Before I Knew Her (Rosehill Hearts #1)

Prologue

Before

The moment I walk through the double doors, I feel like I’m drowning in a sea of noise and confidence. Students are everywhere, greeting each other after a long summer apart.

Cheerleaders talk at each other in excited voices, and football players shout without a care in the world, towering over me in a way that makes me feel even smaller than I already am.

Why don’t they tell you everyone in high school is so tall?

I pull my schedule out of my backpack and scan the page for my assigned locker number, counting them down, as I try to stay out of the way.

I release a breath when I find the right one, but the relief I feel is short-lived.

Because where it should be, between lockers 27 and 29, stands a giant in a football jacket.

He’s big enough to qualify as an actual grown man with strong arms wrapped around a blonde cheerleader, kissing her against my locker.

“Um, excuse me?”

They don’t acknowledge me.

I clear my throat and try again, louder this time.

Nothing.

Does kissing stop up your ears?

With no other option, I tap the girl on the shoulder.

She jerks back, her eyebrows shooting up when she sees me. “What? Can’t you see I’m busy?”

She says it like I’m the one inconveniencing her.

“Y-yes, sorry.” Both of them are looking at me now, but the guy’s eyes dance with amusement as he leans against my locker. “It’s just—” I point behind them, my voice trembling.

“You’re sort of blocking my locker.”

The cheerleader huffs, but she steps aside, muttering something under her breath that I probably don’t want to hear, while the football player seems to be somewhat apologetic.

“My bad, little man,” he says. “We didn’t see you there.”

I nod, feeling my face burn.

Little man.

My stomach twists at the name, but I grip the strap of my backpack and take a deep breath.

The couple is already walking into the crowd, oblivious to anyone around them.

This is going to be a long year.

I don’t talk much during my classes.

Some of my teachers try to get me to open up, to call on me and ask me questions, but they don’t get that being noticed isn’t always a good thing.

I hate having attention on me. Being perceived.

I know that’s weird, that there must be something wrong with me, but I don’t have the words for what.

My stomach growls, not for the first time today, the pangs of hunger becoming too much to ignore.

I curse internally, something that would certainly disappoint my mother, but I overslept this morning, meaning I only had time for a banana.

So against everything in me, I start toward the cafeteria, a place I’ve learned to avoid at all costs if I want to make it through the day unscathed.

By now, I’ve memorized every route that avoids the locker rooms, the back stairs, the benches outside the gym. I know which bathrooms are empty during lunch. I know that if I take my time walking to the library, I can miss the football team.

Today I have to walk right past the gym or go hungry until dinner.

I can hear the voices drifting from the cafeteria, so I walk faster, almost there. I make it past the gym when I hear footsteps behind me, followed by boisterous laughter.

My stomach drops.

“Yo, Kaaaaavi,” I hear in a sing-song voice behind me.

I stiffen, but I keep walking.

“Hey, man, don’t be rude! We’re trying to say hi,” another voice calls.

I don’t look back, but I don’t run, either.

That would only make it worse.

There’s a tug on the strap of my backpack, jerking me back a step.

It’s three of them this time. I don’t know all their names, but I recognize their faces. Juniors, football jerseys, the same group that hasn’t left me alone since school started.

All three of them are at least a foot taller than I am, twice my size in every way.

“Where you headed, little guy?” one of them asks in a mocking tone. “Gonna draw some pretty flowers?”

I’m not quite sure what’s so amusing about drawing flowers, but I suppose in their macho brains, it makes me less of a man.

That doesn’t bother me in the slightest.

“Hey, Kavi!” One of the other guys speaks up, “I got something you can draw!” He follows that up by grabbing at his crotch.

Ugh. Disgusting.

They always say something about art. Or my clothes. Sometimes they make stupid voices that are supposed to sound like me.

And sometimes they get straight to pushing me around.

It seems like one of those days when one of them grabs me by the shirt and shoves me into the locker. The force of the hit knocks the wind out of me, making my sketchbook fall from my arms.

