"Can I ask you something?" I ask as we wander down the halls looking for my locker.

"You just did."

I roll my eyes at her smirk. "You know that's not what I meant."

"I know. So, ask away." She keeps her gaze on the lockers.

"I noticed that as we walked down the hall everyones called you Sam. Not Samantha."

"And?"

"Do you prefer being called Sam?"

She turns and nods. "I do. Samantha feels so tight and stiff, and it's what my parents call me. It never feels like me. So, Sam is light and doesn't have any expectations on her."

I nod. "So, I'm good to call you Sam?"

She nods. "Please do. Oh! Here's your locker." She darts across the hall and stops before locker 234.

I join her. "So, how do I open it?"

She points at the paper in my hand. "First you'll enter the code and then it'll ask you to sync your chip up with it." She tilts her head. "Did your school not have these lockers?"

I shake my head. "We had the old lockers where it was just a lock and you had to spin the combination to open it." I take a peek at the paper and punch the numbers into the pad. 18-06-27. The screen lights green before popping up with a sync button. I open my chip screen and navigate to the settings and let it sync. "How long does it take?" I ask, looking at the two progress bars. One on the locker and one on my screen.

She shrugs. "Depends on how old your chip is and how it connects with the locker.

A sigh escapes my lip. "I'll be here a while then." I look from my silver chip to her wrist where you can't even see her chip.

She must notice because she says, "don't worry. My dad will change your chip here soon."

I nod and keep my eyes on the progress bar.

The halls are crowded, and I finally let myself soak in the noise of all the kids. But I don't look at them. I don't need to see the strange looks I'm sure to get, or the judgmental looks they'll all give.

"I'm just going to pop over to my locker, okay?" Sam looks around the hall. "I'll be right back." I don't get a chance to respond before her ponytail is swishing back and forth and disappearing into the crowd.

I sigh, both in relief and a little in frustration. At least with her gone I shouldn't stand out so much, but without her here I'm lost. The progress bar says 46% so at least it won't be done anytime soon and I can continue to stand here and think about my plan.

Which is nothing right now.

I have no idea how I'm supposed to get the information my aunt and family want. I would have wandered around their house last night but the moment I laid down in that bed I was out like a light. I hadn't realized how exhausting the day had been. And this morning, I wasn't even up early enough to look around the house and claim I had lost my way. It's a big house afterall.

"So you're the girl staying with the princess."

I jump. A guy? Girl? Leans against the locker next to me. Their hair is shaven short but colored a bright neon green color, and in the uniform they wear - that has pants! - it looks almost ridiculous.

"I'm sorry?"

"Names Blake." They hold out their hand. I stare at it for a minute and they retract it. "Not a fan of handshakes, noted. You're the exchange student, right? And you're staying with Sam?" They're green-grey eyes flick over my shoulder.

I nod. "I'm Emma."

"Nice to meet ya. What are your pronouns?"

"She and her. What are yours?" I look around the hall to see if Sams anywhere near enough to save me.

"I go by anything, but-" they point at their ears which have green dangling fluffs on them. "My earrings will tell you what I go by that day."

"And green means what?"

"They and them. Blue or red means he and him and purple or seafoam green means she and her."

"You sure like you're green don't you?"

They smile and somehow it comes off as sharp. "Glad you caught that."

"Kind of hard not to."

"Great, so now that we're introduced I'll show you around the school."

I shake my head and point to my screen. "I have to wait for this to sync." It's now at 71%.

They roll your eyes. "Sam's already lying to you."

"What-"

"You can walk around the school and it'll still sync. Don't trust the princess."

"I kind of have to!" I snap. "Sams the only person I know here!"

They grin and I swear their smile reminds me of a shark. "Now you know me. So, what's your first class?"

I look around the hall again, which is now more empty with only a few people still gathered around or standing at their lockers grabbing their stuff. "I don't know." I scratch my head. "I think I should wait for Sam."

They sigh and roll their eyes. "Fine by me." They turn so their back is now leaning against the lockers.

"What are you doing?"

"Waiting for Sam with you."

"You don't have to do that." My hand clutches into a fist. What is with this person?

They shrug. "I don't really want to go to class this morning, so I don't mind waiting."

"Why don't you want to go to class?" I ask, glancing at my screen, which is now closer to 100% but not quite.

They roll their eyes. "Because it's the worst class ever! Eco mythology? Who wants to learn about what the Earth might have looked like and what could end up springing back up?"

I frown. "I do."

"Oh."

"Emma! Oh-" I turn back around to find Sam slowing to a stop beside me. She crosses her arms and glares at Blake. "I see you've met Blake."

"Sam, long time no see." I swear, their smile gets sharper.

