Choosing Life

By Britain Fairly

What exactly is Bridget Jamieson so frantically trying to hide? Is there a stowaway buried under her skin? Or is it all a ruse? And to what end? Who's ever heard of an empathy belly anyway? Could the gossip possibly be true?

When a British teen girl, daughter of a diplomat from the upper cuff

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trilogy Christian Publishing
• Release date: Jan 20, 2021
• ISBN: 9781647736576

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Trilogy Christian Publishers

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Copyright © 2020 by Britain Fairly

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture quotations marked (KJV) taken from The Holy Bible, King James Version. Cambridge Edition: 1769.

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Manufactured in the United States of America

Trilogy Disclaimer: The views and content expressed in this book are those of the author and may not necessarily reflect the views and doctrine of Trilogy Christian Publishing or the Trinity Broadcasting Network.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

ISBN 978-1-64773-656-9 (Print Book)

ISBN 978-1-64773-657-6 (ebook)

For each of you who pick up this book, GRACE ON YOU. Whatever you are going through, Jesus is here for you. You are His beloved! This story is written to you in love drawn from many moments of truth…

Acknowledgments

To my beautiful Savior, the giver of life, the ultimate pourer of grace, from the depths of my soul, thank You for calling me redeemed. And for Your true message of grace. It’s all about You, Jesus, and Your finished work on the cross. Hallelujah! To God be all the glory!

To my sister, thank you for unabashedly pouring Jesus’ grace over me. Thank you for embracing me wholly, completely, entirely, thoroughly, exceptionally, and unconditionally just as I am. Thank you for teaching me to let my faith be bigger than my fear. Thank you for absolutely praying me onto this planet and wrapping me up in astounding love ever since. Thank you for leaping out in relentless faith and joining me in the parenting journey and for always whispering into my ear when I need to hear it the most, I think you are a beautiful mother. Let me echo your precious words. I, too, think you are a beautiful mother! You are spectacular in every way.

To my darling loves, you are undoubtably the best decisions I’ve ever made. Miracle. Miracle. Miracle. Miracle. Miracle. Miracle. Miracle. You fill my heart in ways I can never fully explain. I fell in love with you before I ever laid eyes on you. I know with utter certainty the Lord ordained your existence, and without you my arms would never be the same. I am eternally grateful and spectacularly honored He thought me worthy to be your mum. Always planned. Always wanted. Always remember, God is crazy about you, and so am I!

To my parents, thank you for the blessing of knowing Jesus since my birth. Thank you for teaching me to love people even when it hurts. Thank you for dragging me around the world and showing me what it means to stretch your arms out to perfect strangers in languages I never seem to speak just because Jesus loves them as much as He loves me. Thank you for praying before I even ask. And thank you for standing beside me and walking out Jesus’ love when it could have been far easier to just keep up appearances. I love you!

To the very real counselor in my life, I pray you always effervesce with the love of Christ. Thank you for being the real-life illustration of what it means to embrace those that are hurting and give them hope. Thank you for speaking truth and life and breath into me. Thank you for sharing the truth of my heavenly Father’s unfailing love for me. You’ll never truly know how much it meant to me. Every wink, every hug, every smile, every squeeze of the hand, every welcoming seat beside you, it matters. You matter. I love you, Ms. C! Keep loving teens in Jesus’ name. Amen.

To the one I hold in my heart, I thank the Lord each night for you. For being my encourager and protector, for defending my honor, for never exploiting my insecurities, and for holding my innermost feeling in this highest of regard for safekeeping always. For kissing me like you’ve been saving them up your whole life with a sweetness of the first time. For offering forgiveness as your first response. For compassion leading your heart. For never making any distinction in biology. For loving us exponentially and growing (our) children in your heart. For fairly fancying me. For praying for me as much as I pray for you.

Thank You, heavenly Father, for touching my soul and helping me find my worth in Jesus the day you whispered, Everything is redeemable, Brit, everything!

Perhaps this is the moment for which you were created.

