Phaedra

Phaedra clicked her tongue, killing time. Because oh no, no way was she letting Xia get away that easily. "Okay, so you met an imaginary person?"

"Forget it." Xia cut her eyes across the street at—Phae had no idea who she was glaring at. Could be Slenderman for all she cared. She got out of the car, locked it behind her from habit.

"No way. You don't get to walk away with my heart, because you're too scared to have a fight."

Xia hissed, "Some of us like not having a criminal record. That must be really hard for you to beat."

"Wow, that's so uncalled for. You act like you're making the big sacrifice here, but you've got nothing to lose. You get me and I get you. That's fair, right? That's so fair."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"What's it mean? It means you're insecure and compulsive. You're obsessive. You're way too introverted for most people. You have the worst time just saying what you mean instead of talking around it." Phae just wanted to fix whatever it was. She liked Xia the way she didn't like most people. She wanted to keep her close.

"As if I don't know that! You wanna spend a little longer talking about what you don't like about me. Sure, I'm up for that. Lay it on me."

"This is what I'm talking about. Why would I spend a month hanging around somebody who got on my nerves? Yeah, I'll skip the drumroll—I wouldn't. I wouldn't do that. I'm cutthroat, I'm a roughneck; I keep a roll of pennies in my glove compartment because I'll get jail time if cops catch me with brass knuckles. I'm trouble and I know how to get into some. I know how to stay out of it, too. I know how to make my problems disappear."

"Are you threatening me?"

"God, you're killing me, Xia. I'm dying right now. Look at me, dying, dollface. How can you do me like this?"

"Stop kidding around. Drop the lingo. Talk to me." She wasn't trying to be invisible now, she was trying to be heard. So was Phae.

"If I wanted you gone, you'd have transferred schools by now. You'd be in Ass End of Nowhere, USA, repeating junior year and crying to your court-appointed therapist. I can do that. I've done stuff like that. I wouldn't do it to you." She didn't do that at all anymore. She had a court-appointed therapist too.

Xia sat down heavily on the curb, her legs having turned leaden under her and knees gone weak. It must be something she ate, or didn't. They hadn't made it to dinner.

"Now, she gets it," Phae muttered under her breath. "I like you. You're not a trick or a joke or a bet. This has always been real. I just didn't know if it was something you wanted or if it was just gratitude getting in the way. Catching one-sided feelings hurts."

Xia sniffed and wiped her face. She reddened further when she realized she'd started to cry. Phaedra took off her scarf and offered it to her as a handkerchief. She hesitated.

"Nothing I can't wash off later."

Xia smiled a little and took it. Phaedra thought she should do more of that. Xia's smiles were small, timid things, like she wasn't quite sure she was being laughed at and wanted to be prepared. Did we do that to her? She couldn't remember ever having it out with the secretary of the Asian Student Association, but maybe she'd just forgotten. Phae used to be mean before she started liking herself. The other girl took her hand and tangled their fingers together in a warm, slightly sticky mess. Phae sat next to her.

"Do you," Xia started and lost her nerve. She took a deep breath and tried again. "Go out with me—again, I mean. Something I want to do. Let's go do something."

"Like what?"

"There's a dance." Xia had mentioned it earlier; Phaedra had disregarded it at once. Just because she could go, didn't mean she went. Not even for her Wild Girls.

"I don't dance."

"I do. Do it for me. I helped organize it and pay for it—you even gave me two hundred dollars to kiss all the volleyball players for it."

Phaedra cringed. That was another plan gone to hell in an Easter basket.

"Dragging you out of the fire wasn't enough. You want my dignity, too? Give me a second, I think I can giftwrap that for you."

"You'll be the prettiest girl there. Nobody'll notice the boys either. You'll outlook both."

Phaedra had never cared about that. Beauty felt like a participation ribbon most of the time.

"Weren't you just shaking in your boots over me? How'd you get so brave?"

"Almost dying changes a lot."

Who was Phae to argue with a statement like that? Why would she want to?

"Okay."

She leaned over and kissed Xia's tear-warm cheek, hating that she'd made her sad enough to cry. Xia bumped their foreheads together and held on tight. Phae held on too.

I'm so sprung.

---

The next afternoon, Phaedra's head was half in the clouds and Sable was doing a noisy job of gnawing on a block of Nicorette gum. Alayna Hu was running the annual Smoke Cessation Barbecue Fundraiser and Sable wanted a prime seat at the raffle. Maybe, just maybe she'd finally ask the girl out and put the whole gang out of its unified misery.

Not. A. Chance.

Phae had never seen this many useless lesbians and bi chicks in her life. They were all hopeless, save for Lucia. Garvey almost had it together, barring that whole jonesing for the jock anti-Christ Ron Jensen deal. Useless lesbians and bi chicks on motorcycles. It's a traveling circus.

Jensen was a great athlete and terrible human being, just like every other high-functioning sociopath roaming the halls of Ellie Webber High. Phaedra couldn't even work up a good froth about the basketball team captain; he only got away with stuff because people who weren't terrified of him worshipped him. He was possessed with the spirit of Napoleon Bonaparte at five feet, six inches tall. He and his crew'd own the school the minute Phae, Tré, Luce, and Hunter drove into the sunset, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.

Not that that's my problem. Her problem had dark brown eyes, too much attitude and wanted to go to a stupid dance run by stupid people. Phaedra chewed at a toothpick she'd found in her glove compartment and tried to find a way out.

"Admin doesn't like my choice of date." She didn't have to explain.

"Admin can suck it." Sable was in no mood for administrative ball breaking. She was still stinging from that time a boys' hockey prick had snapped photos of her in the locker room and she'd gotten the fine for driving over his iPhone afterward. 'Sexist bullshit was their battle cry' and it was still echoing through the halls after every game.

"Let the church say amen. That's what I'm talking about."

Tempest Kennedy, junior and future stand-up comedian, ladies and gents. She's here all week.

Lucia lowered the book she'd been reading from above her head. It had made decent shade while the sun was at high noon, but it wasn't much use as the hours passed. The warmth emanating from the engine of her violet '71 Dodge Challenger made her want to nap instead of read.

She yawned, "The PTA warned that their exclusionary policies wouldn't be tolerated. I'll text Mum." She rolled onto her side to unlock her phone. Lucia's mom was a law professor first, a Wild Girl made good second. Beyond that, she was just a person who couldn't stand injustice.

Sable tapped the rubberized sole of her riding boots triple-time against the painted bumper of her '76 Firebird Trans Am . "Webber's about to make the evening news again. That hasn't happened for a while."

"It's been a month," Mickey reminded her, engrossed as she was in her belated obsession with Kim Kardashian: Hollywood.

"Like I said, 'a while'. We're slipping."