Home > Glimpsed(6)

Glimpsed(6)
Author: G.F. Miller

 

* * *

 


At lunch the next day, I have to nudge two chess clubbers and a soccer player to give up the seats next to Sean. He’s exhaustingly popular. Without a word, I slide a paper bag onto his tray. It’s from Inland Empire Bakery—we went there together at least a hundred times sophomore year. He snags the bag like a famine survivor, crams his face into the top, and takes a dramatic deep breath.

“Ah. My savior. I almost had to eat this compost they serve to the masses.” He pushes his tray away, lifts a cream cheese croissant from the bag, and takes a decadent bite. “Mmmmm. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. I’m really scared right now, Charity.” He glances at my innocent expression as he takes another bite. “Because I already said yes. So what can this bribery be for? She’s a troll, isn’t she?”

“No she’s not. I’m allowed to pay homage to the Great Sean Slater for no particular reason whatsoever.”

He snorts delicately.

I take a pull of orange juice. “So. Homecoming.”

Some sophomore girls stop by at that moment and pull Sean into an intense discussion about the latest post from some YouTuber they’re all following. One of them has lime-green highlights that don’t work at all with her strawberry blond hair. It’s an ill-advised imitation of my Grinchy look from mid-December. It used to make me all kinds of nuts the way people always copied me, until Memom sagely said, “Charity, imitation is the fondest form of flattery.”

She was probably quoting a Hallmark card or something. I don’t know.

Regardless, I nudge the idea into lime-green girl’s head that maybe it’s time for a change. Why not? I’ve got the time.

Sean says, “So. Homecoming.”

Aaaand we’re back. The girls have moved on.

“Okay, it’s Vindhya Chandramouli. Know her?”

He scrunches his face like he’s concentrating. “Girls Who Code? Or… maybe… Robotics Club.”

“That’s her.”

“So?” Sean is impressively blasé.

“So, I think she’ll have a solid voter base within the Accelerated Learning Program and the STEMers. So all you have to do is get her nominated and swing the other influencers her way.”

Sean ponders that for a moment. Then he says, “I’m thinking she and I need a meet-cute ASAP. I’ll take it from there.”

“I’m on it.” I jump up, suddenly alight with creative energy. Planning meet-cutes is one of my specialties. “You’re the best.”

He waves me away with a dispassionate “You owe me now.”

“Nope. Now we’re even.” I slide my phone into my back pocket and gather my trash. As I walk away, I toss over my shoulder, “If you pull it off.”

The student body president takes my seat before I’m even out of earshot, and Sean is on to the next thing.

Before I head out, I whip off a quick text to Vindhya informing her of tomorrow’s meet-cute. She texts back immediately: No! I’m not ready!

Me: Why not?

Vindhya: It’s SEAN SLATER!!? I don’t know what to say. I don’t know what to wear.

Two seconds later she sends another text: I thought there’d be a makeover or something first.

Part of me cringes. But if a makeover will give her the confidence to embrace her destiny, well, she wouldn’t be the first Cindy that needed one. (True story: Memom gave Celine Dion a total makeover in 1982. At least that’s what she claims.) So I text back: No problem. Meet me at Angelic Hair and Nails at 5.

She replies: I have robotics until 6.

Me: They close at 6.

Vindhya: . . . . . . . . . Okay. Never mind. I’ll be there.

I slide the phone into my pocket with a satisfied smile and amble toward the courtyard doors, thinking, I really do love my job.

Halfway there, my butt vibrates. I pull my phone out of my back pocket and glance at it. There’s a new text notification. It’s from a blocked number.

The message reads: I know who you are.

 

 

3 It’s Nothing the Fairy Godmother Can’t Handle

 


I almost drop the phone. That has got to be the creepiest text ever. Right?

I swipe the message off the screen, glancing around for stalker types. The courtyard—an enclosed brick box with no ceiling and about forty circular tables with attached benches—is a beehive of activity. Almost everyone is on their phone, at least tacitly. My eye is drawn to a knot of cheerleaders huddled around one phone, whispering what I can only imagine to be jealous rumors about yours truly. Then I notice Carmen’s homecoming suitor sitting with a couple of AV Club guys. He’s wearing a T-shirt that says LIVE LONG AND PROSPER, and he repeatedly opens and closes what could be—I’m not kidding you—a flip phone. Not too far from him there’s a highly suspicious Goth girl with black lipstick who looks away too quickly. Then my gaze lands on a fishy group of probable hackers who look like they haven’t showered in weeks. They’re snickering secretively.

It might be any of them. Or none of these people. I consider nudging them one at a time with a strong urge to fess up. I do some quick mental math and decide I would look like I was having a stroke if I tried to do that many nudges. So that’s not going to work. I decide I have no choice but to keep walking and blow this off.

Five steps, and the phone vibrates again. I look down almost against my will.

It says: Bibbidi bobbidi boo.

My first instinct is to make a run for it. My skin is crawling, and my leg muscles itch to engage evasive maneuvers. But that’s pointless. I can’t run away from my own phone. The creeper could be here, or a thousand miles away, or waiting on the other side of the door. I shiver.

But, you know, if I did panic-run out of the courtyard, I’d probably become a meme in ninety seconds flat. Plus I’d be faced with the JLHS version of the Spanish Inquisition. Who can afford that kind of bad PR?

So I do what I have to. I pocket the phone and walk—nay, strut—from the courtyard, as if all’s right with the world. I travel through the double doors, down the hall, past my next class, out another set of doors, and across the parking lot… all with perfectly measured strides and swaying hips to project carefree confidence.

When I get to my car, I lock the doors and cave in on myself, panting. My armpits are sticky with nervous sweat. I close my eyes and give in to the freak-out for a minute. Then I dig my phone out of my pocket. The message is still there on the home screen: Bibbidi bobbidi boo.

I swipe it away, wishing I could make the whole situation disappear that easily, and dial Memom.

“EH?” Memom yells into the phone. There is loud music playing on her end.

I yell, “Memom, it’s Charity.”

“Charity? You sound strange, honey. What’s wrong?”

“I’ve been made.”

“You made it?”

“No! Jeez, Memom. I mean my cover’s blown. Somebody knows about me.”

There’s a pause. I wonder if she didn’t hear me and I’m going to have to say all that again. Suddenly the music clicks off, and she says quite seriously, “Oh. Mercy.”

There’s a long pause. I hear her talking to someone else in the room. After about four seconds, I huff, “Uh. Hello? Could use some sage advice right about now.”

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