The Elementalists Read online

  Liz spun around and hunkered down with a twinkle in her eye. “You should ask,” she motioned with her head toward Kirin’s empty desk, “to the dance today,” she said.

  “Not gonna happen. He’s still grounded,” Chloe whispered in an effort to silence her. It didn’t work.

  “Ask him anyway,” Liz shot back with a mischievous smile. “At least then he’ll know that you’re thinking about him.”

  Chloe tried to shush her and glanced around to see if anyone was listening. “That’s weird! Now drop it!” she hissed, which only made Liz giggle like an imp.

  “The fearless Chloe McClellan, crippled with fear,” she teased.

  The lead on Chloe’s mechanical pencil snapped off on the fifty-seventh trace of the diamond. “I never claimed to be fearless,” she muttered, just as Kirin sauntered in with a head of hair unaltered from the pillow. Chloe found it annoyingly cute and averted her eyes, focusing on her diamond-doodle like it was a puzzle that demanded utmost concentration.

  Kirin slid into the seat beside her with a sly sideways glance. He pretended to ignore her as he unpacked his things and then leaned over to get a better view of her scribble. “That’s some impressive design work you’ve got going there.”

  “Pipe down; I’m trying to focus,” she retorted without ever looking up.

  Liz slowly turned back toward the front with a goofy grin.

  “My dad was asking about you last night,” said Kirin. “I guess you made an impression. He wants to talk to you some more about his old cauldron.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Chloe asked, realizing only then that she wasn’t really sure what he was talking about. Mr. Jacobson shuffled in with a waft of cigarette stink and his trademark pit stains.

  “Something about the fifth dragon; he said you’d know what that means.”

  Do I know what that means? It sounded familiar, but just out of reach. Was it something important? Chloe’s hand froze halfway around another pass at the diamond, and she put the pencil down. “Maybe I could stop by his office hours again on Sunday?”

  “Yes, please!” blurted Kirin. “I could use the company; I mean, how many more books can I read before I go batshit?”

  I wonder if we like the same books… And just like that, thoughts of the fifth dragon had vanished again.

  “Sunday morning, though?” Kirin probed. “Aren’t you going to be all tuckered out from the big dance?”

  “Do I really seem like the big dance type?” Chloe challenged with a little smirk.

  Kirin shrugged with a curious glance. “I don’t know, I thought maybe you’d go if Stan or maybe Ezra Richardson asked?”

  Is he fishing for something? Chloe felt a little flushed but forced herself to laugh. “Stan and I are just buddies, and Ezra Richardson will probably arrive in a chariot carried by his adoring fan club. It’s not really my thing,” she stated as Mr. Jacobson started to scroll notes about the Louisiana Purchase across the board.

  “Oh…good.” Kirin turned sideways to face her. “I tried to convince my dad to let me go if you’d go with me. He almost caved, but still said no… I’m kind of glad that you wouldn’t have gone anyway.”

  Liz visibly tensed in front of them.

  “You wanted to go to Homecoming?” she asked, deciding to leave the more-to-the-point “with me” off the end.

  “We’ve been in school for seven weeks, and I’ve been on house arrest for five of them—I would love to go to Homecoming!” he answered.

  Chloe tried to stop her brain from sending the message to speak, but by the time she got the message, her mouth was already talking. “What about Cynthia?” she asked, realizing in that moment that Kirin had never mentioned what had happened at the party and she had never admitted that she had been there to see it firsthand.

  “What about her?” he countered a little defensively.

  Chloe was flustered. “I don’t know; it just seemed like you guys might kind of… I don’t know?”

  Kirin recovered. “I’m pretty sure my dad wouldn’t have approved of Cynthia,” he said before turning toward Mr. Jacobson and leaving Chloe to mull over the meaning of that one.

  The bell rang and the conversations petered out across the room. Chloe could feel Liz listening, and she wanted desperately to say the thing that her old friend was waiting to hear. She wanted to tell him that she would have loved to go to the dance with him. She wanted to say that she wanted to ask him herself. She wanted to say a lot of things in that moment…but she didn’t.

