Read Lovely Vicious for Free Online Page B

the bones of small infants.”
    She takes it, beaming. “Thanks!”
    “Is Avery still mad at you for leaving the party?” I ask.
    “Oh, no. I mean, Avery never really gets mad mad, you know? She sort of just, doesn’t talk to you. Or look at you. Or acknowledge you exist.”
    “Ah, yes. Perfectly reasonable.”
    “I was supposed to, um, talk to Wren. You know, student council president guy.”
    “Your student council prez goes to boozers? Consider me impressed.”
    “He’s cool like that, but at the same time he’s also intimidating. Like, really intimidating. He’s going to MIT and he doesn’t look anywhere at you except your eyes. No lips, no boobs, not even your eyelashes. Just. Your. Eyes.”
    She stares at me as if demonstrating, wide-eyed and unrelenting, and I shudder.
    “Alright, alright. I get the picture. Mega creep.”
    “Yeah, but like, a socially accepted mega creep. It’s weird. He’s friends with everybody. And I mean everybody. He watched an entire season of Naruto just so he could talk to the anime club kids.”
    I whistle. “He’s certainly impressive. Hellbent. Also possibly from actual hell.”      
    “Anyway, Avery wanted me to, um, talk to him.”
    “Just talk?”
    Kayla nods a little too hard for my liking. “She wants more funds for the French club. She’s president of that. She’s trying to set up a trip to France for them or something.”
    “So you talking to him would get you funds? Are you that good at talking?”
    “Just, you know. I’m nice. I can get things from people.”
    “You’re pretty.”
    “But I’m also nice! And I’m smart! Okay, maybe not in World History, but who even cares about stupid plagues anyway? We have vaccines now! I’m really good at home ec and Mrs. Gregory said I have a natural talent for geometry, okay? I’m a lot of things besides pretty so don’t just say that like everyone else!”
    Her chest is heaving, and her face is a little red. I put my hands up in surrender.
    “Okay. I’m sorry. You’re right. You’re a lot of things besides pretty. I just meant…I just meant –”
    “You just meant what? I know I’m pretty, okay? I know that! That’s all anyone talks about! But I’m not pretty enough, I guess, because you’re the one Jack Hunter kissed and not me!”
    She shouts the last sentence. It hangs in the air like icicles, cold and jagged.
    “I didn’t - I’m sorry –”
    “I don’t wanna talk about it anymore,” she murmurs. “I have to watch Gerald, so if you could just leave, that’d be great.”
    I feel all the air punch out of me at once.
    “Oh. R-Right. Sure.”
    I grab my backpack and books, shuffling them away. Kayla gets up and goes into the kitchen, wiping dirt off her brother’s face and scolding him for trying to eat daisies. I want to say bye, or apologize again, but there’s a thick curtain of awkward closing on the stage that is our tenuous friendship. I want to say a lot of things to her. I want to thank her for being the first person to really invite me over to their house, to talk to me, to eat lunch with me. But those words get stuck in my throat, the gratitude I have for her dammed up by shame.
    As I leave and start my car, I mentally kick myself. Of course she gets told she’s pretty. She gets it all the time. Pretty girls like her are sick of hearing it. I was insensitive to even say it – but how could someone like me understand what pretty girls experience?
    Ugly girl.
    Jack kissing me – was it really such a huge deal for her? Maybe I underestimated her feelings for him. She must really like him if she’s that upset. Hell, if I still believed in love and had someone I liked and they kissed my sort-of-friend, I’d be mad at that friend too.
    She has every right to hate me.
    Mom texts me, asking me to buy sponges and some blueberries on the way home. I’m feeling terrible about what I said – so terrible I grab a bar of chocolate. Or three. When I get home I sneak into Mom’s