Page 3 of Evergreen Academy (Society of Magical Botanists #1)
Chapter Two
O n the first day of college, I was as ready as I could be, and I embraced the controlled chaos of finding my new classes and getting a feel for my instructors. Maci and I had Biology together, but other than that, my classmates were mostly people I didn’t know.
At Siskiyous Community College, students were a combination of high school graduates from around the county, students returning to get a degree or take career-oriented classes, student athletes from all over, and sometimes, retirees and other community members who took elective classes for their own enrichment.
When I walked into my art class, that diversity was represented more than it had been in history or math, with students ranging in age from sixteen to sixty.
I scanned the art studio and saw an empty workspace next to a striking girl with a long dark ponytail and deep brown eyes.
“Is anyone sitting here?” I pointed to the seat next to her .
“Nope. All yours.” The girl smiled warmly and gave me a little wave. “I’m Yasmin.”
“Briar. Nice to meet you. Are you a freshman here?”
Yasmin nodded. “I am. I have to say, art is a bit outside of my comfort zone, but it seemed like an easy elective.”
“I’m the opposite. Art’s the one thing that comes easily to me. Science and math, on the other hand…” I made a face, and Yasmin laughed, her ruby earrings swaying softly. “I love your earrings.”
Yasmin’s hands went to her ears, and she made a facial expression that caught me off guard. She almost looked nervous. Finally, she gathered herself and said sweetly, “Thanks. They’re my birthstone.”
“Where did you get—” I began to ask but stopped speaking as our instructor came in and started to pass out the course syllabus.
Yasmin and I both turned our heads to the pieces of paper in front of us, and I scanned mine with excitement.
Most of the topics listed were ones I was already familiar with.
I’d taken AP Art in high school, and my goal was to transfer to an art school, like my mom had.
The period flew by, and I said goodbye to Yasmin on the way out. “See you Wednesday.”
“Definitely. I’m going to need a buddy to help me survive this class. That syllabus looked intense.”
“I’m going for a walk on the Wildflower Trail with a friend right now. Are you free? Do you want to join us?”
Yasmin smiled apologetically. “Can’t. I have to be somewhere in thirty minutes. Rain check?”
“Of course.” We parted ways, and I continued to Wildflower Trail to meet Maci, who was waiting at the trail’s entrance when I arrived.
My friend talked nonstop as we walked the trail, which looped our campus. Like so much of our town of Weed, forest surrounded Siskiyous Community College, and trees dotted the campus, as much a part of the environment as the buildings that housed our classrooms.
We paused at one of the letter boxes along the trail. The boxes were attached to a few special trees along the path, and visitors were encouraged to write the tree a note and leave it in the box.
As Maci scrawled on a small piece of paper, I pulled out my notebook. I studied the large pine tree and sketched it as Maci finished her quick note and tromped around, worrying herself sick about calculus.
“Hopefully, my pleas to the tree will bring me a little luck with this class. I never had a problem with math in high school, you know? But we had an assessment today that we self-scored to see where we’re at, and I didn’t do great.
I can already see my 4.0 GPA goals going down the drain.
” She huffed out a breath. “I think I might actually have to sign up for tutoring.”
Laughing, I looked up from sketching a pinecone. “Oh, the horror.”
Maci laughed, and I could see her relax a little.
“If it makes you feel any better, most people don’t take calculus as a freshman. I’m taking college algebra, and I’m probably going to struggle.” I focused harder on my sketching, trying not to think about all the math homework I’d be doing that semester.
“I know. I sailed through math in high school, and the entrance exam tested me into calculus, so I really didn’t think it would be this hard.”
“I already know you’re going to crush it.” I added a shade of dark green to the edges of the pine leaves, signed the corner with my signature br —for Briar Rose—then tore the page out of the notebook and tucked it into the tree’s letter box.
“What did you write to the tree?” I asked.
“To send me good tree-ish vibes for calculus.”
I laughed. “Good tree-ish vibes? Is that a thing?” I stopped to ponder the box in front of us. “I wonder what whoever collects all the tree letters thinks about them. Do they read them or just use them for fire starters or something?”
“I don’t know, but I’m glad it’s anonymous. It’s kind of cathartic, in a way. Writing to the trees that can never reply. Or drawing, in your case.”
“I guess that’s the point. It is nice to slow down and really study the trees for a moment.” I wondered, not for the first time, who ran the Letters to the Trees program. It had been around ever since I could remember.
There were fifteen trees of different species and sizes along Wildflower Trail that had names and letter boxes attached.
We’d just visited the tree named Frank, a large oak that was unofficially labeled the oldest tree in town.
I’d left drawings for each tree over the past few years, and for Maci it had become a bit of a ritual to send a letter whenever she needed something.
Apparently, a scary first day of Calculus justified a visit.
I made to follow Maci along the path, but my attention snagged on a large leaf that sat on the bench near the tree. It was bright green, as if it had fallen well before its time. But the color wasn’t what had drawn my eye .
The veins of the leaf weren’t in the typical arrangement, with one central vein that had others coming out of it on either side. Instead, the veins rose in shaky lines from the bottom, almost like roots, and then swirled upward. I could swear that they made the shapes of tiny leaves.
“B? Are you ready to head back?”
Startled, I looked up at Maci then back at the leaf. But the wind kicked up and carried it away before I had a chance to examine it further. I rubbed my eyes. All the nature sketching I was doing lately must have been playing tricks on me.
“Yeah,” I murmured and tried to focus on clearing my head as we walked back to campus. There was nothing I needed less on my first week of college than odd tricks of light messing with my brain.