Language Problems

'…their pronunciation is so bad I want to shoot myself,' the German teacher, Anja Arnold, thought dramatically in her native tongue. She had emigrated four years ago to marry an American she met while he was on a business trip and she hated when students butchered her beautiful language.

At least…it was something along those lines. Reading Mrs. Arnold's thoughts could be difficult since Ivy's German skills were basic at best.

While there were some truly atrocious pronunciations going on she sincerely hoped hers weren't counted in her teacher's criticism. She fancied herself fairly decent at accents for all the languages she spoke after much practice watching foreign films with subtitles.

The third year German students weren't allowed to speak English or ask questions in class without being penalized. So when Ivy raised her hand to ask about the short essay they had to write she did so in German, being extra mindful of how she pronounced things to avoid her teacher's ire—even if it was just in her head. Mrs. Arnold was too nice to say such harsh things aloud.

"Frau Arnold, muss der gesamte Aufsatz in der gleichen Zeitform geschrieben werden oder sollten wir Vergangenheit und Gegenwart verwenden?"

Ivy asked about which verb tenses they needed to use in their essay because last time everything was in past tense only to make it easier.

"Beide Zeiten. Sie alle brauchen die Übung vor der nächsten Prüfung," the teacher replied. Both tenses because the students needed practice for their upcoming test.

She smiled and thought warmly, 'This girl speaks German more proficiently than most of these students combined. She must practice a lot.'

Ivy fist pumped under the table. Success! She loved hearing praise inside other people's heads. It was one of the only enjoyable things about having this power.

Several students groaned and even more complained internally.

'Both tenses? Ugh, it's hard enough keeping track of one…'

'Well, I'm officially failing this.'

'I knew I should've taken Spanish!'

'...this is going to keep me up all night, isn't it.'

'You can go take your stupid tenses and shove them up your—'

Ivy sighed. Some of the comments were even more unsavory. High schoolers could have such nasty thoughts.

Through no fault of her own, her innocence was lost far too soon. People's heads could be far worse than the 'adult' websites her mother forbid her and Ethan from seeing. It's not like she wanted to see that stuff anyway. She heard more than enough of it at school, especially from boys.

When the bell rang her thoughts were a strange mixture of German, English, and Italian because a random opera song someone had thought near her once kept running through her head. That was the problem with being multilingual—it was very difficult to keep things straight.

"Ivy Chamberlain!" the AP Bio teacher called a few minutes into her next class.

She responded, "Ja? Uh…intendo si! Aspetta, non è quello…Welche language spreche ich? Wait no, that's not—!"

Ivy hung her head in shame as people's confused thoughts flooded her mind. A few of them thought she was possessed. "What is it, Mr. Beyer?"

"If you're done please read the second paragraph on page 57. In English."

Laughter broke out among her classmates and she sunk further in her seat as she read about the main differences between amphibians and reptiles.

'What was she even saying?!'

'That was so weird. Part of that was German…what was the other part?'

'What a freak. I thought she was American!'

'Three languages in less than thirty seconds! What kind of crazy person is she?!'

'I didn't know Ivy spoke German…or whatever else that was. It wasn't Spanish but it was a little similar…'

The last thought came from Carson, sitting two rows over. His thoughts on the incident were among the more charitable ones. Ivy felt oddly grateful that he was merely curious rather than mocking her internally like most.

She really needed to watch herself better. If she didn't blend in and keep her head low she might be treated the way she was in her early elementary school years. Or worse, get outed as a telepath.

She was always so careful! Before this she only ever mixed her languages up at home when she was practicing in her room with no one the wiser.

After class she tried to escape the room as quickly as possible so she could go drown her sorrows in the last of the m&m cookies her mom had packed in her lunch. Ivy found a relatively secluded spot in a forgotten hallway to eat before heading to the library since no food was allowed in there.

Her phone buzzed. A text from Adrian so soon?

'Hey Clumsy Girl, turns out I have to make up a quiz during lunch today so I won't be able to meet you for hot chocolate. What about tomorrow?'

Tomorrow was fine; swimming in a sea of mortification, she wasn't in the mood to talk to anybody right now anyway. She needed to be on her A game when he was around so she could figure him out.

