CHAPTER EIGHT
SPARKS FLY
Frankie ran-walked down the empty hall, her wool-covered thighs chafing. She didn’t want to attract attention by sprinting, but she needed to be first in the classroom. It was imperative she find a seat in the back. As far from view as one could possibly be without being marked absent. She didn’t need fifteen days of math to know that rumors of a monster sighting plus shocking a girl in the cafeteria equaled trouble.
The bell bwoooped. The halls buzzed with freshly fed normies searching for their fourth-period classrooms. Frankie, mega-paces ahead of the pack, hurried into room 203 for her first geography class. So far, school life hadn’t gone as planned, but at least she was living it.
“No!” she heard herself say aloud upon entering the classroom. The desks were arranged in a circle! No dark corners. No back rows. No place to hide! Her pre-lunch reapplication of Fierce & Flawless would be her only cover.
“This can’t be happening,” she mumbled under her breath while trying to assess which part of the circle would be the least conspicuous. Tiny sparks of electricity shot from her fingertips and sizzled up the metal spine of her pink denim-covered binder. She opted for a seat in front of the windows instead of one facing them, to avoid the sun’s revealing rays.
“What’s with the circle?” An above-average-looking boy entered the room. He was dressed in a white button-down, jeans, and hiking boots. His swagger seemed more leather than L.L.Bean. What he lacked in style he made up for with sass.
He stood by the door, his head cocked as if admiring art in the Louvre. Only he was admiring Frankie. “I’m thinking we should turn this circle into a heart.” He lifted a globe from the shelf and spun it on his finger like a basketball.
Frankie lowered her eyes, wishing she could fire back with something equally flirtatious and cool. Wanna see me burn your initials in this desk with my finger? But instead of playing Frankie, she had been cast in the forgettable role of shy normie by the window.
With one hand in his pocket and the other clutching a tiny flip-top pad (because cool guys don’t take a lot of notes), he strutted over to Frankie. He took his time as he ambled past the wall of maps and the blackboard, probably so she could admire him. “Is this seat taken?” he asked, running a hand through his floppy brown hair.
Frankie shook her head. Did he really have to sit right next to her?
“I’m D.J.,” he said, slouching down in the wooden chair.
“Frankie.”
“Pleasure.” He extended his hand for a shake. Frankie, afraid of sparking, responded with a smile-nod. D.J. tapped her shoulder with his hovering hand, as if that had been the intention all along.
Bzzzt.
“Well, well.” He shook his wrist and looked amused. “Aren’t you the little firecracker?”
Crap! Frankie immediately turned away and opened her geography textbook. She began focusing on the introduction to keep herself from hyperventilating. The class began to fill up quickly, and two girls, in mid-conversation, filled the empty seats beside her.
“I swear,” said the one with the pink-and-black-striped girly-Goth mini, her lips tight against her teeth like someone embarrassed to talk with new braces. “The caf has nothing good for vegans.” She shook two pills from a bottle labeled IRON COMPLEX, and swallowed them without water. Her eyes were smudged with black makeup.
“Why not give the mashed potatoes a burl?” asked her friend, a fair-skinned blond with an Australian accent. Dressed in billowing brown drawstring pants, a tight orange T-shirt, and elbow-length striped knitted gloves, she appeared to have dressed in the dark.
“I loathe garlic,” said Vegan, crossing her legs to reveal a pair of pink knee-high lace-up boots that Lady Gaga would go gaga for.
“Not as much as you loathe mirrors, mate,” joked the Australian as she pushed back a tangle of rope and bead bracelets, rolled down the gloves, and slathered her dry arms with coconut-scented body lotion.
“Help me,” Vegan insisted, lifting her pink-and-black-streaked hair away from her face.
The Australian snapped the cap back on her cream, leaned toward her friend, and began wiping Vegan’s cheek with her thumb. “It’s not easy,” she whispered. “You’ve got lippy where your blush should be. Looks like you were caught in a paintball bingle.”
They burst out laughing.
Frankie returned to her textbook to keep from staring. Even though she wanted to stare forever. Their breezy banter was a comfort of friendship—a comfort Frankie longed to have.
“Faster,” murmured the Vegan. “Before he sees me like this!”
There was only one he in the class, and he was sitting beside Frankie, whispering “Firecracker” to get her attention.
Frankie looked straight ahead and accidentally locked eyes with the ridiculously hot boy entering the room. It was the same one she had been trying not to stare at during lunch. But it was impossible not to. He was wearing a picture of her grandfather Victor right there on his T-shirt. He was either a RAD or a RAD lover. Either way, it meant she had a chance.
“’Scuse me, Sheila,” said the Australian, waking Frankie from her daydream.
“Actually, it’s Frankie,” she said politely.
Vegan leaned forward. “Blue calls everyone Sheila when she doesn’t know their name. It’s an Australian thing.”
“Right-o,” Blue said with a sweet smile. “Anyway, Frankie, it looks like you’re pretty into makeup, and I was wondering if my Lala could borrow some.”
