King Of Hearts

There is nothing here for me, I thought. Everything is so uncertain.

I stared blankly at the cool-colored walls of my new room. A gray shade of green, they brought the woodlands inside and built them all around me. Roots grew from my floors and vines climbed down from my ceiling, surrounding me in a blanket of green earthiness that smelled of oakwood and petrichor. Everything that unfolded around me was unfamiliar and alarming. Trying to quiet my thoughts, I closed my eyes briefly, and with the soft amber glow from the corner lamp, the imprint of the images around the room stayed painted on the insides of my eyelids just waiting for me to reopen them. My room wasn’t new—my life was. I had just moved to Piney Knolls and left my old life behind to live with my adoptive parents, Carmen and James. My new home sat at the end of a long road with not much else on it. The two adjoining bedrooms on the second floor, one of which was mine, had balconies that overlooked the woods. After climbing out of my plush bed made up of soft, white linens, I cautiously placed the pads of my feet onto the floor, making my way to the balcony. It was there, staring into those vast, dark woods overgrown with moss, that I began comprehending the uncertainty of it all. You could understand your life and everything around you, and in an instant, it could all change. The soft tap of my feet met the floor again as I closed the screen and moved back to my bed. I looked over everything once more and wondered if I had imagined all of it. Was this all just a dream? As I wondered, sleep took over my whole body, and I fell deep into a dream. I saw cards lying on an old, knotty table, a single daisy in the center above them.

I woke to the sound of my alarm ringing incessantly, notifying me that the dreaded first day of school was upon me. I was not just the new girl; I was the new victim. I hoped that I wouldn’t be the only one. As she steps into the dismal abyss of Piney High for her first Monday, horror awaits her at every turn. Maybe my internal narration was a little dramatic, but I always had a flair for drama. A light drizzle fell outside my window as I shut off the alarm and fought to get out of bed. I spent minutes deciding what to wear but finally chose my favorite light-washed, worn-out jeans and a white t-shirt. As I looked in the bathroom mirror, I drew on winged eyeliner and put on a few coats of mascara. My eyes looked green today, as they did most days, depending upon what I wore. I pulled my long, brown hair into a low braid that draped down my shoulder. I grabbed my schoolbag, a beat-up denim backpack covered with band patches and buttons, and made my way to the stairs.

As I walked to school, the road felt longer than it did in my car rides with Carmen and James. The lack of anything else on the road, aside from our house, really made it apparent that I was alone in my travels. I finally made it to the front doors where a line of others waited to enter. At least I blended in for a moment in time.

“I love the Foo Fighters, too! Cool bag,” a pretty blond girl said, walking up to me eagerly.

“Thanks! It’s taken me a while to collect all of these,” I said, pointing to my various pins and patches. “What’s your favorite song of theirs?”

“I love February Stars the most. What about you?”

“Long Road to Ruin, for sure. I’m Dove, by the way. Dove Hopewell.”

This was the first time I introduced myself to anyone in Piney Knolls. I had met a few people after I moved, mostly because Carmen and James had introduced me to the people in their circle. I hadn’t been much for making friends outside of that.

“I’m Stephanie Sparks. Nice to meet you, Dove,” she said, scrunching her nose.

Stephanie had a short, blond haircut and crystal blue eyes. She had thick eyeliner and mascara coated on her eyes, and she had a nose piercing. If I had to pick anyone in the crowd to be my first friend, I probably would have picked her had she not approached me first. She had a sweet aura about her, and her style seemed similar to mine.

“You’re new this year, right?” she asked, looking at the schedule I was pulling out of my bag.

She seemed to notice the colorful highlighter marks all over each teacher and class. I tried to be organized and prepared so I didn’t embarrass myself in front of these people.

“Yeah, I have no idea where I am going. I won’t lie,” I laughed. “It says I have English with Mr. Desmond first.”

A smile lit up her face as she grabbed my hand.

“I have Mr. Desmond, too! Let’s walk together, and I can show you around,” she said cheerfully.

We started walking together as the doors opened, and she showed me around the main wings of the school. I thought I was beginning to understand how the layout worked, but I was worried about being able to find things on my own when the time came. When it was almost time for classes to start, we made our way to Room 12. As we entered, most of the students were already seated.

“Name?” Mr. Desmond asked Stephanie. She responded with her full name, and he pointed to her seat in the back of the classroom. I was next. “Name?” he asked again. I could tell immediately that he wasn’t the friendliest teacher.

“Dove Hopewell,” I responded. He scanned the list in his hand three times, looking it up and down curiously.

“I don’t see you here. Are you new? Have you registered?” he asked.

“Yes,” I nodded. “I registered at the office a few weeks ago with my parents, Carmen and James Hopewell.”

He raised his eyebrows at the mention of my parents.

“Hopewell…” I was trying to understand his overall sense of interest in my name, but he continued to speak. “Dove Hopewell. Okay, I’ve written you down here, and you can have a seat in the back.”