—Esther 4:14, paraphrased

Prologue

I am well-mannered, well-spoken, and well-groomed, everything a well-off girl from the most prestigious schools is expected to be. And expectations run extremely high in my life of pressured privilege. I am the chief competition for valedictorian, a school ambassador, community service organizer, French club copresident, competitive tennis player, Sunday school teacher, hospital volunteer, and generally labeled a do-gooder, overachiever, highly structured student, babysitter (for a family of nine), and an Ivy League contender. By all appearances, I lead a charmed life with an ironclad road map to the top.

But appearances are exactly that, appearances. On paper, it sounds easy and amazing. Everyone can be summed up in a list of statistics, right? Wrong. In reality, as I navigate the world of an elite secondary school in a foreign nation as the daughter of a diplomat, the achievements, although highly desirable and accomplished, don’t sum up my internal struggle. The statistics don’t begin to describe the journey, the joy, the elation, the friends, and the love, alongside the intense heartache, the ostracism, the exclusion, the unintentional enemies, the gossip, the shame, and the undeniable truth that one decision can change the course of my life. And still leave room for God’s overwhelming grace to wash over me and irrevocably replace condemned with redeemed. Whilst I am highly motivated to achieve a well-rounded application and gracious letters of recommendations, attend an excellent university, become a physician, and ultimately reach my end goal of being a doctor overseas on a mission field, there are many unspoken pressures that are choking my will to succeed.

Honestly, I love loving people, a gift I’ve received from my parents and sister, who are unquestionably committed to providing for those in need. I am an encourager by nature, something most people need at some point in their life but aren’t always willing to receive, myself included. I generally try to do what is right, and I work tirelessly not to disappoint my parents. And most of the time, I am far too busy or tired from my list of to-be-accomplished to get into trouble or cause trouble. Although my feisty mouth’s need to express itself can sometimes cause a scene. And I am often too hardheaded to notice any help I might need along the way. I am intent on taking care of myself, not asking enough of the other people in my life to share the responsibility. And I often allow my own insecurities, self-doubt, and the oppressive opinions of others in my community to confuse the reality of what my heavenly Father really thinks of me.

It wasn’t until a compassionate counselor extraordinaire defied the long-standing, legalistic status quo of my Christian school that I realized I hadn’t fallen from grace, as some people would have me believe. It was as she shared the revelation of my heavenly Father’s true nature, pouring grace that He offers as a free gift over me, that I finally understood all I had to do was open my heart to receive it. She spoke the Lord’s truth into my soul, and it finally felt its worth, giving me the courage, amidst all my despair, to choose life.

A staunch defender of the rights of others, my recommendation reads. The most intellectually exquisite student I’ve had the opportunity to teach, another noted. I stood reading a stack of recommendations that had finally arrived in my student council box. Pleasantly relieved that my often-stoic teachers offered praise indeed. I knew I had checked off a majority of my need-to-do-to-get-into-an-Ivy-League list, but it wasn’t the awards I needed, I hoped for, I so desperately longed for; it was knowing that my teachers thought I was a good person, a hard worker, someone with integrity that I really treasured, and so far, the letters were convincing me. Honestly, your admissions applications read like an already-framed acceptance letter from Harvard, my advisor had said to me. Except for one thing, I thought to myself cautiously, the one thing no one ever expected from someone voted most likely to succeed. The one thing that seems to instantly cloud most everyone’s previous judgments of me, seems to instantly dismiss all my years of diligent academic work, my accomplishments, my sacrifices, my weekends studying or volunteering instead of going to the cinema with friends after a big tennis team win. The one thing missing from my list of accomplishments is actually the thing I am most proud of, the one thing I work the most at, the hardest at, the one thing that was most difficult to commit to, and the one thing I love unconditionally. It is also the one thing I thought I had managed to hide seamlessly. Until I read the last letter of recommendation waiting at the bottom of the stack:

To: University Admissions Board

Re: Letter of Recommendation

Student: Bridget Jamieson

Submitting Professional: Juliet Cartwright, academic advisor and guidance counselor for Redeemer International School

To whom it may concern:

I am without a doubt utterly astounded by the endless and tireless efforts of this young woman to plan and actively achieve her high-level goals and at such a young age. She is by far, at the age of sixteen, the youngest student I know to compete for the academic accolades she has earned, especially considering she is competing against other highly motivated students several years her elder. Furthermore, I believe she is unabashedly motivated and inherently prepared for the rigors of an Ivy League institution. Additionally, I have no doubt whatsoever that her remarkable time management and leadership skills will unequivocally aid her in attaining her ultimate goal of a doctorate in medicine. It is certain that you will find her to be a student of integrity and ethical academic conduct.

