Freya Jokela sat at the furthest table in the lunchroom, and no one sat next to her. This was ideal. She was sick of people asking her if everything was okay. She hated all the awkward glances and unsolicited advice. She was too pale and too thin, and she looked exhausted no matter how much she slept. That was just how it was, but everyone felt like they had to comment. Alone was better.

Freya turned the pages of a yellowed paperback and picked at her salad. Voices boomed around her, hooting and laughing. Students shouted from table to table. Nothing had been thrown yet, but it seemed like it could happen at any moment. There was meant to be a teacher keeping an eye on things, but Mr. McCallahan hadn’t shown up to his lunch monitor shift all week. The volume in the cafeteria had doubled every day.

Freya remained in her small pocket of serenity as more students filed in. All the other tables were full, and a group sat at hers, scanning first to make sure there were no other options. Freya kept her eyes in the book to avoid them, but she was running out of pages.

The paperback reached the conclusion she had guessed two chapters in, and she set it on the table face down. The back cover copy was garish and overenthusiastic, much like the novel itself.

"Darkness has fallen over the once-peaceful kingdom of Crysterra. The evil Lord Sentros has stolen princess Tansy, and the king is powerless against his Fel Magicks! When all hope seems lost, John Good, a simple orphaned stable hand discovers the legendary Sword of Song. Can this unlikely hero and his ragtag band of adventurers defeat the Dark Lord and save Crysterra?"

Freya felt certain they could, if she was willing to slog through another four thousand pages split over seven books. If she wanted to, she could buy the second volume tonight. Blackwater Books was just a short walk down the hill to Thoreau Street. They had about a dozen used copies of The Sword of Song II: The Scions of Sentros. She could trade this one in, they'd probably give her a dollar for it.

Freya pushed the book away. She didn’t want to read the sequel. She hadn’t even wanted to read this one. She’d found it on a park bench and made the mistake of thumbing through it, thinking, How bad could it be? Then she was trapped. She always finished a book after she started it.

Trapped.

She'd spent so many days at home, watching daytime TV that was just commercials for pills and judge shows where people yelled at each other over nonsense. Days that felt yellowed and thin, with an un-showered sheen of grime, everything wasted. Grayson was just as bad but, if she went to school, Lassa talked to her less.

Freya stood abruptly, gathering her half-eaten salad and the vanquished paperback. She’d made up her mind to skip the last three periods and walk back to the house. Lassa wouldn’t be home until late if she came back at all.

At her side, there was a tchip of outrage. She was afraid she’d knocked over someone’s drink.

Malcolm Lewis glared at her. He was so tall he could stare eye-to-eye with Freya while sitting down. Malcolm was almost nineteen. He’d been held back a grade in elementary. He was sort of attractive if you didn’t know him well.

Freya couldn’t tell what he was pissed about, then she realized he’d said hi to her when he sat. She hadn’t responded. Now, he thought she was leaving because of him.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t recognize you.”

It was the wrong thing to say. Malcolm inhaled sharply, and the three other girls with him joined in a low, “Oooooh.” They thought Freya meant it as an insult. Freya and Malcolm used to date. It hadn’t ended well.

"I was leaving anyway," she mumbled. She couldn’t deal with this right now.

They laughed as she walked away. She picked out Tammy Daud’s voice through the crowd. Freya was sure Tammy was calling her a stuck-up cunt, but it wasn’t important. She wasn’t coming back here.

At the trash cans, Freya threw away the half-eaten salad, and her eyes fell on the book. The cover was a sword-wielding woman wearing armor that seemed to have been designed to expose as many of her vital areas as possible.

If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

Freya threw the book in the trash and left the cafeteria. It was cold out and looked like rain. If she walked home, she was going to get caught in it. Staring at the sky, she wavered. What would hurt more, walking home in the rain or three more periods of this? If the school called Lassa and told her Freya skipped class, she would have to explain why. That would be the worst possible outcome.

Trapped.

Lunch wasn’t even over. There were fifteen more minutes. Freya walked around to the side of the cafeteria without windows. She didn’t want to have to see anyone. She sat on the edge of a planter and stared out at the valley, watching the fog rolling down the Sillas River.

