CHAPTER 22

In Which Megan Doesn’t Know a Kid

EVAN. AFTER THIRD PERIOD.

“I imagine that that all must have been really satisfying, hmm?” Wintre Ion said, flashing the three of them a friendly smile as she did so, as soon as the bell was done ringing. “Ripping Lauren apart I mean? I don’t hate the girl—I’m just better than her—but I have to imagine you do.”

“I mean yeah, I guess,” Evan said with a sigh, “To the extent I hate anyone.” He shook his head. “Wait, no, I actually hate Konigsmann way more. Anyway, I wasn’t joking before class, Wintre. I’m exhausted.”

“It’s Wintre Ion,” Wintre Ion said, voice sharp. “If you don’t mind.”

“Sure, sorry. Wintre Ion, I’m exhausted. I just don’t have it in me to talk to a brand new friend who was a stranger an hour ago right now. Sorry,” Evan said. It wasn’t even fourth period. First the chatting with Merce, which was fine but still taxing, and then Else, and then confronting Lauren, and now Wintre Ion… If people tried to talk to him every period Evan was going to have a breakdown. “Can we pick this up tomorrow?”

Angie stayed neutral and didn’t say anything. Ryan raised an eyebrow, and didn’t say anything.

Wintre Ion studied him for a moment, then said, “I suppose you three haven’t had a lot of conversations with other people the past few years. None of you look the best rested either, if you’ll forgive my rudeness.” She smiled again. “Tomorrow though, we start becoming friends.”

“I thought we made some progress today when I let you listen to how I ripped down Lauren. And you’ll change your mind soon enough,” Evan said, and turned and walked away, just not caring anymore.

Behind him, Ryan said, “Hey now!” Then he said, “He was insulting me,” presumably to Wintre Ion, and then he followed Evan.

Out in the hall, Angie caught up with them. “You okay, Evan?”

Evan gave her a look. “Yeah? I am?”

“Okay, just checking,” Angie said, and then fell silent. They all kept to their own thoughts the short distance to the PhysSci classroom.

ANGIE. TUESDAY. BEFORE FOURTH PERIOD.

Evan seemed pretty cranky and out of it by the end of Algebra, and Angie wasn’t feeling that much better. She'd been a touch distracted the day before in Physical Science, what with the morning and the auguries and the mystic event and the hiccups, and had barely paid attention to the teacher, let alone their classmates. Today she was going to have to do her best to pay attention.

Tammy already seemed to be gone, presumably off to her next class, so she and Ryan grabbed seats in the back. “I don’t want to accept Lauren’s apology,” Angie said once they were settled.

Ryan said, “You’re probably going to have to. It doesn’t need to be soon. Certainly not sooner than Megan does.”

“Megan shouldn’t accept it either,” Angie said darkly. “She ruined our lives, Ryan. She ostracized us for three years and stole my best friend. I hate her and I want her to suffer forever.”

“Yeah, but you know Megan,” Ryan said, shrugging. “She had three years to get attached to Lauren, and she put up with Konigsmann for years and years. Maybe she’s changed enough that she won’t forgive Lauren eventually, but I wouldn’t count on it. She’ll think Lauren is redeemable if Lauren can manage a half-decent apology.”

Angie shook her head unhappily.

“Besides,” Ryan continued, “I want to accept Lauren’s apology. I want all of us to.”

Angie frowned. “Excuse me?”

Ryan grinned. “If we don’t accept her apology, we’ll just never interact with her. If we do, she owes us. We’ll practically own her ass.”

“Ah,” Angie said, not really thrilled by this turn of events.

“Ange, she’s rich as fuck. Even if Evan hunts regularly, Lauren will be able to afford things he or I couldn’t even dream of affording. Hell, just for starters, we could probably make her get Evan a good warding mantle right now.”

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“You know I’m three-quarters done with a warding mantle for him. I’d be done already if we didn’t hang out so much and I didn’t want it to be a surprise,” Angie replied.

“Charms then. We should seriously consider making her buy Evan charms.”

“He’d never accept them.”

Ryan pursed his lips. “He might eventually, but not before he needs them, probably not. Still. I want her to owe me, April. To owe us. But to get that we need to tolerate her, which starts with accepting her apologies.”

Angie sighed. “Whatever. If February can bring herself to accept one, I’ll maybe consider it. Maybe. Only because you want me to, though.”

“Thank you, my dearest,” Ryan said. “I’ll make sure you don’t regret it.”

MEGAN. TUESDAY. BEFORE FOURTH PERIOD.

When she changed back into her class clothes after PE, Megan buttoned up her cardigan. While it could be buttoned, it wasn’t really meant or sized for it, which meant it was noticeably tight, resulting in her chest being similarly more noticeable (if not nearly as noticeable as her butt).

