The walk to Renfro’s was a short one, and since we were coming at it from behind, we could see Esther hard at work long before we actually got there. She was sitting on a crate, leaning against Renfro’s back wall, a funnel perched between her legs. A water balloon dangled from the end, though she wasn’t filling it with water. The multicolored streaks that stained her arms looked suspiciously like paint.
When Spencer kicked a rock that skittered across the empty lot and eventually stopped next to her crate, Esther looked up from her funnel. “Hey, guys!” she said, waving. Flecks of paint went flying, landing in her curly hair, but she didn’t seem to notice. “I’m glad you decided to come early.”
“What are you doing?” Spencer asked, planting both hands on his hips.
Esther looked him up and down. It made me glad I’d brought a shirt. “What do you think?” she replied as she tied off the balloon. “We’re gonna do a little painting!”
Unease rumbled in my stomach like an approaching thunderstorm, but I managed to ignore it. “So what are we gonna paint?”
Her grin might have been contagious if it hadn’t been so terrifying. “I’ll give you one guess,” she replied as she retrieved a T-shirt from a grocery sack and chucked it in my direction. “Here, put this on.”
I caught the T-shirt in both hands, then bobbled it and finally dropped it. When I picked it up again, it had a dirt stain on the back. “I got this one dirty,” I said lamely, holding it back out to her. “And you forgot to take the tags off.”
Esther took it back and snapped the tags off with her teeth, then tossed it back to me. “It doesn’t matter,” she replied, tossing shirts to Riley and Spencer. “They’re about to get much dirtier.”
That probably should have worried me, but I was more concerned about taking off my shirt. The thought of changing while she watched was enough to make me blush.
I dug my toe into the dirt. “Hey, Esther, would you mind?”
“Would I mind what?” she asked.
I felt my cheeks get hot. “Would you mind turning around?”
She sighed and rolled her eyes, but at least she turned around.
As soon as she turned her back, I shucked off my Care Bear shirt—another hand-me-down from Radcliff—while Riley did the same.
Esther made a show of cleaning paint out of her nails. “You know that I couldn’t care less about seeing your chest, right?”
“All the same,” I said, shoving my arms into the sleeves, “I appreciate the privacy.” After yanking it over my head, I mumbled, “You can turn around.”
“See, that wasn’t so hard,” she said.
I pointed at the masking tape that she’d stuck across the shirt. “What is this stuff for?” I asked.
“It’s protecting the logo,” she explained, peeling the tape back to reveal the first word of YOUR PAINT, YOUR VOTE.
Spencer peeled his tape away. “What if the paint bleeds underneath it?”
She considered that, then shrugged. “If it’s just a few drips, it won’t be a big deal. The paintballs are oil-based—otherwise, the paint would just wash off—so if the logo takes a hit, we would definitely be in trouble. But the tape is heavy-duty—it’s the kind that Toby uses—so I think it will hold.” She smacked Spencer’s chest, hard. “Just don’t fiddle with it, genius.”
He made a face at her.
She pretended not to notice. “So this is how it’s gonna work. When everyone gets here, we’re gonna line up over there.” She motioned toward Renfro’s back wall. “Then we’re gonna arm everyone with paintball guns and let them take potshots at us.”
I crinkled my nose. “What do you mean, ‘let them take potshots at us’?” I glanced at the wall, then back at Esther’s paintball gun. “Oh, you mean they’re gonna…?”
“Yep,” Esther said, grinning. “And it’s gonna be freaking amazing. Every time they see these shirts, they’re gonna remember this moment.”
I eyed the paint, the guns, the grocery sacks stuffed with new T-shirts. “This only cost you fifty bucks?”
“Well, the guns belong to Toby—he’s part of this paintball league—but the rest of this stuff only cost me forty-seven eighty-three.” Esther smiled proudly. “And I have the receipts to prove it.”
I rolled my tongue around my mouth, but I was already out of spit. I guess it really was possible to be scared spitless.
