Bloodthirsty - By Flynn Meaney Page 0,24

all the way up and handed her the book. Suddenly all these different people around me represented nothing more than different brands of inferiority. By God, I was the Chauncey Castle of Pelham Public High School! Guys wielding Sharpie markers from crappy cars and girls with scary-heeled shoes had nothing on me.

“I should get inside,” I told Jenny, adding offhand but clearly, “I don’t do well in the sun.”

When I said that, Jenny looked super intrigued. Without even trying, I’d met the perfect target. Jenny followed me inside, almost tripping over herself to follow me. She followed me to the office, where I got my locker number, and to my locker, where I had to kick in the door to get it open. The whole time she followed me, Jenny asked me questions.

What grade was I? Junior. She was, too. Where had I moved from? Far away. But… where exactly?

“You know, the middle of the country,” I said.

I wanted Vampire Finbar to emulate Chauncey Castle in his vague and philosophical answers to questions. Unfortunately, I ended up sounding like Justin Bobby from The Hills.

Jenny continued her interrogation: What classes was I taking? (I handed her my schedule. We compared classes.) Did I have a driver’s license? Yes. Did I have a car? Yes. Did I like to read? Yes, very much. Did I ever read fantasy books? No. Why didn’t I?

“I just don’t think…” I snatched Bloodthirsty out of her hand. I glanced briefly at the lurker on the cover.

“I just don’t think they’re very realistic.” I capped that off with a meaningful look.

I hoped Jenny would get the hint—that fantasy books weren’t as real as my own life as a vampire. But she was too busy leading me to our first class in common, AP U.S. history. I was pumped to learn that, unlike St. Luke’s, Pelham Public didn’t give us assigned seats (no Johnny Frackas for me here!). Jenny chose a seat in the back and slid easily into it, and I squeezed myself into the seat next to hers. Since my summer growth spurt, I found my knees banging against tables and now my school desk. I was making legroom for myself when a kid sat down on the other side of Jenny. Apparently Pelham kids didn’t care about who sat with whom, because he didn’t even look before dropping his bag there.

“Hey, Jen,” he said mildly. Promptly he went to sleep.

I slid forward to stare at this kid. I was fascinated. I’d never seen a real person fall asleep in class. I thought only seventies sitcom characters and John Hughes antiheroes did that. But there was an AP student, his curly Jewfro rising and falling in peaceful rhythm. He was, legitimately, asleep. I even saw a little bit of drool! As our teacher came into class, young and eager to fumble with the whiteboard and his laptop for twenty minutes to show us a two-minute Jon Stewart clip, I observed that guy’s desktop nap and took it as an omen. A good sign that Pelham Public would be, at least compared with St. Luke’s, a relaxed place.

Although Jenny was helpful, and I sat with her in my first two classes, I wasn’t sure I wanted everyone to think we were best friends. She was a little strange, with her enormous collection of fantasy books stored in her L.L.Bean backpack and strapped to her back at all times. With orange hair and freckles, Jenny should have looked like a little kid in a graham cracker commercial. But she wore all black—black choker necklace and a black shirt with skulls and knives on it. And she had dyed her hair black too, although the orange hair had grown back in, so it was half-orange and half-black. As vampire companions go, she had the creepy goth look down but was kind of missing that sexy, cool edge I needed.

So in physics, our third class, I separated from Jenny to sit alone at a lab table and brood. Because the same group of kids had been in all three of my classes so far, and it was clear that all of us AP students would be spending a lot of time together, it was important to make a vampiric impression on them. So while our teacher built a model roller coaster out of Legos, I did my best Edward-Cullen-in-biology-class impression. When a pretty brunette girl sat down next to me, I only glanced at her briefly before looking away. I