First-Year Orientation

by Eric Smith, Lauren Gibaldi, Queen of Swords LLC, Farah Naz Rishi, Olivia A. Cole

Genres: YA Contemporary

Synopsis

Sixteen acclaimed authors—including a National Book Award nominee, a New York Times best-selling novelist, and a beloved actress—join forces for a cross-genre YA anthology of linked short stories about the first days of college.

Jilly cannot believe her parents keep showing up at all of her orientation events. (Except, yes, she can totally believe that.) Isaac wants to be known as someone other than the kid who does magic and has an emotional support bunny. Lilly is stuck working at the college bookstore during orientation (but maybe new friends are closer than they appear). Hira, meanwhile, just wants to retire from ghost hunting once and for all, but a spirit in the library’s romance section has other ideas. For their sophomore effort, the contributing editors behind the critically acclaimed Battle of the Bands admit us to opening day at a fictional college, with a collection that makes an ideal high school graduation gift or “summer-before” read. This colorful array of stories spans genres and moods—from humorous to heartfelt to ghostly—tackling with sensitivity, humor, and warmth what it feels like to take those first shaky steps into adulthood.

With stories by:
Adi Alsaid * Anna Birch * Bryan Bliss * Gloria Chao * Jennifer Chen * Olivia A. Cole * Dana L. Davis * Kristina Forest * Lauren Gibaldi * Kathleen Glasgow * Sam Maggs * Farah Naz Rishi * Lance Rubin * Aminah Mae Safi * Eric Smith * Phil Stamper

 

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Release date: April 4, 2023

Publisher: Candlewick Press

Print pages: 318

Sample

Don't Worry, Nothing Bad Happens to the Rabbit

Eric Smith

A silver dollar dances between my fingers as I walk toward the entryway to Rolland College. It’s this big sandstone-looking arch that meets in the middle of a small brick wall, shrubs and little trees lining the exterior. I run my free hand over the bricks, the grit tickling my skin as I pass under the archway, and flick my coin into the air, my thumbnail colliding with the silver with a satisfying, reverberating chime.

I swipe it out of the air, silencing the music, just as a large bin the size of a Smart car rumbles past me, pushed along by two kids wearing matching purple polo shirts. ROLLAND COLLEGE is emblazed on the back of each shirt, and what looks like a family hustles after the kids. I don’t get a good look at anybody, but the way they’re moving and chatting . . . I can tell they are happy. Excited. I moved in all my stuff this morning, got Bigwig’s small cage secured in the room. Mom thought it would be a good idea to get here as early as humanly possible so no one bothered Bigwig, but I think it was more about Dad worrying that people would bother him about Bigwig.

I love my dad, but he still doesn’t understand. Thinks that if I take a few deep breaths or sign up for yoga at the YMCA, my anxiety will just disappear. When my doctor suggested a support animal, my dad asked, “But have you tried just . . . not being anxious?”

Thanks, Dad.

People are still flowing onto the campus late into the afternoon, though it’s way less harried now than it was when my parents and disinterested sister dropped me here earlier. I run my coin over my fingers again, just as a girl walking with that family turns around, an iPhone in her hand. She’s pointing it all over, like she’s trying to record or take photos of everything nearby.

I lean against the low wall attached to the arch, trying my best to look . . . god, I don’t know, cool or nonchalant? How does one lean in a way that looks cool? Everyone on television seems to know how to

 do it, but I feel like I’m just going to tip over.

I focus on my coin, but when I look up, I notice the girl is focused right on me.

She smirks a little, and the sheer power of that smirk seems to knock my coin out of the air. It pings against the cobblestone sidewalk, and I scramble to pick it up before it gets lost in the grass or falls down a hidden drain or something. It’s not like I can’t get another, but silver Peace Dollars are like thirty dollars a pop on eBay, and the next flea market ripe for rummaging for old coins isn’t for another few weeks. And, well, I’m not in Richmond anymore. I wonder if they have flea markets like that here in New Jersey. They must.

I could just use a regular silver dollar—I packed a bunch of them just in case—but it’s the risk of dropping something rare that makes me try harder not to drop it, you know?

Magic is in the challenge. In the risk.