This recommendation is incredible, I thought to myself, better than I could have ever imagined. Excitement building within me as I continued to read.

Which is why I was fairly astounded with the recent discovery that her abilities to perform in such a rigorous academic environment have not been hampered by the fact that she is indeed a teenage mother. I can recommend her without reservation for your program and feel confident she will be successful as she continues to strive for academic excellence alongside her decision to undertake the most tremendous challenge of parenting in her teen years.

Wait, what? My mind is whirring, nearly spinning. What did my advisor just write? I mean, the letter was great, but how could she write this? How did she find out? I’ve made it this far without anyone guessing my secret. Who told her? Sheer panic setting in. I dropped all the other letters to the polished floor and raced to her office, breathing rapidly, deeply.

We had a new guidance counselor during my second year at my new school. And everyone was talking about her. She was beautiful. Very kind. Compassion was a way of life and business for her. And she was relatively young, in her thirties. Especially when compared to our last guidance counselor, who was well into her seventies and had a special way of making you feel worse than how you were feeling before entering her office. It was a good change. The new counselor had this effortless coolness about her. She drove a really sporty, open-air Jeep with a going-to-walk-about-in-the-outback kind of vibe. She was always elegantly dressed. The thing that surprised me the most, though, was the sincerity she possessed, especially as cool and beautiful as she seemed. She made abstinence seem like the strong choice, not the weak, pitiful route, and she uncompromisingly loved Jesus.

She brought Him into conversations effortlessly with teenagers, which you might think wasn’t too hard to do in a Christian school, but it was. The school was much more focused on piety and rules than the remarkable impact that sharing Jesus’ grace and love freely can have. Ms. Cartwright poured grace on people every chance she got. She exuded that you could be a beautiful, attractive woman and have a heart for the Lord. This genuinely surprised me. She had a gentle nature that spoke to my soul. When she looked at you, she actually saw you; she looked at your heart, not your outside appearance, and she encouraged you to be your best self no matter what reason had sent you to her office.

I do believe she was one of the best things that ever happened to our school, and she is certainly a hero in my own life. She managed to hold you accountable for your actions without humiliating you or causing you shame. You just wanted to be better around her. She loved teenagers. You could tell. A hard task, no doubt. Ask most people about their views on teenagers and they seem to fall along the lines of they’re insufferable and try to spend as little time with them as possible.

Ms. Cartwright didn’t avoid anyone, any topic, or any question. She answered honestly, shared her own imperfections and struggles along the way, and always encouraged every student to talk to their parents, because ultimately she would say, I believe they really do want what’s best for you, and when that wasn’t the case, and occasionally it wasn’t, she was there to help deal with the not-so-great parents too. She didn’t just limit herself to the walls of the school, though. She was there for us in her personal time, too, if we needed it, and it didn’t just extend till we graduated. She has opened her arms to me and embraced me at several key difficult stages in my life. She spoke truth into me and never allowed unworthiness or shame to creep in, and there were lots of times I felt shame overtaking me. If I could gush over one person in my life, it would certainly be Ms. Cartwright, and I am forever thankful.

Ms. Cartwright wasn’t my first introduction to Jesus, though. I was raised in a house of faith with actions. My parents love the Lord. And my parents are lovely people, but even they get caught in the crosshairs of the church’s incongruous mixture of law and grace, be it Protestant or Catholic in denomination. But Ms. Cartwright unabashedly introduced me to my heavenly Father and Savior of the gospels that wants goodness and grace for me, not judgment and shame. She encouraged me to see my humanness for exactly that. Being human. She never excused people’s cruelty or misdoings, but she did lead an example of forgiveness, and this is certainly no easy road when you know even part of her story.

I once read in a book that in Hawaiian culture, when greeting a loved one, they breathe life onto the other person. I liked that. That’s exactly what Ms. Cartwright did for me. She breathed life on me. When I felt completely breathless, when I felt as if I were disappearing and I would never recover, when I felt wounded and emotionally fragile, she breathed life on me.

