Girls Save the World in This One - Ash Parsons Page 0,7

be frustrating with her grown-up seriousness, and it doesn’t even matter that Blair—

A knife twists in my heart at the name.

Okay, so it still does matter about Blair, duh, don’t be foolish, June.

I’m not going to let her ruin this for me. For us.

“June, I feel like you’re getting caught in it,” Imani says gently, and her hand touches my arm.

Sometimes I get too worked up. My mom calls it anxiety, Imani calls it “getting caught,” and I call it being a normal, rational person who can see all the ways everything can go wrong.

“She’s on the way,” Imani says. “Deep breaths.”

I gulp down air, take deep breaths, and nod at Imani.

“It’s not just Siggy. What is it?” Imani asks.

She’s got Spidey-level insight with me. And I do with her, too. We can always see when something is bothering the other, or when the other is upset about the thing underneath the thing.

I wave my hand at the world.

“It’s everything,” I say. “Blair and Scott. And graduation and stuff.”

Imani nods and pulls me into a hug, giving me a big squeeze.

It calms me down, and I squeeze her back to say thanks.

And I really do feel better. Just like that.

The line moves forward, and we step around the edge of the building. I can see the doors and the large ZombieCon! banner designed like a biohazard warning. Above it is a massive promotional sign for Human Wasteland, as big as a billboard, unrolled from the top of the three-story convention center. The main cast stares out at us from the sign, worry lines furrowing their brows, sweat staining their very close-fitting and/or strategically ripped clothes, their eyes intense with everything they’ve seen.

Oh my God, I love this show!

A separate banner hangs below it, the tagline for this season, written in letters three feet tall: WILL YOU SURVIVE . . .

It can be a question, but they write it like an unfinished sentence because it has more impact that way, sounds like an imperative statement, use your will, choose to fight, because one of the themes of the show is what will it take to survive?

Will you survive . . .

A jolt of happy adrenaline dumps into my veins, and I turn and grab Imani’s arms. And something I love about her (and Siggy, too, if she was here, dammit, I’m going to throttle her) is we know each other’s thoughts almost instantly, and even though I was just worrying, Imani is with me immediately right now, a jolt of pure excitement, as we scream at each other.

“ZOMBIECON!”

We’re here, it’s our senior year, graduation is seven months away, and we will be friends forever, no matter what. This day is going to be one of those Special Memories we always think about, think back to, and we’ll have the photo op with Hunter Sterling at the end of the day to prove it was the best day ever. Nothing’s going to stop us. It’ll be the perfect day, maybe the best day of our entire senior year.

Forget prom.

Forget graduation.

We’re at ZombieCon!

3

After taking and posting multiple selfies with the banners behind us, Imani and I start rehashing our plans for the day: listing who we’re going to pay for their autograph, who we might pay for a selfie at their tables, what we might buy for souvenirs. We strike up a conversation with the people in front of us, two girls and a guy, sharing the latest fandom gossip about the current showrunner, who is doing a great job with the show but seems to be a bit of a jerk at cons, and talking about the newest characters on the show.

“Man, it’s too bad our friend Siggy isn’t here, Linus and Annie are her absolute favorites,” Imani tells them.

As we get closer to the doors, the energy of the crowd picks up; you can feel it building like a wave. It’s good-natured, excitement and eagerness, but nobody’s pushing or shoving. It’s that elevated, amped-up feeling from our