“Okay. I’ll try to get off a little early to be home to help.”
“Have a good day, sweetie.”
As soon as I got off the phone, I hurried to the main desk in the library. I logged in and searched for Omnia Academy. I remembered the address from the return address section of the envelope and the letterhead. I thought entering the address after Omnia Academy in the search bar would give me a decent place to start, assuming the place existed. When the results popped up, for some reason I was really surprised to see that the top result was supposedly a website for the academy. Still skeptical, I narrowed my eyes as I clicked on it. I quickly found that notonly did this place exist, but it had been around in the current location since 1865.
Stunned, I stood with my mouth hanging open as I navigated the academy’s website. As the slow servers of the library tried to load the page, the phrase at the top was visible, making me chuckle to myself.Refining everything you are, for as long as you live.
It sounded ominous yet intriguing.
The photo gallery of the campus looked like most of the pictures were taken in the fall, due to the red, orange, and gold colors on the trees and on the ground. I skimmed through the photos and then went on to the small section with information on the academy.
“They hand-select twenty students a year and invite them to attend,” I mumbled.
Wait.
What?
They hand-select twenty students a year and invite them to attend?
Twenty. How the fuck did I get selected? Maybe they invite a lot to apply and then they pick twenty. That sounded more likely.
When I clicked on the curriculum option from the menu, only a small section came up that briefly said the academy taught not only academics but life skills that students would use every day for the rest of their lives. Any additional information could only be obtained by providing login credentials.
Weird. What kind of place is this?
“Guess I’ll find out tonight,” I whispered.
I closed the window on the screen and went to the cart full of books that had been returned. They’d already been checked in and needed to go back to the shelves, so I busied myself with that task until four and then went to find my boss, Maya. I was scheduled to work until six tonight, but with this Atlas dudecoming by the house tonight, I needed to get home and help make the house seem less like a disaster.
I found Maya in the fiction section of the young adult wing, organizing some posters for an upcoming popular series that needed to be put up on the wall.
Maya wrapped her hands around the side of the small ladder and began to move it to where she wanted a poster to go. She stopped at the sound of my voice and smiled when she looked up at me.
“Hi, Maya.”
“Ah! Ryder! You’re just the person I wanted to see.” She hurried over to the table and picked up one of the posters and the stapler.
“I need a huge favor, Maya.”
“I do too.” She patted the ladder and smiled. “I need your tall six-foot frame?—”
“I’m six-one.” I smiled as she swatted in the air.
“What do you need, Ryder?”
“My parents are having company tonight, and I was wondering if I could leave about a half hour early so I could help them clean the house up.” I didn’t want to say anything about the school because it would only lead to questions.
Maya looked at her watch and the posters on the table. “Tell you what, you hang these up for me and you can leave as soon as you’re finished.”
“What? For real? That’s like over an hour early.”
“Yes, I’m sure.”
I quickly jumped up the ladder, making it shake and causing Maya to make a hissing noise.
“Ryder, be careful!” She quickly took hold of the sides of the ladder to steady it. “I hate ladders,” she said under her breath. “Now, don’t shake this thing while I get the poster.”
As soon as she took her hands off the ladder, I made it wobble a little. She hissed again and quickly grabbed a poster and handed it to me. I held it against the wall and tilted it at the angle she directed me to. Once it was where she wanted it, she handed me the stapler. I stapled it to the wall and then we moved on to the rest of the posters. Fifteen minutes later, all the posters were up and I was on my way home.
