Saying goodbye to my family was harder than I thought. It was short, but the emotion was intense and tears were plentiful. Tears make me uncomfortable. I never know what to do.

Aasha was crying harder than when she broke her arm last year. My mom looked like she was still in traumatic shock, tears rolling silently down her face. My dad wasn't crying (thank goodness) but he looked grave. Shreya was crying, but part of me suspected it was for show. It wasn't like I was dying or anything. That's the only time Shreya would really mourn my absence.

I let Mr. Marquez take me away with little resistance. I had no energy left. Ironic. The tears had sucked me dry of energy.

I sat in the backseat of his black, nondescript car. Part of me couldn't believe this was happening. Part of me couldn't breathe. I lay my head against the window.

"You doin' all right back there?" Mr. Marquez asked softly.

"Yeah," I mumbled.

"You're taking this better than most," he added.

"Is this your entire job?" I asked after a moment. Usually I find people hard to talk to, but Mr. Marquez was so...chill.

He laughed. "No, no, the majority of my job is teaching."

"What do you teach?"

"Ah...foreign studies."

"Oh. Like, other countries?"

"Um...sort of. You'll see."

The car lapsed back into uncomfortable silence. Mr. Marquez started humming a song I sort of recognized. I felt like...was it from Carmen? Not like it mattered.

I stared out the window, watching the world whiz by, when it started to rain. As it rained harder, raindrops would conjoin with others, and together as a bigger, thicker drop, they would slide down the window, gathering other bits of water on their way. Subconsciously, I started playing a game I had played a lot as a little kid. I pretended that the raindrops were racing each other, silently cheering on the one I wanted to win.

When I realized what I was doing, I flushed with embarrassment. And then I realized I didn't care. And played again.

Only this time, two of the racing raindrops joined with each other. So there was no winner. Or maybe they're both the winner. I don't know. That wouldn't happen unless you were a raindrop.

We finally made it to the airport. It was still raining hard, so we had to run to get inside. I didn't have any bags, only the clothes on my back: jeans and a simple red t-shirt. In the few seconds it took for us to run from the car to the awning, we were completely soaked. I brushed my long, messy hair out of my face. It was dripping water in my eyes. I sighed. Why rain? Why?

Mr. Marquez, however, was laughing. "Wasn't that fun?" he said with a twinkle in his eye.

"Um, sure. It totally wrecked your suit."

"Oh, that's not a problem," he said laughing, "it isn't even mine."

"Doesn't that make it...more of a problem?"

"Probably," he said, his laughter finally beginning to abate. "Come on, let's get you on that plane."

Making the plane wasn't an issue. It was waiting for the plane to take off. For SOME REASON, there seemed to be a million and a half issues to stop the plane from taking off. I felt edgy. Mr. Marquez wasn't with me, and the longer the plane delayed, the more I was worried.

Finally--FINALLY--the plane started moving. I let out a breath. And then I wondered why I was nervous. Shouldn't I be dreading coming to this new school...hospital? After all, he did say I'm insane.

I'm insane...

Suddenly, the full weight of those words hit me. I was insane. I didn't see what normal people saw. I didn't think what normal people thought. Everything I saw could be a lie. Everything I knew...maybe wasn't real at all.

Why the heck did they put me on a plane by myself?!?!

I felt sick. All my life, the one thing that had kept me calm was my reasoning and logic. The knowledge that I could think something through, and it could make sense. Now I didn't even have my sense, much less my reasoning and logic.

This discovery flooded me with despair and suddenly, I was exhausted. The plane ride was long; I was going to California. I leaned my head against the window and slept.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I saw the mirror again. In the mirror, there was a small boat, bobbing up and down with the waves. It was a little bit bigger than a lifeboat, and looked as if it could fit about six people comfortably. The waves lapped against the hull calmly, and the boat rocked side to side. I listened closely. It seemed to be saying something...almost.

It was like it was calling me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I woke up as the captain was warning us that we were about to land. I stretched my sore muscles. Had I really slept for almost ten hours? Wow. No wonder I was sore.

I got off the plane and realized with a start: I had no idea where to go. Mr. Marquez just told me to get on the plane. He didn't tell me what to do once I got OFF it. How had I forgotten to ask? I usually thought these things through.

Oh wait. I was insane. So it's not like me. Or I had changed. Did that make me different? Or was I someone else that no longer existed?

I was beginning to border an existential crisis.

"Hey, kid!" a rather large man in a black trench coat said. I instantly backed away.

"No, no, no," the man said holding up his hands in a surrender position. "I'm from Dr. Smith's School For Boys."

"Oh..." I came forwards warily. "How do I know?"

The man sighed. "Dang it, I made a bad first impression. Juan always says I'm too harsh. My name is George Wilkins, I'm a teacher. You came from North Carolina?" He took a folded list out of his inner pocket. "Are you...Ravi Jindal?" Only he pronounced it Ray-VEE.

"It's, um, RAH-vee, actually."

The man rolled his eyes. "Sorry I'm not perfect. Now come on, you're the last one here."

He walked away briskly, and I hurried to keep up. Who knew that such a big guy could walk so dang FAST?

