Since I’m pretty sure scaling a very expensive piece of art will get me in trouble, if not actually expelled, on my very first day, it looks like the back of the bench is going to have to do. Even if the top of it is less than two inches wide.
But “no guts, no glory” is a phrase for a reason. Besides, I don’t want another coin. I wantthatcoin. Maybe this is what that guy meant when he said the first coin wasn’t his. He didn’t feel anything, just like I didn’t.
But with this coin, there’s something inside me telling me that I have to get it. That it belongs to me. Of course, that could be just the fear—and by fear, I mean terror—of going back to the amphitheater empty handed.
There’s no way I’m doing that. Absolutely, positively no way.
Athena girls do not fail. I’m not going to be the first to mess with that motto.
The back of the bench is made of slats of evenly spaced wood, each one about an inch from the next. An inch doesn’t exactly give me a great foothold, but I manage to get the edge of my big toe between the middle two pieces of wood and use it to boost myself up.
I flail a little bit, but a quick grab of Perseus’s arm steadies me as I get my other foot on the top of the bench. I push up again and then I’m standing on the top of it, one foot directly in front of the other so I don’t lose my balance.
I take a second to make sure I’m steady, then scoot forward carefully, using everything I learned in gymnastics to keep from falling into a giant heap on the floor. But I’m doing it, and that’s what matters. Now I just have to get that coin before one of the other first years bumps into me while trying to get their own.
A few inches more and then I’m finally close enough to make a grab for it with my free hand. But the second I do, the coin moves from hovering next to Perseus’s ear to floating above his head.
Seriously? Doing my best not to move too quickly, I slide my hand from Perseus’s biceps to his shoulder and scootforward a little more. Then I hold my breath as I push up to my tiptoes, and reach, reach, reach…
The coin jumps again, this time to a spot directly in front of his eye. Andnotthe eye closest to me, becausethatwould be too easy. Nothing else about this day has gone as planned. Why should this?
For the first time, a seed of doubt creeps into my mind. Maybe this isn’t my coin, after all. If it was, wouldn’t it want to be caught by me? The other students don’t seem to be having this same problem. Even the boy who said the coin wasn’t his had no trouble grabbing it.
So what is going on with this one? Why won’t it let me grab it?
A quick glance around tells me I really am running out of time. The Hall of Legends is half empty now. And more people are grabbing their coins with every minute that passes.
I think about getting down, about trying for a different coin. But the moment I try to step away, I feel something inside me pressing me forward, demanding that I go for it one more time.
And so I do, pushing up just a little bit higher on my toes and straining every muscle in my body as I lean forward, forward, forward.
Finally, somehow, my fingers brush against the cold metal of the coin. I squeeze it between the fingertips of my middle and ring finger and then curl them down into a fist as triumph roars through me.
I did it! I really did it!
The coin jumps along my palm, battering the insides of my fingers like it’s dying to get away from me. But I hold on tight as I start to step back down to the bench seat.
As I do, someone makes a grab for their own coin—apparently it’s under the bench I’m currently standing on—and as they do, they bump into the bench hard enough to send me tumbling off the edge I’m so precariously balanced on.
I close my eyes, bracing myself for the pain of slamming into the cold, hard tiles. But it never happens.
Instead, I fall straight into someone’s arms. Or, to be more accurate, someone catches me in order to keep me from hitting the ground.
And that someone isn’t just anyone. It’s aboy.
Because of course it is.
9.On a Wild Coin Chase
OF COURSE IT’S A HANDSOME,self-assured boy who caught me. Everything else about this day has been like a movie about the new girl who needs to be saved, so why not this part too?
So what if Athena girls can totally solve their own problems and stand on their own two feet? Let’s bring a boy in just to make everything a little more embarrassing—or a lot more. Just to be clear, I am currently in the arms of a boy with short blond hair, chocolate-brown eyes, and a dimple on the left side of his mouth. More, that boy doesn’t look like he has any intention of putting me down—at least not anytime soon.
My mind goes blank.
Like “empty sheet of paper” blank.
Like “nothing is working” blank.
