The Silver Moon Elm (18 page)

“It’s not my choice, I—”

“Are you going to kill anyone?”

“Oh, Andi, don’t be afraid.”

“Tell me you won’t kill anyone.”

“I’m not going to kill anyone. Maybe we can help each other. I—”

“Success!” Bobbie’s voice rang out over the lockers a few seconds before she appeared with a steaming hot washcloth. “Let’s get started!”

It took some time to clean the wound and dress it. Bobbie tried it first, but she dropped the washcloth and knocked the bandages on the grimy carpet, so she had to get new material. After that, Andi took over, grabbing the supplies from Bobbie and sitting down next to Jennifer.

Even this young, her hands were clearly quite skilled at this sort of work. She briskly rolled up Jennifer’s skirt just above the knee, careful to support the wounded calf the entire time. Then she slowly pressed her fingers around the wound, as if looking for something.

“You’ve done this before?” Jennifer guessed.

“Medicine runs in my family.”

“Mine, too.” She swallowed at Andi’s guarded look. “It did, anyway.”

“I don’t suppose you can find some hydrogen peroxide?” Andi asked Bobbie.

“Probably locked in the coach’s office.”

“Hmm.” She looked at Jennifer. “You’ll probably need to head home once this is bandaged. You’re staying with Skip Wilson, right?”

“Yeah.”

“He knows?”

“How can he know?” Bobbie interrupted. “We came straight here from chemistry.”

Jennifer answered Andi’s true question. “He knows.” Then she turned to Bobbie. “He knows what to do with an injured leg. He’s, um, had one.”

“But she can’t go home!” Bobbie’s face fell. “We were going to have her come to soccer practice!”

Andi pursed her lips. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Still cradling Jennifer’s leg under one hand, she used the other to gently pat the wound with the washcloth. “Hand me the bandage, Bobbie? Preferably without dropping it.”

Bobbie handed her the new roll. “She only has to watch. We’ve already got a good team, and Jenny says she’s played varsity before! I’ll bet she’s great, Andi.”

Chewing her tongue nervously, Jennifer sided with the girl who held her leg—and life—in her hands. “It’s okay, Bobbie. Andi’s right. I’ll catch practice on Friday. You need me to hold that end?”

“Thanks.” Andi began winding the bandage around Jennifer’s calf. She slowly lowered it as she did so, cradling Jennifer by the knee instead of the ankle so she could get around and around. “Soccer’s important, Bobbie. But it’s not everything. The world will still be spinning Friday, just the way it is now. And it will for Saturday’s big game, or at the practice next Wednesday for the next game!”

This didn’t seem to please Bobbie much, but there was nothing the hulking girl could do. She crossed her arms and let out a deep sigh. “This sucks. Why’dja have to go blow yourself up, Jenny?”

Despite herself, Jennifer began to chuckle. So did the other two girls.

Until Andi’s hand accidentally brushed under Jennifer’s skirt and hit the dagger strapped to her left thigh.

Jennifer and Andi both froze. Without breaking off her stare with Jennifer, Andi slowly withdrew her hand and finished up the bandage.

“I think we should get you out of those clothes now,” she said firmly.

“Oh, no, it’s okay, I—”

“Jenny, they’re burned!” Bobbie’s tone was completely casual, in contrast to Andi’s severe expression. “The back of your sweater had holes in it, even before we left chemistry class. I’ve got some spare stuff in my locker you can use.”

“But everyone will—”

“Now.” Andi wasn’t taking any nonsense.

Jennifer sighed, sat up, and pulled off her sweater. When she examined it, she saw Bobbie was right: The wool had several small burn holes in it.

“Got your shell, too.” Bobbie pointed to a yellowish-brown stain on the cream-colored fabric. “You’re lucky you had two layers. Get rid of that, too, Jenny. My shirt’ll look better.” She turned to a locker right next to them and began dialing the combination.

With no reason to argue, Jennifer took the shirt off.

“Your skirt, too.” Andi insisted. “It’s wrecked all down the back.”

She gave Andi a pleading look and received nothing in return but cool air.

“Fine,” she said through gritted teeth. “I’m just glad it’s my clothes that got hit, and not yours, dear. What you’re wearing looks so much more…fragile than what I had on! Thank goodness I could protect you!”

The heavy hint found its mark. Andi swallowed and softened her expression. “I know,” she said softly. “Thanks.”

