Read Online Betrayal by Lee Nichols - Free Book Online Page B

for staring out the window. The whole class turned to shoot me dirty looks, so I buried myself in the intricacies of trigonometry, wishing all my problems had such concrete solutions.
    After class, I retreated to my locker. Thatcher’s lockers were clustered in lounges—with leather club chairs, potted plants, and oil paintings—that were meant to be study rooms, but were more like hangouts. There was a certain cachet to each lounge, and heavy negotiating for the best of them. Since I started the school year late, I’d been assigned a nerdy lounge offering little in decor beyond an uncomfortable vinyl couch and a molting fica tree, which discouraged lingering.
    Today I was grateful for the solitude when I found a Barbie doll hanging inside my locker. Someone had sheared its blond hair to look like my choppy, short haircut, dressed her in a plaid school uniform—and strung her tie into a noose.
    It bothered me more than it should’ve. It was malevolent and cruel and whoever had put it there (Harry!) had no idea how close I’d come to death that night Coby had been killed.
    I untied Barbie and buried her in the trash. Then I thought for a second and wasn’t sure if trashing my likeness was a good idea. So I dug her out, straightened her uniform, and tidied her hair. She looked pretty unimpressed by the rough treatment, so I put her in my bag, and decided to emulate her self-confident serenity.

6

    Much to my chagrin, Fencing was a required course at Thatcher. Not that I wasn’t good with a sword, but I fought like a barroom brawler. There’s nothing elegant about fighting a wraith, which was why I was terrible at fencing. Sure, I could beat anyone in class in a real swordfight, but I couldn’t get a feel for the rules and intricacies of the exhibition sport.
    I trudged downstairs and into the only room at Thatcher that looked like it belonged in a regular school: the girls’ locker room. The floors were gray concrete, the lockers public-school brown. I was late, and slipped into my fencing whites as the bell rang.
    In the gym, the coach paired me with Sara. “She’ll go easy on you.”
    â€œOh!” I said. “No. Actually, she’s—”
    â€œDelighted,” said Sara, prowling in front of me.
    She was beautiful in her anger, mahogany locks twirling about her shoulders as though they were mad, too. Her color was high and her voice low—even rougher than usual, like she’d worn herself out crying over Coby.
    She lowered into en garde position, and I made a half-hearted effort to defend myself.
    She lunged and I riposted, back and forth down the mat. Well, mostly back, because I wasn’t attacking, just defending.
    â€œWould you fight?” she said.
    â€œI don’t want to fight you.”
    â€œYou promised”—she executed a perfect coupé—“you wouldn’t hurt him.”
    I fell back. “I’m sorry.”
    â€œYou’re sorry ? He’s dead, and you’re sorry.”
    â€œI couldn’t—” I swallowed. “There was nothing I could do.”
    â€œDo you really believe that?”
    The point of my foil drifted downward. “No.”
    â€œNeither do I.”
    And with that, she stabbed me in the chest … and then she just lost it. A horrible, wracking sob burst from her chest, and she started flailing at me with the foil like it was a riding crop.
    I guess I just stood there.
    In a minute, Coach noticed and started screaming at Sara. She banished her to the bench, threatening disciplinary action, but Sara just hurled her foil across the room and shoved into the locker room.
    The ghost jocks—two teenage boys whose mission in death seemed to be heckling me—shimmered into being on the bleachers.
    That Sara has great form , the dark-haired one said.
    Indeed , the other agreed. And she fences well, too.
    Then they high-fived each other over their smarminess.
    I slunk