Grace on you, she whispered in my ear and meant it. Grace on you, Ms. Cartwright whispered to me in her office that afternoon when I brought her that shocking recommendation she had written for me, asking her, pleading with her why she would reveal my secret.

I hold on to this letter Ms. Cartwright wrote for me. They were life-affirming words and have stuck with me, especially on that awful of awful days when all-out judgment and shame cascaded over me. I re-read it every now and again to remind myself of the grace my advisor and guidance counselor put on me that day. She saw beyond the rumors, the whispers, the indignation, the scowls, the lost potential comments, the dismissiveness, the judgment, and the shame that was unleashed on me the day my fiercest academic competition felt the need to share with the whole school and faculty that amidst my academic success, at home, I was known as Mummy. And pneumonia aside, the main reason I was out of school for a month was the fact that I became a mum at sixteen.

How is it that when you say that one simple phrase, She’s a teen mum, it can instantly change praise for the same person into condemnation? How a smile turns into a glare. It’s this idea that if we believe in God, we must be perfect or at least project perfection. It’s this idea that as long as you don’t get caught (i.e., we’ll look the other way if you’re having sex as a teen as long as you don’t get pregnant), it’s okay. It’s this idea that you’re either all good or all bad, but there is no room in between. It’s this idea that you couldn’t possibly have asked Jesus to be your personal Savior and still make mistakes. It’s this idea that teen motherhood is contagious and anyone with that condition should be avoided like the plague instead of embraced and encouraged to make good parenting choices and raise their child knowing God. It’s this idea that if we bless those most in need instead of offering shame, they will continue to make poor choices. When in actuality, the opposite is most often true, that those with the biggest mistakes risk the most when accepting God’s grace, believe the biggest that the Lord can forgive their unpardonable sins other Christians themselves cannot forgive.

It was Ms. Cartwright’s words of grace, freely poured on me that day, that allowed me to bear their indignation, their hypocrisy, their negativity, and try to find my way back to His free gift of love and grace. The gift my heavenly Father had waiting for me when I felt I needed to hide and couldn’t possibly deserve to receive it. The gift that was waiting for me even when I believed a misrepresented, angry God must hate me for my mistakes. And who really cares, anyway, if I make good choices?

But wait, I’m getting ahead of myself.

Chapter 1

The bright morning light reflected nearly golden off the freshly painted white exterior of the building. My new school, I thought as I took in the enormity of the building. It was in bold juxtaposition to the often more modestly sized buildings and homes frequently seen in New Zealand.

Ribbons of rose and peach weaved gracefully through the morning sky. The singular voice of a cheerful twittering bird rose into the air. One by one a cacophony of morning greetings echoed back the early little riser’s call high up in a towering tree as if to say, Dawn is here, a new day is upon us. The immense aviary home stood boldly in the center courtyard of my new school. I imagined it to be an ancient tree. Perhaps growing in steadfast observation over multiple generations of students in this school. The base stood wide and strong and smooth.

When standing just beneath it, with my neck arched back, it shot up straight into the sky like a natural skyscraper. The only branches of the tree hung at the top dashed lightly with leaves and flowers like a polka-dot umbrella, allowing ample sunlight to stream through. I’d never seen a tree of such grandeur except for a trip to the giant sequoia forests in California one summer. This tree, though, this tree had been loved many times before. It had a well-worn groove perfect for leaning back into its solid base and reading a book.

It seemed to have the task of protecting many an afternoon reader from the elements, and I would be its next daily resident. I sat down on the dewy grass in my crisp, new, proprietary plaid uniform and leaned into my new wooden cocoon, new reading material in hand. A gift of a new book from my mother to feed my insatiable need for literature and calm my early-morning jitters.

In nervous anticipation of my first day at Redeemer International School, I arrived with an inordinate amount of time before the first bell officially called classes into session for the year.

I don’t like to be late. I hate it, actually, all eyes glued to me as I try to navigate a new scene once everyone has already taken their places. No, thank you!