Jennifer slid the skirt down, careful not to let it catch on the daggers or the buckles on their sheaths. She had been in locker rooms in front of other girls with less than the underwear she had left, but she had never felt more exposed in her life.

Both girls stared at the daggers. Bobbie whistled.

“Wow, Jenny. You know there’s a strict no-weapons policy at the school. Mouton would expel you in a second if he found out!”

“They’re j-just for self-defense,” Jennifer stammered. “You guys won’t tell anyone, will you? I can explain…”

“Don’t worry. That can wait,” said Andi. “For now, you should get dressed. Bobbie, what do you have in there? My stuff ’s too small for her.”

“I always keep an extra gym outfit in here. It’s clean. Might be a size too big for you, but it shouldn’t matter.”

Andi carefully folded up Jennifer’s clothes and gave them to Bobbie, who put them away in the locker.

“You’ll need to give those up, too,” Andi ordered, pointing at the weapons on Jennifer’s bare thighs. “The shorts won’t hide them.”

With a heavy heart, Jennifer unstrapped both daggers and handed them over. Andi passed them on to Bobbie, who put them on top of the folded clothes. The larger girl rearranged the locker contents so that a soccer ball hid most of the contraband from a casual glance, and then pressed the locker shut with a clang.

“Okay, I should get dressed now.” Jennifer held her hands out for the clothes.

Andi took the extra outfit from Bobbie, but then held it. “Hang on.”

Jennifer felt her whole body turn cold and warm at the same time as she glanced at the secure locker that held her only possessions. She tried to grab for the gym clothes but the other girl took a quick step back. “Andi, please.”

“I want you to tell me and Bobbie something.”

Realizing Andi could simply run away if she wanted to, Jennifer let her arms rest protectively in front of her chest. “What?”

“I want you to tell us you’re going straight home after Spanish, and you won’t try to come to soccer practice.” Andi flicked her magenta-streaked hair behind her left ear. “Do you promise?”

Jennifer let out a breath. “Yes, I promise. Just, please, let me get dressed!”

Andi grinned and handed her the clothes.

“There’s a sports bra in there, too,” Bobbie offered helpfully. “It might go a bit better than what you’ve got on there.”

“I suppose,” Jennifer answered with a glance at her lacy, lilac bra. “Goodness knows if I burn your shirt off next, I’ll want to match underneath!”

That got them giggling again.

“Don’t forget sneakers,” Bobbie reminded her, tossing her a pair. “Flats don’t go at all with what you’ll be wearing now!”

The outfit wasn’t exactly what Jennifer had hoped for—she felt rather conspicuous with shiny yellow Lycra shorts on her butt and an overlarge red T-shirt with FRISKY written in big black letters across the front—but it was, she thought, better than the alternative.

And it did help her learn what the huge, ugly dome was behind the school.

“Hey” came a boy’s grainy voice behind her in study hall. “Frisky.”

Clapping a hand to her forehead and cursing Bobbie for her casual sense of style, Jennifer turned around. “Yeah, that’s me. Frisky. Who are you—Dopey?”

The boy sitting at the next desk was vaguely familiar to her from Winoka High—short and stocky, with lots of stubble on a ruddy face, well-muscled, crew cut, a running back on the football team. Marky? Matty? Whatever. He hung around with Bob Jarkmand, she remembered. When Bob was Bob, and men were men.

“Frisky. That’s Bobbie’s shirt, ain’t it? Sez Frisky.”

“I guess.”

He chuckled through a leer. “Yeah, Frisky. I remember Bobbie bein’ frisky.”

Stop saying frisky! “What a captivating story. I smell a Pulitzer. You should probably leave me alone and start writing your memoirs right now…”

“Yeah,” he blundered on, oblivious to her suggestion, “we macked behind the observatory. Got real busy. That Bobbie has real fruit jiggling around her gelatin, if you know what I mean.” He sniggered, a slow sort of heh-heh-heh as he dully ogled Jennifer’s breasts.

“How poetic. I’m sure your way with words is what unlocked the gardens of her passion. Listen, creep, I—What observatory?”

“Huh?” His eyes stayed on her chest, perhaps still working their way through the text.

She snapped a hand out and grabbed the flesh under his jawbone, making him gasp. Ignoring his efforts to remove her hand, she lifted his head until he was looking her in the face. “Awwwb-suuur-vaaaa-torrr-eee. There’s one in this town?” And, ick, a girl actually let you feel her up next to it?

He nodded as best he could. “Yeah. You know. Behind the school?” His thumb jerked off to the side. “Where all the astronomy classes are?”

