Bad Taste in Boys (15 page)

e walked the rest of the way to bio in silence. I kept obsessively rubbing my finger over my lip lump, and Aaron was probably trying to figure out how he could get out of taking a walking disease vector with a lip crater to homecoming.

I stopped when we got to the door. The hallway had emptied fast; we only had a minute until the bell rang.

“Wait. I can’t go in there,” I said.

“Why not?” Aaron pulled his arm off my shoulders again. It had been nice while it lasted.

“What if Dr. Ho doesn’t check his messages? I need to make sure he’s taking care of things.” I glanced into the classroom. Mrs. Mihalovic was setting up a bunch of stations and covering
them with sterile blue sheets so no one could see what was under them, and I knew what that meant. It was pop quiz day. I was usually one of those freaks who wouldn’t miss pop quiz day for the world, but today, I was a different kind of freak altogether. By the time this was all over, I’d probably be lucky if I wasn’t the committed-to-an-insane-asylum kind of freak.

But this whole thing was my fault; I couldn’t just sit around and wait for the Ho to show up and fix everything. Not if I wanted to live with myself. I could only think of one way to get out of the classroom so I could follow up with him, and I didn’t like it. I would rather have stuck bamboo shards under my fingernails than done what I was about to do, but I was just going to have to swallow the embarrassment.

I threw myself on the floor.

I’d never seen myself seize, since I hadn’t figured out the whole out-of-body experience thing yet. But I’d had it described to me plenty of times, so I figured I should be able to fake it pretty well. Most people panicked when they witnessed a seizure anyway. It wasn’t like they were going to be critiquing my performance. So I shuddered and shook, and I felt like I was doing a great job until I managed to give myself a charley horse.

My fake seizure ended a lot more abruptly than I intended. I clenched my leg, trying not to cry. It hurt so bad. Aaron knelt down beside me and took my calf in his hands, smoothing out the spasming muscles with long, sure strokes of his thumbs.

“It’s okay,” he said, looking over my shoulder. I twisted my head to see the entire AP Biology class clustered in the doorway, staring at me like I’d grown a third eye. “She just strained a muscle during her seizure. Didn’t you, Kate?”

He looked down at me and winked. I could put one over on a lot of people, including Mrs. Mihalovic, but Aaron was too smart, or maybe he just knew me too well already.

“Yeah,” I said. “I’m okay now.”

“Why don’t you help her down to the nurse’s office, Aaron?” Mrs. Mihalovic said. “And come back quickly, please. We’re having a pop quiz today.”

She closed the door, cutting off a chorus of moans from our classmates. I felt like moaning too. Maybe she’d let me take it later for fun.

We walked down the hall, nodding to a pair of freshmen sprinting for the door before Mr. Gilbert shut them out of freshman bio. “Care to explain what’s going on?” Aaron asked once they were out of earshot.

“I had to fake it, Aaron. There are some things I haven’t told you yet.”

My heart pounded. He deserved to know about Mike’s finger. The zombie virus. Coach. I felt bad for keeping everything from him this long. I hoped he wouldn’t be too angry.

But when we turned the corner, a couple of the guidance counselors were standing in front of the nurse’s office.

Mr. Wiesner, my counselor, nodded at me. “Kate,” he said. “You’re looking a little peaked.”

“I was, uh, taking her to the nurse’s office,” Aaron said. “She had a seizure.”

Mr. Wiesner clucked his tongue sympathetically and held the door open for me. I had no choice but to wave goodbye to Aaron while telepathically sending a thank-you for not proclaiming my fakeness in front of AP Bio and my fervent wish that he not get eaten by a zombie before homecoming.

“Thanks,” I said as Aaron headed back to class. “I’ll talk to you later.”

Mrs. Rooney, the school nurse, and I had a long history together. I’d probably spent more time in her office than I had in homeroom. When I was an underclassman, she used to let me read her nursing books while I waited for Mom to pick me up after a particularly bad seizure.

“Kate,” she said, frowning. “I haven’t seen you here in a while.”

