Page 1 of A Class of Her Own

PROLOGUE

Last week of May

The Thornback Beginning, from Meredith’s point of view

I concentrated on slicing my sandwich into even, bite-sized squares -- the whole wheat bread fighting against my cheap plastic knife as I sawed back and forth. I shouldn’t have gone with the thick sliced turkey; it was making things difficult.

“My life, represented in food.” Lizzie’s morose words brought my attention back to the table I was sitting at with my friends in the faculty lunchroom.

Lizzie’s nose wrinkled up as she stared at the limp noodle dangling off the end of her spoon. It looked like some kind of chicken noodle soup.Probably homemade, I thought as she wiggled the noodle at us until it slopped lazily back into her bowl. If I was any sort of cook, I’d ask for the recipe. Everyone had stopped talking at Lizzie’s pronouncement about her life relating to the noodle, and our eyes were all on her, curious about her uncharacteristically dramatic mood.

She continued, “School’s out for summer next week, and I need to do something that makes me feel alive. I’m in danger of disappearing into the void of monotony.”

Only boring people get bored, I thought to myself. For the most part, I had little sympathy for any sort of self-pity. Although I could empathize with needing a change in the routine.

Ruby was the first to reply. “I felt alive when I was catching vomit in a trash can earlier.” She chuckled, her dark eyes nearly disappearing as they crinkled up.

The rest of us groaned, and Hailey -- never one to deal with ‘yucky stuff’ -- pushed her plate of leftover stir-fry away while muttering under her breath about proper table manners and conversation topics.

Lizzie sighed, which had the desired result of reclaiming our attention. “Am I the only one watching the clock tick and realizing how fast time is passing while I sit inside a schoolroom?” She speared us all with a look. “I’m about to finish my tenth year of teaching here and am in serious danger of becoming a vicious stereotype.” She pointed at us one by one with her now noodle-less spoon. “You should all be worried, too. We’re in our thirties, never been married, and teaching school. Eventually someone is going to accuse us of being old maids. Certain parts inside of me are actually turning to dust.”

“Old maid is an insulting term,” I replied, my darkly lined blue eyes flashing in offense. The last thing we needed was to all be roped into her pity party. Maybe I liked being single. Maybe it was the only truly safe and free way to live. And I didn’t appreciate being told there was something wrong with me.

“I could have called us spinsters, which isn’t any better,” Lizzie replied with a shrug.

“Who says we need a label?” I continued, pausing to pop a piece of my sandwich into my mouth before reaching up to tuck a lock of jet-black hair behind my ear. “Labels are limiting.”

“I heard a new term. Thornback,” Aryn stated as she bit into her crisp salad. At our blank stares Aryn hurried to swallow and then leaned forward with a cheery, amused expression. “I read an article the other day that said the word spinster was for women who were like twenty-three to twenty-six. But Thornback was what they called unmarried women over the age of twenty-six. It was some sort of reference to a hideous fish with thorns down its back, meaning those women were ugly and prickly.”

Ruby’s brow furrowed and her lips pouted slightly. “That doesn’t sound any better.”

Aryn held up her hand. “I know. It was terrible. But . . . there’s a movement on social media right now to resurrect the word in more of a dragon-like way. Like saying, ‘Who needs a man? We’re thornback dragon women, and we rule the entire kingdom.’”

The five of us were silent for a beat -- something that certainly didn’t happen often -- before Hailey sputtered out a laugh, her white-blonde bob swaying against her chin as she shook her head. “It’s perfect,” she said. “See, Lizzie, we’re not old maids. We’re a bunch of thornback dragon women, thriving without men.”

Lizzie leaned across the table to give her a high five as her mood lightened. “I love it.”

Ruby squared her shoulders playfully and stated, “I’ll stand with you Lizzie, and so will your sisters of the lunchroom table.” She set down the soda she’d been nursing and gestured widely. “We, the Thornback Five, must seek adventure in the great wilderness outside of this school. Each of us will find our fortunes, and happiness will be ours.”

I rolled my eyes at Ruby’s theatrical speech while everyone else chuckled, drawing the attention of other faculty members who had been peacefully eating. Someone cleared their throat, and I turned my head slightly, clearing my own throat loudly. Since when was laughter and happiness outlawed in an elementary school? This throat clearing passive-aggressiveness was something that happened frequently, which made it easy to brush it off and refocus on each other.

“We should form The Thornback Society,” Aryn said, raising her water bottle. “To fierce woman!”

We all agreed by picking up our various drinks and tapping them together.

“What kind of adventure are we talking about here?” Hailey asked after we’d all taken a swig.

Lizzie shrugged. “I’m not totally sure. All I know is that I need something to happen before I lose myself.”

The ticking of a clock and the squeaking of plastic chairs could be heard while we thought. Across the hall the sounds of children eating and talking wound their way to us, and I wondered if I’d ever felt as carefree as they sounded.

“I need to be outside,” Lizzie said thoughtfully.

“Oh,” Aryn squealed softly. “My brother went on one of those river rafting trips last summer. It was a week long, and you raft and camp as you make your way along a section of river. Maybe we could do something like that?” Her curly red hair caught the light as her blue eyes grew wide with excitement

Lizzie’s expression lit up, and she nodded. “Yes. I’ve never done anything like that. It’s perfect. Who’s with me?”

She looked around the table that was crammed into the small faculty room and surrounded by vending machines that were never used and a kitchenette original to the school from the 1970s. My group of best friends sat there, looking back at her with thoughtful expressions. Aryn -- cheery and kind; Ruby -- the nicest and silliest; and Hailey -- too classy to be here but still one of us. In the past four years, since the last of us had found a position here, we’d all clicked into place and found the home we’d been missing. Somehow, they’d even been willing to take me on, a rarity I didn’t take for granted.

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