Abigail Rath Versus Bloodsucking Fiends

by Catherine Schaff-Stump

  Marty was my partner. She limped to the lab table, picked up our box and shook it. Those skating lessons were still with her.

  “Hey,” I said. “That could be a fragile mystery object!”

  “We have to figure out what it is. No one said it couldn’t be broken.”

  Point to Marty. I glimpsed over my shoulder at the girls attending Coral. One was carrying her observtainer, another her lab book, and yet another her pencil.

  Figuring out what was up with Coral was a lot like figuring out the observtainer. There were things I could do that would help me address the likelihood of her supernaturalness. I was going to do this right and get some conclusive data.

  I wandered to the table in the front of the room where Mrs. Lester had placed a variety of kid-friendly science apparati and scored some liquid crystal sheeting.

  “That’s not going to help us with our observtainer,” said Marty.

  “It is cool, though,” I said. Liquid crystal sheeting measures the temperature of whatever it touches. That means that an undead would be the temperature of their surroundings, like a cold-blooded creature, and the crystal sheeting would remain black. It would be a conversation piece at lunch.

  School lunch was gross. School lunch is always gross, but today’s entree was extra gross. I hated the school’s chili. I had Dad’s genetic English-ness. At home, exciting spices were black pepper. Chili used exotic red things like cayenne and paprika. I’d face down monsters, but I wasn’t going there. The cooks also thought it was a good idea to pair chili with pigs in a blanket. Now that was a food throwback. I don’t think you should waste a perfectly good crescent roll on a hot dog.

  When Dad and Mom had gone to Japan a couple of years ago, they brought me back another quality Hello Kitty product—a Japanese lunch box, two levels of cute from Sanrio. Dad thought if I had a Japanese lunch box, he should know how to make me Japanese lunch. In my lunch today were two rice balls. On the top layer? You guessed it. Designer sausages and some cut strawberries. Separated by a divider wall, of course.

  In the cafeteria, I found Marty sitting with Jo and Bev. Jo glanced up, honey blond hair falling away from across her right eye. “Where have you been, Abby? Marty told us you skipped and had detention last week.”

  “Yup.” I sat down on the slick plastic bench. “However, I have paid my debt to society, so my checkered past can remain there.” Marty hmphed. Jo gave me a thumbs up. She is a pastor’s kid. If anyone approved of skipping, it would be a pastor’s kid.

  “Honor code?” said Bev. Bev took detention very seriously, more so because I was one of her defensive hockey players and as the goalie, she relied on me. “Do you know how far behind we are in practice?”

  “First offense against the code,” I said. “I am so sorry about missing practice.”

  Bev stopped with fork midair. “You aren’t becoming a delinquent, are you?”

  “Not so far as I know. I’ll get back to you if any-thing changes.”

  Across the table from Bev and me, Marty and Jo were undergoing delicate lunch negotiations. “You aren’t going to eat your pudding pop?”

  “All yours, Martido.” Jo took the blanketed pig in trade. Marty can’t eat pork, so Jo was doing her bit for keeping Marty from starving.

  Bev made it through about a spoonful of chili. Jo ate half a bowl. Marty polished hers off. Marty is weird in all kinds of unnatural ways. I flaunted my sausages to the envy of my crew, except for Marty who stuck out her tongue. My eyes scanned the dining room. Lots of girls in blue uniforms in various forms of neatness or slouchiness. The problem with our school uniforms is they’re uniform, so it’s hard to get a line on someone. Then I saw Coral in the center of a group of girls. She was like a lantern in the center of a bunch of wannabe moths. I placed my bento on the table and rummaged in my backpack for the liquid crystal sheet and my lab book.

  “What’s that?” Bev asked.

  “Liquid crystal sheeting. Touch it.”

  Bev rested her finger on it. “Leave it,” I said. I opened my milk. Bev was my baseline. The color she left on the sheet was that lovely bright blue of a living mortal.

  “That’s interesting.” Bev bent the flexible plastic.

