Darynda Jones: Death and the Girl Next Door

Her empathy sent an invisible force pressing into my chest as sadness flooded my lungs. I stood cemented to the spot for a solid minute before I managed a soft, “Thank you.”

Then her smile turned a little wicked. “And if I ever catch you writing notes in my class again…”

“You won’t. Never, I promise.” I recovered and tucked the evidence into my back pocket.

She laughed and pointed toward the door.

With a grateful sigh, I gathered my books and headed that way. “See you tomorrow,” I said.

“If you’re lucky,” she shot back.

When I walked out of the classroom, Brooklyn was waiting for me in the hall.

“What happened to you?” I asked accusingly.

“Oh please,” she said with a dramatic roll of her eyes, “Ms. Mullins loves you.”

“True.”

“Besides, I’m much more interested in supernova.” That got my attention. She leaned in to me and lowered her voice to a seductive purr. “So he’s hot.”

“Can you say blazing inferno?”

“Oh, man, I can’t wait to see this guy. Sucks it’ll have to wait. We’re going to be tardy to second hour. If we play our cards right, we might get lunch detention today. I know, I’m aiming high, but—”

I’d stopped dead in my tracks.

Brooklyn looked back at me, bewildered. “I meant we should step it up, not come to a full stop, Ensign McAlister.”

Several things had been bothering me about that morning. The poster. The fact that I caught Principal Davis eyeing that very thing when I asked to be excused to the bathroom during first hour. What I could have sworn Jared said to me before I turned around. Didn’t he say he was stronger? And finally, how I seemed to have floated up from the ground when Jared took my hand. Course, that last one could be chalked up to hormones.

But … “McAlister. My name is Lorelei McAlister.”

Brooklyn pursed her lips. “Lorelei, I’ve known your name since I kicked your butt in the third grade.”

“Right.” I flashed her an astonished look. “Only you didn’t kick my butt, and he’s never met me. He called me Lorelei McAlister. He said, ‘Anytime, Lorelei McAlister.’”

“But you told him your name.”

“I told him my first name, not my last. How did he know my last name?”

Brooklyn grinned and pointed to the back of my notebook. When I turned it over, LORELEI MCALISTER—written in huge black and red letters—jumped out at me.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Yeah.” I shook my head as if trying to clear cobwebs. “This day has just been, I don’t know, weird. Like the world tilted just enough to make me lose my balance.”

“You need a caffeinated beverage.”

I smiled. “Caffeine would be good.”

“Caffeine is always good.”

“You’re so logical,” I said as we headed to second hour.

“Thank you. I was going for logical. It seemed like the logical thing to do.”

“Though we really should get straight whose butt got kicked that day and whose butt did the touchdown victory dance.”

“Your butt can do the touchdown victory dance?” she asked.

“It could the day it kicked yours.”

“Can it do the alphabet?”

I nodded with a giggle, then sucked in a soft breath as my hand brushed against someone and received a spike of energy in return. I looked back, but there were too many kids in the crowded hall to pinpoint the source. An instant later, a vision flashed in my head. It was short, just the smallest image of a scene, but in it someone was standing watching a girl in a ragged apricot shirt and bloodied khaki capris kneel on the side of a road. She was heaving into the dirt, the contents of her stomach pouring onto the ground in one of the most disturbing visions I’d ever had.

As we entered the classroom for second hour, I glanced down at my apricot shirt and khaki capris. A sickly dread came over me as I realized I was the girl heaving into the dirt. I checked my forehead for a temperature. I didn’t feel sick. And why would I be on the side of some random road? Thank goodness my visions were more entertaining than predictive. Still, I totally should have worn my blue shirt.

“Did you see the new guy?” Glitch slid beside Brooklyn and me at our usual lunch table.

“See him?” I asked. “I almost killed him.” I reached over and stole a fry off his tray.

“Bummer.”

Glitch had to be the geekiest cool kid I knew. He was smart, funny, and short, and everyone at school liked him. It was weird. And he was filling out, becoming manlier. He’d grown three inches over the summer. What the heck was that about?

Even Brooke was developing normally. While she stood on the cusp of womanhood with guns blazing and heart pounding, I seemed to be stuck in the land of bubble gum and lollipops. I still had to pray every night for the girl-part fairy to get off her butt and do her job. I just wasn’t blossoming like the others. And to top it all off, I had infuriatingly curly hair that resembled rusted metal, gray colorless eyes, and translucent skin the sickly tone of baking flour. Other than the fact that my chin was too small, my eyes were too big, and my mouth was too wide for my face, I didn’t have a lot going for me. Unless looking like an elf suddenly took the fashion industry by storm.

But Brooklyn Michelle Prather was gorgeous. An exotic blend of ethnicity gave Brooke an air of dark mystique. She had almond-shaped brown eyes, long black hair, and a delicate feminine build. I had a build too, just not a particularly feminine one.

“Have you heard anything I’ve said?”

I shifted back to the present and squinted at Brooklyn’s cinnamon eyes as they questioned me. I said, “Sorry, I was calculating how much this whole pasty-white-girl thing sucks.”

“Uh-oh.” She turned to Glitch. “She’s on her pasty-white-girl kick. She needs chocolate.” She peeked at the ever-popular snack counter. “Cover me.”

Glitch watched the crowded lunch hall with narrowed eyes, searching for possible enemies. “Okay, but hurry before she starts mentioning the girl-part fairy.”

I chuckled and stayed Brooke with a hand on her arm. “I’m fine.”

With a doubtful expression, Glitch reached over and pulled my lower lid down to study my eye. That’d help.

“Yeah, all right. She looks okay.” He shrugged and added, “Least her eyeball does.”

I stole another fry and leveled a baleful look at him. “No one asked for your opinion, Casey. ”

Brooklyn snorted. “I love it when you call him Casey.” She reached over and stole a piece of chicken off my salad. Eating at our table was kind of a communal effort.

“I don’t,” Glitch said with a pout. “How am I supposed to embrace my Native American ancestry with a name like Casey?”

“Well, maybe your Native American ancestry will benefit from a little Irish temperament thrown into the mix,” she said. “You guys are so calm.”

His eyes widened in horror. “Are you psychotic?”

“You mean today or just in general?”

He glanced around to make sure no one overheard her. “You can’t say crap like that. Do you want to get me killed?”

“You should totally talk with an Irish brogue,” she continued, unconcerned.

“That’s a great idea.” I nudged him and wriggled my brows. “Brogues are sexy.”

He shuddered in disgust. “I’m going to be tomahawked before the day is over.”

“So, did you get a chance to have that little talk?” Brooke asked me, able to switch subjects in a single bound. In all honesty, I hadn’t seen Cameron since he stood glowering at me through the plate-glass windows.

“What little talk?” Glitch asked, his voice muffled from a mouthful of hamburger.