I preferred to seamlessly blend in with the crowd of students that would eventually fill this enormous rectangular courtyard. Arriving one by one this morning. I assumed, based on my vast experience arriving as the new girl, that the other students would seize the advantage of already having a full working knowledge of the physical layout and social hierarchy present in this school like the eleven others I had arrived at as a newbie in the last fourteen years of my life.

Unquestionably, there will be a small gaggle of gooses (or turkeys, as my guidance counselor would later name them) that run the school. A group of girls and guys that make it their daily priority to assert themselves into a self-appointed pecking order within the already-intimidating, intricately wood-carved walls waiting to box me in. I’m more the type to be pecked than to do the pecking. It’s a perfect setup, really, for kids who make their way through life isolating and ostracizing anyone they can just because they can. I’m always new. I have always just moved to a new town or city. I’m always the foreigner, so to speak, and my life is different from most with its constant globe-trotting capacity. Sometimes it’s jealousy on the parts of other students, teachers, or parents for all the places I’ve seen. Or insecurity that I might disrupt the comfort of their already-familiar circles. Or just the intent to feel superior over my family’s economic status, which in itself isn’t lacking, but whatever it is that causes the queen bee or lead turkey to rear its ugly head, I’ll find out soon enough. And at a vastly hastened pace than I had originally anticipated.

I intend to avoid being pecked this year, if at all possible. But as my dad reminds me, I’m not one to stand by either and watch others being pecked for no good reason. Which he says with frequency he loves about me. However, this inability of mine to merely stand by and not let the heat fall on me when someone else’s back has been targeted invariably puts me back on the radar to be pecked. If only I could stay out of the ridiculously pointed attempts of intimidation and removal of proverbial feathers in this secondary school, I might have a fighting chance of really liking it.

Would the faculty and students welcome me as warmly as the greetings I had already enjoyed in this community since our recent relocation? I wondered. Would the student population be as laid-back as I had found the local beachcombers to be? Or would the staunch years of generational, academic, pseudomonarchy, and established wealthy families decide whether they wanted a new club member, regardless of the fact that my family did indeed fall into a similar category of old money?

A few minutes more of reading under my tree and occasional glances up from my book to people-watch as an increasing frenzy of chatter filled the green space around me would reveal itself soon enough. The dewy pink early-morning light dissipated, giving way to a harsher glaring sun, and the first bell sounded the start to classes.

I’m unaccustomed to the traditional new school year in New Zealand beginning in early March. In England, France, and even the US, my school year usually begins in September. But I inherently like the idea of the new school year beginning shortly after the new calendar year. Although, having recently enrolled in an international school that caters to students in need of the typical schedule of European and North American continents for varying reasons, I’m not starting life in my new school down under in March. No, whilst my previous peer group will be starting school in the Northern Hemisphere’s autumn, I’m starting in the Southern Hemisphere’s September spring instead, neither one being the traditional New Zealand March. Confusing? Trust me, I know. But I think it sounds pretty good too. I mean, isn’t spring the season for new life?

New school, new life, maybe? One can always hope! All things being new, though, whether it’s March or September, maybe it will be a great school year after all. Only two more years to go and I am on my way to initiating my plan to become a physician. So I reluctantly relinquished my safe, cozy spot beside the ancient tree and entered through the heavy doors.

If you are in upper school, high school, or secondary school, by whichever name you call it, or have ever been in one, you know that sex is a hot topic. I believe it has been this way since the beginning of time. It certainly is a source of topic in the Bible, and I believe this is because it is such an emotionally charged heart topic. And in truth, we desire pleasure and fun in our lives, and it certainly can be that too.

Having entered upper school, the topic of sex has taken on an identity of its own. It could be likened to on the table of UN discussions in my school—it’s mentioned so many times a day. In the halls, during lunch, whenever the teachers aren’t looking or listening. Who is doing it? What they’re doing? Or what they want people to think they’re doing? When and where? The discussion has continued ad nauseam about who is having sex on television, and then all the billboards and commercials promising us better lives because of sex. You’d think in a Christian school this would be different, but if anything, I find it to be more of a topic because it’s so very off-limits.

Initially, I avoided the topic as best I could—sex, that is—but then I began to be teased rather mercilessly for blushing or avoiding the conversation. I really felt like some things were private. But the joke on me turned from bad to worse as they began calling me a nun. The worst nickname to acquire in a Catholic school, or any school, I imagine. It’s certainly not a badge of honor. Though, it should be.

