Good vs. Evil High (16 page)

Sassy grabbed mine and Harmony’s arms when I
was through. “See? See?! He’s a suspicious character.”

“But it doesn’t prove anything,” Harmony
said. “No one from North Haven would attack someone and leave them
to fry in a boiler room.”

“I’m not saying it was him,” I said. “I’m
just telling you what I heard.”

“I don’t know either, but I say we all go to
the game room and stop worrying about this,” Nadine said.

“Sounds good to me.” I needed to get my mind
off the approaching competition. The fact that I would be the very
first North Havener to compete only added to the pressure. And all
those people watching and cheering for or against me...

As we climbed out of bed, Harmony said, “I’ll
catch up in a minute. I need to find something.” She began
rummaging through a drawer. “Could you help me, Kristine?”

I got the feeling she had an ulterior motive
for getting me alone as the other two went ahead.

When the door closed behind them, Harmony
shut the drawer and jumped back onto the bed, motioning for me to
join her. As soon as I’d sat down, she shut the curtain. “Luke was
asking about you today,” she said.

“When did you see him?” I hadn’t seen him
since that morning.

“When I went to change after I got gravy on
my shirt at lunch, I saw him in the hallway. He wanted to know if
Roman was your boyfriend, but he said not to tell you he asked, so
don’t tell him I told you. But I think he likes you, Kristine.” She
looked really worried.

“I don’t think so. We’ve been friends too
long for something like that.” But I was bursting with hope inside.
I knew he was probably being protective, like a brother or best
friend might be, but I had to admit, he’d sneaked into my fantasies
more than once since I first saw him there. “What’d you tell him?”
I asked, praying she didn’t say yes.

“The truth—Roman thinks you are, you think
you’re not.”

“Good, but you’re worrying over nothing. It’s
not like that with Luke and me.”

“I hope you’re right,” Harmony said. “Because
a Cinder and a North Havener could never be together.”

Chapter
Twenty

~ Rose Awakens ~

The following week flew by. Harmony and I
planned and worked on the dance in the dance hall with the rest of
the activities committee each afternoon. The lofty room was made
all of stone and the electric lighting was terrible. We had our
cons light up our work area most of the time. It was fun, though,
looking at the walls and floor, imagining exactly what it should
look like for the big night. When we weren’t doing that, we were
having fun all over the second floor with Nadine and Sassy.

Coach Beckham continued to push me harder
than the other girls. I wasn’t sure if he was trying to help me or
if he hated me for not joining the Tracers. But I could deal with
it. The thing I couldn’t deal with was the fact that I didn’t see
Luke all week. Not once. I didn’t know if he was in trouble or if
he was mad at me. I couldn’t stop driving myself crazy worrying
about it until Friday morning, when I had something much worse to
worry about.

On that day I woke up with my stomach in
knots, so I wasn’t really planning on eating much for breakfast
anyway. But when I walked into the dining hall, I felt even
worse.

It was dark, except for a projection filling
most of the wall behind the teachers, all looking just as excited
as every other person in the room aside from me. It was the first
time I’d seen the Cinders look so—well—normal. Even when they were
sitting around, laughing and talking like the rest of us, they
always had a sort of downtrodden look about them.

“North Haven’s most recent recruit, Kristine
Fayre, will be leading our great tradition of Winter Competitions
today,” Connie’s voice was saying.

Harmony and I stopped beside the end of the
first Cinder table and looked back. An image of me racing and
beating Rose my first day at North Haven was being shown.

“Break a leg, Fayre,” a Cinder sitting at the
table beside me hissed. I ignored the laughs this drew.

“You may not believe it, but this is her
first race,” Connie went on. “She has a gift that North Haven is
hoping will win their first point this year.”

“It’s me,” Harmony said when a picture of me
laughing with her in the North Haven cafeteria came up.

Connie began giving some basic information
about me.

I grabbed Harmony’s arm and pulled her to our
table at the other end of the room, hoping no one would notice me.
But the North Haven tables stood up and began clapping as I passed
by each one. I did
not
want that kind of attention.