  • • •

  Chloe scooted down the hallway, trying to avoid eye contact with everybody she passed. Most were happy to ignore her; others looked closely, trying to place where they’d seen her before. But with her hair back in a ponytail and her face out from beneath the mud, she hardly looked anything like the increasingly infamous Lightning Girl.

  Word about her public dressing down of Kendra had spread among certain crowds, and she walked from point to point on school grounds with the perpetual feeling that she had a big target on her back. She dropped her eyes to the floor as a trio of junior jocks came hooting down the hallway. They kicked a ball made of crumpled paper and masking tape between them with little regard to anyone in their way. Chloe dodged a wild pass and narrowly avoided the pursuing charge of a square-jawed boy with a white baseball hat on backward. In her internal ramblings, she’d begun to refer to the whole extended soccer and football family as the White Hats.

  Kendra herself had taken to wearing a white cap blazoned with the Charlottesville High Black Knights logo to tamp down the wavy plume of her red locks. Chloe’s keen eye, trained to pick out any warning flutter of red from a distance, now had to readjust to the possible dangers of white-crowned movement in her peripheral vision.

  She walked the halls like some sort of prey animal, trying to appear calm and at home in her surroundings while her eyes darted this way and that with the smallest provocation. In gym class, Kendra hadn’t even looked at her in almost two weeks, but Chloe could feel the smoldering heat of her presence at all times. Just making it through the school day without incident was kind of like juggling balloons of gunpowder and gasoline over a bed of coals.

  Despite her vigilance, she failed to notice as Stan moved to intercept her path. She stepped into a face full of stale jean jacket and patchouli oil. “Hey, dude!” alerted Stan too late.

  Chloe stumbled back with a yelp. “You might want to wash that jacket,” she muttered with a pinched face. “Smells like it hasn’t been washed since the sixties.”

  Stan grinned with a large piece of lettuce stuck in his teeth. “It was my dad’s,” he admitted proudly. “It probably hasn’t.”

  Chloe looked at his eyes and shook her head—bloodshot as always. “Are you high in school?” she whispered.

  He shrugged. “Isn’t that why they call it high school?”

  “That’s kind of sad,” Chloe admonished. “You’re pretty smart, but at this rate, you’re gonna stunt your growth and be rendered a clinical idiot before you graduate.”

  Stan only chuckled. “So, you going to Homecoming on Saturday?” He flared his red eyes with mock enthusiasm.

  “Why does everyone keep asking me that?” she blurted defensively. “No, I’m not going! It’s a totally stupid event, designed to reinforce stereotypes of social hierarchy among an already insecure and vulnerable populace. Even if I had someone to go with, I would boycott on general principle!”

  “You want to go with me?” Stan asked, undeterred by her impromptu rant. “We could get dressed up and go make fun of everyone. I went last year with Brian, and it was actually really fun.”

  They started walking together through the throng, Chloe toward her next class and Stan away from his.

  Chloe sensed the unspoken hurt behind Stan’s momentary silence. “What’s Brian doing this year?” she asked.

  “He’s going with that girl Rosalie, you know, from the party.” Stan shrugged. “But I’d rather go with you anyway, and I’m sure it woul
d thrill my mom to no end.”

  “Who’s Cynthia going with?” Chloe asked.

  Now it was Stan who sensed the question behind Chloe’s question. “She’s skipping it to go to a UVA party with some dude she’s seeing there. Apparently Kirin hasn’t been all that receptive to her advances since the party. Cynthia likes a sure thing, and Kirin was moving too slow for her.” He winked.

  “You mean they didn’t…you know?” Chloe’s voice had involuntarily gone up a few octaves.

  Stan shook his head. “Nope.”

  Chloe couldn’t help it; she was red-faced and even a little teary with relief. How embarrassing!

  “So, what do you say, dude?” Stan stopped to face her. “Would you do me the honor of helping me convince my parents that I’m normal while having a kick-ass good time in the process?”

  Chloe couldn’t help but smile. “The honor would be all mine,” she surrendered, “but under one condition.”

  “Name it, Lightning Girl!”

