Page 98 of As the Rain Falls
He huffs in response, and a perfect curl falls against his forehead, “Cheating by association is not a thing.”
Two rows ahead of me, Antony snorts, barely holding in a laugh.“Blondie’s right. It’s totally a thing, dude.”
“What’s wrong with this school?” Mateo groans loudly, tipping back and forth in his chair. “Do you guys realize that they micromanage us like we’re toddlers?”
“Welcome to Sainte Madeleine,” Antony and I deadpan in perfect unison.We pause, blinking at each other, both narrowing our eyes before we both speak again,“I said it first.”
“Do I seem to care?” I retort immediately, rolling my eyes at him.
Antony makes a noise with his tongue. He seems annoyed.
“Whatever.”
Mateo rises from his seat abruptly, looking at us like he’s just decided we’re his new disciples. Jedi in training. Padawans. Whatever. I’ve been watching too much TV.
“I don’t deserve to be here, and neither of you deserves it either.”
Spoken like a boy who doesn’t need to cheat to ace his tests. Naturally.
“We actually cheated on the test.” I bite the edge of my pink crayon, shrugging before I write the sentence again.
I will not cheat on a test.
“Well, it’s not Antony’s fault if he can’t read numbers…”
“I can read numbers, Mateo,” Antony interrupts, his voice flat.
He readjusts the chain around his neck, which looks like an identical copy of Beckett’s, and tugs his shirt so the buttons hang half-open, exposing a sliver of his chest.
That’s when I notice a small tattoo near his collarbone, the kind that looks like it’s made with a stick-and-poke. The skin around it is reddish, and the tattoo looks fresh, with uneven lines just around the edges.
“I can read them just fine.”
“…And if you can’t A-D-D them, Cassandra,” the brown-haired boy teases, his grin sharp.
“I can add them!” I spin around to face Antony. “Tell him I can add!”
Antony drags his braids to one side, eyes flickering back to me to give me a deadpan kind of look.
“Do I look like Kayla Saint-Louis to you?”
I keep on staring at him, using my best puppy eyes. It usually works on boys, or whatever.
“Jesus, okay,” he sighs while rolling his eyes. “Cassandra knows how to… A-D-D. Or whatever.”
“I’m opening the door,” Mateo announces, turning towards it with the kind of determination that will definitely give us problems. “Cassandra, you got a hairpin in your backpack or something?”
I hesitate, then dig through my makeup bag.After I finally find one, I hand it to the boy who seems to like getting in trouble.
“Don’t break it, please.”
“I won’t,” Mateo promises while bending the clasp into a straight line.
Antony and I crowd behind him, curious to see where this is going. We hold our phones up, keeping our flashlights on like we’re about to perform some kind of complicated surgery.After what feels like an eternity—really, we spend at least half an hour picking at the lock—the lock finally clicks.
“It worked!” Mateo’s grin stretches wide, his eyes disappearing with it as his cheekbones go up. “I can’t believe it actually worked!”
“What do you mean?” I ask, tucking my hair behind my ear because the little stray strands keep falling on my face. “I thought you were, like, professional door opener or something.”
