by Келли Криг
She glanced up from the table, chewing, and squinted down the hallway, to where Danny’s backpack lay beside the umbrella stand. Vaguely she wondered what she’d done with her own. Then she remembered.
Isobel dropped her spoon. It clanged loudly against her bowl.
She launched up from her seat.
“Isobel?” her dad asked from the other end of the table. She didn’t bother to answer. She raced down the hall, then burst through the front door.
The morning air hit her cold, its moisture flooding her lungs, reawakening all the pangs from last night. A deep ache seeped from her bones and resurfaced in her muscles as she forced herself to move. Wet grass whipped at the hems of her jeans.
Oh, please, be okay. Please be okay!
In the grass—it was still there. Thank God.
Isobel ran to crouch beside her backpack. It was covered in a spray of dew, the nylon wet but not drenched. Fingers anxious and fumbling, Isobel pulled open the zippers, pried the bag open. Fixing her hands on The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, she drew the book carefully out, turning it over in her grasp, feeling along the spine. She inspected the pages. It felt dry. It felt whole. She breathed a sigh of relief.
Isobel jerked the zippers closed. That was when she noticed the glittery goop on the front of the bag, right under her embroidered initials. Her eyes narrowed, following the trail of glitter that led up to her heart-shaped key-chain watch.
“Oh, no,” she moaned, picking the silver watch up with her fingertips. The glass in the middle, right over the face of the watch, had shattered, leaking decorative pink glitter goo from inside onto the face of the watch and down the front of her bag, like fairy guts. She must have broken it when she’d slammed her bag down last night, the weight of the book crushing her watch.
Isobel unclipped the watch from her bag and held it in her palm.
She stood, pulling her backpack onto one shoulder with her free arm while staring down at the broken trinket in her hand. She walked slowly back inside the house and dumped her bag by the front door, then wandered into the kitchen, where she slumped once more into her chair.
“What’ve you got there?” her dad asked, not bothering to fold down his paper.
“My watch. It’s broken.”
“Ohhh,” he said, “I’m sorry, sweetheart.”
“Yeah,” she muttered, setting the watch aside on her place mat. She picked up her spoon and prodded her cereal.
“Well,” Danny said from his end of the table, half the milk in his spoonful of Lucky Charms sloshing back into his bowl, “next time you’ll know not to look at it.”
Isobel didn’t have the energy to quip back. It was already going to be a long day. She had practice that afternoon and with half of the crew, too. And if that wasn’t bad enough, she was certain the day wouldn’t end without her running into Brad at least once.
Oh, no, she thought, looking up. Brad. How was she supposed to get home from practice?
Isobel glared down at the table, bracing a hand against her forehead. She felt like just giving up. Could she do that? Where was the eject button on life? It wouldn’t have to be this way if her parents would just go ahead and let her take her driver’s test instead of making her wait until she turned seventeen in the spring. Unfortunately, waiting and keeping a permit longer had been part of the deal when she’d first asked them for a car.
“Dad?”
“Mmm?”
“Can you pick me up today after practice? Around four thirty?”
“Don’t you usually catch a ride home with Brad?” he asked.
“He—his car is in the shop.”
“Oh? I thought he was pretty good with cars.”
Oh, come on, Dad.
“It’s just one of those things. Can you come?”
“Well,” he said, “I guess I could drop by on the way home from work. Does Brad need a ride home too?”
“No.”
That did the trick, and her father put down his paper. He eyed her before asking, “You two still getting along okay?”
“Fine, Dad.” She sighed, slouching. “Fine.”
“You sure you’re feeling all right, Izzy? You don’t look so good.”
“Hundredth time, Dad, yeah.”
Apart from losing all her friends in one weekend, being chased by phantom stalkers, and feeling like a sock puppet personified, she was just peachy, Dad, thanks for asking.
“Humph,” he said, flipping his paper back up. He leafed noisily through a series of pages before snapping the paper straight again. “You’ve been acting kind of funny lately.”
“Hormones,” she murmured.
Danny slammed his spoon on the table. “Gross!” he shouted.
Her dad’s only response was a short “Mm.”
Then her mom came in. “You two ready to hit the bricks?”
Eager for an excuse to bolt, Isobel scooped up her broken watch. Pulling on her brown corduroy jacket from the back of her chair, she started for the door. She grabbed her backpack along the way.
“It’s still early. Who wants a ride to the bus stop?” her mom asked. “I think we even have time for drive-through lattes.”
“Me,” Isobel growled in coffee lust, while Danny shook his head and groaned.
At her locker, Isobel tucked a strand of her half-blow-dried, half-air-dried, pillow-crimped hair behind one ear and leaned down to pick up her binder. Next to her, she heard a furious rustle of papers, followed by books clunking. She looked over to see the weird skinny girl, her locker neighbor, on her knees, rooting through an impossible tangle of papers, bracelets clanking.
Wispy and long-necked, she reminded Isobel of a goose. She always wore long, flowing, flowery broom skirts with black leotard pants underneath and fitted sweaters layered over tank tops. She also wore oval-framed glasses and had straight, mouse brown hair so long she could sit on it. The girl usually secured her hair with a bandanna or a low ponytail tied at the nape of her neck.