Grayson High School was built on a hill, the teacher parking lot was on a terrace below. There were already raindrops glittering on windshields. If Freya wanted to go, she should do it now. She tried to convince herself, but she couldn’t even muster the energy to stand.

The fog came in thick. She couldn’t even see the river. The sun was absent behind a wall of clouds. Freya was caught between gray and gray. She visualized the clouds flowing down as the fog rolled up, the two fronts closing on her like an eyelid, blotting out everything.

When the cloud’s eye opened, everything would be new. This would all be fixed. What if she could just do that every morning? Blink her eyes and jump forward a day in time. How many times would she blink before she stopped? Could she blink her whole life away?

"HEY!"

Tammy Daud shouted at her from a few feet away, trying to startle her. But Freya was too deep in her pit. She didn’t flinch. Instead, she shut her eyes to try and blink this away, too. When she opened them, Tammy stood right in front of her. She felt a flutter of fear, but it died on the wing. What did she have to be afraid of? Not Tammy. Tammy was stupid.

Tammy Daud waved her hand in Freya’s face and snapped her fingers. She probably thought it made her look tough. She probably thought all that makeup hid that her eyes were too close together. Freya stared right through her.

"Yo! You in there, stupid?"

The others from the table had gathered around Tammy. Malcolm still looked angry. Flora and Regina kept their distance. They looked like they didn’t want to be there.

“Me either,” Freya said to no one in particular.

“What the fuck did you say?” Tammy demanded. Being ignored only made her angrier.

This wasn’t the first time with Tammy, and Freya had given the problem some thought. Randall’s Kimber was in a black plastic case on the top shelf of Lassa’s closet. It was next to the box with all his uniforms, and the flag, perfectly folded in its triangular case with the glass window. Freya was a good shot. She’d gone to the range with Randall often.

The gun was still on the shelf. It was all just stupid a daydream. Freya wasn’t going to shoot anyone. The whole time she thought about the gun, she had known exactly what she would do about Tammy.

Nothing.

“Too good to sit with us, huh?”

Freya didn’t take the bait.

"Answer me, bitch!" Tammy worked herself up. She was having a hard time with this. Freya gave her nothing back, and it made Tammy uneasy. It seemed like she might just shout some more and go away. Then Tammy glanced at Malcolm Lewis, and something shifted.

It had been three months since the first time Freya told Malcolm she didn’t want to see him anymore. Since then, she’d had to block his number and exit all the group texts with him. It hadn’t helped. He kept talking to her after she asked him to stop, popping up between classes and surprising her. Now this. Had he put Tammy up to this, or was it her idea?

Freya tried to remember what she had ever liked about Malcolm, and she drew a blank when Tammy socked her in the eye. Everything flashed white, and there was a sound in her skull, like a muffled explosion. The punch knocked her backward into a black chokeberry bush. She rose to her feet, expecting to feel furious, or hurt. There was nothing. She just wanted to lie down.

"OH!" Regina shouted. Tammy up, bouncing back and forth with her fists raised, like they were in a boxing match. Regina and Flora chanted, “Fight! Fight!” and it all seemed so stupid.

Freya didn’t fall, she just sort of stopped trying to stand. She slumped to the ground. The grass was wet against her back, and mist drifted onto her face. She stared at the sky, offering no resistance. She wasn’t afraid, she just didn’t want to be there anymore. They all loomed over her.

“Bitch got knocked out!” Tammy crowed, but she was the only one. The others looked worried.

“What’s wrong with her?” Flora asked.

“Crazy bitch,” Tammy said.

The pain in Freya’s eye was a distant and irrelevant throb. She expected to feel more pain, feet stomping her into the earth or stones smashing against her, but nothing came. She was almost disappointed. They ran away. She stared straight into the sky, up at the perfect gray. It began to rain.

They were tiny drops at first, easy to ignore. The rain grew heavier. It stung in her eyes at first, but that passed. It became a steady rainfall, and she thought she ought to get up, but what good would it do? Wet, dry, it was all the same. Nothing really hurt, nothing really mattered.

Freya was in the rain for a long time. Someone saw her from an upstairs window, and a rush of people came down to get her. She was soaked and very cold. A dozen people asked at once what had happened. She could only shiver.

They marched her towards the school, and all she could think was she should have gotten up. Now, everything would be harder.