Zombie Blondes Read Online Free Page B

up with an answer.
    Meredith laughs. It’s not a mean kind of laugh, though. It’s a misunderstanding sort of laugh as she changes the question around. “I meant, like what are you into? You’re not like one of those girls who writes creepy poems about drowning or anything like that, are you?” she asks.
    I shake my head.
    “No,” I say and I can see a faint sense of approval like a flash of lightning in the blue storm of her eyes.
    “So what
do
you like?” her voice asks in the slow sound of a warning.
    “I don’t know,” I say, shrugging my shoulders. “Normal things, I guess.”
    “Good,” Meredith says. “I like normal things, too.”
    Then we both grin a little at how stupid we sound and things get easier from there now that we don’t feel like strangers. She asks me what classes I have. I hand her my schedule, which I still keep close in my pocket to peek at before each class is dismissed so that I know where I’m going. She looks it over. Making faces as she reads the teachers’ names. Making slightly more dramatic faces to let me know which teachers are truly awful and which are just the regular kind of annoying.
    I keep silent and nod in agreement at everything she says. That seems to please her enough to keep talking. Listening is just fine with me. It’s better than being ignored.
    School attendance duties put an end to our brief friendship, though. Our homeroom teacher narrows his eyes and grunts at the class for us to get quiet. Meredith and I shuffle our feet around to face the front of the room instead of each other as he calls out the first few names. The growl of his voice already seems less threatening than it did yesterday, simply because Meredith is sitting next to me. Because she talked to me.
    Our teacher goes through the list without looking up once. Coughing out last names like they’re something that makes him sick. He doesn’t care to know any of the faces, just so long as they’re
here.
I look over at Meredith and she rolls her eyes to let me know Mr. Edwards, our homeroom teacher, is one of those who belong in the truly awful category.
    Everyone gets up at once, gathering up things when the bell dismisses us to first period. I toss my bag over my shoulder and step out into the row. I hesitate for a second, wondering if I should leave or wait for Meredith.
    I decide to wait and she seems fine with it. We step into the hallway together but that’s about as far as we get. She’s met right away by a group of blondes who look nearly identical to her. I can still tell one of them apart from the rest, though. Because no matter how closely they resemble one another, Morgan stands out.
    She doesn’t bother to hide the evil look on her face as she squints at me, either. “Why are you talking to
her
?” she asks Meredith, saying it like I’m some kind of disease that needsto be avoided.
    Meredith shrugs. “I wasn’t really,” she says.
    I feel my stomach sink and my face blush. I lower my head and continue walking, hoping they don’t notice. It’s not like I really expected her to stick up for me or anything, but it still makes me feel like crap. It’s my fault, though. One stupid conversation and I let myself think we might actually become friends.
    “You better not,” she sneers, “that girl’s a freak.”
    I glance behind me just in time for one last nasty look from Morgan before they disappear into the tide of kids flooding the hallway.
    So much for my day-two theory.
     
    Lukas is waiting for me when I walk into the lunchroom. I see him sitting at the same table I sat at yesterday. But he’s clever enough to try to hide it. Keeps his head down, buried in the bend of his arm like a kitten covering its face with a paw as it sleeps.
    He’s not fooling me, though. He could’ve sat anywhere else if he wanted to sleep. He sat there for me.
    “Great,” I sigh.
    “I guess we’re lunch buddies again?” I say, dropping my books on the table. The impact causes his body