She wasn’t someone Isobel would normally talk to, but for some reason, at that moment it struck her as kind of funny how they saw each other every day and had never spoken.
Didn’t having lockers together make you at least acquaintances? It was one of those situations where you had to be around someone you wouldn’t normally hang out with.
Like being paired for a project.
“Hey,” Isobel said before she could stop herself. “What are you looking for? Did you lose something?”
“She speaks,” the girl said, “imagine that.” Using both arms, she shoveled the pile of papers into her locker, then rose, angling, using her foot to stomp down the contents. “And she, who drops everything, asks me if I’ve lost something. No, I haven’t lost anything. Except, perhaps, my ability to be surprised.”
Isobel couldn’t help but stare as the girl gripped the sides of her locker, switched feet, and stomped again to compress the papers. She had some sort of New York accent, short, sharp, and a little brutal-sounding. Not at all what she’d expected. Suddenly the girl looked at her. “What did you do to your hair?”
Isobel felt her mouth open and a draft float in. Nice. The most fashion-challenged girl in school had just noticed her hair issues. “Slept on it sort of wet,” she murmured. She set her backpack down and crouched to scrounge through her emergency pouch for a hair tie.
So much for making acquaintances.
“Looks good,” the girl said, shutting her locker door. “Makes you look a little less stuck-up.” With that, she turned away and floated off in a swish of hair and skirts.
O-kay, Isobel thought. Despite the dig, she couldn’t keep from smiling just a little. She took the hair tie and looped it around her wrist. Maybe today wasn’t going to be so bad after all.
That’s when she saw them.
Brad. And Nikki. Walking down the hall— together—in her direction, holding hands.
Oh. My. God.
Isobel looked away quickly. She slammed her locker shut and wrestled
to get her combination lock back in place and snap it closed before they got close enough to see her. Giving the combination pad a twist, she risked another glance and, sure enough, Brad was staring straight at her, his hand linked with Nikki’s—fingers intertwined.
And Nikki. Just look at her, smiling away at everything around her, like she just won Miss America or something.
Well, they could have each other.
Isobel spun away to take an alternate route to class. She wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction of a public display. She knew that was what Brad wanted.
But when she entered the stairwell, out of their sight, she felt her swollen sense of pride deflate. She had to fight down a whole swell of emotions she hadn’t expected to feel. She was mad— really mad—but she was confused, too. Then again, she hadn’t expected to see Brad practically welded to Nikki not two days after she’d broken up with him.
But maybe she should have.
14
All That We See
Isobel wasn’t sure why she hadn’t stopped to think about it before now, but as the end of the lunch line drew nearer, it dawned on her. Where was she going to sit?
The last thing she wanted was to be seen floundering around in the lunchroom, especially since the crew would be watching. No doubt they’d already been broadcasting her downfall.
She moved forward out of the line, taking a few slow steps into the cafeteria, like she was trying to be extra careful not to spill her lemonade. She could see the crew out of the corner of her eye, sitting at the usual table. Even though she didn’t look at them straight on, she could tell they were staring, waiting for her to try and sit with them—to try and sit anywhere.
She scanned the room.
As usual, everyone sat within their designated social sphere.
Computer geeks near the far wall. The hippies in the corner, some of them on the floor. The jocks at the tables overlooking the courtyard. And there, in the corner farthest from the windows, like a gaggle of dark, exotic birds, sat the goths and the weirdos.
Among them, she saw Varen.
Before she knew what her feet were doing, they started moving her in that direction. Her pathway chosen, she bypassed the opportunity of an empty table and walked straight for the black gathering, trying to ignore the sacrificial lamb feeling she was getting.
As though they had some kind of sonar or radar built in, a few of them glanced over. She stepped closer and heard someone make a hushing remark. Then, like in a creepy painting where all the figures seem to stare at the onlooker, they turned their heads. All those outlined eyes chiseling into her almost made her veer off course.
Isobel ignored the impulse to steer away. She kept going, her steps taking her ever forward until she drew to a slow stop, standing no more than three feet away.
Everyone stared at her now—the whole cafeteria—she could feel it, a scarcely perceptible vibration coming at her from all angles. It was like they were watching the series finale of some major drama show and were all waiting to see who would die.
Amid all the icicle stares, Varen’s was the only gaze she sought in return. Why, though, did it seem like he was the last person to look at her?
“What do you want, Barbie?” the girl sitting next to him asked.
Isobel’s mouth pinched tight. She heard the girl, registered the words, but for some reason, she couldn’t respond. She was too focused on waiting for Varen. For him to say something.
To intercede on her behalf.
All she could do was keep her eyes locked on his while she stood there, waiting—waiting for him to clear her name and a place for her to sit.
“Hey,” the girl said again, waving a hand between them, breaking the spell.
Varen turned away. Dazed, Isobel looked at the girl, recognizing her instantly as the one who had handed Varen the red envelope, the girl he kept a picture of in his wallet. Lacy.