I scoop it up just as another bin full of clothes, furniture, and whatever rumbles by. The curly-haired girl and her iPhone (and her family, I guess) are gone, having disappeared into the small bundles of kids and people making their way toward the dorms. I can’t believe just hours ago there were lines along this path, parents and their kids backed up all the way to the parking lot, and now it feels like everything will be over in an hour or so.

For a beat I look at the coin and then up ahead. The sound of rumbling moving bins and cheerful voices fades out for a moment, and I shake my head.

It’s college. I’m supposed to reinvent myself, according to my friends back home. And my cousin who already goes here, Megan.

“Girls aren’t going to swarm to you because of a bunch of magic tricks, man,” Seth had said, gripping my shoulder in the hallway of our high school, prom a few days away and me completely dateless. “It’ll be different in college, though. You’ll see. Just . . . maybe less magic and a little more you.”

I sigh and stuff the coin into my pocket, a deck of playing cards squished in there alongside my wallet. There’s a surprising number of wildflowers along the path, and I pluck a few dandelions for Bigwig. I try to shake off echoes of Megan telling me “You know, magic isn’t a personality” when she showed up to help my family unpack my dorm, her snar

k rattling around in my head. Like she’s one to talk. Her acoustic guitar and coffee shops are her entire personality. We get it, you can play breathy, folk-indie covers of OneRepublic songs.

I just brought a few decks of playing cards and my coins. It’s not like I have a top hat with a magic wand and a rabbit or something.

Well, I guess that’s not true. Bigwig is here with me. But he doesn’t count. He’s not here for magic. He’s here for me.

I mean, geez, there’s no gigantic ice cube tray for making me into David Blaine. Let me just have this.

There’s not much to do until the big meet and greets with other students, or that concert on the quad all the excited guides managed to mention to me at least a dozen times during move-in, so I make my way back to the dorms, following the small line of orange bins across campus.

It’s nice here. I was worried since I didn’t get to do an actual tour. Campus being more than three hundred miles away, combined with some horrible weather and constant blackouts at home, kept delaying the trips until it was kinda too late. And exploring using Google Maps and shaky iPhone videos from Megan could do only so much. Coming from Richmond, Virginia, a city with wooded hideaways smack in the middle of it and a massive river nearby, I wondered if I’d be okay not really having that as much anymore. There are woods around the campus, sure. I feel this tug in the center of my chest toward them, the huge maple trees with leaves that are changing just a little too early, bold and beautiful, bordering all the buildings. Where everything might be quiet for a spell. But I know if I walk just a little ways through them, I’ll likely pop out somewhere in the college town.

Wandering the wilderness only to push aside a bit of brush to end up at a Starbucks . . . It’s not the same as finding yourself near the James River in Richmond, which cuts through the city, with rocks to jump on to avoid the calm, lapping water. Where I could sit, undisturbed, watching the egrets and herons catch fish and massive snapping turtles the size of sewer grates snoozing under branches like they weren’t slightly terrifying modern dinosaurs.

I’ll make it work, thou

gh.

I’m sure there’s some mysteries out there. I overheard a girl rambling about ghosts in the library when I was getting breakfast in the cafeteria—apparently called Tot, for some reason—with my family, prompting my dad to ask if I was sure I didn’t want to just come home and go to the University of Richmond with Seth. Megan said it was all just a rumor, but that girl seemed intense about it. Maybe I’ll make some new friends who want to explore with me, maybe find some ghosts.

I reach into my pocket and grab my coin, passing by a few more bins and families, looking at them while also not looking at them, and wonder how to even do that. I feel . . . invisible right now, but not in the way a fun magic trick might make me vanish. On the contrary, I want people here to see me.

The greatest trick I’ll have to pull off here is finding a way to reappear.

I squish into an elevator with two families who seem to be practically vibrating with excitement as we move a few floors up into the dorm, and I immediately regret my decision to skip the stairs. I’m not a huge fan of elevators in the first place, and I’m especially not when there are ten people crammed inside. The elevator jostles about at each floor stop, and I make a mental note to take the stairs whenever I’m here. It’s just three floors. I’ll survive.

Everyone else gets off on the second floor, and I make my way down the hall toward my room on the third. Every door is wide open in the hallway, the sounds of music and loud talking bouncing off the walls around me. I dart quick glances at each doorway, and it’s all mostly other first years, at least I think, getting themselves situated.

