AllFreeNovel
Share Us
They all whirl around to stare at me. And Daniel looks just as stunned as the rest of them at my brash intrusion on the cool kid’s table. I’m pretty shocked myself. But I am just so done with everything they get away with. Especially Sebastian, who’s in trouble or causes some disturbance every other day, it seems, and still has everyone wrapped around his little finger.
“Did you say something?” Victoria stares at me. She’s probably never heard me speak before. She probably doesn’t even know my name.
“Yeah.” I rest an elbow on the table. “I said the chemicals won’t explode. They’ll just melt the container.”
I glance over at Sebastian, whose thumb is drumming against his thigh, eyes wide and lower lip pulled between his teeth.
“Oh. And the tabletop, too.”
There’s a brief pause in the drumming, and then it starts up again. Possibly even faster. I lean farther across the table, so I’m practically speaking into his ear.
“And probably your flesh, too.”
His thumb stills completely and his eyes narrow, probably still trying to figure out what the heck is going on with me. “You don’t know that.”
I give an unaffected shrug and raise the dish in front of me. “I know these containers are made of PVC,” I say. “Acetone and Tetrahydrofuran are both solvents that dissolve PVC.” I incline my chin toward the desk. “And these are fiberglass table-tops. Ethanol breaks down fiberglass, Genius.” I flash a condescending smile and add, “But yeah, the flesh thing was just an informed guess.”
Victoria suddenly removes her hand from his skin, as if she’s conjuring up the gruesome image I just painted. Sebastian doesn’t appear to notice, though.
He just nods slowly, eyeing me for a moment before he speaks, confusion still flecked in those amber eyes. But finally, at least, the smile falters. “Are you sure you’re not mad at me about something?”
He glances at Daniel, sitting next to me, as if he might somehow know the reason for the sudden confrontation. Daniel’s eyes widen and he leans away, clearly not wanting to insert himself into any kind of conflict with the cool kids.
Smart boy.
I shrug at Sebastian. “Not mad. Just trying to save you from embarrassing yourself.” I pause, then add, “Or at least, from melting the flesh off your bones.”
Victoria gawks at Scarlett. “Oh my God, what a bitch.” And then more softly, she adds, “I thought nerds were supposed to benice.”
We usually are, Miss. Popularity.
Trevor knocks his fist lightly against Sebastian’s arm. “Whatever, man. You’ll think of something else.”
“Yeah.” I mutter as Sebastian glances briefly from his friend back to me again. “Better think up something fast, Jock Boy—before you lose your edge.”
But he barely reacts. His eyes slide instead to the side of the room, grazing over the shelves of supplies and the rows of sinks lined with oversized bottles of soap. I know he heard me though, because he shifts slightly and his gaze returns to me.
He winks, the corner of his mouth curving into that infuriating grin. “Done, NG.”
“Giant slip’n’slide out on south fields!” The lanky freshman who has apparently nominated himself SH Prep town crier screams over the shrill end-of-day bell. “Murdoch isback, bitches!”
He calls out only once, but the news has infiltrated every hallway conversation by the time he dashes out one of the back doors two minutes later. Students stream after him like ants scurrying from a felled log. It’s the rooftop incident all over again.
I toss a couple of books into my backpack and get up from my desk in final period calculus, before reluctantly following the crowds through the doors, among the last to exit the building.
When I get outside, half of the long steep hill between the upper and lower south playing fields is covered in bright blue plastic. I recognize it right away: the wide rolls of heavy-duty plastic from the storage room that we often use to cover the floor in art class when we do a sculpture unit. They’re rolled down the hill in long, overlapping strips, all the way to the lower field and then for a good fifteen feet beyond that.
As I make my way closer, I spot Sebastian standing at the top of the hill clutching oversized soap containers in each hand—the ones from the sinks in science class. He’s pouring the suds back and forth along the upper portion of the plastic to the deafening cheer of students, swarming closer as they begin to surround the entire slide.
As if of their own accord, my feet lead me slowly toward the front of the crowd, where Sebastian is standing by the edge of the slide tugging on a long hose he’s attached to a tap on the side of the science building. He is a man on a mission. Fully in his prime, any time he is smack dab in the middle of some hijinks or another. Which, to be fair, is pretty much every few days.
He looks up when someone calls out, “Heads up, man! Mrs. T. incoming!”
Then he just grins, raking his already dampened bangs off his forehead and turns on the hose. His ever-present backwards ball cap is nowhere in sight right now. He starts spraying water back and forth along the plastic sheets, glancing beyond the fields to the field house, where Mrs. Tromely is slowly advancing, leading an approaching troop of teachers, and rolls his eyes.
He looks back to whoever just issued the warning and calls, “Is she always such a party pooper? Or does she just have a hate-on for me?”
The other guy laughs. “Nah, bro. It’s not just you.”
