Only Everything Read online

  “There are others,” I told him. Then I reached past a tiny girl with blond curls and took a carton of milk and a brown roll.

  “You’re cutting the line,” she said.

  “Get over it,” I snapped.

  I gave the woman the meal card Mrs. Leifer had issued me that morning and took my food outside, wincing with every step. Other students had claimed tables and were starting to eat. I concentrated on a sad-looking girl sitting alone and tried to read her feelings. Come on. Give me your name. Your heart’s desire. Something. True love is just the thing to turn that frown upside down. I gritted my teeth, held my breath, and focused. The only sound was that of my blood thumping in my temples. And now the pain radiated down my neck and into my shoulders. Perfection.

  “Hey, True.” Charlie Cox walked up next to me with a tray full of food. “Lunch at a new school. Sucks, doesn’t it?” he said quietly.

  “Does it?” I asked, distracted by the throbbing.

  “Always,” he replied with a tentative smile. “So . . . wanna sit together?”

  Kindness. Interesting. That was new.

  “Sure,” I said.

  Then the three virile boys from the office that morning—Trevor, Josh, and Brian—walked up behind him.

  “Where’re you going? You’re sitting with us,” Josh said, hooking his arm around Charlie’s neck in a friendly way.

  “Oh.” Charlie looked perplexed. Maybe even alarmed. “I guess we’re sitting with them.”

  We walked over to a table under a lovely elm tree and settled in on the benches. My feet pulsated, so I took the opportunity to tug the boots off. The cool air rushed over my bare toes like a soothing balm. A pair of girls shot me a disgusted look, so I stared them down until they went away. The sun pierced my eyes, and I held one hand over them for shade.

  The Virile Trio took out their cell phones and started texting. I bit down on my tongue. All day it had been like this. People texting their friends across the classroom, in the halls, at their lockers, standing right in front of each other. Why not talk to the people around you? Look them in the eye? Connect on a human level? No wonder the true love connection was faltering. Texting “I love you” was simply not the same as saying it out loud while staring deeply into your beloved’s eyes. . . .

  My heart ached, and I touched Orion’s arrow. Three couples. That was it. I would see him again once I matched three couples.

  “So. What do you think of Lake Carmody High?” Charlie asked.

  I bit into the apple and eyed him carefully beneath the cover of my fingers. I already knew he was single, and he’d been in a couple of my honors classes that morning, where I’d seen a few different girls appraising him. Clearly they liked this scruffy, twenty-first-century-artist look he had going. Plus, he was the only human human I’d met today, the only one who’d offered me even an ounce of consideration.

  I could work with Charlie Cox. If only I could read his soul and find out exactly what he wanted in a girl. If only I had my gold-tipped arrows. Ever since I’d left the house that morning, I’d been missing the heft of my quiver and bow on my back. Now I squirmed, my spine actually tingling with longing.

  “Not much,” I answered. “What about you?”

  Charlie’s eyes trailed along the table toward the VT. “It’s . . . weird. These guys? At any other school I’ve been to? Would have kicked my ass by now. Or at least tried to shove me into a locker.”

  I nodded knowingly, thinking of Orion. “The alpha males. They’re born with the primal need to assert themselves. To show everyone around them who’s in charge.”

  Charlie laughed and took a bite of sandwich. “I’ve never thought of it that way, but okay.”

  “They seem to genuinely like you, though,” I mused.

  “I know! That’s the weirdest part. No one has ever asked me to sit with them on the first day before. Four schools in ten years and not once,” he said.

  I smiled, touched. “Is that why you asked me to sit with you?”

  Charlie shrugged. “I know how it feels. And it doesn’t feel good.”

  “Thank you,” I said earnestly.

  He grinned. “Anytime.”

  I decided I liked Charlie. That kind of empathy is rare in the teenage population. It illustrated a depth that I, as someone who had been around for countless millennia, appreciated. I sat back and gazed around the courtyard, munching on the apple and trying to discern if any of these girls were worthy enough to deserve him.

  “Where’d you move from?” he asked, popping open a bottle of iced tea.

  “Maine,” I said flatly.