“Um, sure,” Frankie dug into her GREEN IS THE NEW BLACK tote and pulled out the gold Fierce & Flawless makeup case marked EYELINER. “Take your pick.”
“This is all eyeliner?” Lala gasped, lips pressed against her teeth.
Frankie nodded, unsure whether she should feel pride or shame.
Melody, the girl she’d shocked in the cafeteria, hurried in after the teacher and grabbed the seat across from Frankie. She smiled cordially. Or was that normie for I’m onto you?
Frankie pulled her turtleneck up to keep her sparking bolts from giving her away.
The teacher, a woman with short curly blond hair and a turquoise sweater set, clapped. “Let’s begin!” She drew a big circle on the blackboard and tapped her long stick of chalk in the center. “This is our world. It’s round, just like the configuration of your desks. And I intend to show you how—” The chalk snapped in half and shot across the room.
“Ahhhh!” The possible RAD gripped the side of his neck and fell off his chair. “I’ve been hit!”
Everyone laughed. Frankie leaned forward, concerned.
“That’s enough, Brett.” The humorless teacher sighed as she picked the errant piece of chalk off the ground.
Brett. Brett and Frankie. Brankie. Frett. Frankie B., just like the jeans.… No matter how she said it, they sounded great together.
He crawled back onto his chair and locked eyes with Frankie, making her spark more. For an instant it felt as though his performance was just for her.
Over the span of the next forty-five minutes, she managed to glean that Lala had a crush on D.J. That D.J. had a crush on his “Firecracker.” That Lala could have D.J. because, while he was cute, he didn’t have Brett’s mysterious edge. And that Melody’s RAD-ar must have been beeping because she could not stop staring at D.J., who would not stop trying to get rezapped. It took a tremendous amount of physical control—which felt like trying not to think, which felt like not being able to breathe, which felt like being dead—for Frankie not to light up like Vegas.
When the bell bwooped, she bolted from her seat and raced to the girls’ bathroom. Lala and Blue called after her, but she ignored them. Frankie didn’t know if she had enough willpower to hold back any more sparks.
She burst into the bathroom, locked herself in the first stall, and let it rip. She was thankful that the bathroom was empty, because energy—charged by making eye contact with Brett, being poked at by D.J., and being stared down by Melody—flew from her fingers in a powerful bout. She flushed the toilet several times to cover the sound.
Relieved and drained, she opened the door with an exhausted sigh.
“Sounds like Sheila’s got the thunder from down under,” Blue said, with a sympathetic smile. She rubbed her flat abs. “I know what that’s like, mate.”
Lala giggled into her palm.
“Yeah.” Frankie washed her hands. Better they think she had to go number three than something so odd that it didn’t even have a number.
“You forgot this.” Lala waved the Fierce & Flawless makeup case like a flag.
“Oh, thanks.” Frankie placed her hand where her heart would be. “I’d be lost without this.”
“Why?” Blue twirled a wool-covered finger around one of her blond curls. “You’re so pretty. You don’t need all that makeup.”
Lala nodded in agreement.
“Thanks.” Frankie’s insides swelled. “So are you guys,” she said, meaning it. “It’s just that I kind of, uh, have bad skin.”
“Same.” Blue turned on the faucet and splashed the back of her neck. “Severe dryness.”
“You should see all her lotions,” Lala said with envy. “Her bedroom looks like Sephora.”
“Well, yours looks like the Cashmere Kangaroo,” Blue countered, still soaking.
“What’s the Cashmere Kangaroo?” Frankie asked.
“I have no idea.” Lala giggled. “What is the Cashmere Kangaroo?”
“I made it up.” Blue burst out laughing. “’Cause I couldn’t think of a store that only sold cashmere sweaters.”
“She’s saying that ’cause I’m always cold.” Lala folded her arms over her sweater dress. “Which is why I have a lot of cashmere.”
“Are you always cold too?” Frankie asked Blue. “Is that why you wear those gloves?”
“Nah.” Blue waved away the notion. “Just dry.” She turned to Lala. “Hey, are we going to the spa this weekend?”
“You mean, am I giving you another guest pass?” Lala fired back exuberantly.
“C’mon, luv, that place is so dang exy, I can’t afford my own membership. And if I don’t get in for a soak soon, my skin will turn to cactus.”
“Try a razor,” Lala suggested.
“Only if you try a dingo muzzle.”
Frankie giggled, tickled by the lyrical friskiness of their banter.
“Hey, we should bring Frankie this week,” Lala suggested through tight lips. “I bet some time on the tanning bed would clear up your skin.”
“Ace!” Blue exclaimed, scratching her arm. “That’ll give you the confidence to nab Brett away from his Sheila.”
“What?” Frankie clenched her fists to keep from sparking.
“Caught you staring,” Blue teased, opening the bathroom door.
“Oops.” Frankie pretended to be embarrassed. But all she really felt was joy, to be inducted into their playful game of back-and-forth.
“So, can you make it on Saturday?” Lala asked as they joined the foot traffic in the hall.
“Sure.” Frankie nodded graciously. She had no idea what a tanning bed could do for her, but if that’s what normie girls did to attract boys like Brett, this Sheila was in.