Zombie Queen of Newbury High (2 page)

“Candice, I didn’t mean that.” Mia shot her friend an apologetic look. “It’s just, if he hadn’t asked me, then no one would’ve cared less if I did or didn’t have a date. But now. . . ”

“But now, instead of everyone just thinking you’re that weird girl who once tried to get the school to have a Joss Whedon day, they’ll think you’re the girl Rob dumped,” Candice finished, and Mia let out a groan.

“I’ve really screwed up, haven’t I?”

“No, you haven’t,” Candice finally relented. “Your only sin was being so refreshingly adorable that Rob couldn’t resist you.”

“Thanks.” Mia shot her friend an appreciative glance and sighed. “Now if only I could figure out how to make it happen all over again.”

“Got it,” Candice suddenly whispered. “Since Rob seems incapable of taking his eyes off Samantha’s disgustingly low-cut top, we have to assume that boobs are his fatal flaw. So what about getting a push-up bra to help distract him? We could cut the next few classes and go to the mall.”

“But the senior assembly is this afternoon.” Mia looked at her friend in surprise. “That’s when the football team will be getting their awards. Rob will be there.”

“Yes, and if you don’t act soon, you’ll get to see Samantha and her thirty-six-Ds bouncing up to congratulate him afterward,” Candice said in a matter-of-fact way.

“You’re right.” Mia glanced down at her own less-than-impressive chest. “A push-up bra it is, and maybe we could also—”

“Maybe you could both pay attention?” someone suggested in a mild voice, and Mia looked up to where Mr. Haves had suddenly appeared by her side. “So, Mia, would you like to tell us what happens next?”

Mia hoped no one had heard her push-up-bra plan as she looked up at his encouraging smile. Normally, when teachers did that it was because they were evil passive-aggressive mani acs who liked to see students squirm, but Mr. Haves just genuinely seemed to like helping kids learn. Which as a rule was a good thing, just not today. She peered over to the whiteboard, where there was an amplified photo of a cockroach. Gross.

“Well?” Mr. Haves continued. “What do you think is going to happen to our friend,
Periplaneta americana
next?”

“Um. . . it’s going to fly away?” she guessed, and then wished she hadn’t as the sound of Samantha Griffin’s unmistakable snicker sounded out. Which was more than a little annoying since Samantha wasn’t exactly an A-plus sort of student.

“Not quite. Can anyone else tell me?” Mr. Haves looked hopefully around the class, but when no one raised a hand, he glanced in the direction of his favorite student, Chase Miller—aka the new boy. Well, he’d been at Newbury High for about six months now, but for some reason Mia had never really talked to him. Apparently he was from Boston or somewhere like that. He was tall with short light brown hair and green eyes that were set above a pair of razor-sharp cheek-bones. He also tended to keep to himself.

“The jewel wasp is going to put venom into the cockroach’s brain so it can control its mind and body, making it a brainless minion.”

“Excellent. Well done, Chase.” Mr. Haves clapped as he walked back to the front of the room and brought up the next photograph. “The jewel wasp will lay its eggs on the cockroach. After the eggs hatch, the larvae will feed on the roach. Then the larvae use the roach’s abdomen as the perfect living-dead incubator until the newly hatched wasps can feed on—”

Much to Mia’s relief, the rest of his words were drowned out as the bell rang, quickly followed by the sound of scraping chairs that echoed around the room.

“Can you wait for me? I won’t be long.” Mia turned to where Candice was busy studying something on her cell phone.

“Sure.” Her friend gave a vague wave of her hand without looking up and so Mia piled her books into her bag and took a moment to pat her shoulder-length brown hair into place before hurrying toward Rob. However, just before she got there, Mr. Haves appeared in front of her.

“Mia, could I have a quick word, please?”

“Oh.” She gulped as she watched Rob stride out, engrossed in something Samantha was saying, the faint smell of his cologne catching in her nose as he went. Mia realized this probably wasn’t the time or the place. “Uh, I guess so.”

“Actually, I’ll meet you outside.” Candice waved her phone in the air. “I’ve got to make an important call. When it comes to leprosy, you’ve got to move quickly.”

