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mind?”
    He took the book bag from her before she could even think to protest. Reached in, came up with a key ring.
    “These?” he asked.
    “Yikes,” she said. “Yeah.”
    He fit the right key in the lock, heard the sharp click, and opened the door. She preceded him in, feeling embarrassed. Dumping the notebooks on her desk, she turned to him. He had very dark hair and eyes, a friendly wide smile with a slightly crooked front tooth, and that angular body, sharp cheekbones.
    “I'm Stephen Campbell,” he said. “I teach math.”
    “Maura Shaw,” she said, shaking his hand. She knew that hers must feel like ice, but he didn't react. “I teach English.” She paused, then added, “This is my first day.”
    “At Newport Academy, I know,” he said. “Welcome.”
    “No, I mean as a teacher,” she said. “My first day ever. I've practice-taught, in labs with supervisors, but I've never stood before my own class.”
    “You'll do great,” he said.
    “How can you tell?” she asked.
    “Because you're nervous. If you didn't care, you'd just be coasting. Here you are, ready to illuminate your students' minds, fill them with poetry and drama and new ideas …”
    “For a math teacher, you're very eloquent,” she said.
    “Ha, that's a typical English teacher's way of looking at mathematics. I don't teach computation—I teach philosophy,” he said.
    “Hello, Stephen, and hello, Maura!”
    Wheeling, Maura saw a big, rumpled man, dressed in tweed, with bushy eyebrows and a neatly trimmed beard, burst into the room. She'd met him once before, when he'd been in Ohio and she'd interviewed.
    “Maura,” Stephen said, “you know our headmaster, Ted Shannon.”
    “Good to see you again,” she said, feeling grateful to Stephen for getting her out of the jam with her keys, hoping that he would be Beck's math teacher; she had the feeling they'd speak the same language. “Thank you for this opportunity …”
    Ted laughed, shaking his head. “Glad to have you with us, Maura—yell if you need anything.”
    “Thank you,” she said. Feeling good, she caught Stephen giving her an odd look.
    “He recruited you,” he said.
    “Well, if you can call it that—he sent out a general mailing, I think.”
    “I'm sure it was more personal than that,” Stephen said, gazing down at her, making the top of her head prickle. Just then the bell rang, long and resonant and echoing down the stately stone hallway, and Maura's heart clutched. She glanced at the clock on the wall: eight-thirty sharp.
    “Good luck, Maura,” Stephen said, heading out the door, leaving her to pass out the blue notebooks, one on each desk, and wonder about what kind of math teacher taught philosophy, and what he'd been doing alone on the school steps last night.

    Beck had stood outside the school in the early morning light, sun bouncing off the ocean, practically blinding her, reminding her that water was lapping at the rocks, just waiting to get her. She'd stood with Travis at first, but then some girl with long seal-brown hair, straight as corn silk, very gorgeous, Ally's worst nightmare, had walked over, said she wanted to introduce him to some other juniors. The girl had shined her baby blues at Beck, saying, “I saw you the day the moving van came! Love your braids!”
    Beck was too busy plotting her next move to do anything but say, sounding like a complete dork, “Uh, thanks.”
    “I'm Pell,” the girl said.
    “This is my sister Rebecca,” Travis said.
    “Hi, Rebecca,” Pell said.
    “She likes to be called Beck,” Travis said.
    “Then why didn't you introduce her that way?” Pell said, laughing, pulling him toward the older kids. “Brothers are idiots.”
    “Got that right,” Beck said under her breath, but she was sorry to see him go. She hung back, major case of dry mouth, what the hell was she doing here in the midst of Lifestyles of the Rich and Stupid? All these dumb girls looking as if they'd stepped straight out of
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