During a bitter-sweet flashback, Jessica remembered that teenage angst was nature's way of encouraging independence. Counter-intuitively, there were entire institutions dedicated to penning up adolescence.

"Dysfunction is not inherent to the human condition," she muttered. "It's nature's recoil, I'd say, against the attempt to stifle growth."

"What you say, you fucken Weeb?"

The brunt of a sneaker slammed her into several plastic storage bins. Then and there, the smell of the gym changing room, the heated sourness of post-practice hockey, sunk in. The sprinklers had yet to trigger their fragrance filters, so the scent amplified her bitterness. Looking up, she found the angry scowl of a student in the crimson skirt and white blouse of Ashenvale Academy.

"Mr. Johnson knew my essay was forged!" the bully exclaimed, running pink nails across red-dyed hair. "The point, as I stressed, was to make it sound like my writing!"

"But I thought you wanted a passing grade," Jessica sassed. Her face felt the brunt of a sneaker, again.

"I don't see any teachers or security," said the lookout. Like with all walking clichés, there was a lackey who stood as a lookout to the locker room, casual to the cruelty of yet another Queen Bee. Up until Freshman year, Jessica had thought them extinct.

With the pain in her chin and neck, she struggled to rise but managed to sit upright, and felt the familiar hardness of a hockey stick beneath her fingers.

"And another thing," Queen Bee continued. "Micah said you were talking to Jeremy in the computer lab. Why?"

"Because he asked for help?"

"Be real with me, bitch." She grabbed Jessica's collar. "You know I like him, right? You heard about it, and the next day you just happened to meet up with him in the lab?"

"Nothing's more romantic than computer literacy, Avery," Jessica whispered sarcastically. "I can't control my obsession or the need to make you jealous. My life revolves around it, especially now."

With a small shove, the girl let Jessica fall before crouching over her space. "I forgot. Is this turning you on?"

"You realize there are cameras in this room?"

"Because I give two shits? My dad knows the Principal, cyberwhore, and he has Azarean connections. No one cares about the rambling of some reject. It's annoying. Your parents probably faked their deaths to get away."

Numb to the pain, Jessica carefully rose right before Avery's grin. Faster than her thoughts, her arm swung the hockey shaft and smashed that grin sideways. The blow cracked the stick, and Avery lay on the floor, stiff.

"Shit!" cried the other girl. She looked from Avery to Jessica, horrified, then quickly ran off.

Jessica stared at the body, nails digging into her palms. She had to do something before her life came crashing down again. She had to run. The camera footage had to go.

She sprinted out of the campus. Outside, the clouds seemed particularly grey above the walled garden. After-school activity was a mistake. The blood in her veins churned, her skin crawled, and it channeled from sweltering resentment into a migraine.

Top-tier alumni from every field could secure entry into the most prestigious academies, where they could share halls with Azareans. Hence, the moment she demonstrated a high aptitude in academics, followed by an affinity for hockey, Jess made enemies; the moment she excelled in school, she made enemies; the very moment she cared, she made enemies, which is why she hated Gerald Leibniz. Academia was a curse, social life a curse.

At the border of Ashenvale, she cleared the private shuttle. Her patience for other teens had launched into the cosmos. Instead, she made sprints across the locale, tiring herself for nothing more than an alternative, a way out. A racing heart carried her feet to the nearest tram station. Its distance from the school and the affluent community she loathed helped her breathe easy. The station had no recognizable faces. It blessed her with solitude.

Public transportation. There was always something clandestine about riding the rails home. Lights on the door: blue at every stop, red on the move. Occasionally, a bot would enter and clean the old gum between the seats. If the tram was full, the bot would poke its head inside then exit. It could never scrub the saturation of stories in one place, especially on a weekday.

Daily souls filled the seats, faces that told different narratives and goals. Sometimes, a single car was a sampling of the world, a range of faces old and new; this job and that job, headed to and from work, to friends or loved ones—some rendezvous of ends or means.

Legs together, hands folded over her skirt, black hair running below the pocket of her white shirt, Jessica kept her head down and to herself. Everyone was their own problem, their concerns solely their own, and today would be no different.

Left foot forward, past the sliding door, she stepped hit the sidewalk of grime and watched the tram's inner light disappear between concrete shadows, headed west as the sun gave way to evening. No more large buildings but the neighborhood, park, and people. There was something different about these houses, though, something old. Maybe she'd stumbled upon one of those retro villages, designed to look like a twentieth-century suburb. She quickly realized that she didn't care.

