Free The New Guy by Amy Spalding Page B

to throw it over to Kevin Fanning for AroundTown, where we’ll cover news about not just the school but the larger Eagle Rock community. I’ll let Kevin tell you more.”
    The video seamlessly cuts to Kevin, who was also conspicuously absent from the
Crest
meeting this week. I flip to a blank page in my notebook and jot down the names of all of last year’s staff members who are missing from this year’s crew. Jesse Walters shows up after Kevin, and then Joramae Reyes. I check them off my list as they appear. They’re all wearing professional attire that looks good on camera—even Jesse, whose normal uniform is a ragged band T-shirt and beyond-faded jeans.
    The camera finally cuts back to Natalie, and I exhale a teensy bit of relief that not every single person on my list has appeared.
    “Last on our program, a new segment from a new student.”
    It’s another perfectly edited cut, and then another face is on the screen.
    Alex.
    “What?” I say, again, aloud, and louder. This time, Sadie turns to me with her eyes wide. Her expression matches my emotions.
    “Shhhh!” Meg says, again.
    “Hi, I’m Alex Powell, and this is”—a logo appears on-screen as he says it—“Alex 4 All.”
    I realize he’s wearing the same shirt as he was the day we met. His first day in school, the second day of the school year. I wonder if TALON meets when the
Crest
does, because that would have been the same day as well. I think of Alex’s sugar-coated lips as he confided all about his past to me. And I realize that by then he’d already filmed this. He’d told Natalie and company way before he’d told me. At least a full twenty-four hours. Alex knew all about this airing today when I was curled up in my bed sending him messages last night.
    As Alex throws it back to Natalie, Sadie whispers, Sadie-style, “Are you okay?”
    “I’m fine,” I say just a little too loudly. It’s for everyone else’s benefit, but it must have sounded believable because Sadie turns away from me, and then I’m just stuck with my own thoughts in my own brain as Natalie says that she’ll see us in a week. The credits roll, and every person I hadn’t yet checked off the list is there in some behind-the-scenes capacity.
    Those people all chose to work with Natalie at the helm, not me.
    “Now that
that’s
over, let’s try to get some work accomplished today, shall we?” Ms. Cannon’s tone is just annoyedenough for me to briefly feel love toward her. But then she takes roll and moves onto women in ancient Egypt and she sounds just as annoyed, so the love in my heart is gone as quickly as it arrived.
    The sound of everyone’s pens flying across papers jolts me out of whatever state I didn’t know I was in. I know everyone else hasn’t had their entire world splintered into… world shards, but I wish I could yell at them for just going on with their lives. With
Egypt
.
    I raise my hand, even though it seems like Ms. Cannon is in the middle of something at least fairly important. I’m dealing with something that’s unfairly important.
    “Miss McAllister-Morgan, if this isn’t an emergency, I suggest you hold all your questions until I’m through this section.”
    “This is an emergency,” I say, even though anytime a girl throws around the word
emergency
, people will assume it’s something to do with your period. “May I please be excused?”
    Ms. Cannon sighs loudly but dismisses me. I grab all my things and run out the door, down the hall, and up the stairs to Mr. Wheeler’s room. He’s in the midst of what looks like freshman English—everyone’s super young and staring at him like all his words are important.
    “Hi, Jules,” he says. “This is a surprise. Is everything all right?”
    “
No.
Obviously everything isn’t all right,” I say, and his eyes go huge and round behind his glasses. “TALON?”
    “Oh, that.” He chuckles. “Pretty cool, huh?”
    “NO,” I say, again.
    “Jules.” He sighs and gestures to the