Sweet Venom Read online

  I feel equal parts fear and anticipation. But one look in Ms. West’s sharp eyes and I feel a jolt of confidence. I feel strong and invincible. How can I let myself be afraid of change, when it’s what I want? The chance to become the strong, confident young woman I’ve always dreamed of being.

  This is the first step.

  “Yes,” I say, gathering my courage. “Ready.”

  “Do you have any questions or concerns before I send you to class?”

  I square my shoulders and shake my head. I’m ready for this.

  “If you need anything,” she says, “my office door is always open.”

  I nod, trying to mimic the same air of self-assurance she exudes, as if I appreciate her offer but will never need the help because everything will work out in no time. The facade makes me feel a little more sure of myself, of my future at Alpha and in San Francisco.

  The power of positive thinking.

  She leans out into the hall. “Miranda, would you come here please?”

  When Miranda shows up at Ms. West’s door, my false confidence quivers and that sense of dread plops into my stomach again.

  “Yes, Ms. West?” asks the girl who plowed through me in front of the school.

  “This is Grace Whitfield,” she explains, gesturing to me. “She’s new at Alpha. Since you two have the same homeroom, I thought you might give her a quick tour and then show her to class.”

  “Of course,” Miranda says with a blinding fake smile. “It’d be my pleasure.”

  Think positive, I tell myself. Maybe I misinterpreted her earlier comment. Maybe she’s a really nice person. Maybe she’ll be friendly, now that she knows we share a class. Hitch-ing my backpack up on my shoulder, I smile and hold out my hand. “Nice to meet you, Miranda.”

  She smiles and shakes my hand. For a second I believe this positive thinking thing really works. Then, as soon as Ms. West turns back to her desk, Miranda drops my hand like it’s a plague-ridden rat, rolls her eyes, and stalks out of the office.

  My shoulders sink.

  “Have a wonderful first day,” Ms. West says.

  “Thanks,” I say, turning to give her a quick wave before following after Miranda’s retreating back.

  As I stand outside the girls’ bathroom, waiting for Miranda to emerge, I’m pretty certain this isn’t what Ms. West had in mind for a school tour. After throwing me a look that said she’d rather eat glass than lead around a loser like me, Miranda stalked off into the hall outside the main office and made a beeline for the bathroom.

  She’s been in there for over five minutes.

  I glance at my schedule. Every day at Alpha begins with homeroom, an hour-long period for finishing up homework, going to the library, or seeking help from other teachers. Nothing like the twenty-minute roll call and stay-in-your-seats-for-announcements madness that passed for homeroom at Orangevale. Homeroom here sounds useful.

  Around me, the hall is starting to fill with students. The typical first-day-of-school insanity. Girls are shrieking, diving into group hugs with friends they haven’t seen all summer. A few couples are taking advantage of the chaos to engage in some pretty inappropriate kissing and groping. Some kids, probably freshmen, are wandering around looking slightly lost and terribly frightened. That won’t be me—I won’t let it. I’m a junior now, an upperclassman, and I’m not going to let the unfamiliar environment make me feel like a lowly freshman again. No thank you.

  I’ve never been a Girl Scout, I don’t even know their motto, but I still believe in being prepared. I swing my backpack around and dig through the pile of papers Ms. West gave me until I find the school map printed on the back of the “Welcome to Alpha!” letter. According to my schedule, I have Mrs. Deckler for homeroom in room 117.

  After tracing my finger over most of the ground floor, I find room 117 in a back corner. I squint at the map—it’s no 3D-rendered interactive virtual environment, but it’ll do—and then scan the hall, deciding that if I go to the end of the main hall and turn left, I’ll find my classroom.

  Miranda’s still in the bathroom though. And, as much as I think she’d be overjoyed to find me gone, I don’t want to pull a disappearing flake act on the first day.

  I continue studying my map, trying to get a feel for the layout of the school, mentally extruding the walls and creating an image of the building in my mind. There are four floors, with the upper levels reserved for grades five through eight. All of my classes will be on the first two floors, so I focus on those maps. It’s when I’m scanning over my current location that I see what—after waiting ten minutes—I should have already guessed. The girls’ bathroom has two entrances.