Nuns dedicate themselves to God’s call, to be His hands and feet in the world, through great personal sacrifice and often incredibly trying circumstances. They attend tirelessly to the well-being of those less fortunate, albeit whilst retaining a vow of chastity. However, in my school, nun of these things are considered, pardon the pun. The only part of the equation to a nun’s life of notice to my teen peers is the no-sex part, and to be likened to this lifestyle ideal is social suicide.

So I reluctantly relinquished to the internal struggle I was feeling and thought, If no one will talk about this with me at home, I guess I’ll talk about it here. I was more of a listener really at first, and oh my, the things you hear when you just sit by and listen or walk by, as was the case my first morning amidst the student corridors.

As I walked briskly through the corridors to find my first class, the chatter and gossip bounced off the tall echoey ceilings. I heard Sarah Hampton slept with Sam Tennon over the weekend, one girl twittered, personal intimacies of people she knew, to another girl.

A few lockers down, a group of guys, huddled in a circle, said to another, Yeah, man, she was so easy. We only met down by the dairy this week, and by Friday we were in bed together.

Way to go! the other guys congratulated him as if he had just secured the Nobel Prize, patting one another on the backs.

Am I hearing this right? I wondered as I continued to easily overhear the pompous spouting of very personal topics.

Shouldn’t people be talking more about what they did over the holidays and less about sex? Then again, I questioned myself, maybe that was what they were doing. And it certainly didn’t end there. As I rounded the corner and glanced to my left near the water fountain, or bubbler, as I sometimes heard it referred to, two people, who I assumed were probably teachers, were engaged in their own gossip. Did you hear about Alice Thompkins? I heard she isn’t returning because she’s pregnant. Talk about lost potential. What a way to waste your life, having a baby at seventeen. I guess I hadn’t realized teachers discussed their students in quite this manner before. Maybe I’m just more aware this year, I thought.

I also noticed how many of the students seemed to be pushing the limits of their uniforms. Hemlines extrashort. Graphic T-shirts under the lads’ unbuttoned dress shirts. Sandals instead of the required black church-style shoes, which are remarkably uncomfortable no matter how many years of your life you wear them. I was unaware of the memo everyone else must have received on don’t wear your uniform per the requirements, because I had just simply gotten dressed according to the detailed descriptions laid out in the handbook.

Farther down the corridor, still one girl said, Missy is such a little ‘word I won’t repeat.’ She’s cheating on her boyfriend and rooting with both of them. I hope they give her a disease. I hadn’t heard this type of phrasing before.

Then another chap stacking several books in his arms said, We moved from snogging to shagging over the summer, and now I’m thinking I should ask her if she’s on the pill.

You’re just thinking about that now, man? You’d better hope she hasn’t fallen pregnant!

Nah, that couldn’t be it. She wouldn’t double-cross me like that. But I mean, yeah, Lex has been acting a bit weird the last few weeks, more snarky than usual.

More harsh than usual, huh? That’s hard to do. I don’t know what you see in her, man.

She’s smart, she knows people, you know.

Well, bro, you know girls go crazy once a month. It’s probably just her girl thing.

Now this is phrasing I recognize. I wonder if he’s a Brit, I thought to myself. He’s using Brit speak, as I call it, for making out and then moving on to having sex, instead of some of the NZ lingo I don’t quite get yet. I didn’t hang around to introduce myself, though, in light of the conversation.

I looked up at some of the different numbers and class labels on the wall and then compared with the seemingly endless maze of corridors displayed on the map in my slightly trembling hands. Realizing I was nearly to my class, or so I hoped, I heard another two girls talking. What if the pill doesn’t work right? one of the girls asked her friend, looking visibly nervous.

Well, if you think you have a problem… she said, raising her eyebrows, just get it taken care of before anyone finds out.

Taken care of? her friend asked, not understanding the underlying meaning. But I understood, unfortunately. She meant get an abortion if you think you’re pregnant since your birth control failed and do it now so no one will know. I thought to myself, Geez, not exactly a morning-cup-of-coffee kind of topic.

