Read Online Beastly by Alex Flinn - Free Book Online Page A

my friends (former friends, as Kendra said), catching them in weird moments – getting ragged on by parents, picking their noses, naked, or just generally not thinking about me. I watched Sloane and Trey too. They were together, yeah, but Sloane had another boyfriend, a guy who didn’t go to Tuttle. I wondered if she’d cheated on me too.
    Then I started watching other people. The apartment was empty those long August weeks. Magda made my meals and left them for me, but I only came out if I heard her vacuuming in a different part of the house, or if she went out. I remembered her saying she was frightened for me. Probably, she thought I’d gotten what I deserved. I hated her for thinking that.
    I started this thing where I’d take out my yearbook and choose a page, then point to some random person – usually some loser I wouldn’t have bothered with when I was at the school. I’d read their name, then look in the index to see what activities they did. I thought I’d known everyone at that school. But now I saw that I hadn’t known many of them. Now I knew all their names.
    The game I played was I chose a person then tried to decide where they’d be in the mirror.
    Sometimes it was easy. Technogeeks were always by the computer. Jocks were mostly outside, running around.
    Sunday morning, the picture I chose was Linda Owens. She looked familiar. Then I realized it was the girl from the dance, the one I’d given the rose to who’d gotten so jacked up about it, the one who’d gotten me my second chance. I’d never noticed her at school before that day. Now I looked at her yearbook pages, which were like a resume: National Honor Society, French Honor Society, English Honor Society… well, all the honor societies.
    She had to be at the library.
    “I want to see Linda,” I told the mirror.
    I watched for the library. The mirror usually panned its location, like a movie. So I expected a shot of the cement lions, then Linda, studying even though it was August.
    Instead, the mirror panned a neighborhood I’d never seen before – and wouldn’t want to see. On the street, two worn-out women in tube tops argued. A junkie slumped on a doorstep, shooting up. The mirror panned up a stoop, through a door, up a staircase with a broken step and a bare lightbulb with wires hanging from it, and landed in an apartment.
    The apartment had peeling paint and coming-up linoleum. There were boxes for bookshelves. But everything looked clean, and Linda sat in the middle of it, reading. At least I was right about that.
    She turned a page, then another, and another. I must have watched her read for ten minutes. Yes, I was that bored. But it was more than that. It was sort of cool that she could read like that, and not pay attention to anything around her.
    “Hey, girl!” a voice called, and I jumped. It had been so quiet up until then that I didn’t realize there was anyone else in the apartment with her.
    Linda looked up from her book. “Yes?”
    “I’m… cold. Bring me a blanket, huh?” Linda sighed and put her book facedown. I glanced at the title. Jane Eyre, it was called. I was bored enough at that point that I thought maybe I’d read it someday.
    “Okay,” she said. “Want some tea too?” She was already standing, walking toward the kitchen.
    “Yeah.” The answer was barely more than a grunt. “Just hurry.” Linda turned on the faucet and let it run while she took out a battered red teakettle. She filled the kettle and placed it on the stove. “Where’s that blanket?” The voice was angry. “Coming. Sorry.” With a backward glance at her book, she walked toward the closet and unfolded a skimpy blue blanket. She took it to a man huddled on an old sofa. He was covered in another blanket, so I couldn’t see his face, but he shivered even though it was August. Linda tucked the blanket around his shoulders. “Better?”
    “Not much.”
    “Tea will help.”
    Linda made the tea, and searched through the mostly