  With a groan, I zip my backpack shut and head down the hall toward room 117, clutching my map and schedule. I don’t need to pop into the bathroom to know that Miranda’s long gone.

  I follow the gleaming white hall past open classrooms and walls of lockers. At the end, I make a left, proud of my map-reading skills. Four doors later I find Mrs. Deckler’s class.

  And I’m not at all surprised to find Miranda already in her desk when I walk into the room.

  Pausing for a second in the doorway, I give myself a little pep talk.

  This is it, I tell myself. This is the moment to leave doormat Grace behind and become . . . fearless Grace. Confident Grace. If I take the offensive, I can turn this moment around. I can make sure that my time at Alpha isn’t spent feeling powerless. I take a deep breath, form the words of a biting, witty comment in my mind, and open my mouth.

  “Did you get lost?” Miranda asks before I can utter a sound. “I waited outside the bathroom for like ten minutes.”

  “I—” How do I respond to that? A complete and total lie. “What?”

  She leans forward, as if to say something confidential, but her whisper is anything but quiet. “Are you constipated? Nurse Callahan probably has some laxatives or something.”

  Most of the dozen or so kids in the half-full classroom erupt in barely concealed snorts and giggles. Whatever reputation-establishing comment I’d been about to make completely evaporates into abject humiliation. My cheeks burn to the point of combustion. My ears quickly follow. Every life-changing hope I had bursts like a bubble hitting concrete. There is no recovering from a comment like that. Ever.

  Tales of my digestive distress will probably circulate throughout the school by lunchtime. Even freshmen will feel sorry for me, while being thankful it’s not them being thrown under the social bus.

  I do the only thing I can do; I duck my head and hurry to the back of the classroom. Slipping into an empty desk, I make myself as small and invisible as humanly possible.

  “Miranda is a vortex of evil.”

  I look up from being preoccupied with my backpack—aka pretending to be too busy to notice the stares and snickers—to find the girl in the next desk over studiously doodling on her spiral-bound.

  “I’m sorry?” I ask, not sure she actually said something.

  She jerks her head, sending a wave of black hair with white tips in Miranda’s general direction at the front of the room. “Never apologize for Miranda bashing. It’s my favorite pastime.”

  “Oh.” Looks like I’m not the only person on the receiving end of Miranda’s bad attitude.

  “I see we’re trying out a new hairstyle to start the school year, Vail.” The teacher behind the big wooden desk smiles at the girl next to me. “Shall we expect new colors weekly?”

  Vail shrugs and goes back to her drawings.

  As Mrs. Deckler enlists Miranda’s help to hand out some paperwork, I lean slightly to my left and say, “I’m Grace Whitfield.”

  The only indication that she hears me is a momentary pause in the motion of her pencil. A hesitation over the next eye socket in a sea of skulls and crossbones. Then, as Miranda passes between us and accidentally drops my paper onto the floor, my neighbor mutters, “Suck a lemon, Sanders.”

  “Couldn’t afford to dye all your hair, Vail?” Miranda pretends to c
arefully set a paper on Vail’s desk before sending it sailing into the aisle. “Next time I’ll lend you the fifty cents.”

  “Save it for your implants fund.”

  Vail flashes a sympathetic look at Miranda’s less-than-overflowing chest. A giggle escapes before I can help it. I smack a hand over my mouth when Miranda spears me with a death look. Then, apparently deciding to pretend to take the high road, she stalks off. Vail goes back to her doodling. I swallow my laughter.

  “I wish I could do that.” I sigh.

  “What?”

  “Tell off girls like that,” I explain, leaning down to grab both our papers off the floor. “My mind always freezes.”

  For several long moments I think she’s not going to respond. Her attention is fully focused on filling in the spaces between her skulls and crossbones with smiley faces. As I set her paper on the edge of her desk, I notice that the smiley faces have fangs.

  I shrug and start reading over my paper, a pretty standard set of classroom rules.