A fluttering movement catches my attention, and I turn to spot parents (I assume) putting Minnie Mouse sheets on someone’s bed. It’s sweet. My parents got new sheets for me to take to college, but dropping the still-sealed packages from Target on the mattress was the extent of their help making the bed. My dad is more of a roll-fitted-sheets-into-a-ball kind of person, which always drives Mom up the wall.

My room’s at the end of the hall, and as I get closer, I notice there’s movement inside.

I force a smile to crack my face, and I have to push down . . . Is it anxiety or excitement brewing in my chest? Whoever my roommate is, they’re here. I spent the summer a bit jealous of my friends back home who had connected with their future roomies, chatting in DMs or texting. My pal Rich even managed to connect with his entire suite, and he couldn’t stop talking to me about Mike and Chris, two dudes who were suddenly his new best friends.

As annoying as Megan is, ragging on me for the magic and just, like, existing, at least she’s here. I’m hopeful we’ll be able to hang out a bit, and maybe she’ll introduce me to some of her pals. But one tidbit of advice stuck in my head all summer long.

“When you head off to college, you’ll learn who your real friends are.”

I thought it was just her being bitter. I know she was really popular in high school with her music and all and lost some of that when she graduated. I never really thought about how the girls she was connected at the hip to almost my entire life, who sometimes showed up for Thanksgiving and other holidays with her, were just . . . suddenly gone. Why would I notice, though? I didn’t hang out with them. They didn’t really talk to me. They were just her mostly faceless squad that sometimes popped up on my Instagram, posing with heart hands and sunsets, calling each other best friends forever.

That moment of things splitting off, of friendships fracturing . . . I just didn’t realize so much of that would happen the summer beforehand. Friends who were once inseparable from me, off with their college pals. Or starting school early, moving into campus over the summer to work part-time jobs and take courses. I was never popular, but, like, I had people. Friends who I sat with at boring football games and gathered together to see whatever the latest Marvel movie was. Who slept over in grade school and who I cried with in cafeterias over breakups and chicken patties.

I dig my hands into my pockets as I near the doorway to my room, pulling out the d

andelions for Bigwig. I take a deep breath. I’ll have to explain about the bunny. But who doesn’t like bunnies? It’ll be fine. It’ll all be okay—

“What is all that?” a voice asks.

“I dunno.” Someone else scoffs. “Looks like . . . books about magic?”

“Like the cards with monsters and spells and shit?”

“No, like, magic tricks. Making cards disappear or whatever.”

“Oh.” Someone else snorts out a laugh, and I’m not sure who. I’ve stopped moving, and I lean against the wall next to the door right outside the threshold. “Is that a pet rabbit? What a dork.”

“Ugh.” The first voice groans. “This was supposed to be my year, man. Meet a bunch of girls. Just sleep the fuck around. And now I’m gonna have . . . David Copperfield here cramping my style.”

“Who is that?”

“Some old magician, made the Statue of Liberty disappear.”

“What? That sounds awesome!”

“It wasn’t.”

“Well. Maybe your roommate is cool, who knows?”

“Yeah, right.” There’s a rattling noise and the sound of scrambling. “Who the hell brings a bunny to college?”

“Hey, man, you probably shouldn’t do that.”

More rattling.

“Whatever, it’s fine. Come here, bunny—”

That sound breaks through the voice again, and it snaps me out of my eavesdropping.

They’re kicking or shaking or hitting Bigwig’s cage.

I hurry into the room, dandelions clutched in my hand.

Three guys all turn to look at me at once, including the one who was clearly rattling Bigwig’s cage, his foot still pressed against the wire mesh. He steps back quickly, but it’s too late, I’ve seen him. All three of them look . . . weirdly the same, tall white kids wearing stonewashed jeans and T-shirts that just have random words on them. They look like the

 kind of kids I used to see running around Virginia Beach, wearing sunglasses inside boardwalk restaurants serving fried food, their hair held in place by ocean air and salt.

“Hey,” the cage rattler says, taking a step toward me. “Are you . . . uh . . .”

“Isaac.” I nod, looking down at Bigwig. He’s in the corner of his cage, pressed against the plastic bottom, his nose and whiskers flickering intensely.

“Nick.”

I walk around him, open the top of Bigwig’s cage, and drop some dandelions in. He starts devouring them immediately, and then I wonder with a sudden jolt if they spray anything on the plants on this campus. I make a note to ask someone next time, especially if I plan to take Bigwig outside in his harness. I bet the woods would be safe, though.