I made my way to the back of the class and found an empty seat next to Stephanie.

“Don’t mind Desmond,” she whispered, handing me a textbook from underneath her chair. “I’ve heard everyone say that he’s kind of… intense.”

“I could gather that,” I agreed.

While Desmond certainly was intense, he looked like a normal guy. He appeared to be in his mid-thirties and well-dressed. Some students even remarked that he looked like a GQ model. He wore his dark brown hair slicked back and had a clean shave with soft freckles on his face. He cleared his throat, and everyone quickly gave him their full attention.

“Before we begin, I’d like for each of you to grab a textbook from under your seat or the seat next to you. You’ll need this throughout the semester in addition to the novels I assign. I will be passing around a log sheet, so please make sure you write down your name and the book number you’re assigned from the inside cover,” he ordered.

Mr. Desmond walked us through the curriculum for the semester and outlined a few novels we would be reading throughout the class. He made a note of how many copies he’d need to have for our class. Before we knew it, the bell rang. Stephanie gave me a disappointed look that I could decipher before she even spoke.

“I have to use the restroom, and my next class is kind of far away, otherwise I’d walk you,” she said sorrowfully.

“It’s okay. I’ll find my way, don’t you worry,” I shrugged, giving her a playful wink.

I tried to play it cool with her, hoping she couldn’t sense my undying anxiety about finding the rest of my classes. As I walked alone in the hall, I felt that people were staring at me. It could be that I stuck out like a sore thumb being new to the school, or it could be that my panic made me feel like I wasn’t invisible enough to go unnoticed. I couldn’t tell which was worse: walking down my long road alone or walking down this long hall surrounded by tons of strangers. I glanced multiple times at my schedule. Room 37, Room 37, Room 37. I repeated the room number in my head like a comforting mantra. I had no idea where it was, and repeating it sure wasn’t going to help me.

The hallway hustle was overwhelming, and a short boy with shoulder-length, black hair and a worn band shirt ran past me toward his friend, screaming.

“Steve, I told you I did your mom last week!”

He knocked into my arm, and instantaneously, I dropped my textbook and my schedule on the floor. As I bent down to retrieve them, a tall boy with jet-black hair beat me to it. He placed the textbook and schedule into my hands, and I looked at him, ready to say thank you. Then, I froze. When my eyes met his, it was over. I was swallowed up in a pool of gray clouds. His eyes were a stormy sea, a mysterious shipwreck, a looming raincloud. They were a black and white photo, tattered at the edges. They were so much more. They almost entirely lacked color, save some small flecks of yellow that flickered in the fluorescent lighting. Where am I? I thought. It was lost on me.

Before I knew it, after we exchanged that eye contact, he turned and walked away, disappearing into the crowd of students trying to find their classes. Did he take your breath away? Really? Wow, you’re so pathetic. Finally, I came back to earth. Room 37, Room 37. I looked to the left of where I stood in the hall, and there it was: Room 37.

Ms. Needer almost looked too young to be a teacher. She was fashionable and had long, curly hair that fell in beautiful tendrils down her shoulders. She had a warmth and openness about her that Mr. Desmond definitely lacked. Her blue eyes scanned the room, and she acknowledged students as they entered.

“Welcome, everyone!” she cheered. “Today we’ll be going over our plans for the semester. Silly me, I forgot to print the syllabus this morning, so I’d ask that you please take notes.”

I opened my bag to take out a blank notebook and pen. I felt so disheveled with everything on my desk, and I shuffled to put my schedule in the front of my English textbook. What I saw when I opened it made no sense. What the hell? I didn’t put this in here. Inside the cover, resting against the spine of the book, was a playing card: the Ace of Spades. The card looked ordinary and tattered. I thought back to Mr. Desmond’s class and recalled opening the front of the book to write the textbook number down on the log sheet he passed around. This card was not there then, so how exactly was it there now? I flipped it over. Yeah, my premonition was correct. It doesn’t have legs. Or arms. Or any appendages for that matter. I sighed. I looked around and noticed everyone else taking notes, so I began to do so as well. I spent the rest of the class so heavily focused on Ms. Needer’s syllabus that I completely forgot about the card. At the end of the period, I placed it back in the front of the textbook and put everything in my backpack.

My third class was the last one before lunch. I smiled and relished the thought of taking a break. This was going to be the easiest day of the year undoubtedly, but the dread of finding my classrooms in a new school full of strangers was daunting and tiring. I found Mr. Han’s classroom quickly, to my surprise. When I walked in and saw Stephanie, a smile came to my face. Mr. Han was a middle-aged man with a bright smile. He had black hair and a black tie to match. He wore a pocket protector filled to the brim with pens. It was old-school, but I found it quite endearing.

“Seats aren’t assigned, friends. I won’t split you up unless you give me a reason,” he said, adding a hearty laugh after his words of caution. I picked the seat next to Stephanie, of course.