  Mrs. Deckler gets up and clears her throat like she’s going to start reading the rules or something, and Vail finally says, “Standing up to Miranda is easy.” She pulls the rules sheet on top of her notebook and turns her doodling attention to the pink handout. “You just have to stop caring what she thinks.”

  As Mrs. Deckler starts droning on about attendance policies and how to ask for a library or study pass, I sink farther into my desk. That’s my problem. I can’t stop caring what the Mirandas of the world think of me.

  Unless something dramatic happens, San Francisco Grace is going to have pretty much the same experience as Orangevale Grace. Guess I’ll have to get used to doormat status.

  Chapter 3

  Grace

  My head bounces against the window as the city bus hits a pothole. At this point, accidentally getting knocked unconscious would give me a welcome excuse for forgetting my first day at Alpha. Is a little amnesia too much to ask for?

  Except for the mild welcome from Vail in homeroom, the rest of the day has gone pretty much according to Miranda’s evil plan. Why didn’t I stand up to her when I had the chance? Too bad real life doesn’t have Pause and Rewind. My first day would have gone infinitely better if I could have stopped time long enough to think up a comeback for Miranda’s snark.

  Instead, I spent all day replaying the moment in my mind.

  The bus driver announces my stop. Slinging my backpack over my shoulder, I stand and move to the back doors. I’m about to step down into the stairwell when the bus pulls away from the curb. I hold on to a pole to keep from flying into a little old Chinese lady’s lap. The bag in her arms squirms, and I’m half afraid there’s a live chicken in there.

  “Excuse me,” I say, trying to get the driver’s attention.

  He ignores me, continuing through the intersection and to the next stop, where another passenger pushes past me out the door. I hurry down the steps and leap to the sidewalk before the bus can take off again. Guess I’m too used to school bus drivers, who are required to make sure you get off at your stop. City bus drivers don’t seem to care.

  As I trudge the extra two uphill blocks back to our street, I make a mental list of anything good that happened today. I know Mom is going to ask, and I want her to think everything’s great.

  Let’s see, there was Vail in homeroom. She didn’t exactly go out of her way to be friendly, but she wasn’t horribly rude, either. Which is more than I can say about the rest of Alpha. That’s something.

  There was the counselor, Ms. West, who seemed pretty cool. Mrs. Deckler was nice too, and already knew I’d have English with her in addition to homeroom. Counselors and teachers in Orangevale never cared that much.

  And I have a whole world of electives to choose from. I browsed them at lunch—having no one to eat with, I slipped away to the library to eat my avocado-and-sprouts sandwich alone—and narrowed down my selection to about five choices. With no first-day-of-school homework, picking my electives is my main task for the night.

  I reach our block, and while I dig out my key ring, I try to focus on the positive. Mom worries, and I don’t want her to think I’m unhappy at the new school. Even if I am.

  No, I have to give it more than a day. Tomorrow could be infinitely better. It can hardly be worse. I can’t act less confident.

  In Orangevale I never had to use house keys. Mom was always home, the door unlocked, ready with an after-school snack. Our building in San Francisco is a multistory U-shaped thing with a locked front gate leading into the courtyard and a locked main entrance. The only ways inside are using a key, getting buzzed in by a tenant, or sneaking in after someone else. I tried that last one the first day in town and got a dirty look from one of our neighbors, so I don’t think I’ll be using the sneaking-in technique again.

  The key turns easily in the lock and the gate swings open with a high-pitched squeak. I make sure it closes and locks behind me before heading toward the door. I love the courtyard. It’s full of shady trees and brightly colored tropical flowers that smell like I’ve always imagined Hawaii would. A little piece of paradise in the big city.

  At the lime-green front door I flip to another key on my ring. Everything—the door, the trees, the flowers—is a stark contrast of color against the bright white of the building rising up on three sides. Too bad the interior isn’t as vibrant and cheerful.

  I head into the gloomy hallway, with its dark wood floor and insufficient lighting. It creeps me out a little. Too many shadows and hidden corners.