  That iced tea looked good. Refreshing. I picked up the bottle and gulped down half of it. Charlie stared. I placed it down and sighed. My head throbbed a bit more dully.

  “Um, that was mine,” Charlie said.

  “What is with everyone and this mine thing?” I asked. “ ‘That’s my desk, you took my pencil, mine, mine mine.’ Doesn’t anyone on Earth share?”

  He narrowed his eyes at me, and I realized with a start that I might have said too much. Normally, I was not one to complain, but this day—and this headache—were frustrating me to no end. It was so difficult, getting used to these new rules. Normally I simply visualized what I wanted and it would appear before me. My brothers and sister, my friends back home . . . we’d never wanted for anything, and we’d never had a problem with anyone taking something from us, because we could always conjure another.

  Except for our loves, of course. We always took issue when someone tried to steal our loves.

  Suddenly a plain girl with gorgeous auburn hair paused at the end of our table. “Did you take my scarf?”

  I sighed as I reached back to untie it. “See what I mean?” I handed the scarf to the girl, who stared. “What? I don’t have fleas.”

  She ran to her friends to whisper. A tall, handsome boy with shaggy brown hair and the letters QB on the arm of his jacket shot me a disturbed look before ushering her through a door marked THE CAFÉ, her friends trailing behind. A stiff breeze blew my hair into my face. Mental note: Tomorrow, braids.

  “Ooookay,” Charlie said. “Can I have your milk, then?”

  “Sure,” I said, taking another bite of apple. Why did he even feel the need to ask? “I can always get another.”

  A car motor gunned and we both looked up. Idling at the bottom of the stairs leading from the courtyard to the parking lot was a sleek black car. A pretty girl in tight jeans jogged down the steps and over to the driver, who got out and laid a serious kiss on her. He wore an oil-stained baseball cap, and even from here I could tell his fingernails were black with grime. He picked up his girlfriend and sat her down on the hood of the car, where they went at it like dogs in heat.

  I grimaced. Those two, I had not matched up. I would have remembered.

  “Ever wonder what people are thinking?” Charlie sounded mildly disgusted.

  My eyes narrowed. I used to always know what people were thinking. But now I would have given anything for the smallest inkling.

  “All the time,” I said.

  Charlie shook his head and picked up the sandwich again as Veronica, Darla, and their hangers-on arrived with trays piled high with greens. Darla shot me the smallest of smiles, then sat down next to Charlie, angling away from us. Veronica slid into a chair next to Josh, wrapping her arms around his neck and leaning in for a kiss. Then she glanced over at the couple on the car.

  “God. Do we really have to watch that?” she asked, scrunching her nose.

  “I know,” Darla put in, pushing her salad around with her fork. “And she used to be so normal.”

  “Katrina Ramos? Please,” Veronica said dismissively.

  Darla’s cheeks turned pink. “Well, she was semi-normal. We used to have a lot of classes together. She was nice.”

  Veronica scoffed and widened her eyes. “And look at her now,” she said derisively.

  “Come on, V. You gotta cut the girl some slack after what happened,” J
osh said. For a long moment, everyone at the table was silent.

  “Why?” Charlie piped up. “What happened?”

  Darla leaned toward him. “Her dad died last year. In a car crash,” she whispered. “This huge pileup on 78. It was on every news channel for days. After that, she just kind of . . .”

  “Turned slut?” Veronica suggested.

  The guys laughed. Darla shifted in her seat. Charlie watched Katrina and her boyfriend for another few seconds, and I could tell he felt for her. The boy definitely had heart.

  “Charlie, I’m going to find you a girlfriend,” I announced, pressing the tip of Orion’s arrow into the pad of my finger.

  “What?” Trevor said with a laugh.

  Charlie paled.

  “Yeah . . . what?” he squeaked.

  “I’m going to find you a girlfriend,” I repeated, taking another swig of iced tea. “I’m really good at matching up couples. It’s a special talent of mine.”

  Veronica rolled her eyes. “Who is this freak?” she whispered to Josh.

  “You think I need a girlfriend?” Charlie asked, fiddling with the ripped top of the milk carton.

