to prevent something like that from happening again," she explained. "We also have to measure your intellectual ability with a...special exam. That alone takes about three hours."
By then, the two had already walked all the way up the pathway through the well-manicured lawn to the main office. Miss Kaylee opened the door and led Kenny into the lobby. It was a small but elegant room bedecked with drawling abstract paintings and evenly-spaced pots of vibrant flowers. A woman looked up from a desk near the back of the room and smiled at Miss Kaylee.
"Dr. Anderson! You're back!" the woman exclaimed. "Great timing, too, because Dr. Zhang just asked to see you when you came in."
Kenny watched as Miss Kaylee's face paled. "Really? Isn't that funny?"
The woman laughed. "Yeah! Hey, is this the new student you were talking about?"
All eyes turned to Kenny, and she could feel her cheeks going pink. She wasn't prepared to be the center of attention, even if only two other people were in the room with her. Without meaning to, she stepped behind Miss Kaylee's leg, peering at the stranger from her thigh.
"She's a bit shy," Miss Kaylee whispered, but it was the kind of whisper you could hear over a sonic boom. Embarrassed, Kenny averted her eyes toward the ground.
"Oh, I see." The woman got out of her chair and bent over to introduce herself to Kenny. "My name's Mrs. Brennan. I'm the secretary here at AGC, so if you ever need anything, you can come to me or Dr. Anderson here."
"Okay, Kenny." Miss Kaylee sighed. "Mrs. Brennan is going to take you to the Clinic while I go talk to Dr. Zhang. You can leave your things here for now."
Kenny nodded and watched Miss Kaylee stride into another room. She wished she could go with her as Mrs. Brennan offered the young girl her hand. Kenny stared at it for a long moment and then back at the woman. Did she want her to shake it? Mrs. Brennan was holding the hand the wrong way if she did; her palm was facing upward instead of sideways. Kenny took it in her own and turned it, shaking it anyway.
Mrs. Brennan laughed. "No, sweetie, I want you to hold my hand."
What? Kenny thought, puzzled by this request. But why? I can walk by myself. It's not like I'll get lost. Still, she took Mrs. Brennan's hand in her own, and off to the Clinic the two went.