When I sat down, a tiny girl with hateful
blue eyes appeared on the screen. A harsher voice began announcing
her in more of a pro-wresting-match kind of way.

“I’ve never been shown up there before!”
Harmony said as we sat down. “Thanks, Kristine.”

“You’re welcome, but I don’t really feel like
I did anything.”

“Hellooo, you’re like the greatest sprinter
ever,” a girl named Lexi said from across the table. She flipped
her long dark hair behind her shoulders. “You’re even faster than
Rose Jennings, and she was the greatest ever.”

I felt miserable. This should have been
Rose’s big day. She’s the one who worked so hard for it. She’s the
one who wanted it. This wasn’t right.

“Do you think Rose can have visitors?” I
asked Harmony, even though I didn’t know if the doctors had let
Rose wake up yet or not. Probably not, since Headmaster hadn’t made
any announcements about it.

“Sure. We can go see her after breakfast.
She’ll probably be asleep, though.”

After forcing down some oatmeal and a banana,
I followed Harmony through the hallway to the stairs we’d come out
of the hangar on, this time taking them up two flights. We entered
a hallway with more normal looking doors, but no signs indicating
we were on a hospital floor. The only person we saw there was a man
in black walking away from us with the medical plus sign on his
back.

“Excuse me,” Harmony called out to him. He
turned around and stared at us blankly. “We’re looking for Rose
Jennings.” He turned away and began walking again.

“Wait,” I said, running after him.

Harmony put her arm out to stop me. “It’s
okay.”

I gave her a strange look, but stayed where I
was. When I looked back at the man, he pointed to a door on his
left and kept going.

“I hope he’s not Rose’s doctor,” I whispered.
Harmony and I went to the room.

We heard voices inside, so I knocked first. A
nurse in one of our white suits opened the door and we found
Headmaster and Coach Ling beside a bed. “Give us a minute, will you
girls?” Headmaster asked.

An extremely bruised and bandaged Rose lifted
her head in the bed and smiled when she saw me. “Wait, I need
Kristine.” I looked at Headmaster for permission and went to her
bedside when he nodded. “Thank you for finding me, and thank you
for running for me today. I don’t know what our school would have
done if you hadn’t been recruited to kick off the competition.”

“You’re welcome.” I felt better knowing my
running made her feel better. “But who did this to you?”

“Why don’t you two wait outside and we’ll let
you know when we’re done?” Headmaster said.

“Yes, sir.” Harmony and I went to sit right
outside the door in awed silence. Rose looked so beat up.

A good while later our cons began buzzing. I
reached in my bag as Harmony reached in her pocket, then we saw
Headmaster. “Good morning, North Haven,” he began. “It’s an extra
good morning today, because Rose Jennings is awake and well.”

“Hey, everybody.” Rose leaned into the
picture and waved with the hand that had an IV in it. “Be sure and
cheer on the Tracers and Kristine extra hard for me tonight.”

The focus went back to Headmaster.
“Unfortunately, we still don’t know who Rose’s attacker is. We need
everyone to continue to be watchful and careful. No one goes
anywhere alone, and if anyone has any information, please come to
me. You can remain anonymous, of course. And as Rose mentioned, we
should all be there to cheer on our school’s competitors this
evening. I’ll see you all there.” Our cons went black and began to
close.

Harmony and I stood up as the door behind us
opened. “Why don’t you go on in, Harmony?” Headmaster asked. “I
need to have a word with Kristine.”

“Okay.”

We heard Rose’s cheerful voice as Harmony
entered her room. “Tell me everything I missed since—” The rest of
what she was saying was muffled when the door closed.

“I talked to my brother,” Headmaster said,
“and unfortunately, he hasn’t agreed to let Luke send for you at
night. He believes it would make him weak if he turned to you
whenever he needed you. I hate that he’s being so coldhearted, but
I wanted to let you know—Also,” He lowered his voice, even though
no one else was around. “if you’re caught out of bed at night, as
long as it’s for this purpose and not in his or your sleeping
quarters, you won’t be in any trouble with me, because you’ll have
my permission.”

“Thank you, Headmaster.”

He patted my shoulder gently as he walked
past me toward the stairs. I went to join Harmony and Rose.

