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  List of Ten

  Halli Gomez

  STERLING TEEN and the distinctive Sterling Teen logo

  are trademarks of Sterling Publishing Co., Inc.

  © 2021 Halli Gomez

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (including electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

  ISBN 978-1-4549-4015-9

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  sterlingpublishing.com

  Cover design by Elizabeth Mihaltse Lindy

  Interior design by Julie Robine

  For John Cunningham,

  the unofficial mayor of Thornhill

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Ten

  February 1

  February 1

  February 1

  February 2

  February 4

  February 6

  February 8

  February 9

  February 13

  February 13

  February 14

  February 16

  February 18

  February 20

  February 23

  February 27

  March 6

  March 7

  March 7

  March 8

  March 9

  March 15

  March 17

  March 20

  March 20

  March 21

  March 22

  March 25

  March 27

  March 27

  March 28

  March 29

  March 29

  March 29

  March 30

  March 31

  March 31

  April 1

  April 6

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  Resources

  TEN

  Three letters. One puny syllable. The number didn’t sound impressive, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it. You could say I was obsessed with it.

  It didn’t help that the world shoved it in my face. In social studies we debated the Bill of Rights. And who picked the FBI Ten Most Wanted List? Please. I could come up with at least twenty psycho-quality people in New York City alone.

  My theory was the world’s fascination with the number started with Moses and the Ten Commandments. In biblical days, people knew better than to argue with a guy who parted seas. But I blamed my obsession on my psychiatrist.

  Almost ten years ago, Dr. Hadley Quentin, or “Hardly Qualified,” as I liked to call him, planted the idea to close my eyes, take a deep breath, and count to ten. It was supposed to relax me, but the last thing a six-year-old with Tourette syndrome and obsessive-compulsive disorder needed was a fixation on one particular number.

  But I was young and desperate and let the number run my life. As if I had any say. It conspired with my brain and interfered with everything from walking to sleeping. Until I decided to take control.

  To celebrate taking back my life, I created my List of Ten. And on April 6, the tenth anniversary of my diagnosis, it will be complete.

  1. Get my first kiss

  2. Meet someone else with Tourette syndrome

  3. Be pain-free

  4. Find a babysitter for my baby brother

  5. See the space shuttle

  6. Talk about Tourette in public

  7. Give away my Tim Howard autographed picture

  8. Drive a car

  9. Talk to Mom

  10. Commit suicide

  FEBRUARY 1

  One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine.

  I stepped into the room the same second I got to ten. Also the same second the bell rang. Yeah, it sounded cool, but required absolutely no talent or planning. I counted my steps every day, so it was bound to happen at some point.

  Of course, I still had to make it to my desk before class started. In other classes I’d be considered late and heading to the teacher’s desk to pick up a detention slip, but Mrs. Frances didn’t care. Probably because it took her a few minutes to get her stuff together, and right now she was preoccupied with her computer.

  My desk was in the front row, but on the far side of the room. I stood in the doorway and debated which path to take. The long way down the side, across the back, then up to my desk, or the shortest across the front. My neck twitched. My hands squeezed into fists.

  Since class hadn’t started yet, everyone sat in their best conversation positions, facing away from the teacher. Abhy and Spencer argued about whether Luke Skywalker was Rey’s father, and three girls puckered and posed in front of the phones they held at arm’s length. Their fascination with Instagram selfies would make it possible for me to walk across the room without being noticed.

  I took a deep breath and the first step. One. You’d think I was heading toward the electric chair. It was just science, which happened to be my favorite subject. Another step. Two. I stretched my legs to maximize the distance. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.

  I was three desks from mine, but it didn’t matter. I’d hit the magic number. I bent down, touched the floor, and just in case someone saw, fumbled with my shoelaces like that’s the real reason my hands were near the nasty floor. From the corner of my eye I saw Jason’s eyes on me. Busted. Heat rushed from my neck to my forehead, and not because they turned on the heat in this school. I stood up, took three giant steps to my desk, one, two, three, whispered the remaining seven to get to ten, and fell into my chair.

  My neck twitched. My hands squeezed into fists. Repeat. I pulled A Farewell to Arms out of my backpack. If anything could take my mind away from here it was World War I. I read and annotated until Mrs. Frances stood up, barely visible above her computer monitor, and pushed her wide black-framed glasses farther up her nose.

  “New term, new seats,” she announced.

  For one breathtaking minute, my body froze. Okay, it was literally scared stiff, but the neck twitches and hand squeezing stopped. I savored the stillness.

  Then the minute passed.

  My head bobbed to my left shoulder. My left shoulder lifted to my head. Repeat. Head bob, shoulder lift. Head bob, shoulder lift. Of course it came back. I’d done the neck twitch every day, every hour, every few minutes since I was six. But right now it was out of control.

  I pleaded with Mrs. Frances. My mind to her mind. My eyes to her’s. Please don’t do this. Don’t change my comfortable hell. She moved to the front of the room and studied the paper in her hand.

