My name is Adam Wolfe, and depending on who you ask, I'm either the greatest magician in the world, or the worst.

I don't really have much of an opinion on the subject myself. I'm just different, and my magic is different, and there isn't anything I can do about it—no matter how hard I try.

It's the first day of my senior year of high school, and I'm already on campus; but then, I'm always on campus. St. Bosco's is technically a boarding school, but I'm the only one who lives here during the school year. I also live here during the summer. I just live here, period; and I have the whole place to myself, which is a lot less fun than it sounds.

Back when St. Bosco’s was first built, it was the only school of magic west of the Mississippi, so students came from miles around. Now, however, there are dozens of schools in every state, so no one needs to board anymore. Everybody attending St. Bosco’s lives close enough that their parents can just drop them off and pick them up each day. It gets lonely, but at least I never have roommate drama.

When I wake up, I'm so eager to finally see other people again that I put on my uniform right away even though it's only six in the morning, taking the time to roll up the shirt sleeves. I have to, because my arms are always just a little too long for my shirts. The cuffs hit just above my wrists, and I look ridiculous. I can't go up a size either, because then I'm drowning in a shirt that’s wide enough to fit two of me. I have the same problem with the grey slacks, but fortunately a belt helps make up the difference there.

I automatically reach for the grey and navy striped tie in my cupboard, but with a rush of pleasure I remember that seniors aren't required to wear them. It's a small perk for going twelve years without ending your magical career prematurely by accidentally blowing yourself to kingdom come. I hate that stupid tie, I'd never figured out how to tie the damn thing right. I always have to make El redo it for me when she arrives in the mornings before I can get a demerit for looking sloppy. Well, sloppier than usual.

I glance in the mirror before I leave my room to see how bad my hair is. I hadn't cut it all summer and it was starting to get really out of control now, black curls constantly getting into my eyes every time I blink.

I look okay otherwise. I never look good, exactly, but I don't look like I've been steamrollered or bulldozed or hit by a train, and that's good enough for me.

The skin under my eyes is always a little grey. My cheeks are slightly hollow, no matter how much I eat, and I am always one missed meal from tipping the scales from thin to scrawny. And then there's the small scar on my upper lip, a painful reminder of the dangerous nature of my magic. I avoid looking at it as much as I can.

The last thing I put on is the silver watch that El's parents gave me this past Christmas. It's flashy and way too big for my skinny wrist, but I always wear it anyway. I'd never owned anything as nice as this watch before, and getting it from El's parents made me feel more a part of a family than I could remember feeling in my life.

I head down to the front of the school, passing the dining hall where I know the cooks will already be preparing enough hot breakfast to feed a Roman legion. Most days only a few students eat breakfast on campus, but the three women that keep a school full of precocious magical youths fed whip up a real feast for the first day of school. It's called the Pancake Social, but pancakes are only the tip of the culinary iceberg.

There are cinnamon rolls with warm icing; waffles with real maple syrup, not the fake maple-flavored corn syrup stuff I’d always had before; every variety of muffin that has ever existed; french toast that's been soaking in syrup and milk overnight to make it as soft and moist as possible; crispy bacon and eggs fluffier than you would think possible; thick slices of ham and sausages and hash browns and toast with way too much butter.

We don't usually eat quite that good, but the Pancake Social is a tradition that all the stops are pulled out for. Almost everyone comes early so they can snag at least one pancake or sausage.

The dining hall is empty, of course, but the metal grill that separates the kitchen and the dining tables is open and waves of steam are already pouring out, carrying the smell of bread and cinnamon and syrup on their tides. I slink into the kitchen, technically not allowed behind the serving counter but it's not like anyone is going to stop me, and I loiter in the doorway while I wait to be noticed.

They're rushing around, frantically trying to get everything prepared in time, but eventually Mrs. Pendle spots me and stops for a moment.

“Oh, good morning Adam!” she says, smiling brightly. “You're up early, aren't you?”