“I had a seizure in Mrs. Mihalovic’s class. I’m not feeling so good now.”

“You look horrible, you poor thing.”

It was almost insulting. I couldn’t possibly look that bad. I almost started arguing with her over it before I realized that it would be awfully counterproductive.

“Shall I call your dad to come pick you up?” she asked.

“No!” She widened her eyes at me, and I forced myself to speak
at a more reasonable volume. “He’s in an important meeting today, and it was just a seizure. If I could just lie down in the back room for a little bit, I should be okay. I could probably even go back to bio in time to take our pop quiz.”

She deposited me in the back room on her foldout cot with a glass of water and a thin blanket. I had my phone out about five seconds after she closed the door behind her. Dr. Ho’s office number was still in my call history.

The phone barely rang before someone snatched it up and yelled, “What?”

“Uh …” I was kind of taken aback. Maybe there was a crossed line or something. I knew I hadn’t dialed wrong. “I need to talk to Dr. Ho. Can you help me?”

“Afraid not, honey. Dr. Ho went rock climbing yesterday and fell off a cliff. I don’t know when he’ll be back in the office, but I imagine it’ll be a while. Can I take a message?”

I started hyperventilating. It was nice to know that he wasn’t avoiding me, but what was I supposed to do now? The Ho couldn’t help cure zombies from traction. And really, if he was falling off cliffs, he wasn’t as smart as I thought he was.

“Well?” she demanded.

“No message,” I said.

She hung up on me. I wasn’t very impressed with his secretarial staff. But I had a much bigger problem to worry about.

I eyed the door. I knew Mrs. Rooney worked with the health
department sometimes. If I could convince her that I wasn’t completely batty, she could put me in touch with the right person. It was just a matter of constructing an airtight argument.

I lay there in the dark for a while, going through all the evidence in my head, thinking through the arguments she’d likely make and planning my responses. I had to be completely rational if I wanted her to listen to me, so I had to eliminate the Z‑word from my vocabulary. Otherwise, she’d write me off as a total nutcase.

Finally, I flung open the door, ready to impress Mrs. Rooney with my viral detection abilities. It figured; she wasn’t at her desk. I couldn’t catch a break. But the secretaries liked me. Maybe one of them would page her if I asked nicely enough.

I was halfway to the administrative offices when the screaming started. I wasn’t surprised. I’d known it was only a matter of time before the zombies started attacking.

I jogged toward the ruckus. I didn’t hear anyone yelling “Zombies!” just yet; they seemed to be in the wordless panic-at-the-top-of-your-lungs stage. The noise came from the direction of the cafeteria, and I had horrific mental images of zombie lunch ladies. Our lunch ladies were kind of scary to begin with. But zombie lunch ladies? Almost as scary as clowns.

As I got closer, the screams grew so loud and shrill that I started to wish for earplugs. I turned down the hallway leading to the kitchen, and Mindi Skibinski came running in the other direction. She knocked me off my feet. Seriously, she could teach our linebackers
something; I flew backward so fast that I slid across the lineolum on my butt and banged my head into the lockers. She didn’t even pause. She was too busy running and screaming.

Only an idiot would walk in on a zombie infestation empty-handed, so I looked around for something to defend myself with. I entered the little alcove outside the kitchen, which was fitted with coat hooks and stocked with about a thousand hairnets. Nothing that would be vaguely useful in a zombie fight. It was almost enough to make me wish I was one of Jonah’s geeky gamer friends; at least then I’d have a pseudosword.

I opened the door, letting out a blast of screaming that assaulted my eardrums, and then I dashed inside because I figured it might give me a slight edge of surprise. I was about to go into a room full of zombies armed only with a backpack. I’d take anything that could make me feel better about the situation.

The kitchen was crowded and steamy and always smelled like fish sticks no matter what they were cooking. I took two steps in and grabbed a pair of metal tongs, then inched around the storage freezer and into the main room.