  “No weed smoking,” she challenged.

  Stan winced with a big exhale of stale air. “Dude, you play mean…but okay, I’m in. No smoking.” He offered his sweaty hand with the big grin returned, and they shook on it.

  “And clean that lettuce out of your teeth,” Chloe added with a sly smirk. “That’ll be totally rancid by Saturday night.”

  • • •

  It wasn’t until after cross-country practice that day that Chloe finally ran into Ezra, freshly showered and looking magnificent as always as he exited the men’s locker room. He cupped a hand to his mouth to make sure his ensuing bellows would be heard.

  “LG in the house!” His words echoed down the hallway, and a number of people turned to look, much to Chloe’s dismay. “My girl’s looking primed and hungry to tear up the field in that district championship tomorrow!” He met Chloe in a half-awkward fist bump, which he embellished with an explosion noise. “I’m thinking it’s time you quit holding back and take first place; show these crusty old biddies what a fresh young speed demon really looks like.”

  Chloe shot him a pipe-down look. “You’re in rare form today. Not even a little nervous about facing the dreaded Monticello Dragons on your home turf Saturday?”

  “No, ma’am, I’m gonna own that field!” Ezra declared for all in earshot to hear. “When I was a sophomore, our team sucked plenty, but not anymore! Now I’m king! I figure the worst thing that might happen is we don’t beat those fools bad enough that they feel embarrassed to wake up on Sunday!” He closed his eyes, tilted his head back, and opened his arms in victory.

  For a moment, Chloe could almost hear the screams of the adoring crowd. She laughed as Ezra opened one eye, checked both ways, and leaned in close. “Actually, I’m nervous as hell, but if I get a couple good nights’ rest, eat right, and keep my focus, I think we can take ’em,” he whispered.

  “I have total faith in you, King Ezra the First,” she said with a mock bow. “And what lucky lady will have the honor of being your queen Saturday night?”

  “Homecoming Queen? We’ll just have to wait and see,” he answered. “Probably whoever’s been campaigning the hardest for votes—Charlene or Samantha?” He hooked a thumb toward a couple of makeshift posters on the wall, advertising various junior and senior girls whose popularity score was publicly on the line. Chloe read the closest banner—complete with multicolored, stenciled letters and half a tub of glitter: Bring it Home for Samantha Brown, She’s got it all but that Golden Crown.

  Chloe could only hide her face in her hands and shake her head.

  “Or maybe some dark horse candidate with a groundswell of support behind her,” he added cryptically with a sly smile. “You never know… As for my Homecoming concubine, however,” Ezra continued, “I had to dip into your class to find someone new.”

  Chloe tensed and peered up at him from between her fingers. “No.”

  “This year I’ve found me a red-haired vixen who would not be denied!”

  “No,” she repeated at a whisper.

  “I know what you’re thinking, but trust me: my girl Kendra is on FIRE!”

  “You didn’t.” Chloe felt like she might throw up.

  “I didn’t do anything yet,” he defended.

  “Don’t do this,” begged Chloe. “You could go with anybody; ask someone your own age.”

  “I’ve already been through everyone my own age, and plus, she asked me!” Ezra was smiling, but was clearly a little taken off guard by the vehemence of Chloe’s horror. “What’s the big deal? I’ll be a gentleman.”

  “She’s only fifteen, and she’s a complete asshole!” Chloe whispered.

  “Actually, she turns sixteen tomorrow, and have you seen her?” He was nodding. “There is nothing too young about that; she looks like a Victoria’s Secret model!”

  “You’re disgusting!” Chloe snapped.

  Ezra looked a little hurt. “You’re jealous.”

  Chloe couldn’t even look him in the eye. “No, it’s just that most guys act nice but are secretly jerks, whereas you act like a jerk but are secretly nice… Except when you do stupid, stereotypical jock things like ask the biggest underage bitch in school to boost your already out-of-control reputation,” she hissed.

  “Jesus, Lightning, what’s crawled up your butt?”

  “Whatever,” she said, marching past him toward the long bus ride and walk home. “Good luck with your STD-laden future.”