  “It measures body temperature,” I said. I scribbled down her name and the color in my lab book. “Be right back.” I snatched the sheet away from her and scrambled toward Coral. Bev’s blue fingerprint faded, and where I pinched the sheeting, it turned a rainbow of colors.

  Coral sipped from a thermos. Soup? Pudding? Blood? Not chili, anyway. Someone else had some taste buds.

  “Hey, Coral,” I said.

  “Hi,” said Coral. “Sorry about the limbo thing. Again.”

  “Rematch next week,” I said. It was getting personal.

  “Are you coming to the slumber party?”

  “Yup. William wants me to watch movies with him.” I was playing with the liquid crystal sheeting. I too was a lovely shade of living blue. I put my name down and the color. “Do you want to try?”

  “What is that?”

  “It’s a temperature measure. I’m doing some extra credit for Mrs. Lester.”

  “Okay,” she said. She grabbed the sheet.

  Three girls sat down while we waited for the results. The sheet didn’t change color. It remained black, which meant her temperature was somewhere in the sixty-five to eighty degrees Fahrenheit zone, or twenty degrees Celsius, just to make things more scientific. Not the temperature of a human being.

  “Hmmm,” I said. “It looks like you’re not alive.”

  Coral laughed. We all laughed. I handed the sheet around to the other girls, noting names and colors.

  Coral’s lack of color change was a piece of evidence, but not a conclusive one. People with poor circulation also did not affect the sheet. I had a lot more work to do.

  “Thanks,” I said. “I gotta get back to my lunch.”

  “What was that?” Jo asked.

  “Science,” I said. “In action.”

  Right after school, I dressed in my kneepads and shin guards and headed out to the hockey field. It was another fine spring day, with a gentle wind that tickled the hair on your arms. Outside was still a little cool in the shade, so I sat on the damp grass in the sun. It smelled green and fresh. While Mr. Pruitt talked to the team, I laid back on the grass, one leg folded for a good stretch, and then I folded and stretched the other one. Mr. Pruitt had the grace to say nothing about last week’s absence and Heather Jurgens, who had been filling in for me, returned to the bench for the first part of practice. I stood and bent to the side, first one way, then the other.

  I was a hardcore hockey player. My position was right guard. Defense is a hard job. You have to be faster than the other girls to make sure no one can launch the ball into the goal. You also can’t be afraid to use your stick on your opponents if need be. This was a monster hunter proving ground, right here.

  Coral approached as I lunged forward, stretching my calves. She was wearing a cautionary orange vest, very construction worker. She knelt. “Nice to see you here.”

  “Looking forward to seeing you play.”

  “I was captain of the team at my school in Portland.”

  That figured. “What position?”

  “Center.”

  That figured too. Coral Petrova seemed to be at the center of everything. I moved into some squats while she pulled one of her arms to limber it up.

  “I’m glad you’re coming to the party,” said Coral. “Although I was going to invite you, William asked me to ask you specially.”

  I stopped stretching. “Why?”

  “It’s awful, isn’t it? What is it with boys? When they like someone, why don’t they just come out and say so?”

  “What?” I stood up. She smiled. “I—wait a second.”

  “You made an excellent impression.”

  I was going to have to nip this in the bud. “You know, I hate to disappoint your brother, but—”

  “Right. I al
ready told him about you and Vince, but he’s hopeful since you said yes to a date.”

  I was losing control of this conversation. “Coral, there is no me and Vince. I mean, yes, there is a me and Vince, but as in a me and Vince are best buddies kind of thing, not a me and Vince are sitting in a tree kind of thing.”

  “Good,” Coral smiled.

  “Actually, Coral,” I said, my voice lowered, “there might be a Vince and Marty.”

  “Oh sure. I’d never do anything to upset Marty. I’ll tell William about you and Vince. But William, well, he wants to give Vince a run for his money.”

  “Look, I have to beat some girls over the head with this hockey stick. Let’s give my love life a rest.”

  I wandered out to the turf and took my place, giving a thumbs up to Bev. Bev stood in front of the goal, so covered in limb guards that she looked like the Michelin Man. To my left Andrea Jones jutted her jaw in a serious crush-all-the-other-team kind of way.

