A wide-eyed figure stared up at the illustrious mansion standing before her, completely taken aback by the sight. It was a structural masterpiece, beautiful architecture surrounded by well-manicured gardens and impressive wrought-iron gates. The whole setting seemed very imposing, almost intimidating, but the prospective student found herself rooted to the spot. And despite the grandeur of the school, things seemed and felt relatively normal, some students even laughing and playing Frisbee on the front lawn. (She didn’t notice the boy with bug eyes.)
She glanced back at her bags, which were sitting in a messy pile beside her, and pondered how she was going to carry all of them to the front door, which loomed too far ahead of her. With a lonely pang, she almost wished her parents were there to help her settle in. But she knew that would only spell disaster for all of her carefully crafted plans. The whole point was for them
not to find out about her…mutant-ness. The girl needed to, proverbially, suck it up and acclimate to her new environment, which actually didn’t seem all that different from the one she was used to. If the giggling high school kids were any indication, she would probably fit in alright.
She took a deep breath, eyed the shiny black button that would cement her fate at the mansion, and pressed it. A high-pitched beeping noise emanated from the call box, followed by crackling.
A friendly voice emerged, light static surrounding it, “Yes, how may I help you?”
“Um, I’m a new student,” she said dumbly, forgetting all of her well-rehearsed introductory lines.
“What’s your name?”
“Jack. Uh, Jacqueline Little.”
Later…
“And finally, this is your room,” the tour guide said, gesturing to an upcoming door on the Girls’ Wing. “Since you’ve expressed interest in a roommate, you’ve been assigned to a girl named Elizabeth Sundance. If you have any issues, you can contact the main office. Oh, and your bags are all inside already. Have any last questions?” he asked, handing over the key to her room.
Jack shook her head no. “Thank you so much for the tour,” she said with a tentative smile.
“No problem. Feel free to approach me if you think of any questions. See you around.” He grinned and waved goodbye
She nodded and said her goodbye to the tour guide, turning back to the door to her room…and to her future. Oh gosh, thinking of it like that made her skin crawl with cheesy discomfort. But it was sort of true, wasn’t it? Turning that door knob…meeting her roommate and unpacking…they would be the first steps toward her future at the new school. Not to be overdramatic, but it was kind of a pivotal moment for her…
Jack laughed. It was not the time for such deeply absurd thoughts.
She cleared her head and her throat before turning the doorknob, ready to meet her roommate. She was happily greeted by…nothing. There was no one in the room. Aw, man. The teenager silently sighed and strolled over to what she assumed to be her bed, seeing as how it was bare. Her bags and belongings were piled next to it, waiting to be unpacked and tucked away. Her whole life, stuffed into one duffle bag, two full-size suitcases, and one big cardboard box…how unnerving.
Not that that could begin to cover all of the strange things Jack had seen that day. Mutants, she decided, were fascinating. But some of them were also very weird. During her tour she had seen bug mutants, fire mutants, mutants with several heads, amongst many, many others. But by far, the strangest sight was a candelabra mutant. Literally, a boy in the shape of a candle holder. She felt quite rude, gawking at the awkward mutant (who very much resembled Lumiere from Beauty in the Beast, sans the charming accent), but found she could not look away. Her guide had seemed unfazed throughout the tour, so she only felt foolish for reacting in such a way.
She realized that Elizabeth, her roommate, could potentially have a physical mutation much like the ones she had passed by in the corridors. Not that Jack had anything against such mutations, or mutants in general, but it certainly would take her some getting used to…and proper preparation to engage. Perhaps it wasn’t such a bad thing that Elizabeth wasn’t present. She leaned back and tried to think of a proper way to greet her possibly physically mutated roommate, but a sudden disturbance interrupted her anxious thoughts.
Jacqueline Little, recently emerged mutant and future starving artist, was very, very hungry. She had been too nervous to eat much that day, but eventually her hunger had to catch up with her. The guide had said that the kitchen was open to everyone, and she had spied a few students lounging around there and the adjacent living room. It wouldn’t hurt to check it out, would it? And it was never too early to start socializing. Jack made up her mind, steeled herself for the visual onslaught, and headed out the door, her destination the kitchen.