It hits the tile and loose pages scatter everywhere.

“Oops. Better be careful with that,” The big sweaty guy says, moving back to join his friends again.

I peel myself from the lockers, dropping to my knees to gather the pages with shaky hands.

I’m not going to cry in front of them.

A foot kicks a few pages across the floor, so I have to crawl after them while lockers slam around us, other students acting like nothing is happening.

I’m invisible.

While I’m picking up my scattered drawings, a fourth pair of shoes joins the group.

“Seriously?” I glance up and find Nate Wesley, star quarterback, looking down at me and then looking back up at the three idiots.

“You guys don’t have anything better to do than pick on freshmen?” he asks with raised eyebrows and his arms crossed over his chest.

They freeze at that.

Not out of guilt, but embarrassment. Nate is the captain of the team. If he thinks this is lame, then it’s lame.

“We were just messing around,” one mutters.

“Yeah, well,” Nate shrugs, “find someone who thinks it’s funny.”

They shuffle away, tails between their legs.

I watch them until they’re out of sight before I turn back to look at Nate. I find him already looking down at me with a look on his face I don’t understand, his eyes ghosting over my scattered art, and then back to my face.

For a second, I think he might say something, even help. But after a moment, he turns and walks away without a word.

I sit there for a second longer, kneeling on the cold floor, before collecting the rest of my pages with sweaty hands.

Assholes.

By spring, the art room has become my sanctuary.

It’s quiet after school. I like it best that way, when the noise of the day has faded, and it’s only me, my paintbrush, and the hum of the music Ms. Price leaves on throughout the day.

She says she likes the company, and I think she understands that I don’t want to go home yet.

This room is the only place I can be myself, whoever that is.

Ms. Price is different, with her baggy clothes and long ginger braid, her voice somehow rough and kind at the same time.

She’s not what you would expect a teacher from Rosehill to be, but still, she’s unapologetically herself.

I admire that about her.

She’s standing behind me while I work, watching my brush glide across the canvas. “This is excellent, Kavi. You’ve really improved this year.”

I glance at her with a smile and turn back to my painting of a woman sitting cross-legged, hugging her knees.

She’s hiding, but there’s a glowing quality to her, trying to break free from her shell, but something is holding her back.

“I think I understand how she feels,” I admit, and Ms. Price nods, like that makes perfect sense.

“You’ve got a gift.” She settles onto a stool beside me. “Not only talent, but empathy. That you can’t teach.”

I shrug, unsure how to respond to that. If it’s even true.

She leans forward, focused on my painting. “You ever think about teaching?”

“Teaching?”

She nods. “You’ve got the heart for it. And the talent. But the heart is what makes a good teacher, especially in a place like this.”

My first instinct is to scoff. Me? A teacher? In Rosehill?

“I don’t think people here would want someone like me teaching their kids.”

“Maybe not, but they don’t know you yet. Someday, they will. And you’d be exactly the person a kid like you needs to see standing at the front of the room.”

She doesn’t expect an answer. She never does. She stands and crosses the room to clean her brushes, the conversation is over.

I stare down at my painting, the woman, the escaping light, the shadowed face, and I wonder if she feels like there’s something wrong with her the way I do?

Now

The room looks smaller than I remember.

The tables are arranged in clusters, stained with years of paint, charcoal, and glue. The big window that overlooks the football field is cracked in the corner, just as it was ten years ago.

But the old easel in the front?

That’s mine now.

I set my bag down, aware that my hands are trembling slightly, but I walk to the center of the room, breathing it all in.

Being back here, in this room, takes me back to being an awkward teenager in the wrong body, but it takes me back to all of those afternoons spent with Ms. Price, discovering who I am.

I pull out my syllabus, smoothing the paper even though it’s already perfect, before I set it down. I touch the surface of the teacher’s desk, where Ms. Price used to sit and watch me draw.

When I saw her email about the job opening, it felt like fate.

I take a deep breath before I straighten my shoulders and walk to the whiteboard.

I write my name, Iris Patel, in large letters across the whiteboard.