Yeah, get it taken care of, and then in a few weeks, you and your lad can get back to it. Just tell him you’re on your cycle, so he won’t get suspicious.

It is that easy? she asked, appearing truly concerned.

Totally normal, she said. You feel like you have the flu. And then, Whoosh, the problem’s gone.

I don’t know, Lex. The other girl hesitated.

And with that, feeling completely flustered by all the deeply personal gossip and conversations that were flooding the corridors, I decided to duck into my first class.

Chapter 2

The gossip has turned out to be ferocious in my school. Both the girls and the guys feel the need to be detailed about whom they’ve been with. I often feel for the girls and the embarrassment they must have feel at their personal encounters being publicized. I’m not thoroughly clued in on all the details, though, not as much as I probably should be at fourteen. Although, in time, I’ll come to realize many of my classmates aren’t as knowledgeable as they claim and really spend a lot of time blustering.

Sex is not considered a cordial topic of conversation at my house, and so I’ve learned the basics from an outdated book explaining how mothers get pregnant. Think more birds-and-bees metaphors, less anatomical and physical, let alone emotional realities. Like most teenagers, though, I’m curious in knowing more, especially since most passing periods surround this topic. And recently, I’ve noticed my closest guy friend is beginning to look a bit different to me, less friend, more cute boy!

I’m grateful he’s here at this school. My new school. Philip was my first and only friend for a while. We had been friends as kids in la belle France. His mother is in a similar diplomatic-type job as my father. Though she’s a lawyer specializing in international law; his father is equally prestigious, but less diplomatic, especially in family life. We hadn’t seen each other in years until I saw him sitting in my math class the first day of school. Utter shock and then a profound sense of joy set in.

James? No way! he said. I can’t believe you’re here.

Philip? Wow! I responded. I can’t believe you just called me James.

What, no good? No one calls you that anymore?

Well, not here anyways.

"Ahh, come on, really? You were the best James and the Giant Peach that L’école Internationale Française has ever seen."

Oh, thank you, thank you. I playfully bowed.

I mean, seriously, you saved me that day when I couldn’t remember a word of my grasshopper lines and you whispered them to me the entire play. You made me look like a hero, he said. It was also the day I realized the theatrical arts are not my gift. I freeze in front of people, he continued. Which is why my dignitary mother and litigator of a father feel the need to sign me up for the forensics team.

"What is forensics?" I asked.

It’s this kind of archaic punishment where you have to stand in front of millions of strangers and repeat memorized lines or speeches. I laughed. He always did have a flare for the dramatic. Seriously, though, Bridget—using my actual given name—you’d be brilliant at it. Come rescue me again. Come with me, I can’t bear to join this wretched club alone, he teasingly begged. James, I almost didn’t recognize you with the new look, Philip noted, looking at my hair. Did you outgrow the red?

No, I covered the red, I offered, acknowledging my new brunette look to my old friend. The new look he was mentioning was the fact that not only had I become a brunette, but now I also spend far too much time each morning using a flat iron to straighten my hair into submission. I want to fit in with the other girls, look as similar as possible, and my curly red hair is not the way to fit in. Not in a sea of blondes and brunettes. There are a few girls with shades of red, but I feel it looks much better on them than it does on me. And these days the only time I let it curl is when I can’t control it after getting wet. And it rains a lot in New Zealand, so it’s often a battle I don’t win.

Philip and I continued to catch up since the teacher hadn’t arrived yet, and then she walked in—strutted in, actually—her turkey feathers fluffed and preened to absolute perfection! Ms. Self-Appointed Queen of the School herself, Alexis Crown. The lead intimidator, the one I assumed existed but hoped to avoid, showed up in my first class. Tragedy, I thought to myself. What a bad way to begin each day.

Sure enough, my suspicions were confirmed. And as soon as I learned her surname, I knew it fit her perfectly. Alexis Crown, believing she missed her true calling of being born a royal, declared herself sovereign over the school. My, my, my, aren’t you moving in quickly on the yank. She glared at me with her cool blue eyes and a flip of her salon-coifed, shoulder-length hair. I saw him first, she quipped.

In Philip’s witty style, he jumped up out of his chair, gave a little salute and bow, saying, At your service, me lady.

