A/N: [October 5th 2024]
Work has been a lot this year, which delayed things a lot and continues to have me very exhausted, so after a while I decided to hold this year's story, what part of it I have written already, for the new year to come. The last chunk of last year's story I held up to now so it would line up day to day and post one chapter each day as before, as I continue to work on the next one.

October 5th 2023

Chapter 278
We Return to the Beginning

She'd had three weeks with her new freshmen now, just as they'd had three weeks with her. Where a lot of them had been strangers to one another on that first day, now they were starting to feel familiar, maybe not well known, but still… Suddenly, she had a better idea of who they were as people, who they might become, at least as far as the time they'd spend here at school for the next four years, and that made her as happy this year as it had done on each of her teaching years up to now. She saw the artists, the athletes… She saw the ones who would use their hands to create, others their feet, others their voices… sometimes mixing it up with more than one activity.

The seniors had chosen clay work for their special project, and the sophomores had gone the way of portraits. The freshmen had taken some time to make up their mind, but in the end they'd chosen to go for a concentration on comic books, on graphic novels, everything along that lane, and Maya was already so thrilled at the prospect. She had been talking it over with Sam, who could not wait to step in whenever he could, bringing in his perspective as a published artist. Maya had also reached out to the Peter at the comic book store, knowing from past conversations that he was deeply knowledgeable on the entire style, the history… The goal was for each of the students to come to the end of the year with their own finished piece. It would be a joint assignment with English class, something she knew she'd want to do again in the future, same as Lindsay Alcott felt.

She loved getting to know them all more and more, just as much as she would always remember the moment when they had all been new, when they had stepped into her classroom for the first time as students, the first day. The first of them to come this year ended up being Julie Dixon, and Maya would have almost expected her to have marched up the lane and come knocking at her door, not saying she might want to drive in to school with her but heavily implying it until her neighbor and new teacher would bring it up… if her older sister hadn't been there, excited to drive her to her first day of freshman year.

Julie and Amy were close, yes, close as any sisters could be, but they were also markedly different from one another, enough to suggest that, were they not sisters, they would never be friends. Having known them since they were children, Maya liked both of the Dixon girls in their own way. Amy she could count on for activity, for laughter and chaos, but Julie was her girl for quiet, for peace and creativity. At least twice a week, since they'd gotten to know each other and even up to now when she was fifteen, Maya could count on her neighbor bringing over a drawing that she'd made, knowing that Mrs. Friar from up the road was an artist herself, that she was even an art teacher. And she was good. She was kind of excellent, actually. Her signature of late, since her vitiligo had started to show itself, was to find one way or another, evident or not, to include some mark of it in her art. Her diary cover, when it would first be handed in, would show it, too, and it made Maya smile whenever she saw it.

Whether or not they would echo their older siblings' romance, it had to be said that Jake's younger brother had plenty to go within himself, as far as what Amy's younger sister had in her, the way the two of them did already. Willy Bennett very much had introvert written all over him. He had the look of a jock to him, and he was a basketball player like all of his siblings and like his mother, but that might almost have been a fluke, born of his having the sport as a connection to his family all his life. Everything else about him, right from the way he'd come and sat at the very first station nearest to the door and the seat nearest as well, the better to drop his bag and read his book until the bell rang said just about everything that they needed to know about him. You would never hear him be nearly as animated as when he spoke of his favorite books, when he spoke about what he was reading at the moment, for good or ill.

Looking back on this year, she knew, she would remember feeling anxious at the thought of meeting one student in particular, in that she wasn't sure whether she would meet her on the first day. She'd asked Julie Dixon about her once she'd learned of her situation and that the two girls had been in the same classes over middle school, and her neighbor had stated how Angie Anna Bowles had probably not made it more than two weeks at a time before being left feeling too ill or being in the hospital outright and thus being absent from school for days, or weeks, or two whole months near the end of last year. It might have felt easier at this point to have her home schooled, but that wasn't what she wanted, and so here she was, due to start freshman year with her classmates… and then she'd been rushed into the ER three nights before the year began. Maya had been told of this, and the days had passed, and the year had begun…

… and Angie Anna was there, looking very much like she'd just spent a couple of days in the hospital, which she had, but also looking so glad to be in school, unlike so many of her classmates. In her introduction, she mentioned having been sick like this since she was eight years old without going into too many more details. She specified that she was to be called Angie Anna always, not just Angie, not Angela. It was her full name, and it meant a lot to her and that was all, so they would call her by her full name, always. She had her own style, which couldn't help but suggest that she didn't want to be perceived as 'the sick girl' all the time, which Maya appreciated immediately as much as she did the girl herself.

