Better Off Alone (Adopted by Brendon and Sarah Urie)

79. Callie

I looked out the window as we pulled into the school driveway. My stomach was doing flip flops. I saw Brian and Patricia waiting by the drop off and smiled. We didn't have a lot of classes together but they made the ones with Melanie marginally more tolerable.

Dad held my arm as I was getting ready to get out of the car.

"If you can, or have to, video anything Melanie does to you today, okay? Keep track. We're working hard on fixing this," he said. I smiled.

"Okay," I said, grabbed my bag and hopped out of the car.

Last night, after Dad called the school, and we talked about what the director had said, Dad asked if I wanted to wait for them to fix it or go back to school. I thought about it.

"If I stay home, Melanie wins," I said. Realizing I'd also said I'd switch schools if they couldn't fix this. "And even though I said I'd switch schools, no. Why should I have to?"

Mom and Dad both said I was brave to decide to go back and we talked about how to handle anything Melanie might pull.

"The important thing for you to know, that I can't stress enough," Dad said, with sort of mad/sad eyes. "Is that we would have never adopted you as a publicity stunt."

I blushed. I felt dumb thinking that. Dad had a good point. If they'd wanted me to be a publicity stunt, wouldn't I have been paraded around and dragged onto more than one talk show? We talked a long time about that. I realized how dumb that was. Dad showed me a few more articles that the magazine the one Melanie gave me, came from. I realized how dumb they were. And so was Melanie if she believed them.

And so, here I was, again, back at school where I'd hoped things would improve since not was a school for deaf kids. But so far it had been a bit of a nightmare.

I sighed, smiled at Dad and opened my door. He grabbed my arm lightly, again.

"Be the rockstar I know you are," he smiled at me.

"You're the rockstar, Dad. I'm deaf as a doorpost," I smiled.

"Cheeky," he smiled and laughed. "I love you. Have a good day and let me know if anything happens. I'm home all day, even though I'll be in my studio. I'll have my phone with me at all times. Okay?"

I nodded.

"Love you too, Dad," I smiled as I hopped out of the car and walked to meet my friends.

They started talking to me the minute I got close and Dad pulled away without me even noticing.

The three of us went into the school and to our first class. Melanie wasn't there. I sighed, internally, with relief.

Class was fun. We talked about verbs and nouns. Our teacher talked about our major project for the year, which was a novel study comparing two novels we'd read this term. We'd be able to pick any two and he handed out papers with all the instructions. We were supposed to read a total of six books between now and Christmas and would have the second term to write our essays and work on the presentation part. I smiled. Not only do I love to read, I could probably make a great presentation thanks to Dad. He'd probably be able to help out with something. Once I decided which books I was going to use for the project.

It was turning out to be a pretty good day.

My second class was math and while I don't love it, I do okay. Bs mostly, and sometimes a C, but sometimes an A. I'm a pretty solid B student in math. Which is fine. I don't intend to be a mathematician anyway.

Lunch is where my day went to hell.

I was sitting with Patricia and Brian, minding my own business when someone came up behind me and I felt cold liquid suddenly. I looked up and Melanie was there pouring her milk on me.