* * * *

It was four o’clock when I walked into the
competitors’ room with the Tracers. It was a pleasant room, with
white padded chairs and shiny silver lockers. I figured our
headmaster had designed it.

“This is for you,” Coach Ling said, handing
me a white suit with traces of lightning down the sides of the
legs. “You can use Rose’s locker for now. It’s over here, between
Adora and Anna’s.”

When I was finished changing, Adora looked
like she might cry as she watched me open the locker with Rose’s
name on it and throw my clothes inside. I felt as if I should say
something, but couldn’t find the right words.

We both heard the sound of bubbles popping as
I shut the door, so I pulled it back open and took my con out.
Harmony was calling me, and she looked pretty uncomfortable.

“Hey, Harmony, are you okay?” I asked.

“Could you meet me by the bathrooms in the
red section’s lowest level? They should be the closest ones to
you.”

“Are you alone?”

“Not exactly.”

“Harmony, what’s going on?”

“Could you just c’mere for a minute?”

“I’ll be right there.”

I didn’t think to ask Coach Ling for
permission until my con was back in my bag and it was thrown over
my shoulder. “You don’t mind, do you? I’ll be fast. I’ll even run
there and back.”

She held up a hand with her fingers spaced
far apart. “Five minutes, Fayre, and you probably want to take one
of the girls with you.”

“I’ll be all right on my own. It’s close
enough you can almost hear me if anything goes wrong.” I got the
feeling Harmony didn’t want any third wheels tagging along.

“Headmaster said no one goes anywhere
alone.”

“I know, but it’s right down the hall.”

“We can’t waste time standing around talking.
Go ahead and hurry.”

I ran from the room and down the hallway, up
some stairs and onto the lowest level of the indoor arena’s outside
hallway, passing no one along the way. I was on the North Haven
side, so there were no torches, only bright light and red circles
painted close to the ceiling to indicate which section I was
in.

No sign of Harmony.

I slowed down as I neared the bathroom and
realized a dark figure was leaning against the wall just inside the
boys’ bathroom. Instinctively, I flinched as I twisted around to
look behind me, fully expecting a vicious attack. But it was only
Luke. “Hey, what are you doing here?” I asked.

“I talked your friend into calling you down
here. This place’ll be packed in a little while and I wanted to see
you before you raced. Why didn’t you tell me you were going to be
competing?”

“I didn’t know until last Friday, and I would
have if I saw you. Where the heck have you been?”

“Headmaster found out what happened with
us.”

“How? My headmaster said he wouldn’t say
anything.”

“No idea. He wasn’t really mad about it, just
that I let myself get caught. He’s had me do all the dirtiest jobs
he could find ever since. I’m free now, though. Competitors get
special treatment during competitions.”

“I’m glad you had Harmony call me. I’ve been
worried about you.”

“...Will you meet me at the edge of the North
Haven-Cinder line on this floor after the competition tonight?”

“Sure.” My heart began racing in a good way
for the first time all day. “I need to get back, though. My coach
only gave me five minutes.”

“Wait, I wanted to wish you good luck. That’s
why I had Harmony call you.”

I felt this warm fuzzy tingling in my chest.
“Really? Just so you could tell me good luck?”

He smiled sheepishly, looking more like the
young Luke I remembered. “Yeah.”

I closed the space between us and wrapped my
arms around his neck. “Thanks, Luke. It means a lot...I’ll win it
for you,” I said as we let each other go.

He turned his arms inward and disappeared. In
the shadows of the bathroom entryway, I couldn’t see the hand that
placed itself on my cheek. I couldn’t help but lay one of mine over
it as I leaned against his warm skin. It felt like a dream to feel
him when I couldn’t see him, like it wasn’t quite real.

“I’ll win it for you, too,” he whispered so
close to my ear I felt his lips brush against it. A thrill and a
shiver washed over me as his touch was taken away, and then I
didn’t know where he was. I stood there for a minute, wishing he
would reappear, because the sensation I was feeling was too good to
walk away from.

But I was forced to walk away in the end,
because I knew I’d already been gone too long and that he might not
even be there.