Come to think of it…what sort of observational experiments could she even do? She needed to come up with a plan to keep running into Adrian after the hot chocolate excuse was over and done with. Finding out his secret definitely wasn't going to happen during one lunch period.

'Works for me. I'll meet you outside of the cafeteria tomorrow. See you then!'

He sent a thumbs up emoji in response. Well, that was one thing taken care of.

Ivy looked at the plastic bag that once held her cookies. Only a few crumbs remained. How unfortunate. She wasn't completely cheered up yet and they were already gone. With a sigh she hoisted her backpack onto her shoulders and trudged to the library. She may as well start on that German essay since it was already on the brain.

She worked diligently throughout lunch, basking in the relative quiet of the library. Less than ten people's thoughts in a room so large were easy to block out if she concentrated. Putting on her noise-cancelling headphones and putting on classical music helped too. There were no rules against headphones at lunch.

'Why is Ivy so good at disappearing?' a complaining inner voice broke through her barrier.

Oh no. Lydia. Try as she might, Lydia had yet to locate Ivy's hiding place during lunch. If she had things her way she would drag poor Ivy into the crowded, horribly overwhelming cafeteria for lunch to sit with her large group of friends. They took up three tables pushed together!

The one time Lydia caught her had been horrible. Ivy's head hurt so badly that she needed to go to the nurse's office and lie down, missing sixth period. That was an experience she would rather not repeat.

If Ivy could hear her she had to be near the library. Which meant she could probably see through the glass doors or adjacent windows to where Ivy was sitting.

Frantically saving her document onto the flash drive she always carried with her, she exited out of the computer and scuttled to safety behind some bookshelves. Lydia wouldn't be able to find her unless she came into the library personally.

'Is she in the library?' Lydia thought as she passed by. 'No, I don't see her…maybe she's in the bathroom…but there are like three different bathrooms on this floor! Ugh! I should really just text her but she always keeps her phone on silent at school…probably wouldn't get it in time anyway…'

Lydia's inner voice faded off, indicating she was out of range. Ivy's heart rate slowly went back to what it was before the scare.

Although…she couldn't help but wonder what Lydia wanted to talk to her about. She usually didn't bother looking during the middle of lunch, preferring to try scouting her out at the beginning so Ivy could eat with her. Oh well. She could ask later.

Glancing at the clock, Ivy saw that there were less than ten minutes left of the break. Not enough time to make any progress on her essay after logging back into a computer. With a sigh she pulled a mystery novel out of her backpack and figured she could get a few pages in before it was time to go to APUSH.

Engrossed in the novel, she was startled when the bell rang. And she was just about to find out whether or not the murderer was the current boyfriend or the supposedly dead ex-fiance, too. How lame.

"English, think English," she muttered to herself, not wanting to make the same mistake from this morning.

She should be fine. Reading the book in English had helped her transition back after working on her German essay.

'Oh, there she is!' Lydia thought happily, spotting her as she rounded a corner.

At least she didn't get spotted exiting the library. Then she would never be able to work on homework in peace ever again.

"Ivyyyyy!" she crowed, trying to drape herself across her friend, who successfully dodged, as usual.

"Hey, Lydia. What's up?"

"Didn't you get my texts?" the other girl pouted.

"Sorry, my phone was on silent," she said truthfully, even though she knew Lydia was planning to text her. Ah, the half-truths of a telepath.

"Whatever. I wanted to talk to you about costumes! I need help putting mine together and thought if you figured out who you wanted to go as we could work on them together!"

Her inner thoughts went a mile a minute, worrying about getting it done in time. 'The dance is a week and a half away. I don't have anything ready! If I screw this up, Adrian won't like me anymore and we won't get married but, even worse, I won't pass Algebra II!'

Adrian? Adrian Marquez, the silent thoughts guy Adrian? Lydia hadn't thought of a last name…Ivy didn't know anything about him other than that he was a student here.

Sophomores, juniors, and seniors could all take Algebra II depending on their math levels before entering high school. Grade was no real indication of whether or not he would be in that class anyway…

More than anything, Ivy wanted to ask but how could she bring it up without seeming completely random? More likely than not, she needed to wait until the day of the dance to find out for sure…if it was the same Adrian going together as a group might help her gather intel. This could be a good thing.