“Ahhhh! Ahhhh!” One of the lunch ladies was crouched on her hands and knees atop the metal counter, screaming at the top of her lungs. When she saw me, she pointed at the floor and screamed some more, like maybe I hadn’t gotten the picture yet. I looked down at my feet, expecting to see a sneaky ninja zombie.

Instead, a bug crawled over the toe of my shoe.

But the word
bug
didn’t quite do it justice. This was no mere
insect; it was a strange mutant creature the length of my index finger, and I swore I could feel its weight as it skittled over my foot.

“Ewww!” I made a loud noise that sounded suspiciously like a scream and kicked my leg wildly. The offending creature sailed through the air, narrowly missing one of the other lunch ladies, who screamed at me and waved her hands around like the airflow might deflect any other airborne insects.

Okay. These were freakishly big bugs, but still? They were
bugs.

Another one crawled out from underneath the sink; it looked like some kind of roach. Nothing to be afraid of; it wasn’t like we were talking brown recluse spiders or something else poisonous.

I’d had enough of the screaming. I grabbed the nearest lunch lady by the shoulders and shook her. “Stop shouting! It’s just a roach!”

She stopped midshriek, but her face stayed scrunched up like she was still screaming and I had merely managed to mute her with my mind. It was a superpower I had often wished for but had never managed to make work.

“They hiss,” she said. “I’m getting out of here.” She walked out the door, and the rest of the lunch ladies followed, muttering angrily.

I searched the kitchen. No zombies, but those freaky bugs were everywhere.

I decided to swing through the cafeteria. I let myself through the doors and walked right into a big herd of jerseyed JV football players standing in a big semicircle with their backs to me.

“Dude!” said one of them. They were all taking pictures of the bugs with their cell phones and punching each other on the shoulders. Just another moment when I realized how little I understood about guys.

I knew I should sneak out before they saw me, because this was clearly not a nerd-friendly situation. But today I wasn’t in the mood to retreat.

“Hey, you guys know what’s up with the bugs?” I asked.

They squinted at me like I was speaking Swahili. Then they turned back to what they were doing. Again, another hint that I should just leave, but I was tired of backing down. I’d talked to Aaron when I thought I couldn’t. I could do this too.

“Hey! Do any of you know what’s up with all the bugs?” I said it a little louder this time.

They turned around again, in perfect unison, like maybe they practiced synchronized turning in their spare time.

“You talking to us?” said a guy with short dark hair and a black T‑shirt, stepping forward and shoving his chest at me. It wasn’t as impressive as Hawaii’s.

On a normal day, I would have gone all meek and inoffensive, as dictated by my geek survival instincts. But not today.

“Yes,” I said patiently. “There’s no one else here.”

He didn’t quite know what to make of me. He looked back at his friends like maybe they’d give him a clue on how to handle the geek. They didn’t.

That’s when I noticed the injection mark peeking out from
the sleeve of his T-shirt. I grabbed his arm in an attempt to get a closer look, but I would have had better luck moving the Great Wall of China with my pinky finger. He shoved me away, glowering, and raised his fists. He thought I was trying to pick a fight with him.

“Did Coach inject you with something?” I rattled the question off quickly, before he could pound my teeth in. The thug paused, his brow furrowing.

“Huh?” he asked.

“Did Coach give you a shot?” I spoke slower this time, pointing to the mark on his arm.

“What’s it to you?”

“Look.” I took his arm gently and lifted his sleeve to expose the circular bruise on his arm. “Coach was giving out some B twelve, and it’s tainted. So he asked me to get all of it back. Do you have any?”

He squinted at me uncertainly.

“I think you should give it to her,” said a deep voice from behind me. I turned around to see Hawaii. “This chick’s pretty cool.”

“Thanks,” I said, surprised. “So he did give you some? How many of you used it?”

They all just stared at me, and I was starting to get a little impatient. I’d never seen many benefits to popularity, but I was beginning to understand its uses. If I’d been Kiki, I’d have had them eating out of my hand already instead of staring at me like I was one of those stupid bugs.