“A ride and coffee!” Triumphantly, she held a Starbucks cup out the window, and I took it, still feeling uneasy. I barely slid into the passenger seat before she was pulling back into the street, her fingers drumming on the steering wheel.
“So did everything go okay with your parents?” I asked, holding the coffee tight to keep it from sloshing through the little hole in the lid as Bee took a corner a little too fast. I almost had to yell to be heard over the music.
“It was fine!” Bee said, and I wished she would take off her sunglasses so I could see her face. “I mean, weird. At first it was like they didn’t even recognize me, or it was like they had just woken up or something.” She gave a little shrug. “But then it was fine. Like you said, they think I’ve been at cheerleading camp this whole time.”
We were almost to the school now—it wasn’t very far from my house—and I put my coffee in the cup holder before reaching out to touch her arm gently. “You’re sure you’re okay?”
“Are you?” she asked, glancing over at me. I could see her brows rising over the tops of her aviators. “I’m not the one who could have super-dangerous challenges thrown at me at any moment. Although”—the corners of her mouth turned down—“I guess I will be if something happens to you.”
“Nothing is going to happen to me,” I said with a confidence I definitely did not feel. “I’ll get through this, you can go back to being normal, and everything will be like it was before. Well, mostly.”
Bee pulled into a parking spot and shut off the engine, turning to face me. She slid her glasses onto the top of her head and studied my face. “Nothing is ever going to be normal again, is it?” Then she frowned. “But it hasn’t been normal for you in a long time.”
Look, I definitely wasn’t thrilled my best friend had been all magicked up, and was now my backup in case I got horribly killed during some supernatural trials. But I had to admit that Bee actually knowing what was going on, being able to talk to her about it and have her understand, felt good. One fewer person to lie to was always a nice thing as far as I was concerned.
“Don’t worry about me,” I said. “I’ve had months to get used to this kind of thing.”
“That’s what all the hanging out with Saylor was about, huh?” she asked, opening her car door. “The karate stuff?”
I nodded. “I’ll tell you the whole story at lunch, promise.”
We both stepped out of the car and into the bright spring morning. The smell of flowers hung in the air, and the grass sparkled with dew. It was a gorgeous day, and I took a deep breath, feeling a little better. On a morning like this, it seemed impossible to believe that anything bad could happen. I had my best friend back, a new pair of ballet flats on my feet, and a boyfriend heading toward me with a smile on his face and . . . what appeared to be bowling shoes on his feet.
“Where did you even get those?” I asked as he came up to stand beside me, and he held one foot out, turning his ankle.
“Salvation Army. They’re cool, right?”
They did kind of match his shirt, which I guessed I should consider a win.
I turned to say something to Bee, but she was already heading off toward the school, shoulders held back.
Following my gaze, David nodded toward Bee. “She okay?”
I thought about Bee’s bright smile, how fake it had seemed, and I gave an uneasy shrug. “She’s not not okay, I guess,” I finally settled on, and David nodded.
“Kind of the status quo around here.”
I couldn’t argue with that.
Bee wasn’t in any of my classes that day, which wasn’t a surprise since technically she wasn’t registered for spring semester. Ryan had said he’d meet her at the main office to do the best he could, Mage-wise, to help out with that, but by the time lunch rolled around, I was getting a little worried about Bee. Stepping outside, I scanned the courtyard for her bright hair, but there was no sign of her. Ryan was out there, though, already sitting at one of the picnic tables with Mary Beth and the twins, but there was no sign of Brandon, Ryan’s best friend and Bee’s boyfriend.
Catching Ryan’s eye, I mouthed, “Bee?”
He gave me a thumbs-up, then a little wave, inviting me to sit at his table. Mary Beth glanced behind her, and while she didn’t, like, hiss or anything, I could see her eyes narrow. So, yeah, sitting with them was out.
I thought about going back into the building to look for Bee, but she was a big girl, and if she wanted to handle this on her own, I needed to respect that.
Taking a deep breath, I glanced around the courtyard again, and saw David waving to me, so I joined him and his friends from the newspaper, Michael and Chie. The three of them were sitting underneath the big oak tree on the edge of the courtyard, and when I walked over, David jumped up to pull a jacket out of his bag for me to sit on.
“Thanks,” I told him, arranging myself on his tweed. Chie and Michael, who’d been laughing when I came over, now sat in silence, paying a lot of attention to their lunch.
Apparently I wasn’t going to escape weirdness no matter where I sat.
“I like your necklace, Chie,” I said, figuring flattery was always a good tactic. And seeing as how she was wearing a battered army jacket, an oversized black T-shirt, and a pair of leggings that I was pretty sure violated dress code, the necklace was about the only thing I could compliment.
But as Chie’s fingers trailed over the gold chain, her dark eyes regarded me suspiciously. “I got it at Walmart,” she said, almost like a challenge.
I nodded. “They have pretty stuff. Sometimes.”
David shot me a look that was part exasperation, part amusement, and I gave a little shrug in response. I was all for making an effort to be nice, but I wasn’t going to gush over Walmart. Come on, now.
After clearing his throat, David pulled an apple out of his bag, tossing it back and forth between his hands. “We were talking about what story the newspaper should tackle next.” He nodded at his friends. “Chie has this great idea about how few people in Pine Grove actually recycle, and then Michael wanted to investigate allegations that the cafeteria is still using foods with MSG even after the school board told them they couldn’t.”
I took a long swallow of Diet Coke, hoping that would give me time to think of some reply. In the end, all I came up with was “Okay.”