Of course, this came with risks. “Oh, hey!” said an older boy, a sophomore maybe, coming up behind her outside the locker rooms. “Wow! Hey, hi,” he went on, falling into step beside her. “Hey, would you want to chat a minute? I love your hair. You’ve really nailed your whole look!”

“Thanks,” Megan said, hardly looking at him. “I’m on my way to meet a friend, actually. What do you want?”

“Well, I’d just like a chance to get to know you a bit. I’m Chance Baker, can I ask your name?”

Megan suppressed a sigh and tried to be polite. “I’m Megan O’Sadie. I really don’t have a lot of time.”

“Well, maybe we can catch a coffee together sometime!” the boy said. He was actually good enough looking that if he weren’t being too pushy in the hall at school and Chris didn’t exist she might have considered saying yes.

But he was, and Chris did. “Actually, there’s someone I really like and I’m not hurting for friends,” Megan said, “So I don’t know if I’m really interested in a date, if it’s all the same? Maybe if we have a class together someday we could get to know each other naturally, but until then, I wish you well.”

“Ah, come on,” Chance said. “If you give me a me—” and he sort of paused, as if for a laugh that didn’t come, “— you might forget all about this other guy. I promise it’ll be worth your time.”

Megan pursed her lips and stopped, turning toward him. For a moment he looked triumphant, then he got a good look at her face. “No,” she said. Almost growled. It was all but through her teeth. “I am not interested. Please leave me alone before we make a scene. You won’t enjoy that.”

He swallowed visibly, and then said, “I think I forgot something in the locker room, sorry, I’ll see you later maybe!” over his shoulder as he turned and fled.

Megan sighed and headed outside.

“Hey girl!” Chris said behind Megan, catching her outside the Performance building. She spun around with a grin, and he had on that easy, crooked grin of his own. “How’s it going?”

“Oh, down and up,” Megan said, the smile falling off her face when she thought of what Evan said, the encounter she’d just had, the ones she’d had earlier. “Better now, but…”

“But?”

Megan was silent for a moment. Did she want to talk about this? Only sort of willingly, she said, “Did… Evan told you about his…”

“His sister and his father?” Chris said quietly, growing somber as well. “Yes. Um? You okay?”

Megan found herself trying not to cry. “Not really. I… I didn’t know about Evan’s father dying, till right before last period. I feel like a total utter piece of shit.”

“Aw,” Chris said. “Hey, don’t beat yourself up. Unless you, like, paid close attention to the list of casualties after that Solstice breach a couple years back, you’d have no way to know.”

“Yeah, but he saved Lauren’s uncle!” Megan exclaimed, feeling like she was about to explode into tears unless she stopped talking about it. “I don’t—I’m going to be… I can’t talk about it anymore. I’ll… talk to Evan later.” Chris opened his mouth, but Megan, anticipating his question, said, “Evan had a confrontation with Lauren after second period, in the Performance building atrium. I caught part of it on the way to PE. He said something about it to her.”

“I see,” Chris said. “What else did he say?”

“He told her that he wasn’t going to listen to an apology to her unless I wanted him to,” Megan said soberly. “I don’t… I don’t know if I can make that decision for him. And then he just chewed her out for exiling them for a little bit, saying if she’d wanted a reason not to do it, she could have found one. Then he got quiet and I couldn’t hear, and then he walked away from her. He went right past me, but I don’t think he saw me.”

“I see,” Chris said again. “That must have been cathartic for him. I was being slow talking to people in the locker room, so I totally missed it. I think you shouldn’t beat yourself up about his father, at least until you know whether you should. If Evan is upset about it, you can feel as bad as you want, but he may well be happy to hear you didn’t learn about it. We’ll see if he wants to talk about it at lunch.”

Chris paused. Then he said, “I have yet to have any person here mention the Exiles to me. I haven’t asked yet, just to see whether it’s brought up. I’m curious what answers I’ll get when I do.” Another pause. “Granted, anyone new I meet I’m still asking about themselves, so that’s probably part of it.”

“Yeah!” Megan said, and managed a laugh. “You do need to give someone the opportunity to bring it up.”

“Yeah, I probably do,” Chris said. Then he yawned. Then he yawned more. “Boy, it was important to catch you so we could talk to you this morning but I wish just a little bit that I’d slept more. Sorry, only a little.” He smiled. It was kind of a sleepy smile, and it was unexpectedly adorable. He continued, “I hate to say it, but I may need to postpone our music party. I’m beat, and Evan’s gotta be feeling rougher than me.” He yawned again.

Disappointment, but Megan wasn’t the best-rested herself. “Okay,” she said. “That makes sense if they want to wait.”

EVAN. TUESDAY. BEGINNING OF FOURTH PERIOD.

In History, Evan ignored everyone and put his head down on his desk. No one bothered him, for which he thanked the Powers Above.