Read Shocking Pink for Free Online

that?”
    “What?”
    “Music. Shh…there.”
    The other two girls listened. They heard it, too.
    “Where’s it coming from?” Julie asked, frowning. They were standing dead center between the four empty houses at the end of the cul-de-sac.
    Andie strained to locate the source of the faint music. It floated on the night air, disembodied, there and then gone. It was odd music, disturbing somehow, with a slow, deep beat that made her pulse pound.
    “We shouldn’t be hearing music here.” Andie looked at her friends. “Where would it be coming from?”
    Julie glanced over her shoulder at the rest of the houses on her street. All were completely dark. “This is weird. Everybody on this block is asleep.”
    “We’re not.” At her friend’s blank glances, Raven giggled. “Guys, get a grip. It’s probably coming from a couple blocks away. Sound carries on the night air. Which I should know.” She grimaced. “My parents’ fights were legendary, all over every neighborhood we ever lived in.”
    “You’re right.” Andie laughed, sounding a bit breathless even to her own ears. “My imagination is working overtime.”
    “But it is kind of creepy,” Julie said, rubbing her arms. “It’s so quiet otherwise.”
    Raven laughed. “Come on you chickenshits. Follow me!” She took off in a sort of run-limp-hop because of her stitches; with a sound of surprise, the other two followed her. They cut across the backyard of the last house, then ducked into the twenty-foot stand of trees that separated Trent’s farm from Happy Hollow. Once in the open fields, it was easier to see; their shed stood out incongruously against the otherwise flat, barren field.
    They reached it, but instead of going inside, climbed onto the metal roof, lay back and gazed up at the black velvet sky. Minutes passed; none of them spoke. Somewhere in the distance a dog barked.
    “It’s so beautiful,” Julie murmured.
    Raven murmured her agreement. “And so quiet.”
    Andie folded her arms behind her head and breathed deeply. “It’s like we’re the only people in the whole universe. Just us and the stars.”
    “What if it was just us?” Raven mused. “No asshole parents? Nobody making us be what they want us to be?”
    “If it was just us,” Andie murmured, “I wouldn’t be so sad right now.”
    “What about boys?”
    Andie and Raven looked at each other, then burst out laughing. “Leave it to you, Julie.”
    “Well, really.” She sniffed, sounding annoyed. “We’d have to have boys. You guys might be able to do without…well, you know, but not me.”
    “Well, I could,” Raven said, her tone fierce. “Boys become men. Then they become like your dad or mine.” She made a sound of disgust. “No thank you.”
    Andie looked at her. “They don’t have to be that way.”
    “No?” Raven frowned. “Go ask your mom if I’m right.”
    The girls fell silent for long moments, then Raven reached across and touched Andie’s arm. “I’m sorry I said that.”
    “It’s okay.”
    Raven propped herself up on her elbow. “Do either of you ever think about the future? Where we’re going to be? What we’re going to be?”
    “College,” Andie offered.
    “Together,” Julie added.
    “But beyond that? Like, who do you want to be? And what do you want your life to be like?”
    “That’s easy,” Julie said. “I want to be popular. I mean really popular. And I won’t feel bad about it. I won’t feel guilty about being pretty and having fun or about going out every single night if I want to.”
    Raven sat up and drew her knees to her chest. “I want to be the one who says how it’s going to be. I want to be the one other people follow.”
    Julie giggled. “You’ll probably be the first woman president. They’ll put your face on a postage stamp or something.”
    “This face? Please, I’d scare little children.”
    “Stop that,” Andie said, frowning, feeling bad for her friend. “You’re gorgeous. The only reason the