  “Okay, everyone pack up your materials and move to the back.”

  Chairs scraped around me. Papers fluttered. The mumble of voices drifted behind me.

  I took a deep breath. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven—

  Mrs. Frances looked up from her paper. Her eyes landed on me.

  “Troy, pack up your books.”

  My chest tightened. She interrupted me in the middle. And on an odd number.

  Eight, nine, ten. I shoved the book in my backpack and started again. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.

  I stood up, trudged to the back, and fitted myself into the corner. Mrs. Frances consulted her paper, called out a name, and pointed to my old desk. “Bradley.”

  One of the selfie girls giggled. Bradley moaned.

  “Mrs. Frances, can I have another seat?”

  “What’s wrong with that one?” she asked.

  Bradley glared at me like this des
k-switching event was my idea. Mrs. Frances could have said half the class had Ebola and it was a contamination issue. It wouldn’t have mattered. It took me four months to get comfortable in the last seat.

  “It’s . . . well . . . he’s . . ,” Bradley said. “Nothing.”

  Bradley sighed, turned away from me, and took the long way to the seat. I tensed my neck muscles and occupied my mind by mentally reciting the periodic table. I didn’t want to see him disinfect my old chair before sitting down. And someone who frequently forgot their deodorant after PE shouldn’t be worried about me.

  I recited all the elements, but as usual, my brain changed directions on me and fixated on something else: the papers in my backpack. They were probably crumpled from stuffing everything inside. I wrinkled my face to mimic the wrinkled papers.

  My neck twitched again. My face scrunched itself up. Another neck twitch. Then a face scrunch neck twitch combo. Great, a new one. I slumped further into the corner and stared at my sneakers.

  What grand purpose could switching desks serve? Was she alphabetizing the classroom? Putting us in height order? Maybe it was something completely radical, like arranging us by birthday. While all those possibilities seemed rational to me, they were uncharacteristic of a woman who mixed her pens and pencils and left sentences half finished.

  Bradley mumbled something to the boy behind him while Mrs. Frances finished filling the first two rows. Six seats in each. Twelve.

  I counted to ten.

  She started the next row. Dead center of the room. My neck twitched. My face scrunched. One new neighbor was nothing compared to what the middle of the room would do to me. Being surrounded by other kids’ desks, some turned slightly diagonal, pencils left crooked, and wrinkled pieces of paper taunting me, would make my whole body shake. I would have to touch everything. Repeatedly.

  I stared at the teacher and resisted putting my finger to my temple like Professor X did in the X-Men movies before he learned to implant his thoughts into someone else’s mind without all the dramatics. I screamed the words in my head. Put me next to Abhy again. The urge to touch his desk should be gone since I already knew what it felt like. And his desk was neat.

  I counted to ten, stood straight, then leaned forward hoping she’d call this craziness off. But Mrs. Frances ignored my signals this time too and continued reading names. Spencer, Esther.

  Not a middle desk. Please not the middle. An invisible hand squeezed my chest. I tried to suck air in, but none made it to my lungs. One, two, three, four—there would be four desks to touch—five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.

  “Eric.” Mrs. Frances pointed to a desk in the third row, three seats back. The room started to spin.

  “Abhy,” she called.

  A tiny bit of air got in. She called more names and pointed to more desks. Each time she filled a desk, the breathing got easier. I was on number six when she called my name. Seven, eight, nine, ten. I could breathe again and even the stale classroom air felt good. I skimmed the back wall on the way to my new desk.

  Fifth seat back in the row closest to the door. There was no one behind me, and I was golden if there was a fire drill. All that stood between the door and me was Bob, the classroom skeleton, and a waist-high bookcase filled with magazines, books, and videos from the nineties. The videos were probably fire hazards, but it was a chance I was willing to take for this seat.

  I sank into my chair and breathed freely. Oxygen in. Carbon dioxide out. Repeat. Mrs. Frances smiled at me. I nodded back. I had a new love for her. Either she got my mental telepathy messages or she really was observant despite her obvious lack of organizational skills.

  My neck twitch went from every four seconds to every two minutes, and the face scrunch showed up every fourth time. I straightened the wrinkled papers in my backpack, pulled out my science notebook, and wrote the date: February 1. Then found the courage to peek at my new neighbor on the left.

  Khory Price.

  A girl.

  My neck twitched faster. Touching a boy’s desk was bad, but a girl’s? With my place on the social ladder, it would come across as creepy, and I didn’t need another label. I already sported the nickname “American Horror Story Freak Show.”

  I shoved my left hand under my leg. My elbow jerked trying to free it. With my right hand I smoothed the crinkled papers. A difficult feat, but it kept me occupied. My head still bobbed. My shoulder still lifted.

  I didn’t want to be a jerk and ignore her, but if I looked toward Khory and saw the brown faux wood of her desk, I’d have to touch the place where it attached to the gray metal. My fingers tingled with the idea of running themselves over the seam.