Along dirty curbs and tagged surfaces, she never bothered to question the lack of bots. Holding her elbows, oblivious to the world, she tarried near shades and the fallen oak leaves of a park she did not recognize.

"Hey!" a random voice called.

She ignored it.

"Hey!"

It was probably not calling her.

"Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!"

She stopped, staring at her knee-high socks.

"Hey, you!" the voice persisted.

Turning, Jessica's sanguinely landed on short shorts. Irreversibly memorable short jean shorts "Hot Pants," as the hipsters would say. Tan legs followed a slender torso in a tank top that squeezed the obvious endowments underneath. A black pedicure adorned the hands on a slim waist, and brown hair styled as a mullet jagged over dark eyes that scowled from a lioness expression. It was some random stranger who looked like she could beat up the skinny guy next to her.

The skinny guy's tank top was freakishly white, but he had baggy black pants. Stalky, his shaved head hunched from his neck in a lazy poise, dark blue eyes skimming the ground, somewhere else.

"Do you know where you are?" growled the fierce girl.

"No," Jessica mumbled.

"Ha! You are in the west side. Obviously, you're not from around here or you'd know the crew'd eat you up in the time it took to sneak a baggie up your ass."

"Oh..."

"Maybe we should just take your things," she threatened, shouldering the guy next to her. "Right, babe?"

"Oh, definitely," he said, eyeing his phone.

Grinning like a pleased predator, something was missing in the eyes. The guy beside her, boyfriend presumably, he was absent. No matter. The girl hadn't finished talking when Jessica unstrapped her satchel and dropped it. Farther down the sidewalk, she showed her back to the couple and ignored their gawking.

"Hold on! You're giving it up, just like that?"

"Your plan didn't work, babe," the boyfriend sighed.

"Thank you, pendejo! I wouldn't have known."

When she eventually returned beside the solemn schoolgirl, she was alone, calling, "Hey!"

Over her shoulder, Jessica watched indifferently. Why hadn't she walked off with her belongings?

"What is your deal, huh?" the girl whined. "Who wanders and just lets their stuff go? What's the matter with you?"

"Why are you following me?"

"Tell me what your deal is!"

"Why?"

"Cuz it's freaken weird, that's why!"

"What's it matter?"

The stranger ran ahead and stood staunchly in Jessica's path. Determination created creases on her face. "You can't just walk all mopy other people's neighborhoods, drop your stuff, and act like nothing's wrong!"

A minute passed without a word between either of them. When it became clear the stranger wouldn't leave, Jessica's eyes slanted over the ground.

"You ever been blindsided?"

"Huh? What's that? Are you on something?"

Jessica started quivering before the strength in her legs departed. She fell on the park sidewalk, bathing in a bubble of sobs. Her hands fell over her face in a natural effort to quell the tears, but when they wouldn't stop, she scrunched between her knees. After hearing a velcro scrub, she suddenly remembered her satchel.

"Tablet, crap, Calculus book. Ew. Crap. Star Wars fan, huh?" The stranger grabbed Jessica's hand and touched her thumb to the e-card. "Jessica? This says you're not from around here."

Jessica broke from sobs to a glare.

"Just a freshman? I got you by a year." After sifting through more of Jessica's personal items, the stranger found a small monitor. Juggling with the buttons, she triggered a tripod and screen. She peered from the screen to Jessica. They made sober eye contact. "You okay with me taking this?" The tablet pictured an eight-year-old between both parents, all three of them smiling.

Jessica swiped the device, the strange girl releasing it without a fuss, and froze. She scrolled through pictures in silence, and eventually felt another shoulder.

"So, you are holding onto something; aren't you?"

After a few more pictures, Jessica turned and acknowledged the balmy smirk and unusual hairstyle. At that moment, the hairstyle was kind of cool.

"Take your junk." The stranger delivered the satchel with its contents. "And I'll take you home," helping Jessica rise.

Sill, Jessica scowled. "Why?"

"Because it's not a good idea to travel so far on your own."

"You misunderstand. Why would you care to help me? Do all this?"

"What's it matter?"

"It needs to add up."

"Pfft. No, it doesn't!"

Jessica wiped the last tear.

The strange girl sighed. "Miro lo que haces. A caballo dado, no le busques el colmillo."

"Es por mi bien?"

"Andale, chica!" She stole a quick glance and handed back the e-card. "Here, Jessica Leebzen."

"What's your name?"

"Valerie."

Valerie Bolivar.

"I knew I'd find your nerd ass here!"