“I saw Oakley Sennett pick up your books for you,” she said inquisitively. I swear nothing gets past these people.

“Who?” I asked, as if it wasn’t obvious that she was referring to the gray-eyed dreamboat of a guy I had briefly interacted with earlier.

“Oakley Sennett. The guy you were staring at,” she said matter-of-factly.

“Excuse me? I believe he was staring at me.”

She laughed and I joined her, fearing that my taking things too seriously would wear her out.

“Sit with me at lunch?” I asked, changing the subject.

“I usually sit with my cousin and his friends.”

“Well, how else am I going to learn about this Oakley character?” I pressed, nudging her playfully.

“I’d love to,” she smiled, changing her mind instantly.

Mr. Han began handing out a syllabus and packets of worksheets to each student. He talked to us about our textbooks and what would be required during his class. He was a no-nonsense sort of guy, but he had a fun, airy personality that eased my worries about the difficulty of the class.

“Jon, Billy, you’re both late,” Mr. Han sighed as two tall, muscular boys walked into the room together. “It’s the first day. Come on, guys!”

They both nodded and found seats directly behind Stephanie and me. Jon and Billy were a brown-haired, brown-eyed duo. They almost looked as if they were related.

“B-Rey,” Jon said, slamming his fist down on his friend’s desk.

Billy’s last name was Reyes, I would learn during class, and he was one of the many popular, beefy jocks trying out for the school’s football team.

“Yeah, bro?” Billy asked, giving Jon his full attention.

“Did you hear that weirdo is getting himself a girl?” he asked. I glanced back to see Billy raise his eyebrows with curiosity at Jon.

“Which weirdo, dude? There are lots,” he chuckled. I couldn’t disagree with him there.

“Sennett. He’s got a girlfriend. At least, that is what I’m being told,” he said, bringing his voice down lower. Billy now seemed very intrigued.

“Sennett’s never had a girlfriend. Or a friend of any variety, man. What are you going on about?”

“Yeah, well, here is what I heard. I’ve gotta tell you before Han goes on about these physics and shit,” he began. I tried not to laugh, but Stephanie and I shot each other a look of amusement. These physics and shit. I like it. “So, you know little Mikey, right?” His friend nodded in agreement, waiting for him to get to the juice. “So little Mikey was running around all psyched out about something in the hallway. You know how he is, always messing with people. He’s fucked up. Anyways, little Mikey bumps into this chick in the hallway. Doesn’t even know her and just slams right into her, knocking her books all over the place. It was like a lot of books, I think.”

I could tell by Billy’s silence that he was beginning to lose interest in the amount of detail that Jon was adding to the story. Incorrect detail, I might add. It was one book, and I very well could have handled picking it up myself, if it weren’t for a handsome stranger intervening.

“Time stops, man,” he said, finally speculating accurately, “and Sennett picks up this girl’s books and is just looking at her. My girlfriend was telling me all this last period, and she said it was like something out of a Taylor Swift song.”

I kept staring at my paper and writing answers on the checklist of items that Mr. Han gave us to test our previous knowledge from other science classes. It didn’t bother me that I was the subject of discussion between two total strangers. In fact, I had spent so long being ignored by other people that it was nice to be noticed. I cared more about those stormy eyes and what secrets they held, but now was not the time to be caught in a daydream.

“There’s no fucking way,” Billy said, shaking his head. “So, Cassie told you and you take her word for it? What did these two say to each other that makes you think they’re together now?”

I found that I liked the way Billy spoke. He could form a sentence much better than Jon.

“Well, because!” Jon said, throwing his arms up in the air and proving my point about his sentence structure. “Cassie said it was so intense that neither of them said nothing. She doesn’t say thank you; he doesn’t say you’re welcome. Neither said nothing.”

Double negative, of course. Great job there, Jon. I thought back to my last class with Ms. Needer and remembered a petite brunette girl in the front of the class named Cassie. She must have caught a glimpse of the commotion outside the room before class. She embellished the story a little bit, but I gave her an imaginary pat on the back, having a flair for the dramatic myself. Hopefully, this wouldn’t turn into the talk of the whole school. I felt a tap on my shoulder.

“Hey, are you tryna hit me up with the answer to number one?” Jon asked me. I laughed, and he frowned at my reaction.

“I’m sorry, I don’t mean to laugh. It’s just that this is a questionnaire about what we know from previous classes. It’s not about something he taught us today. It’s the first day,” I explained.

“Oh, I get it! Thanks,” he said. I was glad that I hadn’t offended him. He was so caught up in his story that he hadn’t paid attention to Mr. Han’s instructions, and I couldn’t fault him for that.

After the bell rang, Stephanie and I walked out together and made our way to the cafeteria. We found a seat at a corner table near some large windows so we could watch the rain as it began to fall heavily on the concrete patio outside. Stephanie opened her lunch bag and took out each item, placing everything in a row neatly. I added this level of organization to the list of reasons we got along so well.

“So, tell me more about this Oakley,” I demanded.