  “Come on, Lightning, don’t run away again,” he called after her. “I can give you a ride home.”

  She kept on walking.

  “Chloe!” he tried one last time behind her, but she was deaf to all but the buzz of anger that filled her ears. Finally she understood why Kendra hadn’t retaliated before now… Though she didn’t want to admit it, Ezra was right—she was jealous.

  Chapter 13

  The Preamble Scramble

  Ezra was right about another thing, too—fueled by all her rage and confusion, Chloe was a monster at the district championships on Saturday morning. She didn’t win the race, coming in second place to Angela, the fastest senior girl on her own team. But with her “gutsy and bold” performance, Chloe had proven that she was one of the most important girls on the varsity squad and that she could have a real shot at one day becoming the fastest long distance girl in the state.

  To her knowledge, Chloe was one of only six incoming tenth graders who had made it onto varsity sports teams in the first semester, though she was loathe to qualify Kendra’s coup at making the varsity field hockey squad—after her father’s generous donation to the booster’s program—as equivalent to achievement in sport. Regardless, despite Chloe’s designs on quiet anonymity, she’d once again done something newsworthy that would spread fast and only increase the notoriety of the elusive Lightning Girl. For some annoying reason, she just couldn’t stop herself from living loud and large at every turn. And now she was preparing to go back into the belly of the beast.

  She looked at herself in the full-length mirror on her mom’s closet door and sighed heavily.

  “What’s wrong with this one?” challenged Audrey. “You look adorable!”

  Chloe stared at the purple satin and chiffon dress, trying not to make eye contact with the spindly little girl who was wearing it. “I look like a flower girl at an eighties-themed wedding.”

  “You’re incorrigible, you know that?” said Audrey before delving back into her overstuffed closet. “You’ve looked good in every one of these.”

  Chloe glanced over to the three discarded dresses already tossed recklessly on the bed and grimaced at the memory of the way she looked in each. The first was a yellow floral-patterned assault on the senses, the second an ultra low-cut evening gown monstrosity, and the third an oversized smock dress that made her look like she was wearing a Snuggie.

  “I’m not even going with a real date,” she reminded her mom. “Can’t I just wear some nice pants and a button-down or something?”

  “No,” Audr
ey’s muffled voice carried from deep within the closet. “I’ve got something for you in here.”

  “Seriously, Mom, what’s the point?” Chloe protested. “I don’t have anyone to look good for. I would’ve skipped the whole stupid thing if Stan hadn’t needed my support.” She yanked off the purple dress and tossed it toward the bed. Beneath she had on her typically underwhelming underwear that Audrey had picked up in a four-pack from Target. This time, the reflection in the mirror stared back with open disdain.

  Audrey emerged from the closet with a dusty dress box and lint in her hair. “This is the one I was looking for,” she declared with a knowing smile. “This is what you’re wearing tonight.”

  “You sound pretty sure of yourself,” Chloe muttered as she hunched her shoulders.

  “Yes, I am,” answered Audrey as she placed the box on the bed and reverently opened the lid. She smiled as she removed a vintage, though understated, A-line, dyed a rich, dark green. “I wore this when I was just a little younger than you are now,” she said.

  She stepped over to Chloe and held the dress up to her back. “It was a Junior Assembly dance in the eighth grade, and for the first time in my life, I felt beautiful.” She reached over Chloe’s shoulders and held the dress up in front of the mirror.

  Chloe had to admit the dress was gorgeous and exactly her size.

  “I didn’t wear it for anybody else but myself that night. I looked good just for me,” said Audrey. “But you know what? It was only once I realized that I could be beautiful that anyone else took notice.”

  “News flash, Mom: I don’t look like you. Believe me, I wish I did, but I’m not the girl who gets noticed that way.”

  Audrey ignored her as she pulled the dress over Chloe’s head without asking. “I’m telling you, honey, you’ve got everything going for you, and the only one who isn’t impressed yet is yourself. Why else do you think you have a cute surfer from California, the star quarterback with a killer smile, and now this new hippie kid all circling for your attention?”