Variant

Well, I didn’t have any at my last school-I’d never met anyone there because I was always at the gas station. And I definitely didn’t consider Mr. Cole a friend. There was my caseworker, but she couldn’t ever remember my name.

I shook my head. “Not really. But how do you know that?” Almost imperceptibly, Becky’s smile wilted. Oh. “Wait. You’re the same, aren’t you?”

She turned her gaze down, tapping her fingers absently on the binder. “Yes,” she said. “All of us are like that.”

I couldn’t believe it. A whole school full of people like me-no friends, no family. No one who would notice that we were gone.

I pounded my fist into the arm of the couch.

“They take the ones that no one will miss.”

Her tour-guide laugh reappeared. “You make it sound so sinister.”

I jumped up, rubbing my hands over my face and head. “If it doesn’t sound sinister to you, Becky, then you’ve been here too long.” Maxfield wasn’t just a prison. It hid what it was doing, seeking out students who had no ties, no homes.

Those had been questions on the scholarship application, though they’d referred to it as a personality profile. How many close friends do you have? Who do you confide in? I must have answered just right- none and no one.

If the school was picking the kids who wouldn’t be missed, then were they ever going to let us go? No one was going to come looking for us. Nobody cared.

Becky didn’t respond. When I finally turned around, she was still sitting looking as calm as ever. What was wrong with her? Didn’t she get it?

“We’ve kinda messed up my official presentation,” she said with a smile and a joking sigh, “so let’s get right to the details.” She held up the binder and motioned for me to come back and sit. I walked to her, but stayed on my feet. “This book is your manual for all things related to Maxfield Academy. It has the rules, a map of the grounds, and a list of services. Everything you’ll need.”

I stared at her. “I think you’re crazy. I think this school has made you insane.”

She just smiled. That’s all she ever did. She had to be nuts.

“Benson, I’m trying to help.”

“Help me or our kidnappers?”

“You,” Becky insisted. She handed me the binder and then clasped her hands in her lap. “Now, listen. We need to go over a couple of the bigger rules, and then I’ll take you up to your dorm.”

Great. I didn’t want to go to the dorm; I wanted her to take me back outside. I’d climb the stupid wall and get out of here. I wondered why no one else had done that. It was tall, but there had to be a way. The two that ran after Ms. Vaughn’s car-maybe they’d tried. I’d find them and ask.

“Benson?” Becky pointed at the manual.

I opened the binder halfheartedly. The front page had a black-and-white photocopy of the ornate coat of arms that had been on the school’s website. The color version had looked so regal, like I was going to some Ivy League school that was going to make everything that was wrong about my life right. This paper just looked like a copy of a copy of a copy.

I sat down again with a sigh, closing the book and looking at Becky. “Are the rules as stupid as everything else?”

She laughed. “They’re not stupid at all. Very basic stuff.”

I nodded, wondering how someone like Becky would define basic. She certainly had a screwed-up version of normal.

“There are lots of rules, and you can look them up in your book. But there are four big ones that will get you in a lot of trouble. First of all, no sex.” She made a fake grimace. “That’s the first thing that all the students think when they hear that there are no adults in the school. But, even though there are no adults, there are these.” She crossed the room and pointed to a security camera in the corner. She avoided my eyes, which meant she probably felt as uncomfortable discussing this with me as I felt hearing about it from her.

“Every room, every hallway,” Becky continued, still staring up in the corner. “So, they know whether you’ve been naughty or nice, and if you break big rules-like that one-you will get detention.”

“What is detention?”

Becky glanced my way and then returned to her desk. “Detention is bad enough that you don’t want to end up there.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” I said, putting the binder to the side and leaning forward in my seat. “How about you start giving me some real answers?”

Becky stammered for a moment, her eyes looking everywhere but at me.

“What is detention?” I asked again, speaking slowly.

She exhaled and then looked down. “When people go to detention they don’t come back.”

“They get sent home?”

“I’m sure they don’t.”

“What? They get sent to someplace worse?”

Becky broke, her face suddenly contorted in-was it sadness? Fear?

“I don’t know,” she said firmly, turning away from me. “Nobody knows.”

I didn’t let up. “Have people been sent to detention before?”

“Can we just say ‘it’s bad enough that you don’t want to end up there’ and leave it at that?”

I asked again. “Have people been sent there?”

“Yes.”

“And they don’t come back?”

“No.”