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They moaned, but Rory couldn’t help smiling. No matter how excruciating the drills were or how physically taxing practice would be, she loved being out on the field. A tiny spark of hope flared in heart about what was to come.
* * *
“Alright, everyone. Be quiet,” Penelope demanded from the front of the classroom. “We only have this lunch period to nail down our staff, so shut up.”
Rory took a seat next to Gina in the back. She wasn’t wrong, the room was almost empty. Besides the two of them and Penelope, there were about five others at this meeting, which surely couldn’t be enough people to put together an entire yearbook. She wondered if she made a big mistake in coming to this meeting and if she was about to sign up for a far greater commitment than anticipated.
She reached for her backpack on the floor, standing up to leave. “Gina, I—”
Gina grabbed Rory’s sweatshirt and pulled her back down into her seat. “Rory Michaels, do not leave me here.”
“But you want to be here,” she hissed.
“Something you want to tell the rest of the class, Rory?” Penelope asked.
She looked up at Penelope, who was now at the front of the room with her arms crossed, tapping her peep-toe chunky wedges, eyes wide with amusement.
She slumped, shrugging her backpack off as she shook her head.
“Good, let’s get started,” Penelope said, grabbing a stack of papers.
“She loved that a little too much,” Rory mumbled softly to Gina.
“Just…give it a chance, okay?” she whispered back. “You could always just say no after the test.”
Before she had a chance to really think through what the test could possibly be, Penelope slapped down a piece of paper in front of her. A totally blank piece of paper.
“Here at Haverport High Yearbook Committee, we are in desperate need of designers,” Penelope said to the group, placing a blank paper in front of Gina. “Sean is our photographer,” she continued, pointing to where he sat at the front of the room, wearing his signature black jeans, flat-brim hat, and thick-framed glasses. “He has been taking pictures of the different clubs and sports teams, and now it’s time to start putting the book together.
“I’ll be editing the copy, but what we now need are some artists to bring it to life. Your task is simple—I want you to draw me a mockup of what you think a yearbook spread could look like. I want to see what kind of eye you have, so I know what section I should place you to work on. That’s if you’re even good enough.”
“Is she in a place to turn people away?” Rory grumbled.
Gina rolled her eyes, which had the two of them stifling giggles as Penelope continued to drone on at the front. Gina opened up her notebook and wrote EYE ROLL COUNT at the top, starting a tally.
“You have ten minutes to wow me, so give me your best,” Penelope finished, floating down into the teacher’s seat at the front of the class.
Rory flipped the pencil in her hand as she stared down at her paper, unsure of where to start. She glanced around at her peers, noticing how each of them drew out simple frames with graphics and designs that looked generic, even plain.
But she never liked plain. She didn’t spend a chunk of her Scoops tips on different shades of nail polish for no reason. She enjoyed bold colors and loud laughter and animated movies that made you sing. She covered every inch of her bedroom walls with pictures and sketches and posters. She wouldn’t want to look back on her high school yearbook as something dull. She’d want it to have lots of color. Lots of life.
She slipped out of her chair and went to the front of the classroom, stepping in front of Penelope. “Do you have any colored pencils?”
Penelope frowned. “This isn’t a coloring class.”
She bristled, grinding her teeth. “Just…trust me. Maybe something in this classroom? Markers? Crayons?”
“Here,” said a soft voice. Rory turned and noticed Vanessa Ramirez sitting next to Penelope. She hadn’t even noticed Vanessa sitting there all this time with the way Penelope commanded the room’s attention.
Compared to Penelope’s blown-out red hair and fancy shoes, Vanessa was her opposite. Her short bob of black curls framed her kind face. She wore no-nonsense combat boots, a black tee with an Avatar graphic on the front, and fishnet tights beneath a bright-orange skirt. Her eyeliner was drawn out like a cat, which paired well with her headband that donned black velvet cat ears.
The two crystals placed delicately at the corner of Vanessa’s eyes twinkled as she smiled at Rory and handed her what looked like a prized set of colored pencils, the aluminum case covered in cartoon stickers.
“Thanks,” Rory said, holding the case with care. She sat down, popped it open, reached for a bright blue pencil, and got to work.
Nine minutes later, Penelope’s phone was chiming at the front of the room as she instructed everyone to put their pencils down. Rory placed a purple pencil back in the case and shut it with a soft snick.
“Damn, Michaels,” Gina said, leaning over.