“Just excited,” I reply.

“Ah, that's right, this is only your third Pancake Social, isn't it?”

“Yes ma'am.”

“Well, you'll have to wait a little bit longer, I'm afraid; but I might have something to tide you over until it starts. You're so thin, I'm worried you'll slip right down a drain one of these days!”

She always says that, and she always gives me extra food, even when it's just me and the teachers over the summer and she's the only cook on campus. It's her life's mission to fatten me up. I'd be inclined to think she was a fairy tale witch intent on eating me if I didn't already know that she was just a regular witch without any cannibalistic intentions to speak of.

She scrounges up two of the muffins for me and a cup of milk to wash them down with. I thank her and wave to Ms. Bella and Mrs. Hancock, the other two cooks, before leaving them to their task.

My muffins and I head out to the front of the school, where picnic tables have already been set out on the lush green lawn. The lawn is magicked so it's always lush and green, even though the state has been in a drought for years. It seemed like a silly waste of magic to me when I first arrived, but now I appreciate things like that; the little ways that magic can make you happier, or your day a little brighter. Magic comes from emotions, and there's no such thing as a waste of magic.

I avoid the picnic tables and decide to sit under an oak tree even though the ground is slightly damp. It's pleasantly cool now, but I know that it'll be sweltering before ten, and I aim to claim the best shady spot while I can. The courtyard in the front of the school is huge, but I can still see the gravel parking lot from where I sit, and can just make out the road beyond that. No cars that don't belong to St. Bosco students or their families ever use that road, so I know that anybody I see driving up it will be one of my school mates.

St. Bosco's teaches kids from kindergarten to twelfth grade, so even though there aren't a ton of magicians in the world, it's impossible to know everyone. Out of those that I do know by name or at least by sight, plenty don't care for me, and a few outright detest me. Even so, I'm practically tingling with eagerness for people to start arriving. I visited El a couple of times over the summer, and I even went to the beach once with some classmates who thought to pick me up on the way since they had to drive past the school to get there; but mostly my summers at St. Bosco's are long and lonely. I'm eager to see a face that doesn't belong to a staff member.

It's an hour and a half before the first person shows up.

At seven-thirty it’s already uncomfortably warm, and I’m beginning to wish I'd worn my school shorts instead of pants even though I look like an idiot in them, when I hear the distant sound of a car. I sit up straighter and strain my eyes, and eventually a black car trundles into view, slowing and pulling into the gravel parking lot where it grinds to a halt.

I don't recognize the car, or the family that comes out of it. It’s a girl several years younger than me, maybe fourteen or so, and her parents. They also have a really little kid with them, a boy just too young for kindergarten.

I smile at the girl and her family as they approach, and they smile politely back, but go to sit at one of the tables a little ways away from me. I don't think her parents realize who I am at first, because the girl leans in towards them and says something too quiet for me to hear. They both glance quickly back at me with expressions caught somewhere between affected nonchalance and blatant curiosity. I don't mind much, I’m used to it by now.

A few more families trickle in over the next half hour, mostly younger kids I’ve seen around but never talked to. A gaggle of juniors I definitely know by sight show up packed in a van without a single parent between them—evidently someone had gotten their license over the summer and was eager to flaunt it over all their lowly friends who hadn't turned sixteen yet. A few of them smile and wave at me, others sneer or ignore me entirely. It’s always a mixed bag.

By eight o'clock, there are perhaps a dozen family or friend groups gathered, and the stream of those arriving grows more steady by the minute. I sense the tingle in the air a split second before the breakfast feast magically appears on the picnic tables. Literally magically, of course. Some people clap, and everyone rushes forwards to get the first or best bites. I would have been right there with them, prepared to wrestle someone's granny for the biggest cinnamon roll, but El still hasn't arrived yet.