  I mind-messaged Mrs. Frances to start class, but she continued to scribble questions on the whiteboard. Apparently our connection was gone.

  Against my better judgment, I peeked at Khory Price. She had her left elbow on the desk and her forehead in her hand, and alternated between writing and erasing numbers in an open notebook. The only thing consistent was the sighs.

  Her hair slid off her shoulder and covered the wood and metal seam of the desk. Suddenly the urge to touch the wood disappeared, but it wasn’t as satisfying as I’d hoped. My fingers still tingled and moved up and down as much as they could trapped under my leg. They had an urge to touch something, and realizing what it was made me wish for the desk.

  Her hair. Long and brown, with a hint of red when the sun shone through the window. It was shiny and smooth. My fingers would slip down like on a water-park slide and get lost in the curls at the ends. I ran my right hand through my own hair. It did nothing to satisfy the tingle and probably just made my hair stand up straight. My left elbow jerked to free my hand. I yanked it out and held it back like it was a two-year-old going for candy.

  Khory slammed her pencil down and stared at me. “What?”

  My cheeks burned. I shook my head and focused on my own notebook and the date. Sixty-five days left.

  “Sorry, I’m Khory,” she said.

  Of course, I already knew that. There were only twenty-two of us in the class. I didn’t talk much, but I listened well.

  “I’m Troy.” That was the extent of my conversation abilities.

  “Hi.”

  Thankfully she didn’t want to shake hands or I’d have to free my left hand. If we were both girls, we would have hugged and squealed or made some other noise only dogs could hear. I got away with a nod. She turned back to her desk, frowned at her notebook, then bit her bottom lip. I counted to ten and watched her hair fall over her shoulder and cover part of her face. She twisted the edge of her paper. My left arm lifted a few inches and moved to the edge of my desk. There was no controlling it. It had a mind of its own and stretched out until it was a millimeter from the tip of her curls.

  “I hate math,” she said. “Or maybe it’s just Mr. Nagel. He stares too much and creeps me out. I hate when people stare at me.”

  I let out a big breath and yanked my hand away just as Khory looked up.

  I had him too, but he turned away when I walked into the room. Maybe he thought I was the creepy one. I kept that to myself since I couldn’t handle another seat rearranging and fumbled with my pencil. I counted to myself and tapped it ten times on my desk, then leaned back and attempted to seem cool, or not as weird.

  “Okay, class. Listen up,” Mrs. Frances announced. “Before we start the new section, I want to tell you about a new science summer program. It’s a three-week intensive course on astronomy ending with a field trip to New York.”

  The chance for a trip to New York, even for a school-type program, got people to put their phones down and sit up straight. Except Khory.

  She sank in her chair and stared at her desk. A shadow covered her face, one that had nothing to do with the sun streaming through the window.

  “You good?” I asked.

  Khory turned to me. “Yes. It sounds interesting, doesn’t it? I’d love to go, but New York is so far.”

  “Sure.” It sounded
like a dream come true, but it conflicted with another, more important dream I had. Summer was almost five months away, and my list would be completed by then.

  FEBRUARY 1

  After Chemistry and a brief stop at my locker, I started the trek to the back door and the bus lot. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten steps. Bend down. Repeat. Faster and faster each time. I didn’t want to walk the three and a half miles home if I missed the bus. My brother was waiting for me.

  I climbed the school-bus steps. My favorite seat behind the driver was taken by a short, beefy kid with a trombone, so I scanned the seats for an empty one, or at least one by the window. My neck twitched. Sitting on the end with a seat across the aisle was just like the classroom-desk issue. The urge to touch it, and the person sitting there, would be overwhelming. The thought alone made my fingers tingle.

  There was one empty seat seven rows back. I made my way there and slid all the way to the window. I ran my fingers over the empty space next to me, then tapped it ten times. Just as I was about to start another round of tapping, a pair of gray legging-covered legs stopped in the aisle.

  “Great,” the legging girl groaned.

  I yanked my hand back. She flopped onto the seat, swung her legs toward the aisle, and put her back to me. Her long, blonde ponytail teased me. Pull me! I grabbed my jacket and pulled it instead. Nowhere near as satisfying.

  The bus engine choked, sputtered, then eventually came to life. When we bumped our way to the open road, I took out my phone and opened the List of Ten. I thought about the new seats, Khory, and the astronomy summer program. Could I fit them into the list?

  Before high school, my real dream was to have friends and a girlfriend. Someone who would wait at our locker before school and get me in trouble for texting me during dinner. Of course, we would share a locker. But high school was a rude awakening for what the real world had to offer. Hormones brought on a whole new mess of Tourette tics, emotions, and interactions with society that I would have preferred not to have. So what did adulthood promise? More of the same.

  I could just imagine Dr. Hardly Qualified’s reaction if I’d told him my plan to commit suicide. He’d press his pointer finger to his cheek, which he always did to appear thoughtful while he came up with something to say. Then he’d grab some outdated, dust-covered book from his shelf.