“How’d you, uh, manage to get a bunny in here?” Nick asks, looking from me to his friends as I close Bigwig’s cage.

“Is he part of your magic act?” one of the other guys asks, barely suppressing a giggle. I glare at him and he shrinks away a little. “Sorry.”

“He’s an emotional support animal. I have really bad anxiety,” I grumble. “Bigwig helps.”

“Bigwig?” Nick asks, but with a laugh.

“Yeah, you know . . . Watership Down?”

He stares at me.

“So I’m taking it you’re not an English major?” I ask.

“Nah, business.” Nick shrugs, weirdly puffing up at the mention of his major, like a peacock. “My dad runs a hedge fund, hoping to do the same someday, I think.” He smirks. “There’s probably a joke in there somewhere about hedges and bushes and rabbits, but I’m a little too tired from unpacking to think of it.”

This cracks a little smile out of me.

Okay, Nick.

“Sorry about earlier.” Nick fidgets a little. “I didn’t mean to like . . . rough up your rabb

it. I was just curious—”

“It’s okay.” I shrug. It’s not, but I don’t want to start things off on a sour note here. We have to live together. His bed is like four feet away from mine, and with Bigwig at the foot of my bed, he’s not too far away, either. The idea of being so close in proximity to someone who doesn’t like me, who doesn’t like my rabbit, makes me feel tense all over.

There’s a little pause in the conversation. People are still chatting in the hallway, the sound of doors opening and closing, music blasting, filling the space between me and these dudes.

“So . . .” One of Nick’s friends shrugs, looking around at all of us. “You, uh, do magic?”

“A little.” I shrug right back.

“Show us something.” He folds his arms, nodding at me. Nick’s eyes light up a little and he smiles at his bros.

“Yeah, totally!” Nick exclaims, sitting on his bed. He pats it, and the two guys sit with him.

“Oh, uh . . . s-sure,” I stammer, my heart suddenly pounding. The guys in Nick’s crew or whatever haven’t even bothered to introduce themselves. I don’t want to put a show on for them. They don’t care about me; it feels like every detail I share with them is a joke. My hands are sweating and I take a deep breath, the kind my dad is convinced will cure my anxiety and absolutely does not do that.

I look down at Bigwig and debate taking him out, but as if on cue, he flops over on his side with a loud floooffff against the paper bedding. I wish I could relax that easily.

I take the cards out of my pocket, and with a quick movement, shuck them out of their small box. The quick shhhkt sound the paper makes against the box is so satisfying. It calms me down a little, the texture of the back of the cards soothing, and I shuffle them between my hands. They flutter from one to the other, and one of Nick’s bros nods, looking at least somewhat impressed.

“All right, pick a card.” I hold them out to Nick, and one of his friends reaches out to pluck one instead. Nick gives him a playful shove, and all of them

lean in to look at the card. “Show it to . . . okay, never mind. You’ve all seen the card, right? Pop it back in the deck here.”

The guy puts the card back. I shuffle the cards about a little, knowing perfectly well where his card is. I let him cut the deck a few times, and then I lift up the stack.

“Is this your card?” I ask.

“No?” The guy snorts, looking at his bros. At Nick, who winces a little.

“Really?” I ask, and flip the deck around. It’s an eight of clubs. It’s absolutely his card.

“Nah.” The guy shrugs. “Had a king, I think.”

Nick sighs and rubs his forehead. Okay, at least he’s aware his friends are dicks.

“I’m pretty sure—” I start.

“Don’t beat yourself up, champ,” the guy says, getting up from the bed. He leans on Nick’s desk, smirking.

Ugh. It is the eight of clubs. He’s just fucking with me.

“Okay, well, we’re gonna go get lunch. I’ll see you tonight, I guess?” Nick says, breaking up the scene. “You going to orientation or the concert?”

“Yeah, orientation for as much as I can.” I shrug. “Probably not the concert. All those people.”

“Ah, right. Right. The anxiety. The rabbit.” He nods, his mouth a thin line. “All right, see you, Isaac.”

He walks out the door, his two dude friends following. Maybe this won’t be so bad. He didn’t seem like he was that terrible, even if his friends absolutely were. I could tell he wasn’t thrilled with how his one pal was—

“Man, sucks to be you.”