“Did she just say ‘leprosy’?” Mr. Haves lifted a surprised eyebrow as he beckoned Mia to follow him to the front of the classroom.

“Yeah, Leprosy. They’re, uh, this great band. She wants to get concert tickets,” Mia improvised as she reluctantly headed over.

“I’ll have to listen out for them,” Mr. Haves said as he reached into his desk and pulled out a piece of paper, which bore a striking resemblance to the test she’d taken a couple of weeks ago. That was the day after Rob had asked her to the senior prom. Then he waved a second piece of paper in the air. That one looked like Friday’s test. The one she’d taken after hearing the rumors that Samantha was after Rob.

“So, about these,” Mr. Haves said as Mia studied her shoes. As she recalled, she didn’t exactly nail either of them. “I don’t need to tell you you’re one of my better students, which is why I’m concerned about these grades. Is there something going on?”

What? Like the fact that the guy she’d secretly had a crush on for four years suddenly asked her out on a date for no apparent reason? And then after five more dates, he had made her the happiest girl in the whole entire world by asking her to prom.
And now he had apparently decided to get with Samantha Griffin.

“Everything’s fine. I’ve just been a bit stressed. It’s no big gie,” she said.

“Are you sure?” Mr. Haves wrinkled his eyes together and looked concerned. “Because I noticed Rob is now lab partners with Samantha. Does that have something to do with it?”

“No, of course not,” she said instead as the blood started to pound in her ears. If Mr. Haves knew about it, then there was a fair chance that the rest of the school did, as well. “And I’m sorry about the tests. I, er, had food poisoning last week.”

“What sort?”

“Excuse me?”

“What sort of food poisoning?”

“The poison sort. Anyway, if that’s everything, I’d better get going.”

“Of course, but remember Mia, if you ever have any problems, you can talk to me. You’re a bright student and that’s the way we want things to stay. Actually, if you’d like, I could arrange for another student to tutor you before the next test. Just to get you back on track.”

“Honestly, Mr. Haves, it’s fine. I’ve got everything completely under control.” Mia managed to shoot him a faint smile before she walked out of the classroom. She was about to become the laughingstock of the entire school, and she was fairly certain talking to a teacher or getting some tutoring wasn’t going to change that.

“So how bad?” Candice demanded the minute Mia stepped into the hallway and shut the door behind her.

“Bad,” she said with a shudder. “Not only did I fail the last two tests, but even Mr. Haves has noticed that Rob and Samantha are getting close. This is serious, Candice. I think we’re going to need more than a push-up bra to fix it.”

two

“
S
o what’s the new plan?” Candice asked as she fired up the brand-new VW Bug that her parents had bought her for her birthday and carefully reversed out of the school parking lot. All Mia got for hers was the promise she could drive her mom’s more modest Ford Focus on the weekends. It wasn’t quite the same thing.

“I have no idea, so all suggestions will be gratefully received,” she said as Candice headed into the Twilight Zone’s afternoon traffic and toward the mall. Actually, the town was officially called Newbury, but since nearly all the streets had been named after solar and lunar occurrences, it had long ago been dubbed the “Twilight Zone” as a joke, since nothing much ever happened there.

“Well, we’ll think of something. The important thing is not to panic, because it’s totally counterproductive. This one time I thought I had this weird lung disease that you can only get when you’re ninety. I can’t tell you how much I freaked out.”

“Right now I’d rather be ninety than stuck with this problem.” Mia leaned forward and put some music on, which Candice immediately turned down. She claimed that loud music didn’t go with road safety, and with her limited life expectancy, she couldn’t afford to take any chances. “How did this even happen to me?”

“It’s because you got sick of living in the shadow of your younger sister and when Rob asked you out, the urge to be popular momentarily killed off all of your other brain cells,” Candice bluntly informed her, while slowing the car to a snail’s pace as they came up to a red light. “It’s definitely a character flaw.”

