Rooms

The room is unfamiliar. I don’t know how I got here.

           A man comes in through the door. I hear the click of a lock behind him. He signals me to take a seat at a small wood table, so I sit down in a chair. The man makes a face of disgust and signals me to sit down on the stool opposite the chair. Confused, I move to the stool. The man takes out a huge binder and flips through the thick pages until he finds what he is looking for. He sits down in the chair.

           “Name?” he says.

           “I…don’t know,” I mumble. The man adjusts the mask on his face and sighs.

           “Age?” he says.

           “…I think, uh, fourteen?” I reply. Obviously annoyed, the man fiddles with the strings of his black mask. He throws me a sharp glance, eagle eyes piercing through me.

           “Future occupation?” he snaps.

           “I don’t know?” I whisper. How am I supposed to know these things?

           The man slams his binder on the table. It shakes at the impact…I also shake at the impact. The man’s green eyes glare at me.

           “Your name is Eva Dean,” he growls. “You are thirteen, a student. What do you want to be when you grow up?”

           I squeeze into myself. “A…swimmer? But I don’t—I don’t know—”

           My voice trails off in the unforgiving silence. The man, clearly disapproving, rolls his green eyes and runs a hand through his hair.

           “What do you want to be when you grow up?” he repeats.

           No longer able to look into his eyes, I stare instead at his black mask. Suddenly it hits me. There are no mirrors. I don’t know what I look like.

           “What do I look like?” I ask him.

           He stares at me. Strands of his black hair fall into his face. He laughs.

           “It doesn’t matter what you look like,” he replies. Suddenly his eyes are empty of any mirth. “So what is your future occupation?”

           I comb my mind frantically. What would be a safe job that I could certainly do?

           “An English teacher,” I say. Then, spontaneously, “Am I pretty?”

           The man’s oily black hair falls into his face even more. He does not laugh this time.

           “It doesn’t matter if an English teacher is pretty.”

           He gets up, brushes his oily black hair out of his face, and unlocks the door. He takes a card out of the binder and hands it to me.

           “Get up and follow me,” he says. As we walk through the door, I look at the card. It says:

EMMA DEAN

AGE: 13

MAJOR IN COLLEGE: English

FUTURE CAREER: English teacher

APPEARANCE:

PERSONALITY:

           Disappointed, I look up at the many doors lining either side of the hallway we are walking through. I see a smiling man open a door before us and usher a laughing boy through. The man with the black mask stops abruptly, and I nearly collide into him.

           The other man turns and smiles at us.

           “John!” he says, waving vigorously. “What’s your charge’s future career?”

           John shrugs. “English teacher.”

           “Oh,” says the man. Then he brightens and turns to the boy. “Well, my charge—by the way, his name’s Charlie!—is going to be a singer!”

           John shrugs. He and the other man walk on together, talking (or at least, the woman talks). Charlie and I trail after them.

           I turn my head and look at Charlie. He has a snub nose, brown eyes, and dark brown hair. I wonder how he could possibly be a singer. Singers have to be handsome, right?

           Charlie turns and looks at me too. “How old are you?” he asks.

           I shrug. “Thirteen…what about you?”

           “Oh!” he grins, showing off his buck teeth. “I’m thirteen too! By the way…what’s your name?”

           I glance down at the card the masked man gave me. “Emma.”

           Charlie stares at me. I squirm a little. Then, suddenly, he says,

           “You’re really pretty.”

           I duck my head. After all, it doesn’t matter if English teachers are pretty. Besides, I don’t think I am pretty. There’s no way. I probably look terrible, but Charlie’s being nice.

           Just then, our guides come to a door.

           “Seventeen-year-olds,” Charlie reads. I stare at the words on the door too. I turn to him in confusion.

           “But aren’t we thirt—”

           As we step through, we fall into darkness. We whistle through the empty air. Is this how I die?

           But Charlie grins. I can see his white teeth shining in the darkness. “Don’t worry!” he shouts over the noise. “We’ll be fine!”

           I can’t hear the rest of his little speech. Fine? Fine? Of course an ugly boy with the confidence to be a singer would spout nonsense like that. I’m sure I’ll die. I can’t believe myself. Stupid, pathetic. Charlie reaches for my hand. He’s shouting something and smiling again. I jerk my hand out of his grip. I don’t want his help. When I twist out of his grip, I fall away from him. He lands softly on a trampoline apparently designed for our landing. I plummet into a pile of books and papers. My back screams. Despite the darkness, I see things go even darker…

           I wake up in another room. The masked man is nowhere to be seen. Instead, I see someone else, smiling down at me.

           “Welcome!” she cheers. I stare at her.

           “What’s your name?” she asks.

           My name? Frantically I search myself for the card I was given. But I can’t find it. I want to know what I look like. Am I pretty, like Charlie said? So I ask.

           “What do I look like?”

           The young woman pauses in surprise. But then she beams.

           “You’re very pretty!” she tells me. “For an injured young woman, you look amazing!”

           What if she’s lying? But I think about Charlie, and suddenly I wish I had let him help me. Now I’m all alone again. Maybe I can start over with this woman.

           “My name…is Emma,” I say. The woman smiles, clearly pleased.

           “I’m Lise,” she says in return. “You’re an English teacher, right? I’m a ballet dancer!”

           I pause. “No,” I say firmly. “I’m not an English teacher. I’ve always wanted to be… a swimmer.”

           Lise’s smile grows wider. “You have an awesome personality.”