I still wasn’t sure they’d show up, even only a few days out. But I could hope. Or I could sit there and be miserable. Or, heck, I could call somebody else at the last minute. Kanesha was putting together a southern style dinner for the other girls. I donated a pie from the Dupont Circle farmer’s market.

It was only fair, given she’d assumed I’d be there and I was bailing on her. I felt guilty about that, but this was important.

Or would blow up into some kind of massive fight that might even take out the Old Ebbitt. I didn’t know. All I hoped and prayed was that nothing else would happen between now and then.

Well, not prayed. I wasn’t even sure who to pray to. I wanted to know, that was all, and if I was right, I wanted to…connect.

Connect with them, work out how I really fit in. Even though I knew everything could end in disaster.

Maybe everything would, I thought, as the history teacher droned on about something or other, his voice such a monotone that I was reminded of the ghost teacher in Harry Potter.

Sometimes he showed more enthusiasm. Not today. Maybe he was coming down with something. I was nasty enough to hope he was, so we’d get a couple of days of a substitute.

The last substitute history teacher we’d had had been funny, although he’d been recycling his jokes within three days, so keeping him around might not have worked.

Which all meant I was thinking about family stuff and not…oh, right, he was talking about the 1920s and the boom and the craziness.

I made desultory notes in the hope of remembering it all, and barely stopped myself from doodling in the corner. In the mood I was in, I’d probably doodle an eight-legged horse. Then again, these were my notes. The teacher wouldn’t see them. In defiance, I sketched a quick version of exactly that, then went back to taking notes until the bell rang, pretty much mid sentence.

He did that a lot. Never seemed able to time his presentations properly. He stammered out a reading assignment even as we fled the room. There wasn’t exactly much time between periods, after all.

I was pretty sure half of the class hadn’t heard it. I was nervous, though. I felt more like I was meeting a boyfriend (or girlfriend)’s parents rather than confronting those I was still not 100% sure were my own.

Yes. It felt much more like that, but I knew I had a connection to him. I’d known it from the start. Just not wanted to admit what it was.

Then?

The fire alarm went off. With a sigh, I changed course to the nearest exit. Somebody had probably pulled it to get out of class again.

Somebody who wasn’t me, at least, although it had been at times tempting. But I didn’t fancy being suspended when I was finally caught.

Outside, it was raining.