“I know. What was I thinking?” Mia slumped back into the plush upholstery and groaned. Candice was right. She had made a cardinal error. Most of the time she was content to live in Fringeland—doing okay at school, staying off the radar, and watching a little bit too much television. She liked Fringeland. She was happy there. But then when Rob had borrowed some biology notes and randomly decided to ask her out (on an
American Idol
night), she had lost all sense of reason and let herself get caught up in the idea of dating one of the most popular guys in school.
And had she mentioned how gorgeous he was?
Even thinking about him made her face start to flush.

“I think we’ve just established that you weren’t thinking,” Candice reminded her.

“God, Grace is never going to let me live this one down. Not that she really believed Rob had asked me in the first place. She said he only did it as a dare.”

“That’s because Grace is an idiot. I think it’s all the hair dye she uses. I read this article the other day, and apparently the chemicals can leak into your brain and make you go crazy. Would explain a lot.”

“Yes, but after six dates with me, Rob wants to move on to Samantha, so maybe she’s right?”

“Oh, please. Since when is Grace right? Anyway, this is a matter of principle. He asked you to the prom first and he should stick to his decision,” Candice declared as she pulled up to the Newbury Mall. It had been built five years ago and was a huge sprawling creation, flanked by palm trees and settled smack-bang in the middle of the Twilight Zone. It was also the place where Mia had finally found her prom dress last week.

She and Candice had spent the entire day trying on clothes and were just about to go home and recover in front of
Supernatural
repeats when she had spotted the most amazing nip-waisted black dress. Candice called it “Goth prom.” Mia called it “perfect,” and they both agreed that it was worth every cent of the jaw-dropping price. Perhaps Mia should check if the store did refunds?

“So any other ideas besides a push-up bra?” Mia asked as her friend slowed down at the first parking spot, but after studying it for a minute, she obviously thought it looked too difficult to reverse into and kept driving.

“Some slutty shoes?”

“I think it’s going to take more than that.” Mia frowned. “The way Samantha was operating on him, nothing short of a lobotomy will stop him from falling under her spell. She’s like one of those gross wasps that Mr. Haves was talking about. The ones who inject venom into someone’s brain and make them become a mindless slave.”

“That’s it.” Candice suddenly put her foot on the brake as the car behind them started to honk. “A spell. We get a spell and make him fall in love with you. Perfect.”

“Brilliant idea!” Mia said with a hint of sarcasm. “And if only we went to Hogwarts, then maybe we could figure out how to rustle one up. Seriously, we need to think of something real that will work—”

“Actually.” Her friend coughed as she started to slowly drive toward the parking-lot exit. “I think I know what we need. . . . ”

 

“Okay, if this is some sort of joke, it’s not funny,” Mia said fifteen minutes later as Candice pulled to a stop outside a questionable strip mall that had seen better days not to mention better tenants.

“Of course it’s not a joke.” Candice sounded offended as she hopped out of the car.

“So what could we possibly find in a liquor store or a seedy video store to help my situation?” Mia demanded as she glanced around at the run-down buildings in front of her.

“This is where we can get a love spell.” Candice nodded for her to follow her past an overflowing Dumpster and around the corner to an alley that was wedged in between a greasy-looking pizza place and a loan shark with blacked-out windows and a kicked-in door.

Mia stared at her friend for a minute, but Candice just hurried on, carefully stepping over the puddles of water that were blocking the way, until she came to a halt outside an unassuming paint-chipped red door.

“Enough.” Mia folded her arms in annoyance. “Candice Bailey, this isn’t funny, and if you think for one minute that I’m stepping into that place, you’re very much mistaken. I thought you were trying to help me, not freak me out.”

“I am trying to help.” Candice pushed the door open and gripped Mia’s wrist.

“What? By taking me to a store that happens to be down a dank, dark alley,” Mia snapped as she found herself being dragged into a low-lit room. Through the thick fog of incense that caught in her nose, she could just make out shelf after shelf of bottles and books.
And was that a cauldron over in the corner?

“Anyway, you’re the one who can practically quote
Buffy
and
Supernatural
by heart,” Candice reminded her. “You should feel right at home here.”