  “Everyone needs love,” I told him. “It’s a universal truth.”

  Charlie chuckled.

  “She’s right about that,” Josh announced, kissing Veronica’s cheek.

  “Don’t you want a girlfriend?” I asked, perplexed. “Or is it that you want a boyfriend? Because either way, I can help.”

  Trevor almost choked. Brian eyed Charlie curiously. Loud music blasted through the windows of the black car. I winced, touching my fingertips to my temples. Almost everyone in the courtyard stared. Charlie’s ears turned pink.

  “Girlfriend. I’m a girlfriend kind of guy,” Charlie specified. “And, um, sure. I guess.”

  “Then I’m going to get you one.”

  Charlie shifted in his seat, and his shoulders hunched. It was like he was trying to grow smaller. “Why do I feel like I don’t have a choice here?”

  I tilted my head. “Because you don’t.”

  He glanced along the table. Veronica and Josh were now feeding each other cucumber slices. Down in the parking lot, the dirty guy was nuzzling his girlfriend’s neck while that awful guitar music assaulted everyone’s eardrums.

  “Okay, fine,” Charlie said. “Why the hell not?”

  “This should be interesting,” Veronica said under her breath.

  I ignored her. “Good,” I said to Charlie. I smiled and took a cookie off the plate in front of him. Charlie watched me bite into it, crestfallen. I rolled my eyes, broke off half, and handed it back to him.

  “Now tell me everything there is to know about you.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Katrina

  I had Ms. Day for English again. This was a good sign. Ms. Day was one of the only teachers who had been nice to me after my dad died last year. Most of the others could barely figure out what to say to me. But Ms. Day, she’d offered to help me with makeup work a few times—an offer I’d always turned down—and had even given me a Christmas present—a gift card to Barnes & Noble. “Escapism is good for the soul,” she’d said. Until this summer I’d had no idea what that meant. But even knowing the teacher was a non-nightmare wasn’t stopping my nerves about handing in my paper. In five minutes everyone was going to know I’d done the summer homework. In my old honors classes, this wouldn’t have been a big deal. Everyone else would have done the homework too. But in these classes, people laughed at you for doing the work. They stared. They whispered.

  I hated that.

  It doesn’t matter, I told myself. This is not about them. Fresh start, fresh start, fresh start.

  As I came around the corner into the literary arts wing, I tripped, and my stack of new, uncovered textbooks slipped out of my arms. Of course everyone in the hall applauded. Originality was not big at my school. My face burned as I bent to check on the poor freshman I’d collided with. She was still crouched at my feet, the laces of her shoe in each hand.

  “I’m so sorry!” I said. “I didn’t even see you!”

  “It’s all right,” she replied, tying her shoelace. She stood and shoved her big glasses up on her nose. She had dark skin, brown eyes, and black hair pulled back in a perfect ponytail. “I get that a lot.”

  Then her eyes shifted past me. When I turned around, I stopped breathing. Not-Justin-Bieber was standing there, holding my books out to me in a neat stack. Except up close he looked nothing like Justin Bieber. His cheeks were more square and his eyes very, very blue. He was hotter than Justin Bieber. By a lot.

  “That looked painful,” he said with a smile. His voice made my heart feel fuzzy and warm, like hot chocolate on a cold day.

  “We’re okay,” I replied, glancing over my shoulder at the frosh, mostly to force myself to tear my eyes off him. “Right . . . ?”

  “Zadie,” she replied, lifting a hand. She had on about twenty Hello Kitty bracelets, some beaded, some silver, some string. “I’m Zadie.”

  “Nice to meet you, Zadie,” Not-Bieber said. “I’m Charlie.”

  They both looked at me. “Oh, Katrina. That’s my me. I mean name. I’m Katrina.”

  Charlie’s smile widened. “I think these are yours.”

  “Oh. Right.” I realized with a start that my black poetry notebook was still on the floor and had fallen open, exposing my latest attempts at haiku to the world. I grabbed it and took my books from him, feeling like an idiot for making him stand there holding them for so long. And also for not being able to speak. My face was hot as I clutched the books, and my poetry, to my chest. “Thanks.”

