18

It had been as awful as Claire had feared. She walked into the building with her head held high, past clumps of students, groups she normally would’ve been included in BWWC.

Before the world went crazy.

Today, there were whispers and quick looks in her direction and glances that darted away. Snickers and smiles half-hidden behind hands. She was used to being one of the whisperers.

Now, she was on the outside. Friendless. Alone.

By virtue of the rigid caste system that ruled high schools, she’d always been one of the golden ones. An arbiter of all that was cool and fashionable. But today, she’d receive the subtle cruelties of which she had once been the chief inflictor.

Giggling, Heather and Zoe Lawrence arched their bodies away from her in the hallway as if she had a disease. She opened her locker to find a crude drawing of a dead man in a car with his head blown off. Smashing it into a ball, she crammed the paper deep inside her backpack.

Reaching the comparative safety of first-period honors English, she prayed for the teacher to start class and kept her head buried in her textbook throughout the next ninety minutes.

Prayed? Claire Monaghan?

What a joke.

As if that could make a difference.

But by third period, she was ready to try anything. Whatever works, she figured, though she wasn’t sure if the prayer thing worked that way or not.

And so went the day until lunch. Dreading lunch with its virtually unsupervised arena of peer torture, she hid in the back of the line with the hope of getting lost by intermingling with the freshmen.

Carrying her tray, she assessed the scene as a soldier might survey a field of land mines. Getting through the day was all she could hope for at this point.

“Where have you been keeping yourself, Claire?” Ellen, head cheerleader in her too-tight skirt, grabbed one of her arms, and Kaitlyn, tenth-grade homecoming court representative, grabbed the other. “You must join us and tell us every luscious detail about your family.”

They dragged her across the cafeteria to a table loaded with jocks and their janes. A table she would’ve picked out herself and been welcomed to BWWC. Her cheeks flaming, she tried to halt their progress by planting her feet with the sheer force of inertia. But Ellen and Kaitlyn proved an irresistible force.

Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Justin rise from his own circle of lowly freshmen friends, victims of social apartheid. He’d never reach her in time though, and she surrendered to her fate. It was payback.

Payback in the biggest and most humiliating way.

Ellen smirked. “Like a soap opera, isn’t it, Kaitlyn?”

“If you’re into trailer trash, I suppose.” Kaitlyn’s sycophantic laugh grated against Claire’s nerve endings.

She squirmed, trying to loosen their hold on her arms. But both girls put their backs into it, lugging her across the floor.

Sandy Fleming, appearing out of nowhere, stumbled into Kaitlyn, knocking them both off balance. Green Jell-O flew off Sandy’s tray to land in a squiggly jumble all over Ellen’s fuchsia pedicure.

“Oooh,” Ellen wailed. “My sandals.”

Sandy threw both hands to her face, dropping the now-empty tray on Kaitlyn’s similarly vulnerable feet.

“You imbecilic moron.” Kaitlyn hopped up and down, bunny-like, rubbing and massaging each throbbing foot, first one, then the other. Bent over double, she lost her balance and stumbled face first into the moss-green muck at Ellen’s feet.

“Get off me.” Ellen gestured to Tad Ewell, who was gawking with the rest of the jocks and janes. “Tad! Get some napkins and help me.”

He rose but started to laugh. Soon the rest of the table were laughing themselves silly.

“Stop laughing at me!” screamed Ellen. A crowd formed. The kind of crowd that bands together to watch school-yard fights or that rubbernecks at traffic accidents on the Beltline.

The kind of crowd that enjoys public executions.

“Quick.” Sandy grabbed Claire, stunned into paralysis by the unfolding drama. “Now’s our chance.” She jerked Claire out of the melee as two teachers rushed to investigate the commotion.

Sandy brought her over to her own table, occupied by three other girls she recognized from the Redeemer youth group. With an anxious look, Justin returned to his guy friends.

Claire sank onto the bench. “What did you do?” She loosened her death grip on the lunch tray. It landed with a clang on the Formica-topped table.

Sandy shrugged. “No big deal. Can someone share their lunch with me?”

“What did you bring her over here for?” Three pairs of hostile glares pointed in her direction, laserlike.

Claire gulped. No safe harbor here. “Have my lunch, Sandy. You deserve it.” She slid the tray over to her. “Way beyond the call of duty.”

A girl Claire vaguely remembered from English jabbed a fork in Claire’s direction. “Duty? Like Sandy or anybody else owes you anything.”

She hadn’t been aware before now that girl could speak. Was her name Ethel? Or Wanda?

Maybe Phyllis? It didn’t matter, did it? She was one of those brainy, boring girls.

She sighed. How low had she fallen? God help her, she was sitting with the geeky girls.

Was this her life post-BWWC?

Sandy stuffed a French fry into her mouth. “That’s enough, Anna.”

Claire pursed her lips. Okay, so her name was Anna. Big whoop.

Sandy twirled another fry between her thumb and forefinger. “I did what I thought was right. Has nothing to do with you guys.”

“Nothing to do with us?” Another girl weighed in, staring daggers at Claire.

She glared back. Weighed in was right. Somebody should put that one on a diet. Ever hear the word exercise? How about self-control?

Hefty, Claire dubbed her, shifted her bulk on the bench.

The table moved.

“You put a target on each of our backs. Like we need more grief from that crowd.”

Sandy fiddled with the burger. “Lily . . .”

Lily? Claire’s brows arched. Interesting. Definitely not typecasting.

“I mean it, Sandy.” Lily poked a chubby finger at Claire. “She’s as arrogant and obnoxious as they are. She deserves everything they dish out and more.”

Claire scrambled to her feet. She hadn’t realized there were people out there who hated her this much. Had her dad realized that, too, in that last split second?

“It’s not about deserving, Lily.” Sandy angled toward the other girl. “I got this crazy idea. You know I can’t stand to see anything suffer, a bug or an animal. Much less a person God created in His own image.”

Sandy held up her hand before they could voice any protests. “I’m not trying to get preachy like my dad. But right is right.” She rose to stand beside Claire. “Wrong can’t be tolerated. Somebody has to take a stand or we become like them and her.”

Claire winced.

She shot Claire an apologetic look. “We’ll go. I don’t want to force anyone to fight my battles.”

“Wait, Sandy.” Her slanted black eyes huge in her wire-rimmed glasses, the hitherto silent third girl placed a restraining hand on Sandy’s arm.

Claire was beyond guessing names at this point.

The girl squeezed Sandy’s hand. “I just wish I had half your courage.” She stuck out her hand to Claire.

It hung there in the air for a second. Then Claire had the good sense to take it.

“My name is Julie. We’re in—”

“clothing apparel and design together,” Claire finished for her. Thank God, she’d remembered that.

Anna stood next. “Anna.” She didn’t offer her hand. “You’re right, Sandy. It’s what Jesus would’ve wanted you to do.”

Claire’s brows rose almost to her hairline.

Wow, there were people who took that stuff seriously? Not just on Sunday?

Lily moved awkwardly to her feet. “Grace. Isn’t that what your father talked about a few weeks ago? How none of us deserve anything but death. Yet God . . .” Tears peppered her eyes.

For the first time, it occurred to Claire that other people in the world carried wounds, too.

Julie laughed, her cheeks lifting and her eyes turning into half-moons. “I wish I had Sandy’s imagination. Did you see the look on homecoming queen’s face?”