Usually she's here as early as possible, knowing that I'll just be tooling around by myself without her. I’m almost starting to get worried that something has happened when I see the big green minivan pull around the corner and into view. A grin spreads across my face and I abandon my shady spot to jog up the drive, wanting to meet her as soon as she gets out of the car.

Her mom and dad are the first ones out, but El's two younger siblings aren't far behind them.

“Adam! How are you?” her mom says with a smile almost as wide as my own when she sees me. She pulls me in for a hug when I’m close enough.

“I'm good, Mrs. Fuentes,” I reply, and I shake her dad's hand as he comes around to greet me too. Mrs. Fuentes always does the driving, since El's dad doesn't have a license. That always makes me feel a little better about never having had the chance to learn how to drive myself. “Hi, Mr. Fuentes.”

“Good morning, Adam. Magic's Might, is it really that hot already, or is it just me?” he asks, tugging at the collar of his shirt.

“You're getting old, Dad,” come's El's voice, and I turn to see her struggling to pull her messenger bag out of the car. It's heavy and awkward, and she's always complaining about how the uneven weight distribution from the single strap messes with her back, or how her books constantly bumping against her thigh when she walks gives her bruises, but she refuses to trade the thing in for a regular backpack. “It's a sign of weakness. Watch out, or you'll be ousted by a younger, fitter male. Right, Mom?”

Her father just shakes his head, like he can't believe where he went wrong, and pats me on the shoulder.

“Good luck having her back. Maybe next summer you'll talk her into staying in the dorms with you, eh? And give her poor old folks a bit of a break.”

“I'm graduating this year, Dad,” El says with the exasperation of someone who has had this conversation a hundred times. “I leave school for good in June.”

I feel an uncomfortable twist in my stomach, and I interrupt the conversation by giving El the biggest hug I can muster. I have to crouch a little to manage it, since she barely scrapes by at 5'1” on a good day, which leaves me almost full foot taller than her.

“Alright, alright, I just saw you a few weeks ago!” she protests, but she doesn't struggle that much. Eventually she pushes me off and inspects me with a critical eye, as if afraid I had changed somehow despite, as she so lovingly mentioned, it having been only a couple of weeks since we'd last seen each other. I inspect her back, just to give her a taste of her own medicine.

Her skin is dark brown, darker than the rest of her family's even though she spends half as much time outside as the rest of them do; and her hair is thick and shiny and so black it’s practically a void that time and space can’t escape from. She always wears it in a braid or ponytail, and she's constantly complaining about it being too long and getting in the way. She changes the subject when I tell her to just cut it short then, the same way she does when I suggest she trades in the messenger bag for a regular backpack.

She's wearing her uniform too, but she wisely opted for the short sleeved collared shirt and a grey pleated skirt, anticipating the heat of the day. She is still wearing her grey and navy bow tie—everyone has the option to choose between a regular tie or a bow tie, but only the girls ever wear the bow tie because they just make the boys look like they're cosplaying the eleventh Doctor or something—but I wasn't expecting anything less. El doesn't often wear makeup or do her nails, but she is always impeccably dressed. Not wearing neckwear of some sort would be an affront to her dignity, I think.

“You look awful, Adam,” she says after giving me a good hard look up and down.

“Don't I always?” I reply, still grinning.

She shrugs. “I guess so. I just always forget how shitty you look after I haven't seen you for a while.”

“Language, Eleanor!” her mother, who is tying her youngest son's tie into a complex windsor knot, scolds.

“Sorry Mom,” El says, not sorry at all.

“Hi Adam, bye Adam!” the middle child, Noemi, calls to me as she rushes past, backpack askew, towards where her friends are gathered. She's fourteen this year, and far too cool to be seen with her parents, big sister, or little brother for more than five minutes at a time.

“Bye Noemi,” I call after her, but she's already gone.

“Come on.” El links arms with me and begins dragging me down the drive as well. “Before everything good is gone. I'm starving, and if I don't get at least one pancake, the entire school year will be ruined.”