  I hurry to the stairwell and run to the second floor. After one near-death experience in the classic—aka creaky and ancient—elevator, I’ve decided I could use the exercise of taking the stairs.

  At our apartment door, I select the third and final key on my ring and burst inside. My rotten day forgotten, I set my backpack on the dining table and follow the smell of brownies to the kitchen.

  “Mom, I’m home!” I shout, grabbing a still-warm treat from the piled-high plate on the counter.

  She emerges from the back hall wearing paint-spattered jeans and a matching smock. Since we’ve been in the apartment only a little over a week, she’s still finishing up the decorating and unpacking. Judging from the shade of soft taupe dominating her clothes, I’d guess she’s tackling the master bedroom today.

  “So . . .” she prods with a huge smile on her round face, “how was your first day? Tell me everything.”

  As a rule, I don’t lie to my parents. I don’t even usually keep things from them. We’re very close, and I want it to stay that way. But this move has been difficult in so many ways—the long family talks after I got the scholarship, the concerns about uprooting me and Thane in the middle of our high school careers, the last-minute decision that meant a last-minute move. If Dad hadn’t gotten that promotion to the San Francisco office, we’d still be in Orangevale.

  Now Dad’s working crazy hours, and I know Mom is still stressed about everything. I don’t want her worrying that we’ve made the wrong decision, which is why I smile and say, “It was great. I think Alpha is going to be really good for me.”

  “Thank goodness,” she says, ignoring her freshly painted state and rushing forward to wrap me in a tight Mom hug. “I was so worried.”

  “And all for nothing,” I tease. Mission accomplished. Mom is relieved, which means the smile on my face isn’t as forced as it was a minute ago. “You’ve got brownie in your hair.”

  She runs her fingers through her black-brown waves. “Did I get it?”

  “I’m not sure,” I say, leaning in to inspect. “I can’t tell under all that paint.”

  “Ha ha.” She teasingly smacks me on the shoulder. “Not funny.”

  I shrug. “I thought it was.”

  She steps around me into the kitchen and heads for the sink.

  “And you found the bus and everything easily enough?” she asks over her shoulder.

  “Mmm-hmmm,” I say around my mouthful of brownie. Mom doesn’t
need to know about the bad bus driver any more than she needs to know about Miranda or my solo lunch in the library.

  Mom busies herself with washing the few dishes in the sink while I finish my brownie. Moist, chocolaty goodness. The perfect cure for my disappointing day.

  I pour myself a glass of pineapple Fanta to wash down the last crumbs.

  “Where’s Thane?” I ask after a big gulp. “Isn’t he home yet?”

  “The public schools have a later schedule. He gets out twenty minutes after you,” she answers, drying her hands on a kitchen towel. “He should be home soon. Do you need anything?”

  “Nope, I’m good.”

  “Okay, then I’ll get back to my painting.” Her smile is thrilled but weary. She’s excited to be making over the apartment, but also exhausted. “Shout if you need anything.”

  “Want some help?” I offer. With no homework to do, I need something to distract me from the mental replay of today’s lowlights.

  “That’s sweet,” she says, “but I’m almost done.” At my skeptical look, she adds, “Really.”

  “You’re sure?” When she nods, I say, “Okay.” I refill my Fanta and head for the dining table.

  I pull out the packet of Alpha Academy papers the counselor gave me this morning and dig for the electives lists. I have to choose two, in addition to Spanish, and the first one is easy. I don’t boast about it much, but I’m a bit of a computer geek. Okay, I’m a serious computer geek. Ever since I got my first laptop in third grade, I’ve been fascinated by computers and technology. It’s my dream to work for one of the big software companies someday.

  I circle Computer Science on the list.

  The other elective, however, is a harder choice.

  At lunch I marked stars next to Journalism and Yearbook. I’ve always been intrigued by the media. I don’t have any experience, but I’m sure I could learn the necessary programs easily enough. But then this afternoon I overheard someone say that Miranda is social editor on the school paper, and I don’t need that conflict. I erase the star next to journalism.