Glass Houses Page 0,17

them. "Monica," he repeated. "How come nobody told me?"

Eve was watching him, biting her lip. "Sorry, Shane. We would have - I swear, I thought she left town.

Went off to college somewhere else."

Shane shook it off, whatever it was, and shrugged, trying to look like he didn't care. It was obvious to Claire that he did, though. "She probably couldn't stand not being the queen bee, and had to come begging back to Daddy to buy her some grades."

"Shane - "

"I'm fine. Don't worry about me."

"She probably doesn't even remember you," Eve blurted, and then looked as if she wished she hadn't said it. "I - that's not what I meant. I'm sorry."

He laughed, and it sounded wrong and a little bit shaky. There was a short, odd silence, and then Eve changed the subject by resolutely picking up her plate of cooling bacon and eggs.

And then went still and round-eyed. "Oh, shit," she said, and then covered her mouth.

"What?"

She pointed at the plates on the counter. Shane's, hers...and Claire's. "Three plates. He knew something was up. We told him Michael wasn't around. No wonder he kept poking."

Shane said nothing, but Claire could see he was - if possible - even more upset. He didn't show it much, but he picked up his plate and walked away, out into the living room, then up the steps two at a time.

His upstairs door slammed.

Eve bit her lip, watching after him.

"So...Shane and Monica...?" Claire guessed.

Eve kept staring at the doorway. "Not like you're thinking," she said. "He wouldn't touch that skank in a million years. But they were in high school together, and Shane - got on her bad side. Just like you did."

Claire's appetite for breakfast was suddenly gone. "What happened?"

"He stood up to her, and his house burned. He nearly died," she said. "His - his sister wasn't so lucky.

Michael got him out of town, off on his own, before he did something crazy. He's been gone a couple of years. Just came back right before I moved in here." Eve forced a bright smile. "Let's eat, yeah? I'm starving."

They sat out in the living room, chatting about nothing, not talking about the thing that was most important: what to do.

Because, Claire sensed, neither one of them had a clue.

Chapter Five

Claire watched the clock - some old-style wall clock, with hands - crawl slowly up to, and past, eleven o'clock. Professor Hamms is starting the lecture, she thought, and felt a nauseating twist in her stomach.

This was the second day in a row she'd missed school. In her whole life she'd never missed two days of school back-to-back. Sure, she'd read the textbook already - twice - but lectures were important. That was how you found out the good stuff, especially in classes like physics, where they did practical demonstrations. Lectures were the fun part.

It was Thursday. That meant she had a lab class later, too. You couldn't make up lab class, no matter how good your excuse.

She sighed, forced herself to look away from the time, and opened up her Calc II book - she'd tested out of Calc I, could have tested out of Calc II, but she'd thought maybe she might learn something new about solving linear inequalities, which had always been a problem for her.

"What the hell are you doing?" Shane. He was on the stairs, staring at her. She hadn't heard him coming, but that was probably because he was barefoot. His hair was a mess, too. Maybe he'd been asleep.

"Studying," she said.

"Huh," he said, like he'd never actually seen it done before. "Interesting." He vaulted over the railing three steps from the bottom and flopped down on the leather couch next to her, flicking the TV on with the remote next to him, then changing inputs. "This going to bother you?"

"No," she said politely. It was a lie, but she wasn't quite ready to be, you know, blunt. It was her first day.

"Great. Want to take a break?"

"A break?"

"That's when you stop studying" - he tilted his head to the side to look at the book - "okay, whatever the hell that is, and actually do something fun. It's a custom where I come from." He dumped something in the center of her open book with a plastic thump. She flinched and picked up the wireless game controller with two fingers. "Oh, come on. You can't tell me you've never played a video game."

Truthfully, she had. Once. She hadn't liked it very much.