“Don’t worry,” Esther said. “The first shot’s always the toughest. After a while, you’ll get used to it.” She smacked me on the shoulder. “Let’s get ready for battle!”
Riley checked his watch (which I sincerely hoped was paint-proof). “It’s eight fifty-nine,” he said.
Spencer pointed out two lonely figures headed up the street. “And here they come!” he crowed.
My heart lifted a little. I could handle only two. But what started as a trickle quickly turned into a stream, then a genuine deluge. By ten minutes after nine, the empty lot behind Renfro’s was filled to overflowing with a sea of eager sixth graders. A few looked vaguely interested, but most looked downright eager to shoot us with paintball guns. They must have deciphered Esther’s flyers a lot more quickly than I had.
Spencer climbed up on a crate. “All right, all right!” he said to get everyone’s attention. “First off, we want to thank you guys for coming. Our art director—”
“That’s me!” Esther said.
“—will explain how this will work,” he said as if she hadn’t cut in.
Esther cleared her throat. “All right, listen up!” she hollered. “This is pretty self-explanatory. We have these shirts, we have this paint, and we need you guys to help us put the two together.”
One of the kids who was standing near the front—I thought his name was Jason—motioned toward the paintball guns. “Are we allowed to go for head shots?”
Esther sized him up. “Sure,” she finally said, “if you think that you can hit one.”
While everyone else snickered, I started composing my last will and testament in my head.
“In addition to the guns,” she said, “we also have these paint balloons, so feel free to mix it up. And we have quite a few shirts, so even when we finish these”—she gestured to the shirts that we were wearing—“we’ll have more to go around.” She pointed at the kid who’d asked the question about head shots. “Jayden, I’m putting you in charge of giving everyone a turn.”
Jayden nodded eagerly. Apparently, his name wasn’t Jason.
“All right, then,” Esther said. “Once we get our headgear on, we’ll get to work!”
Esther’s mention of headgear produced a couple of friendly boos, but the others seemed okay with it (and thank goodness for that). She handed each of us a fencing mask—or what I figured was a fencing mask—and showed us how to put it on. I was grateful for the mesh screen, since I didn’t want anyone to see me when I accidentally squealed.
“We’ll start with our backs,” she said, pulling her mask over her face. “And please make sure you stay behind the solid yellow line!”
I snuck a peek over my shoulder. I hadn’t noticed any line. With any luck, that meant it was on the other side of Renfro’s.
Even though it was only nine, the wall was already warm. It was a good thing we had the masks, since my nose probably would have scraped it. I wanted to sink into that wall and grab a root beer float at Renfro’s (or, better yet, escape when the others weren’t looking). I fought the urge to barf as the crowd shifted behind us. Jayden must have been organizing everyone into a line and distributing the ammo.
Too soon, he shouted, “Fire!”
I’d never actually fired a paintball gun before, but Owen and Radcliff had both owned one, so I knew that creepy hissing sound wasn’t a good sign. You had to attach compressed air canisters to make paintball guns fire, so they let off little hisses every time you squeezed the trigger.
But I only had a second to think these less-than-helpful thoughts before a dozen welts rose on my back. I had to bite my lip to keep from screaming.
“Next!” Jayden shouted firmly, and there was a momentary lull as the weaponry changed hands.
I pressed my mask against the cinderblock and waited for that telltale hiss. The second volley missed our shirts, but somehow, it found our legs. As more welts bloomed on my calves, I cursed myself for wearing shorts.
While Jayden helped the next group, I blinked back nervous tears. A sudden breeze blew through the empty lot, stirring the leg hairs that weren’t already plastered with paint. The breeze smelled like ice cream sundaes, and for a second, maybe more, I actually felt kind of good. So when the next wave of ammo hit and one of Esther’s paint balloons exploded on my head, I did something unexpected:
I actually laughed out loud.