I look toward the door. Nick and his boys are gone, but I can hear their voices in the hallway.

“Says you.” I make out Nick’s voice. “I’ll tell girls there’s a pet bunny in my room and that’ll be it. Accidental wingman.”

“Huh. Okay. Fair enough.”

“Kid is seriously weir

d, though.” I recognize card guy.

“Yeah, well, we’ll see how it goes,” Nick says, and their voices fade and then vanish.

I scoop Bigwig out of his cage and sit down on my bed, nestling him in my lap. I take a bundle of deep breaths, running my hands over his fur. He’s warm and nuzzles into me. It’s okay. It’s all right to be upset and stressed and angry like this. But oh my god, why couldn’t I have a cool roommate? Someone nice? After a summer of slowly losing most of my friends to growing up and moving on, why did I get this guy, out of everyone I possibly could have gotten?

I look out the small window near my bed, which much to my surprise overlooks the patches of woods by the school. Hmm. I look down at Bigwig and glance over at his harness sitting on my dresser.

Orientation isn’t for another few hours. I’ve got time.

I ruffle Bigwig’s fur.

“Let’s go, buddy.”

I was mistaken about the woods. They’re thick. Lush, even. I figured I’d peer in and be able to see, like, an Applebee’s through the tree trunks and brush, but it’s just more woods, farther and farther in. I close my eyes and inhale, and I swear I can even smell a creek nearby, in the way fresh water makes the air crisp.

Like back home in Richmond.

“All right, feels safe here.” I nod, putting Bigwig down on the forest floor, his leash in my hand. His harness looks a bit silly, I know, like a rabbit wearing a sweater vest, but it’s the best way to keep him secure and comfortable walking around. You have to be careful with a harness on a rabbit, or any kind of leash, really. They’re just fragile animals; if they get scared, they can break their own necks.

Bigwig immediately hops around happily, no doubt excited to stretch his legs after being trapped in my parents’ car all the way up here from Richmond. A

nd being stuck in his cage, for that matter. Back at home, he was a house rabbit, mostly. Free rein of my bedroom, sometimes the downstairs. But now he’s going to be stuck in that cage. I’ll have to bring him out here often. Figure out a routine and a time when the least amount of people might be around.

I sit down on what looks like a buried boulder, a thick slice of gray sticking out of the ground, and fuss with my silver dollar. Shifting it from one hand to the other and back, making it appear to vanish one moment, reappear the next. I keep going until the motion feels fluid, and I feel the tension releasing from my chest and shoulders. Here, in the woods. A rabbit nibbling grass. The smell and sound of running water, the control of something in my hands.

I know Dad doesn’t understand. My sister doesn’t, either, not really.

My old friends back home, maybe we’ll find our way back to each other at some point, but who knows. Sometimes it felt like they understood. Sometimes. That with magic, these little tricks, there’s comfort. In what you can control, in letting people see what you want them to. About what’s in front of them.

The sound of hurried footsteps snaps me out of my near trance. Bigwig goes still, looking in the direction of the movement. I look around, wondering if there’s another animal out here, but the steps get closer, more urgent, and I hear . . .

Someone talking to themself?

“And out here, you can really see how thick the wilderness is,” the voice says, and I watch as that girl with the devastating smirk and short curly hair bursts out from some shrubs. Her iPhone is in front of her, and she’s talking into it.

She lowers it, playing herself back. She mumbles something, and then holds it up again, adjusting her hair.

“Um—” I start.

“Oh my god!” she shouts, and her phone hurtles out of her hand, clattering against the rock and tumbling to the ground. Bigwig gets a bit startled and darts around, and I scramble for him as she dives for her phone.

I’m on the forest floor, bunny in my arms, and she’s sitting right across from me, looking at her phone from all angles. After a beat and some silence, she looks up at me and down at Bigwig.

“Sorry about that.” I clear my throat. “Is your phone okay?”

“Yeah . . .” She keeps

looking down at Bigwig. “Is that a rabbit on a leash?”

“Yeah, this is Bigwig.”

“Like the punk rock band?”

“No, like from Watership Down.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

She looks around the woods, wringing her wrists, and sets her eyes on him again. She stoops down and glances back up at me.

“Is it okay if I pet him?” she asks. “And maybe . . . take some videos?”

“Yeah, sure. He’s . . . that’s his job, really. ...