  The game began. Coral was an excellent center. She shuffled the ball down the field with inhuman speed. Talk about being entirely obvious about not being from around here. Some of the other girls were so smitten with her playing they could only admire and they stopped trying to take the ball from her. I dashed across the field to the border of my territory. She came at me, a little contest, personal. This wasn’t limbo. Here there was no Miss Nice Abby.

  Our sticks scrabbled. She moved the ball past me. I scrabbled for the ball again. I routed her, eyed one of my offensive teammates, and shunted the ball in her direction.

  I swear, Coral’s eyes flashed red when they looked at me. I smiled, my pearly whites gleaming like a bad actor on a toothpaste commercial.

  Then she was back among the pack. Andrea watched her go. “She’s fast.”

  “We can take her,” I said, my eyes on the herd.

  Coral emerged victorious again and came our way, this time shunting towards Andrea. It was a mighty effort, and Andrea wasn’t a sloppy athlete. Andrea weaved and raked, but Coral moved and faked. She shot the ball toward the net. Bev blocked with her body, but couldn’t quite make the height. Goal for the other team.

  Coral winked at me. I threw her a salute.

  We lost the game, but it was a respectable loss. I took a stick across the shins in an action, a distraction from Coral’s drive. I would bruise up pretty nicely, but Andrea’s attempts at defense had ended with more damage than mine. She had to go to the nurse’s office and would probably have quite the shiner.

  In the locker room, everyone was full of admiration for Coral and her exciting performance. I hung up my gear and peeled off my sweaty shirt. Bev plunked down on the wooden bench by my locker, her hair matted and tucked behind her ears.

  “What do you think you were doing out there?”

  “I was getting my stick handed to me,” I said. “I’ll do better tomorrow.”

  “Yes, you will,” said Bev. “You and Andrea were terrible today.”

  I grabbed my towel and shampoo. “We were all under siege. Coral’s fast, but you’re the one who let the goals

  go past.”

  “I can’t play without a good defense.”

  “We’ll work on it,” I said. “Lucky that Coral’s on our team, huh?”

  I started to walk away, but Bev pulled me back. “I’m not finished with you yet.”

  I pulled away from Bev, but she clamped hard. “Hey,” I said. “Back off.”

  Bev slapped me.

  My cheek blazed with pain and embarrassment. Bev was one of the last people in the world I thought would hit me.

  Other girls gathered around the bench. Coral watched, expressionless.

  Bev swung at me again. Since the shock had passed, I grabbed Bev’s wrist and twisted her arm behind her back. I knew we were both in trouble the moment she hit me, because teachers aren’t interested in justice. They’re interested in spreading the punishment around, just to make sure fights don’t happen again. I wasn’t going to let whatever was bothering Bev become another vehicle for detention. Two strikes against the honor code were more serious than one.

  “Stop it,” I said. “Remember the honor code?”

  Coral stepped toward us. “It’s all right, Bev,” she soothed. “I’ll take care of Abby for you.”

  All the fight went out of Bev. “Funny,” said Coral. “It’s almost like she isn’t herself. That’s what you’re thinking?”

  “What did you say?” I asked Coral.

  “You know, she’s right about you and Andrea. We might have to make some changes. Bev and I might have to recommend you get off the team to Mr. Pruitt. Maybe Heather can replace you.”

  “Like Mr. Pruitt would listen to you.”

  “Well, that’s the thing, Abby. Everyone’s going to listen to me from now on.”

  “So, that’s how it is?”

  “That’s how it is. Nothing personal. It goes without saying you have been uninvited to my party.”

  All the girls watched me, eyes saucer wide. “Don’t mess with me, Coral. It’s best for you if you just keep playing normal human.”

  Coral startled. She was supernatural somehow, and she knew I knew it. I had her.

  “We’ll see about that.”

  “Yes, we will.”

