Pearl in the Mist (Landry 2)

"Well, we might as well start our introductions here," Mrs. Penny said. "Jacqueline . . . Kathleen."

A girl at least five foot eleven, if not six feet tall, stepped out first. I saw by the way she slouched when she walked that she was conscious of her height. She had a narrow face with a long, pinched nose above a small mouth with thin lips that became pale rubber bands, especially when she smirked. I was soon to learn that smirking was her favorite

expression. Her bitterness was centered in her disapproving brown eyes that more than not were merely slits. She looked like someone spying on the world, an uninvited guest who attended a party for people much happier than herself.

"This is Jacqueline Gidot. Jacqueline, meet Gisselle and Ruby Dumas and their father.".

"Hello," Jacqueline said, looking quickly from me to Gisselle. I imagined that the girls in our quad had been warned that Gisselle was in a wheelchair, but of course, actually confronting her in it was more impressive.

"Hi," I replied. Gisselle just nodded, but she looked up with new interest when Jacqueline's roommate stepped up beside her.

"And this is Kathleen Norton."

Kathleen had a warmer smile. She was a dirty blonde about our height, but much wider in the hips and shoulders.

"Everybody calls me Kate," she told us quickly and followed that with a quick giggle.

"Or Chubs," Jacqueline inserted dryly. Kate just laughed. It looked to me like she laughed after most everything she said or everything and anything said about her. It was more of a nervous reaction. Her blue eyes were wide as if in awe when she looked at Gisselle, and I knew Gisselle wasn't going to like that.

"Chubs?" Gisselle snorted.

"She eats everything in sight and hoards candy all over our room like a gray-tail squirrel," Jacqueline added disdainfully. Kate laughed. Like a sponge she absorbed Jacqueline's sarcasm, smiled, and went on as if nothing had been said.

"Welcome to Greenwood."

"Thank you," I said.

"Which room is ours?" Gisselle demanded impatiently.

"Right across the way," Mrs. Penny said. When we turned, we confronted an adorable doll-like strawberry blonde with a face full of dimples standing in the doorway of the room adjacent to ours.

"This is Samantha," Mrs. Penny announced.

"Hi," Samantha said. She looked years younger than us. "You're a senior?" Gisselle asked. The tiny Samantha nodded.

"Samantha's actually from Mississippi," Mrs. Penny explained, as if Mississippi wasn't just the adjacent state but another country too. "Samantha, this is Gisselle and Ruby Dumas and their father."

"Hi," she said.

The sound of someone coming down the hallway behind us returned our attention to the

corridor. A studious-looking girl hurriedly entered the quad. She wore her dark brown hair just below her ears and a pair of thick-lensed black-frame glasses, which made her brown eyes seem so much larger. She had large, hard features and was pale to the point of looking sickly, but she had a large bosom, almost as large as Mrs. Penny's, and a figure Jacqueline would tell us later was wasted on that horsey face.

"Victoria. Just in time to meet the new residents, Ruby and Gisselle Dumas," Mrs. Penny said. "This is Samantha's roommate," she explained to us.

"Hi," I said. "I'm Ruby."

Victoria took off her glasses before extending her long-fingered hand. I shook it.

"I just came from the library," she said in a quick breath. "Mr. Warden posted his outside reading assignments for European history already."

"Vicki is determined to be the class

valedictorian," Jacqueline declared from her doorway. "Or else she'll commit suicide."

"I will not," Vicki retorted. "It's just smart to get a head start," she told me. And then she looked down at Gisselle, who wore a smirk almost as disdainful as the one on Jacqueline's face. "Welcome."

"Thank you."