"Emma, sorry, I got caught up with some of my friends. How's the syncing going?" She turns to me and acts like Blake isn't there.

And I'm happy to play along. I glance at my screen. "It's complete." I show her the green filled bar.

She grins. "Great! So, we'll have to get your textbooks from the library later but right now we should get to class."

"Sounds good."

"I'll see you guys later," Blake says as we start walking around. "And, Emma." I look over my shoulder at them. "If you need help with anything let me know." Then they're spinning around and heading the opposite direction of us.

My breath catches in my throat. They couldn't know... could they?

"Ignore them," Sam says with a roll of her eyes.

"What's their problem?" I ask as I try to calm my rolling heart.

"They're just..." She sighs. "Look, I'll be upfront with you." She turns to me with a serious expression. "Blake is my ex, so they're probably just trying to get under your skin and scare you off."

"That's silly."

She nods. "It is." She continues walking. "Especially since you have no interest in dating me. So why would they even bother?"

I nod. "Yep. Totally." This is a time I'm glad it's harder to see my blush.

Sam side-eyes me. "Anyway. Just ignore Blake."

I chuckle. "I won't have any problem doing that." I hope. But if Blake is who I think they are then I won't be able to ignore them. Quite the opposite actually. "Hey," I say. "Well it's on my mind what's a girl gotta do to get some pants?" I gesture down to my skirt which isn't doing much to keep my legs warm.

A blush grows farther as Sam looks my legs up and down. She smirks. "I'll add it to the list. For now..." She stops before a door with the number sixty on it. "Let's head into class."

***

"Alright. So library, office and... was there anything else we had to do?" Sam lists the items after on her fingers.

I shake my head. "I don't think so."

The halls are littered with kids who push and shove their way through, everyone trying to reach their lockers to grab their stuff, or just trying to get out of the school so as to not miss the bus. It's different here in the way that when I look around the hall everyone looks different. Lots of people have their hair colored, others you can tell who they are and know how to refer to them. But the main difference is how the crowd isn't super diverse. Back home because of all of Asia and Europe having to condense into Old Africa to save themselves all the schools had a lot of different cultures in them. But here, even though a few students look like they come from across the sea they are still a minority. And here I'd been, thinking Merica had been super diverse. But I guess that's still not super true.

"Okay, so we'll go to the library first and then we can stop at the office and order some pants," Sam interrupts my thoughts as she does a sort of dance through the halls.

"Order some pants?" I ask, ducking between people to follow her. Not doing quite as graceful of a dance as she did.

She nods. "They don't just have some in stock. So you'll have to order some and they should be here by the end of the week."

I grimace and pull my skirt down. "I have to deal with this for a week?"

She looks back over her shoulder at me. "It's not that bad."

I roll my eyes. "Says you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

But I don't get a chance to respond as my arm is pulled and I'm tripped backwards into the crowd. Arms wrap around my shoulders and pull me out of the crowd and into a classroom. "Hey1" I yell. "What's- Oh. Blake."

They grin at me. "Hello."

I sigh and run a hand through my hair. "What do you want?"

"So, your Aunt has told me you haven't made much progress yet."

My eyes widen. I should have known. "It's been a day!" I hiss.

"Yeah? And by day one I already had some information."

"Well I'm sorry I'm not as good as Blake the Betrayer!" I glare at them.

They send a glare right back at me. "Don't call me that."

"Why not?" I place a hand on my hip. "Does it hit a sore spot?"

They shake their head, and I think it's more to dispel anything they were about to say than to answer my question. "Look." They clap their hands together. "I'm not here to fight with you."

I roll my eyes. "Could have fooled me."

"Your Aunt wants me to help you."

"I don't need your help."

"I think you do. And so does your Aunt."

My hand clutches into a fist. "I don't need the help."

They sigh and it fills up the empty room. "Look, I know my... name makes me sound untrustworthy but that's only to the people I spy on. I promise I won't betray you. We're working for the same people." They're eyes plead with me to believe them.

"It's not that. I need to do this by myself."

"Emma? Are you in there?"

Blakes eyes dart to the door. "If you won't accept my help now just know I'll be here to help you whenever you need it," they say in a hushed tone. "But please, be careful of Sam and her family. They always know more than they let on."

"Yeah sure." I roll my eyes and open the door before giving Blake a chance to hide. "Sorry, Sam." I rub the back of my neck and attempt a smile. "I somehow got tripped in the crowd and got stuck in here."

"That's alright. Are you okay?" Her gaze moves over my shoulder but drifts back to me without her saying anything.

Did Blake hide? "I'm fine. Shall we go and get my books and order some pants?"

She nods. "We should hurry though. The limo will be here soon after picking up Jax."

"Great. We shouldn't be too long then."

She sighs. "I hope so. But you never know with our librarian."