We wove through the people at the airport--with several close calls where I lost sight of Mr. Wilkins--until we reached a gathering of boys in a corner. Most were sitting, though one was standing against the wall a few feet away.

As we walked up, all eyes turned to me. I could feel my face burning. I sat down next to a blonde boy who looked nice.

"Ah, now we can begin," a man with a British accent said that I hadn't noticed before. He was very...strange. Not obscurely so, just very out of place. He was in a black business suit with a red tie (which clashed with his orange-ish hair), old style wire rimmed glasses, and was sitting cross-legged on the floor with everyone else.

I scrutinized him carefully. He was a slender man, but had to be over 30. Yet here he was, sitting criss-cross-applesauce with a bunch of fourteen-year-old boys.

"Let's start with introductions. I am Dr. Smith, your new headmaster/principal/captain of your new school." He smiled brightly at us. "It, in fact, is named after me."

We stared.

He adjusted the glasses on his nose. "Let's go around the circle and say our names! That is what one does in these situations, correct?"

Some nodded slowly. Some just stared.

"Right then. Let's start with you," he said pointing to the boy two to my left. He widened his eyes. "Um, alright. I'm Noah."

Dr. Smith frowned. "This is going to be boring, I can already tell. We need something about you, something interesting." His eyes lit up. "A hobby, perhaps?"

"Ok..." the boy said, shifting uncomfortably. "I...was in the chess club at my school?"

A boy across the circle snickered. Noah looked down.

Dr. Smith pointed to the next boy. "Alright, and you?"

I bit my lip. We were going in a counter-clockwise direction, which bugged me. I like clockwise. But my mom says I need to learn to let stuff like that go. I sighed.

The blonde boy who I thought looked nice was next. He spoke very calmly and not loudly, but everyone could hear him. "Hey, my name is Isaac. A hobby of mine is probably drawing. I like art."

Then it was my turn.

"My name is Ravi, and uh...hobbies? I don't really know, um, I like to read?"

"Ravi? Like ravioli?" the boy who snickered at Noah said.

I fought the urge to roll my eyes. Like I hadn't heard THAT one before. "No. That's more of a 'ra as in rag' sound. This is 'ra as in raw meat'."

"Yeah, 'cause raw meat is better than ravioli," the boy scoffed. Then I actually DID roll my eyes.

"Now, now, boys," Dr. Smith said in a fake I'm-the-father voice, "let's be kind to each other here."

I think I saw several other people roll their eyes. Just an eye-rolling kind of day.

We continued around the circle. I began to make a mental list in my head unintentionally. I like lists. When we finished, it looked something like this:

-Noah, the quiet boy who likes chess
-Isaac, the nice boy who likes art
-Me, the awkward idiot
-Spencer, the nerdy boy who likes space
-Liam, the loud boy with no filter who likes lacrosse
-Alex, the boy who started with "yo dudes," who likes soccer
-Xavier, the African-American boy who likes YouTube and is almost as loud as Liam
-Deynan, the boy who snickered at Noah and called me Ravioli, who likes football
-Mason, the boy standing, with dark spiky hair and who looked like he would rather be in a dark basement sulking.
-Harrison, the curly brown haired boy who looked and sounded like a sheep, and liked tennis

As I reviewed the list in my head, I realized I was being really judgemental.

But then I shrugged that thought aside. It didn't really matter.

When we finished going around the circle, Dr. Smith clapped his hands in delight. "Splendid! Now that we know each other, I'm sure we'll get along fabulously. Now, to the boat!"

The what?

We walked outside the airport to a sidewalk, where Dr. Smith promptly turned right and walked out on a sidewalk. We followed a bit slower. Every now and then he would look over his shoulder and say, "Hurry up now, boys! We have places to be you know!"

"Like where?" Liam (the redhead) said loudly.

"Oh, I may as well not tell you," Dr. Smith said with a sly grin, "that will make it all the more miraculous when we arrive."

We fell silent, not sure whether to be excited or scared. We probably should've been both, knowing Dr. Smith.

We walked a long ways, out past the the highway of swiftly moving cars and gates of the airport. We must've looked pretty strange: a badly dressed man with 11 or so middle school boys trailing behind him.

Finally--FINALLY--we came to a wharf of sorts, filled with boats, ships, and sailors, loud shouts and dinging bells. The sun was beginning to set, casting a golden glow across the city. It was all very picturesque, and made me wish I appreciated art more. In all honesty, I felt like art was a bit of a waste of time. I moved my head around one of the boats to see the sun setting over the ocean. It almost looked almost like the sun was floating. I looked away quickly. Pretty as it was, it was hurting my eyes.

We stopped in front of a pretty big boat. It looked like a cruise ship. The curly print on the side read Lady Hermia. I approved of the name of the ship. Hermia was from A Midsummer Night's Dream, which was one of my favorite plays.

We walked aboard. No sooner had the first boy gotten on (Mason, the sulky boy wearing black) then the ship began to leave port.

"Well boys," Dr. Smith said, reclining backwards perched on a bench, "you're on your way towards a great adventure."

I rolled my eyes. How clichè.