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itself is punishment enough or they pretended not to care that Sarah had defiled her skin, because Leah said they just shrugged and Sarah’s been wearing kneesocks lately. Sarah once joked in front of me that it was a good thing I got blinded in the summer, or I might have missed a day of school, God forbid. Of course that was before I had no choice but to miss half of ninth grade. And who knows how I might be this year, who I am now?
    Spark nosed my leg, which gave me enough confidence to keep walking. And Ms. Mabel lowered her giant hand onto my shoulder and guided me, pointing out the girls’ bathroom, the teachers’ lounge, rooms 214, 216, 218, and then, maybe sensing how overwhelmed I was, she tried small talk and told me her family had lived in Sauberg for three generations, her father was the chief of police for forty years, and she lived with him until he died, and yadda yadda. Maybe she hoped she’d be the Anne Sullivan to my Helen Keller. Then she asked about my family. I said there were seven kids, and she whistled low under her breath, and thought about my parents having sex while I thought about her thinking about my parents having sex. Whenever anyone finds out that there are seven kids in my family, they imagine my mom and dad having sex. I mean, be honest. You hear “seven kids,” and you’re immediately like, “Wow, those people love having sex. It’s all they do. Constantly.”
    When we finally arrived at English, I was exhausted and ready to go home and hide under the cushions of our gold couch. I heard frantic scratching and clicking, and smelled so much white dust I felt like I’d swallowed a hopscotch. Spark sneezed.
    Ms. Spencer either didn’t notice Spark and me, or she chose not to say anything as we settled ourselves in the first row. I was grateful to be left alone. “I’ll read what she’s writing on the board as soon as she’s done,” Miss Mabel told me.
    Ms. Spencer was scribbling so fast and wildly I wondered if we were starting the year with
The Odyssey
(which Leah read to me when I was frozen on the couch, missing ninth grade, and trick or treating, and homecoming, and everything else). Maybe Ms. Spencer had decided to transcribe the entire text in chalk. A piece snapped and I heard it hit the floor.
    People were shuffling in, some pausing to gasp over the sight of me, others stopping to say hi, maul Spark, or marvel over my HumanWare brailler, the one Sarah made sure I was aware cost almost six thousand dollars. Ms. Mabel read the board into my tired right ear: “Assignments, reading, writing, journal, two analytical papers. Books:
A Raisin in the Sun
,
Macbeth
,
To Kill a Mockingbird
,
The Stranger
,
The Inferno
,
Antigone
.” I jotted the titles down in my brailler, and Ms. Mabel stayed the entire time, telling me whenever Ms. Spencer wrote anything on the board, which was approximately seven hundred times a minute. Had teachers always written on the board this much? How had I not noticed, and how would I ever manage without help? Before my accident, I would have celebrated extra hours to write my in-class exams or finish assignments. But now that I need extra time and someone else to read the board to me, I feel furious and proud and want to show everyone that I don’t need anything “special,” even though I clearly do. I hate the word
special
.
    I was considering this when someone started crying uncontrollably. I didn’t know who it was, except that it wasn’t me, thank god. No one was surprised; since Claire, crying is like clearing your throat in Sauberg. People walk the streets weeping. Ms. Spencer just clucked her mouth and said there were grief counselors downstairs to help us “deal with our feelings.” When class ended, Ms. Mabel stayed to talk to Ms. Spencer about getting me my assignments in advance so she and I could translate them into braille, and I tuned them out until they were done, when Spark and I felt our way toward the door and stood there