"Philip, she’s insulting you with the yank bit," I said, feeling incredulous that in less than ten seconds, she had already hurled an insult at my funny pal.

I know. He winked at me. But I am proud to be an American. The insults don’t bother me. And by the way, Your Majesty, I’m a Red Sox fan. No Yankees here. He laughed.

W-h-a-t arrrre you talking about? she blustered back.

Well, I guess that’s an inside joke for us Yankees and Brits over here. He laughed a little as he gave an impish grin. Clearly, his sense of humor still intact.

I giggled. I knew I liked you, I thought to myself. Maybe it won’t be so bad here after all.

What inside joke? Ms. Crowned Jewel herself demanded. You don’t even know each other, she rebutted with a So there, ha, attitude. You’re both new, she added as if we weren’t aware of our status in the school already.

Oh, but we do know each other, I chimed in, adding for affect, Philip is the first boy I ever let kiss me. He winked at me and put his arm around my shoulder.

She huffed off to the front of the class, joining several of her underlings, and Philip said, I’m not sure that’s the last we’ve heard from her. I think she kinda likes me! Then he whispered in my ear, By the way, I always liked that you weren’t one to kiss and tell, until today, that is. He flashed his slightly lopsided grin at me. It’s not what you’re thinking, that I’ve been seeking out lads to kiss on my first day of school.

Philip was the first boy I ever let kiss me, I thought to myself, but I was nine years old and he had scraped his knees badly on the pavement. I held his hand and walked with him to the nurse’s office, where I whispered, I won’t tell anyone if you cry, as the nurse poured on the foaming peroxide. And these were the days prior to the now much-gentler touch of antistinging, medicated Band-Aid wash.

But he didn’t cry, and when we were back outside, he leaned over and kissed me on the cheek, followed by, Oh, I liked that! And Thanks! I often wondered if it was thanks for letting him kiss me. Or thanks for keeping him company as he got his wounded knees bandaged.

Hey, I whispered, leaning closer into him, noticing he smelled good. Cologne, maybe?

Yeah? he whispered back.

Do you remember telling me thanks after you kissed me?

Yeah. Why? he asked.

What did you mean by that? Thanks for the kiss or for the walking with you for bandages?

Aww, wouldn’t you like to know? he bantered back.

No, seriously?

I meant thanks for telling me you wouldn’t tell anyone if I cried when the nurse poured on that burning peroxide. You always did have a compassionate side. Even at nine. I smiled inside now at how he thought of me. It wasn’t the first time you saved me either, he added. Remember how that kid had shoved me to the ground because I wouldn’t give him my football? You told him to bugger off and almost got sent to the principal’s office.

You were my best friend, I responded. Just doing best friend kind of stuff.

Philip touched my hand lightly. Well, maybe sometime I’ll return the favor and come to your rescue. Since we are locked into this math class together for the next year. I laughed at his comment, tossing my bouncy hair lightly, even though I had attempted to straighten it this morning.

"Me, need rescued? Never! I mean, I am ‘James’ of James and the Giant Peach, you know!"

I know, I know. Now, don’t go getting a swollen head on me now. We can’t have two women wearing a crown in this room, he joked, nodding toward Alexis seated proudly in the front. So can I still call you James?

Yeah, why not? I answered. Not the worst childhood nickname I can think of. And honestly, it endeared me to him once more. He had remembered how the entire year after I played the lead in James and the Giant Peach, the James part had stuck as a nickname. It was nice to see a familiar face. A very cute, much older familiar face. Maybe I’ll let you kiss me again, I teased, leaning over.

And maybe I will, he replied. Flirting with me a little, I thought.

Our teacher was late for class, which was why we’d had so much downtime to reconnect. But once he did arrive, he was with the headmaster. Uh-oh, I thought, who’s in trouble already?

We all stood and greeted the headmaster with the proper Good morning, Mr. Baldwin and were then seated once again. It was one of those private school things we had to do about a million times a day. Greet faculty entering or exiting the classroom with a Good morning or Good day in the upright position, in addition to standing every time you spoke or were called on. No one could claim lack of exercise at our school! At the very least, your thigh muscles would be in shape by the end of term.

Ladies and gentlemen, let me begin by saying, no one is in trouble,