It might have been that she would have met Katie Willows for the very first time on the first day of school that year if not for the fact that she was currently hosting one of their new exchange campers. For that, she had gotten to see the girl several times in the weeks ahead of classes starting. She very much fit in the category of kids who'd undergone a solid growth spurt and, as a result, was having to grow into this new body and learn to use it. The clumsiness brought back memories of Phoebe when she'd been a freshman, and it made Maya smirk to herself, thinking whether Katie might benefit from some dance lessons… or maybe cheer practice. She was certainly a happy girl and had the kind of spirit that their school would be so lucky to have representing them at their sporting events. It would definitely be worth exploring that idea once tryout dates were announced.

In the meantime, she was entirely focused on figuring her way around her new school, naturally, but also on seeing to her guest and their freshman XC, Cate Ngo. They got along as well as anyone would hope to get along with the stranger suddenly living in your room/the stranger whose house you moved into for a year. It had definitely helped that the two of them had been writing one another since the match had been made. They had been preparing for school before it ever started.

Once they made it to the start of classes, that first day, Maya had been amused to see how much Cate felt like just one of the freshmen, as though she could have been part of that class ever since kindergarten and had grown up alongside a good number of those kids. She navigated the place like she might have been returning for her second year, or her third or fourth…

"My grandfather says I was born to be a traveler," she'd told the class on that first day. "He says I could go anywhere and be happy. I haven't been a lot of places yet, but I have been to a few, and maybe he's got a point. Whatever I become when I'm older, I know I want to get around, not stay in one place forever."

Those first three weeks had taken them all and made them into a class for her. She couldn't wait to see what they would all become over the course of the four years ahead of them. That was the way she'd feel every year, with every group that walked into her class for the first time, but then that was the way she should feel, wasn't it? If she didn't feel filled with this energy at the idea of accompanying her students through four years of discovery and creation, then she wouldn't be a teacher anymore. And she was very, very much a teacher still, as far deep within as she could be. There was still this joke between Lucas and her, about how she would keep saying that this part or that part of the school year was her favorite, and what made it wonderful, to her especially, was that in some way it was all true. It felt as though it should not even make sense, but it did. And right now, this was her favorite time. The beginning, the discovery, forming this connection with a new group until it felt like it was a group, with its own identity.

From within that group, by now, she was already coming to consider all those names, faces, stories, seeking a new member to join the ranks of Born Curious. She'd already gotten some push out of the remaining trio, each in their own way and the sneakiest out of her little sister, and she hadn't given them a name yet, but she was getting close to it. She'd been discussing it all with Stella, as she was also seeking a new member to join the Critically Bookish.

"Hazel Yasuda," Stella had told her just the day before.

"One of yours, or just…"

"French is not her strong suit, not at the moment," Stella affirmed, and Maya appreciated the determination in her former student. "But I know she's got it in her, and that's not what's important for this, for the quiz team. I'm pretty sure she only took it because this was the only class that would fit her schedule, and now she's in it, she's got this look in her eyes like she's going to get through this, no matter how impossible it seems right now."

"I like her already," Maya replied.

Ever since that conversation, she had spotted the girl in question a few times in the hallways. She could see just what Stella meant. If things went as they hoped, maybe it wouldn't be long before the second team had its roster locked down and, if that was the case, she really needed to do the same. She did have a thought, one she felt stronger about every day, but she did have some concerns. The last thing she wanted was to put pressure on Angie Anna, and much as she hated to think of it that way, how would they cope if they lost her for weeks or months on end? Was that a reason not to give her a chance? The quiz team might be just the thing she needed… All she had to do was say yes.

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners