We left the restroom and enteredthe throng of students hurrying to their next classes. We joined them, andLilly took me through a winding hallway to a set of beautiful marble stairs,leading both up and down. The English and Arts Building of Kingsley was anotherred brick building, but much larger than the Administration Building.

Located on the first floor were thetheater and dressing rooms; there was also a lavish foyer and an elegant,marble staircase that led up to the second and third floors. All other gradelevels of English, honors or non-honors, were located on the second floor. Thethird floor was dedicated entirely to the Drama department.

Although this floor had many smallrooms assigned to storage and props, the majority of the floor was taken up bya large, unusual drama studio. There were no desks or white-boards in the room.The room glowed with paint in effervescent colors: oranges, and reds, greensand blues; beautiful silk floor pillows were scattered around the room.Oriental room dividers stood in one corner, suggesting a dressing room, whilevarious props and costumes cluttered together in another corner.

An exotic but frazzled lookingwoman stood in the front of the room, holding her hands wide, welcoming us intoher classroom. The woman, whom I assumed to be Mrs. Woodsen, the Drama teacher,had frizzy, unkempt dark black hair and leather-like skin that suggested yearsand years in the sun, as she seemed to be in her late fifties.

She was wearing a deep purplekimono, with vibrant red dragons embroidering its floor length silk. Around herwrists were dozens of golden bangle bracelets that jingled with every smallmovement she made.

This teacher, who seemed more thanhuman, transfixed me as I took a seat on the floor like everyone else. I hadnoticed that although the room would suggest chaos and confusion, all of thestudents entered the room silently and took their respective places on thefloor. I sat close to Lilly, not sure whether to be terrified of what was tocome next, or excited.

“Hello, my darlings,” Mrs.Woodsen’s voice purred her hello. As I looked at her thick eyeliner and darkred lipstick, she reminded me of a cat, or an Egyptian, or maybe an Egyptiancat.

“I understand we have new actors tojoin this vivacious cast today,” she slowly moved her eyes to mine and held myattention for a few seconds before searching out Kiran and Talbott. I washorrified when I realized they were in this class as well, but as I lookedaround, I noticed that I recognized most of the students from English werehere. “So before we begin our work with the one-acts, I would like for each ofthese newcomers to introduce themselves and enlighten us on their uniquepersonas.”

I was mortified; surely she didn’texpect me to speak in front of this entire class of people. Not to mention thefact that almost all of this entire class of people witnessed the only uniquething about me already this morning. Thankfully, Talbott stood up first. Itried my best to shrink into a ball of nothing.

“Well, I am Talbott Angelo,” hesaid in a strong, authoritative voice, his accent thick, making his words runtogether. “I am new to this place and this school. I come from London withKiran. I hope to enjoy America very much,” he gave a goofy smile and laughed alittle, along with the rest of the class. He waited for Kiran to stand beforehe took his seat back on the floor. His huge frame seemed too big among theother, smaller-framed girls that had surrounded him.

“Welcome Talbott, we are sothankful you have been sent to us,” Mrs. Woodsen purred to him. She turned herfull attention on Kiran, gazing at him until I was almost embarrassed for her.He was not able to look fully at her face and I noticed a light shade of redcreep up the back of his neck.

“My dear Kiran, you don’t have tosay anything unless of course you want to,” Mrs. Woodsen’s eyes became glassywith obvious adoration. Yuck.

“No, it’s all right,” he forced hiseyes up and gave her a benevolent smile.

Kiran cleared his throat. Hisperfect posture and amazing good looks already set him apart from everybodyelse; but now with him standing and everyone else on the floor it almost seemedas if we were bowing down to him. Thinking that Mrs. Woodsen practically was, Ismiled, and then realized Kiran was looking directly at me.

“Hmmm…” he continued to stare atme, while seemingly thinking about what he was going to say. “I am KiranKendrick. I am also from London,” Unlike Talbott, Kiran’s accent was light andcrisp, making him sound like the perfect English gentleman. “We arrivedyesterday. And let’s see…. something unique only to me ….” he was obviouslydragging this out on purpose because a mischievous grin began to appear in thecorners of his mouth. I found myself impatient with him, despite all of hislooks and glory. Then he looked directly at me again, “Well, recently I caughta fainting, young girl, and saved her from imminent danger,” he finisheddramatically.

As his eyes locked with mine sointensely, and since apparently everyone in this class had already been awitness to my episode, all thirty voices burst out in laughter at once. Thesound was shrill and mocking and I was once again humiliated.

“Quiet down my darlings. Iapparently am not privy to the joke, so let us calm ourselves and our innerauras so that we may hear from our last new soul,” her calming voice met withimmediate success and all voices became silent. Kiran took his seat, but notwithout giving another roguish wink in my direction. I now found myselfextremely irritated with him.

I struggled to my feet, not nearlyas effortlessly as the two boys before me did. I looked around at my seatedpeers; my mind was blank and my face bright red. The faces staring back wereexceptionally beautiful; their eyes unnaturally bright, and their hair unnaturallyshiny. They were also exceptionally hostile and judgmental. It was nice to knowI had once again been able to isolate and alienate myself just as quickly atthis school as at any other.

“Um,” I coughed to clear my voiceand found Lilly’s face, the only genial expression in the room. Even Mrs.Woodsen seemed to be eyeing me skeptically. “Um, I am Eden Matthews. I am fromhere, I mean from Omaha. And I recently fainted in front of my entire firsthour class, but I don’t remember anyone saving me from banging my head againstthe floor,” I finished quickly and quite sarcastically, before plopping downcross-legged next to Lilly, unable to look up or at anyone. I thought for asecond that I might come off funny or at least witty, but the deafening silenceindicated otherwise. Lilly patted my knee reassuringly, but I was too mortifiedeven to look at her.

“Well, I do hope you are all right,dear,” Mrs. Woodsen eyed me even more suspiciously before turning her gaze on afew students who had begun to whisper. I looked over to see that it was thegirls who had surrounded Kiran and Talbott. They stopped talking afterreceiving the evil eye from Mrs. Woodsen, but all turned to give me a dirtylook. “Unfortunately for those of you who are new, we have already startedworking on our one-act plays, and the groups have already been chosen. I amafraid you three will have to work together quietly on busywork, until afterthe One-Act Meet, in a few weeks. I will have you grade papers from the youngerclasses. Please sit in a group behind the dividers, so that the other studentscan have room to work on their small masterpieces.”

At this point, the entire classstood up and moved into their one-act groups. Lilly gave me an encouragingsmile and went to stand with her own group. I picked up my backpack andshuffled slowly behind the dividers. This had to be some cruel joke.  Mrs. Woodsen was now officially my leastfavorite teacher, even worse than Mr. Lambert was. Again, I was reminded thatthis was only second hour and the day was far from over. I had never regrettedburning down a school more than I did at that moment.