In Which Summer Reveals Her Water Bottle
Chapter 4
In which Summer reveals her water bottle
I’m worried about what will happen when we reach the art room. Will we get detention? Or, even worse, suspended? That’s got to be a record of some sort; suspension in the first week of school. And when the principal asks me why the heck I barged into the second years’ art class I won’t even know the answer because Summer won’t tell me! And my mom will have a conniption when she hears about it and I’ll have to hide my head unless I want her to cut off all my hair as punishment or something crazy like that.
I’m brought back from my panic attack by the loud sound of Summer pounding on the door to the art room. Before anyone can answer her, she opens it and drags me in, motioning for Grey to follow again. As she cuts a path through the sea of plastic chairs and bewildered teenagers, I look around at the art room.
Since art’s an elective, the room doesn’t accommodate a lot of people; there are about seven or eight round tables, along with a counter, a teacher’s desk, and a wall of shelves. Every flat surface is covered with various art paraphernalia; there’s clay tools, paintbrushes, shading pencils, paint buckets, tissue paper, and several odder things such as dried corn and old books. As I’m looking around, I happen to see the teacher glaring furiously at us for interrupting her class, and so I look down and let my face be hidden by the shadows cast by my hair.
Right about then Summer stops and I nearly trip over her. She’s staring down at a small girl working on a sculpture of what looks to be the beginning of a horse. From what I can see of her, the girl has mousy brown hair tied back in a sloppy bun and light, freckly skin. I glance back at her statue and realize that for someone in high school, she’s really good; her hands are practically flying over the clay.
I almost don’t see what happens next. As I’m looking at the clay-work, Summer holds up a water bottle in the hand that isn’t grabbing me. I glimpse up at her and am about to ask her what she’s doing when she pours the whole bottle all over the beautiful horse sculpture.
“What are you doing?!” the girl and I exclaim simultaneously, her voice coated with outrage, mine with shock.
“Don’t worry,” Summer responds cheerfully as she throws the empty bottle into a trash bin. “It’s water from a spring by my house. It’s perfectly clean.”
“That doesn’t explain why you poured it all over my horse!” the girl retorts shrilly. “I’ve been working on that for days!”
Summer shrugs. “Don’t worry, you can fix it later. It’s only been four days since school started. But now we have to go.” The girl peers up at Summer and opens her mouth as if to say something, but an odd look crosses her face and she closes it again.
“Do I know you?” she asks after a second.
“I would certainly hope so, Whinny! We just met the other day, you know. Can you really forget someone in that short a period of time?”
Whinny tilts her head as if trying to remember, and her expression turns thoughtful. Summer takes the opportunity to clasp her wrist and pulls her, along with myself, out of the room after giving the teacher some kind of slip. I can feel every pair of eyes, along with the teacher’s, on our backs as we return to the hallway.
In which Summer reveals her water bottle
I’m worried about what will happen when we reach the art room. Will we get detention? Or, even worse, suspended? That’s got to be a record of some sort; suspension in the first week of school. And when the principal asks me why the heck I barged into the second years’ art class I won’t even know the answer because Summer won’t tell me! And my mom will have a conniption when she hears about it and I’ll have to hide my head unless I want her to cut off all my hair as punishment or something crazy like that.
I’m brought back from my panic attack by the loud sound of Summer pounding on the door to the art room. Before anyone can answer her, she opens it and drags me in, motioning for Grey to follow again. As she cuts a path through the sea of plastic chairs and bewildered teenagers, I look around at the art room.
Since art’s an elective, the room doesn’t accommodate a lot of people; there are about seven or eight round tables, along with a counter, a teacher’s desk, and a wall of shelves. Every flat surface is covered with various art paraphernalia; there’s clay tools, paintbrushes, shading pencils, paint buckets, tissue paper, and several odder things such as dried corn and old books. As I’m looking around, I happen to see the teacher glaring furiously at us for interrupting her class, and so I look down and let my face be hidden by the shadows cast by my hair.
Right about then Summer stops and I nearly trip over her. She’s staring down at a small girl working on a sculpture of what looks to be the beginning of a horse. From what I can see of her, the girl has mousy brown hair tied back in a sloppy bun and light, freckly skin. I glance back at her statue and realize that for someone in high school, she’s really good; her hands are practically flying over the clay.
I almost don’t see what happens next. As I’m looking at the clay-work, Summer holds up a water bottle in the hand that isn’t grabbing me. I glimpse up at her and am about to ask her what she’s doing when she pours the whole bottle all over the beautiful horse sculpture.
“What are you doing?!” the girl and I exclaim simultaneously, her voice coated with outrage, mine with shock.
“Don’t worry,” Summer responds cheerfully as she throws the empty bottle into a trash bin. “It’s water from a spring by my house. It’s perfectly clean.”
“That doesn’t explain why you poured it all over my horse!” the girl retorts shrilly. “I’ve been working on that for days!”
Summer shrugs. “Don’t worry, you can fix it later. It’s only been four days since school started. But now we have to go.” The girl peers up at Summer and opens her mouth as if to say something, but an odd look crosses her face and she closes it again.
“Do I know you?” she asks after a second.
“I would certainly hope so, Whinny! We just met the other day, you know. Can you really forget someone in that short a period of time?”
Whinny tilts her head as if trying to remember, and her expression turns thoughtful. Summer takes the opportunity to clasp her wrist and pulls her, along with myself, out of the room after giving the teacher some kind of slip. I can feel every pair of eyes, along with the teacher’s, on our backs as we return to the hallway.