Throwing the fool’s head back so that he fell off his chair, Jennifer spun around in her own seat and tried to think.

It’s an observatory.

Astronomy classes are held there.

Astronomy is one of four quadrivium subjects.

I’m not in an astronomy class, the only one of the four they excused me from.

They put me in Spanish instead.

I therefore have no reason to go to the observatory.

Clever of them.

In Spanish class, she ignored new vocabulary words like desatento and complot, and kept strategizing.

Who did she know who went to astronomy class? Skip, Bobbie, the A-List. How about Andi? She wasn’t sure.

Would any of them help her get in? She imagined she could count on Skip, though she was a bit perturbed at him for not telling her last night that he had a class there. Maybe it’s a morning class and he missed it the first day, like you did with Ungodly Math 909, she reasoned. She could certainly ask him about that today after school. Maybe they could even agree to sneak into the observatory before Saturday afternoon’s soccer game with Eveningstar.

And what about Bobbie? No, she didn’t quite trust her yet. Maybe it was who she/he was at Winoka High, or maybe it was the unnerving strength she had shown with that poison in the girls’ room. But she didn’t seem the type to go along with a plan that didn’t have her in a lead role.

That left the rest of the A-List out, since they would probably all blab to Bobbie…with the possible exception of Andi. After all, Andi knew her secret now—and she hadn’t said anything to anyone. Should she invite Andi to come along with Skip and her?

Just as the bell rang for the end of school, she decided that she would.

Leaving class, she was surprised to run right into Bobbie and Andi, along with Abigail, Anne, and Amy.

“Oh! Hey, guys.” She let a corner of her mouth turn up. “You checking on me to make sure I go straight home? Don’t worry, I’m…” She trailed off when she saw their expressions. Bobbie looked angry, and Andi looked miserable again. “What’s wrong?”

The larger girl abruptly straightened and put on a shiny smile. “Nothing! Last class was a big bummer. Mr. Frost—our mathematics and geometry teacher—is such a jerk. He spent most of the time yelling at Andi here, just because she doesn’t like going up to the blackboard to present stuff. I wish we had Slider; I hear he’s way cooler. Anyway, come on. Time for soccer practice.”

“But I thought you wanted me to go straight home!”

“Oh.” Bobbie tossed her tight bob of blonde hair carelessly. “Yeah, Andi and I talked about that. Your leg’s okay to walk, isn’t it? You can just come watch. Right, Andi?”

Andi silently examined the corner of the textbook she held in her trembling hands.

Jennifer’s head was full of clamoring alarm bells. She knows. Andi told her.

But before she could even think to run, the other three girls had surrounded her with forced smiles, and they were hustling her down the hallway, with Bobbie in the lead and Andi trailing behind. Nobody said anything as they walked. Jennifer desperately looked around for Skip, but the hallway was full of strange and unhelpful faces.

“You look great in that T-shirt!” Bobbie loudly called over her shoulder as she skipped into the girls’ locker room. “But I think I need it back for soccer practice. You don’t mind, do you?” This made Jennifer halt at the doorway, but six firm hands pushed her in.

There was another group of girls passing through the locker room, and Jennifer caught a glimpse of a coach walking out a back entrance, but she knew calling for help would only make things worse. Bobbie took her by the wrist and led her over to the bench where earlier they had wrapped her leg.

“Now.” Her strong hand let go of Jennifer’s wrist. “How about that shirt.”

Jennifer looked from unfriendly face to unfriendly face. They were in a circle around her. Sighing, she yanked the shirt off and tossed it to Bobbie.

“By the way,” she shot at Bobbie, “I hear that shirt’s been busy behind the observatory.”

The remark didn’t faze Bobbie. “Sneakers.”

She kicked them off. They made sullen thumps against the tile floor. The bottoms of her bare feet itched.

“Shorts.”

“Bobbie, she doesn’t have—”

“Shut up, Andi.”

Jennifer took the shorts off and held them out.

“Thanks.” Bobbie winked as she took them. “You can keep the sports bra; I never had much use for it behind the observatory. Hold her, girls. I don’t want her making a move with the locker open.”

Amy and Abigail each took tight hold of an arm. While their grips were not as strong as Bobbie’s, Jennifer didn’t bother moving. If these girls only wanted to humiliate her, then struggling would only alert others who might want to do worse. And if these girls wanted to do worse themselves…Well, she’d worry about that then.