The sound bubbled up my throat before I could tell what it was. It started as a snicker, then morphed into an all-out belly laugh, knocking me onto my knees. By the time I got back up, Spencer was belly-laughing, too, and even Riley had stopped whimpering. We must have looked insane.
Esther, who’d been grinning like an idiot from the moment we’d arrived, slapped me on my paint-streaked back. “See, it’s not so bad,” she said.
I was laughing too hard to reply.
She slapped me on the back again. “I think it’s time to turn around!”
Hysterical tears clouded my vision, so even after I turned around, I couldn’t tell what was going on. When a nervous hush descended, I rubbed the tears out of my eyes. The crowd was parting around something like a school of fish around a shark, and even though the something—or, more precisely, the someone—was still a long way from the front, I could tell who the shark was.
Apparently, Veronica had come to play with her food.
Twelve
By the time Veronica reached the yellow line, the crowd had gone perfectly still. They were probably too afraid to speak, or maybe they just wanted to hear our bones break when she snapped us in half.
“David,” Veronica said as she dipped her head at me.
I was still wearing the mask, so how she knew which one was me, I honestly had no idea. “Hi,” was all I said. My voice echoed in my ears, sounding small and insignificant.
As her entourage fanned out behind her, I couldn’t help but notice there was one of them for one of us. Brady had lined up across from Esther, and Hector and Samantha were trying to out-glare Riley and Spencer.
Hector exposed his teeth in a rough approximation of a grin. “Looks like you’re having a fiesta.”
Esther’s hands clenched into fists. “Well, no one invited you.”
“Really?” Hector replied, pulling a flyer from his pocket. “Then how did we end up with this?”
Esther ripped her mask off. “Where in Shepherd’s Vale did you get that?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” he asked.
I squinted at the flyer. It was smudged with pencil lead (and what looked like carrot juice).
I set my sights on Riley. “Why’d you give them one?” I asked.
Riley held his hands up. “I didn’t!” he insisted. But then he ducked his head. “But I did throw some away.”
Esther’s face flushed purple. “You were supposed to pass them out!”
“I had extras,” Riley said.
“You weren’t supposed to have extras,” I replied.
Veronica motioned toward the flyer. “So anyone can take a shot?”
I snuck a peek at Esther (who was sneaking a peek at me). “That was the idea,” I said slowly.
Veronica stuck out her chin. “Then we want to take ours.”
Our eyes met, and somehow, an unspoken agreement passed between us. I knew that she was baiting me, waiting to see if I would blink. Owen and Radcliff had been fond of playing chicken with the beaters that had always accumulated behind Classics by Jesse (though they’d sworn me to secrecy, since Mom would have freaked out if she’d known), but these stakes seemed so much higher.
I swallowed, hard. “All right.” I wouldn’t be the first to blink.
Spencer pointed at the back. “But you’ll have to wait your turn.”
Jayden had just handed her the gun, so he tried to take it back.
Veronica didn’t let it go. “Do you really want to make me wait?”
Now it was my turn to rip my mask off. If she wanted to go toe to toe, we’d do it face to face. “Of course not,” I replied. I hoped I sounded braver than I felt. “We want you to take your turns and go.”
Veronica cocked an eyebrow. It looked like she was smiling, sort of, but it was probably an illusion. “Don’t you want to put your mask back on?”
I wasn’t sure if it was bravery or just plain, old stupidity, but if I put that mask back on, I knew I wouldn’t win a single vote. So instead of doing the right thing, I drew myself up to my full height. “No, Veronica, I don’t.”
A shudder rippled through the crowd, but Veronica just shrugged.
“Suit yourself,” was all she said as she raised the paintball gun.
She was far enough away that I couldn’t tell where she was aiming, but the one thing I did know was that it was going to hurt. I clenched my teeth and stared her down, and for a second, maybe less, I thought she smiled again.
The smile caught me off guard, and I almost relaxed. Maybe I’d been wrong. Maybe “La Vie en rose” had changed her as much as it had changed me. Maybe we were almost friends. But before I could decide, Veronica drew a bracing breath and calmly squeezed the trigger.
