Nevermore

Isobel stared down at her food, her appetite replaced now by guilt-saturated nausea. Not knowing what to say, she squeezed her ketchup packet over her burger, still holding on to the slimming hope that they’d all just let it go. Yesterday on the phone, Nikki had acted like she’d known Isobel had been making it up anyway, right? So why did it matter now?

When she couldn’t think of anything not incriminating to say, Isobel tried shrugging. She realized quickly, though, when Nikki made her “Tch!” sound, that that had been the wrong response.

Nikki stood, gathering her tray. “Something smells over here, I’m switching.” And with that, she unthreaded her long legs from underneath the table and marched away to a distant, unoccupied table in the corner. No one dared try to stop her, least of all Isobel.

Without looking up, she felt the table shudder again as someone else stood. She could see varsity colors out of the corner of one eye, and she knew it must be Mark, moving to join Nikki, no doubt. Alyssa followed next, and finally even Stevie got up with what Isobel thought was an apologetic cough.

It was just her and Brad now.

“Where were you for real?” he asked after a long moment, ending the uncomfortable silence that had stretched between them. He’d asked in that soft and reasonable way that said all could still be forgiven.

“I can’t tell you, because you’ll just get mad.”

“Then that’s probably a good indication that you should tell me,” he said with strained patience. She’d been batting zero ever since last Friday, and now she was striking out. Big-time.

A sharp sting started behind her eyes. She shouldn’t have to make excuses to her boyfriend about doing her homework. Isobel lifted a finger to wipe a tear away before it could form.

She thought that everybody in the whole cafeteria had to be watching. The thought made her face burn, and she tried to shield her eyes with one hand.

Then, before she could summon up the resolve to answer, Brad rose from the table, taking his tray and moving away toward the others, leaving her completely alone.

Isobel felt her shoulders hitch when she tried to take a breath. She hadn’t eaten lunch by herself since the fifth grade, when everyone had found out her mom had made her wash her hair the night before with mayonnaise.

The tears came freely now, to the point where she could be sure of mascara trails. She sat there, shielding her face from view with one hand and trying to convince the world with her other, by poking a fork through her salad, that she was just fine.

Everything turned blurry through the lens of tears, but she could still register the pair of black boots that stopped beside her table.

Oh God, she thought. Anything but this.

“Please,” she murmured at her burger, her voice no more than a squeaky whisper, “don’t do this.”

“It’s dead,” he said. “I don’t think it can hear you.”

“You’re making things worse!” she hissed, and still shielding her soppy eyes from the rest of the cafeteria, she angled her head to peer up at him.

“That’s a good look for you,” he said.

Isobel didn’t have to look in the crew’s direction to know they were watching. She could feel Brad’s gaze on them. And if he hadn’t been able to guess who she’d been with on Saturday, he certainly knew now. Was this guy dense? Brad could pave the courtyard with him.

“He’s going to kill you.”

“Can’t,” he said. “Already dead. Remember?”

“You pick a funny time to adopt a sense of humor,” she snapped, glancing back down.

“When are we meeting again for the project?”

Where did he get off? Did he not have a clue? “Go away. We’re not.”

“How about after school?”

“I have practice.” It was funny how she could tell him the truth but had to lie to her friends.

“So I’m doing it by myself after all?” he asked in that cold, unaffected way.

“Mr. Swanson will give you a new partner. Go away.”

And to her surprise, just like that, he did.

6

Things Unseen

Isobel had not wanted to come to practice today. Not after the episode at lunch. But with a pep rally and game on Friday, she’d had no choice. If she had missed, not only would the crew despise her, but so would the rest of the squad. They’d been working on their routine for months now, and she was the middle flyer for most of the big stunts. Plus, there was Coach’s little rule of “Miss a practice, miss a game.”

Isobel put one hand on Nikki’s shoulder and the other on Alyssa’s, shoving her sneakers into their awaiting grasps, literally handing herself over to people who currently hated her.