  Game on.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The Pod Teachers

  (and Students)

  “I don’t like him,” said Vince. Vince had heard from Coral that William and I were going with my dad to see Revenge of the Summer Camp Gill Monster. We were sitting at the snack bar of Big Mel’s. No Ned of course, because it was early after school.

  “You don’t like William? There’s a surprise.”

  “I don’t think you should be alone with him. The girls at my school fawn all over him. He’s what we call a player, Abby.”

  Being from an all girls’ school that sounded to me like someone who admired checkers. “Pardon me for having a sheltered life, but pray tell”—here I blinked to look innocent and girly—”what is a player?”

  “A guy who flatters lots of girls.”

  “Isn’t flattery a good life skill?”

  Vince hammered his fist on the counter. “What is with you?”

  “Me? What is with you? When Coral’s around, I don’t even exist, even though I’ve been your friend forever. If there were a definition of BFF in the dictionary, it would be us. But when I want to do anything with William, you act like a jerk.”

  Vince frowned. “I don’t like him. Ned doesn’t like him either.”

  “Ned doesn’t like Coral,” I countered. “He says she cheats at limbo.”

  “She doesn’t.”

  “And you know how?”

  “I just know.”

  “Now. Doesn’t that strike you as weird? You could still like her, and she could still cheat at limbo.”

  Vince slammed down the last of his Coke and dropped the paper cup onto the counter. “You go out with William, and I won’t talk to you again.”

  “Okay.” I had enough of this crummy week. “Let me tell you how this is going to go. I am going out with William this weekend. You are going to stop being a hypocrite. If you can’t, I’m going to let Ned explain to you what a total jerk you are.”

  Vince crumpled the paper cup and skated away. I called after him.

  “Dad says you’re under diabolical mind control.” I waved my hands. “Diabolical mind control!”

  Vince turned around and skated away backwards. “Knock it off, Abby! You blame everything on the supernatural.”

  “When it is supernatural, that’s okay!”

  “Well, it’s not this time.”

  “Oh, okay. This time, then, it’s about what? Girlfriends? Or just being a jerk?”

  Big Mel skated out. “Abby! Vince! No horseplay.”

  Vince sneered at me. He rolled away, glaring at me as he made a turn, one skate over the other.

  “Don’t you give me that look!” Mel said as Vince shot by, “or you’re out.”


  Fine. Mind control or not, I wasn’t going to talk to Vince again. At least until he apologized.

  The next morning at school there was a palpable change in the air. The moment I stepped into the hall, everyone else statued. Frozen, like pod people.

  “Ms. Rath!” Stodgy Stogdill navigated the obstacle course of blue uniformed girls and waved a piece of paper in front of my face like he was erasing my oxygen. He had buck teeth, yellow from too much coffee, and his breath smelled of stale tobacco. “What do you call this?”

  “Um...a report?”

  He snapped the paper with his free hand so that his words were punctuated by staccato percussion. “This is the sloppiest assignment I’ve ever seen! You didn’t do what I asked you! This paper is imbecilic.”

  Stupid? He called my paper stupid? In front of everyone? I chewed my lower lip to stop it from quivering.

  “You fail this paper, Ms. Rath! You’ll have to do better, or you will fail my class!” He crumpled the paper and threw it. It crashed by my feet.

  Marty crouched and picked up the paper boulder. “Why was he so mad?”

  My eyes stung. I would not cry in front of all the students, but I’d been yelled at by a teacher, and I was shaking. Monsters seemed easier to deal with than angry teachers.

  Marty uncrumpled the assignment and was embarrassed when she saw the F. “I told you that you didn’t do the assignment like he wanted it.”

  “Not helping,” I said.

  “Okay. Do you need a Kleenex?”

  I wiped away stinging tears with my fingers. “No.” I sniffed. “Let’s go to science.”

  Marty followed me. My fellow students kept a constant bubble of space around me. Teachers stood outside their doors and gave me the evil eye.

  “A C I could understand,” I said. “But an F! Stodgy’s never given me an F before!”

  “Maybe it was meant to be a motivator,” Marty said.

  “Still not helping.” I controlled the quaver in my voice. An F. What would my parents say?