The paintballs hit me in the chest, one right after the other. I lost track of the number as they burst against the tape, exploding against my chest like blood bursting from a wound. I stepped back to catch myself, but I didn’t find my balance. I found Spencer’s rock instead. It caught my heel and tipped me over, and as I staggered back against Renfro’s, the paint—red paint, I noticed—dribbled down into the dirt and collected into gleaming beads.
Esther dropped to her knees beside me, cushioning my fall. She put a hand behind my head, which would have made an awesome death scene if I’d actually been dying.
I guess Spencer didn’t get the memo, because he launched himself at Veronica. “Holy Faraday, you killed him!”
Before Spencer could make contact, Hector caught him by the wrist, taking him down in one smooth move. “Don’t be an idiot, muchacho.”
Spencer fell flat on his face, but he didn’t let that stop him. He looked like a dying worm as he writhed and squirmed in place, pinned down by Hector’s claw-like grip. He definitely wasn’t giving up, but he wasn’t gaining any traction, either.
His back glistened with wet paint, and his front must have been a mess, but Samantha didn’t seem to mind. After planting herself on his back, she growled, “Stop that, or we’ll kill you next.”
Spencer finally stopped, but whether he’d taken her threat seriously or he could no longer move, I honestly couldn’t have said.
“Say something,” Esther croaked, brushing the hair out of my eyes.
I looked down at my chest, which was still dripping with red paint, then slowly, very slowly, tugged at a corner of the tape. A bead of paint bled down the front. YOUR PAINT, YOUR VOTE, it said, and now that paint was Veronica’s.
I managed a weak smile. “That’s gonna look amazing when it dries.”
Esther’s gaze darted back and forth between my face and the T-shirt. Finally, she grinned. “Yeah, I guess it will,” she said as she held out her hand. “Way to sacrifice yourself.”
I took hold of her hand, and she towed me to my feet. As I surveyed the scene, the other kids hollered and catcalled—but not the populars. Hector sneered, Samantha spat, and Brady made a face. Veronica, on the other hand, just returned the gun to Jayden, then slowly turned around.
&
nbsp; The crowd gave her a wide berth as she strutted off into the sunset (or, in this case, the sunrise). I squinted at her back, grateful that she couldn’t watch me watching her, but just before she turned the corner, she snuck a peek over her shoulder.
“Nice shirt,” was all she said.
Esther’s experience of a lifetime had turned into a celebration by the time they disappeared, but instead of joining in, I sat down on a crate and tried to puzzle out her words.
Thirteen
The T-shirts were a hit. Making them had been epically awesome—my arms and legs were still covered with paint—but what made the whole thing even better was that they were also cool. Spencer couldn’t have been happier. He wanted to hand them out like candy, but Esther and I agreed that that would be against the rules, so Spencer did the next best thing—he signed them out like library books.
Esther tried to argue that that was still against the rules, but Spencer wouldn’t listen. On Monday, YOUR PAINT, YOUR VOTE T-shirts descended on the school like locusts. Though there were only twelve of them, they seemed to pop up everywhere: on the bus, in Mr. Ashton’s class, on the way to lunch. Spencer probably had the schedule down to the class period.
As soon as he got to the table, Esther pushed her lunch aside. “So?” she asked. “How many straws?”
He couldn’t do much more than grin.
Esther punched him in the shoulder. “Are you gonna say something, or are you just gonna sit there giggling?”
He drew an overdue breath. “Thirty-eight!” he finally squeaked.
I looked down at my lunch box to disguise my goofy grin. Thirty-eight was nowhere near enough, but it was a heck of a lot better than five.
Spencer yanked a Milky Way out of his pocket and held it up over his head. “And next week, it will be fifty-eight!” He took a bite of Milky Way, then looked this way and that. “But have you guys heard the rumors?”
“What rumors?” Esther asked.
Spencer licked his lips. “I heard the queen bee fought with her drones.”
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