The Predicteds Read Online Free Page B

doing?” I exclaim, scrambling in my chair.
    â€œPost-traumatic stress,” she says definitively. “You’ve got it.”
    â€œWhat are you talking about?” I say loudly. The gray librarian looks up from her post at her desk and calls—far louder than I did—“Second warning, Missy. Keep it quiet.”
    â€œWhat are you talking about?” I whisper.
    â€œPost-traumatic stress,” she whispers back, leaning in closer to look at my eyes. I swat her away, catching one of her butterfly clips in the palm of my hand. “You are jumpy,” she says, “because of the shooting.”
    â€œMaybe,” I say sarcastically, “I’m jumpy because you are in my face.”
    She nods as if to say, Good point . “Did you know him?” she asks after a second.
    The odd thing is that I don’t have to ask. I know immediately that she means the shooter. “No,” I say, realizing that for just a second, I hadn’t thought about him. “I didn’t even see him,” I tell her now. I don’t have any idea what he even looked like. I haven’t even seen a picture of him. And I never will. I don’t want to know. Giving him a face is more generous than I feel like being. I prefer to think of him as a blurred-out entity, like a mob witness.
    She nods. “Lucky.”
    â€œHow about you?”
    â€œI was outside. Cut class for a cigarette. I missed the whole thing.”
    â€œMust be karma,” I say.
    â€œYeah,” she replies bitterly and tugs at a frizzy piece of hair, pursing her shiny pink lips. “You’re Daphne Wright, right?”
    â€œHow did you know?”
    â€œI’m psychic,” she says, tossing the book on the table in front of us. A little orange construction-paper bookmark falls out.
    For a split-second, I’m charmed by her. “Oh, really? What am I thinking right now?” I smile tentatively, half-friendly, half-making fun of her.
    â€œNot that kind of psychic, silly.”
    â€œI didn’t realize there were different kinds of psychics.”
    The girl rolls her eyes. “I can tell you everything about you.”
    â€œI already know everything about me.”
    We are at an impasse. Do I like her, or do I want her to suddenly come down with a case of laryngitis? It’s always a toss-up with me. Melissa says I’m a misanthrope in training. The girl’s eyes move to the open double doors of the library room from where I’ve just escaped. The noise is louder, the sub looks even more harried. She’ll never make it through the day.
    â€œHow do you know my name?” I repeat.
    She points at the freshly printed schedule clipped to the top of my notebook that is sticking out of my backpack. I’ve been carrying it around since the first day. Daphne Wright , it proclaims. “Oh,” I say.
    The girl slinks down in her chair so low that she looks like a puddle of goo melting. Her earrings—hideous dangly things that look like blue peacock feathers—move violently as she whips her head, peering one way and then the other.
    â€œWhat?” I ask, growing nervous. Is he back? How could that be?
    She’s staring at Dizzy and her friends. They’ve come out of the classroom and are standing a few feet from the paperbacks, just out of our earshot.
    â€œThem?” I ask. “I just had the pleasure of meeting them. Mean girls, huh?” I’ve already written them off. I’ve been to enough schools to spot these kind of girls a mile away. It’s best to be polite but distant. Never get too close, or they’ll figure out how to torture you.
    Dizzy sees me in the chair and waves. She gives some sort of hand signal to the others, and they all began walking toward us. Great , I think.
    â€œShit,” the butterfly girl says as she sits up quickly. “I’m outta here.” She grabs her bag and makes a run for it, a skinny flash