Chapter 211

#78

I am sitting at the edge of the pool with my legs in the water and my sketchbook open on my lap and my headphones in and for about forty minutes I have successfully avoided thinking about anything that requires my actual attention.

Then a shadow falls across the page.

I pull one headphone out and look up. Zeke is standing behind me with his hands in his pockets. “You’re not at your desk.”

“Extremely observant,” I say. “Have you considered a career in security?”

“Your class started twenty minutes ago.”

“My class,” I say, closing the sketchbook, “can start without me. It is a screen with a teacher on it. The teacher does not know whether I am there or not. The screen is the same regardless.”

Zeke looks at me for a moment with the parti