“I don’t know if you’re lost or something,” she said, her voice deep, mellow, and full of disinterest. “Or, like, if it’s too hard for you to remember which table you’re supposed to sit at?”
A snicker trickled through the others. “But you can’t sit here.”
Isobel looked back to Varen. Tell them, she thought. Why didn’t he just tell them?
He sat staring straight ahead, his jaw hard.
Like an electroshock, Isobel felt a surge of fear, mortification, stupidity, and liquid anger. It all shot through her spine, a deadly mixture that filled her from the inside out.
With every second that ticked by, the knot in her stomach expanded. She could feel everyone staring at her, and her face burned.
So this was how it would go?
“I can’t believe you,” she said, her voice scarcely above a whisper.
But she was talking right to him. Right at him. Why wouldn’t he look at her?
Slowly, one by one, the rest of them followed his example. They each turned back to their lunches, chains clanking, black lace rustling—a few dark smiles gracing painted lips.
Dismissed, they seemed to say.
No, Isobel thought, it wasn’t going to be that easy.
“You think you’re different.” Her voice wavered, and she hated sounding so weak. “You think you’re all so different,” she went on, louder this time. “You do everything to be different,” she spat.
The silence of the table—of the whole cafeteria—was reclaimed in an instant. “But you’re not,” she said at last. “You are just like every. Body. Else.”
Pivoting, Isobel swung away. She dumped her tray onto the vacant table she had passed earlier, where it landed with a loud clatter. Refusing to meet anyone’s eyes, she stormed out the cafeteria doors, using both arms to shove them wide.
Alone in the hallway, she bit down on the inside of her bottom lip, hard—hard enough to taste the copper sting of blood. She pounded her fist against a locker door.
Stupid.
Stupid, stupid, stupid!
She kept walking, straight to the nearest girls’ bathroom.
She pushed through the door and dabbed the sleeve of her sweater against her eyelids, hating the tears that soaked it, hating that she’d have to hand wash the fabric later in Woolite to get the mascara smudges out—hating most of all the thought that he might know she was crying.
Isobel grabbed the trash can, piled high with wadded paper towels and tissues, and hauled it over. It toppled onto its side, its metal body clanging against the tiled floor.
She really didn’t care. It was just embarrassing, was all. Humiliating. But then what had she expected? It shouldn’t be this big of a surprise. None of it should be. Not Brad, not Nikki—least of all him.
I don’t care. She said it over and over in her mind, pacing the floor, trampling wet towels.
All he’d cared about was the project.
All that had mattered to him was the grade.
She was expendable.
“I don’t care!” she screamed at the trash can, kicking it. The crash echoed, and the can upchucked more wadded paper towels onto the floor.
She was stupid for shouting. She was stupid for crying, and most of all, she was stupid for believing, for even a second, that they might have been friends.
Isobel grabbed a handful of paper towels from the metal dispenser. She would not go back out into the hall with her makeup smeared and her eyes puffy-red.
Drawing in a shuddering breath, she turned on the faucet and brought her gaze up to her reflection.
A dry croak caught in her throat.
He stood in the doorway of the stall behind her. A man, cloaked in black. He stared at her, a tattered fedora hat shading his features, a white scarf swathing his mouth and nose, hiding his face.
She opened her mouth to . . . to what? To scream? To say something?
Suddenly, in the mirror, the door to the bathroom popped open. The skinny girl, her locker neighbor, poked her head in. Isobel whirled around.
“Talk about crash and burn,” the
girl said. “You all right or what?”
Isobel stared at the open space where she had seen the man. Behind her, she gripped the cold sink. Her eyes darted to the girl and then, her head whipping around, she looked back into the mirror. In it she could see her own face, drained of color, and the stall behind her—empty.
Her lips formed words. “Did you . . . ?” The question withered in her mouth.
“I . . . ,” the girl started, “well, I thought I’d better, I dunno . . . check on you?”
“You didn’t just see . . . ?” Isobel turned, pointed at the stall.
The girl shrugged. “Well . . .” She gave a quick glance over one bony shoulder back into the hall. “Hate to break it to you, but I think it’s pretty safe to say everybody saw.”
15
The Power of Words
“All right, ladies, take five!”
The shrill blast of Coach Anne’s whistle pierced through Isobel’s head, ringing in her brain like a fire bell, sending her headache officially into migraine status.
Without turning to talk and stretch with the others like she normally would, Isobel broke away from formation and trudged to the bleachers, where she’d left her gym bag. She tugged down on the hems of her blue practice shorts and plopped onto the bottom-most bench. She grabbed, opened, and drained the rest of her Gatorade in one smooth motion, then screwed the cap back on and stuffed the empty bottle into the bag between her street shoes and jeans.
Sitting there, she couldn’t seem to bring herself to form a single coherent thought. Not since she’d had to order her brain to stop its relentless attempts to assign a rational explanation to what she’d seen in the girls’ bathroom earlier that day: the dark figure that had stared her down and then vanished.
Deciding that she would do better to wait until after she’d had more than ten cents’ worth of sleep, Isobel tried to think of something else. That, however, only left room for her brain to play and replay the agonizing scene from lunch.