  “Um. Okay. Bye,” Zadie said, turning around.

  “Bye! And sorry! Again!” I called after her.

  She waved and smiled and was gone, leaving Charlie and me standing there alone.

  “So,” he said.

  I opened my mouth to say something to him, when I was suddenly dragged off by the arm.

  “Raine!” I protested.

  “You’re welcome!” she sang, looking down at her phone.

  She practically flung me into Ms. Day’s room. I glanced over my shoulder at Charlie, who had pushed his hands into his pockets and was loping away, and realized maybe I should thank her. If I’d kept talking to him, I probably would have said something else as brilliant as “That’s my me.” Ugh.

  “Katrina! Hello!” Ms. Day greeted me as I shuffled through the door.

  Every kid in the room stopped talking and turned to look at me. It was like I had the words “Teacher’s Pet” stamped across my forehead. I bowed my head as Raine slipped by and took a seat toward the back of the room.

  “Hey, Ms. Day.”

  My heels clicked loudly as I rushed after Raine and plopped into the seat next to hers, my cheeks pulsating. Raine’s thumbs flew over the screen on her phone.

  “Lana says hey,” she told me. “She says Mr. P got hot this summer.”

  I snorted a laugh. Mr. P was an ancient, shriveled history teacher. He wore polka-dotted bow ties with plaid shirts and stopped every five feet in the hallway to lean against the wall and catch his breath.

  Suddenly my own phone vibrated. My heart leaped when I saw that it was a text from Ty. But why was he texting when he’d left me in the courtyard exactly one class period ago? Maybe he’d remembered that I had English seventh period and wanted to wish me luck! I clicked the text.

  CANT GET THERE TILL 4. SRY.

  Damn.

  His place was too far to walk to from school. I could walk home, but I didn’t want to go home. My mom was always crankier than usual after the overnight shift, and I hadn’t even seen her in two days. I also realized suddenly that I hadn’t dusted or vacuumed the house, and if I went home, that meant I’d have to go grocery shopping first. With no ride from Ty.

  Sometimes I hated my life.

  I slumped in my chair until my whole butt hung off the edge. The guy next to me, a senior whose name I didn’t know, hunched so fully he look
ed like a turtle, his leather jacket covering everything but the tips of his frosted blond hair as he rested his cheek on the desk.

  “Welcome back, everyone!” Ms. Day said brightly, standing at the front of the room in her bright-green dress and brown flats, her black, gray-streaked hair pulled back in a bun. “I hope you all had a fun, productive summer.”

  A couple of people sighed. Someone outright laughed.

  “How many of you did the summer reading assignment?” she asked, lifting her chin as she surveyed the room.

  Raine looked at me and smirked. “Katrina did it, Ms. Day!” she announced.

  Ms. Day’s eyebrows shot up.

  “Raine,” I said through my teeth, clutching my bag in my lap.

  “What?” she said, lifting the hand that wasn’t holding the phone. “Like you weren’t going to hand it in?”

  Chrissa Jones and Elana Rosen laughed.

  “Which book did you choose, Katrina?” Ms. Day asked, walking toward my row.

  “Um . . . The Perks of Being a Wallflower?” I said, tugging the paper out. My makeup bag, a pen, and three quarters flew out with it, tumbling to the floor. More laughter. Ms. Day picked up the makeup bag. Raine got the pen. The guy next to me snagged one of the quarters.

  “Finders keepers,” he said, clutching it in his fist. Then he turtled up again.

  “Good choice.” Ms. Day traded my makeup bag for the paper, which shook as I handed it over. “I look forward to reading this.”

  “Um. Okay.”

  Suddenly I was sweating like I was in gym class, doing the dreaded squat thrusts. But then Ms. Day gave me this proud smile, like she was impressed. By me. And something inside me unclenched. I sat up straight and put my things back in my bag.

  “Anyone else?” Ms. Day asked.

  Two other kids had written papers. Josh Harper’s was handwritten and on The Catcher in the Rye, and Casey Catalfo had read The Secret Life of Bees. It made me feel much less conspicuous, and I realized one of the windows was open, pouring sweetly scented late-summer air over our desks.