“What if I tell campus security? Huh? What’s gonna happen then? Oh, wait, they’re on your payroll. Maybe I’ll just go to the police with this.”
“You have no evidence. Get out!”
I sarcastically salute him, slamming the door so hard behind me I hear one of his stupid glass penguin statuettes fall and shatter. He grumbles and yells at his secretary for a broom, and I walk away with a smirk. His outrage confirms everything. I won, and we both know it. Principal Goodworth M Evans is small fry, and never posed a real challenge at all.
I’m almost disappointed, but then I remember Jack.
I still have Jack.
I still have a lovely, satisfying challenge waiting for me.
***
Someday, the world has to acknowledge my raw sex appeal.
Today is that day.
On Wednesday, I wear the skimpiest, most jaw-dropping outfit I can manage while still being inside dress code – a short denim skirt and a bright red shirt with slits cut in the side and a wide neck to show off my collarbone and shoulders. I wear red flats, put my hair up in a high ponytail, and wear five times more makeup than usual. I look, for all intents and purposes, hot as hell. Well, I always look hot. Now my hot just can’t be ignored.
Jack was trying to insult my looks with those pictures. And he did. He insulted them so well; people will have no choice but to notice the difference. The before picture was plastered all over the school, and after picture is breathing and walking around and in a bright red shirt. If he expected me to cower, to wear dull colors and shrink away from the attention, he was very, very wrong. I might not be Kayla or Avery pretty, but I’m better than the girl in the picture, and that’s all the school needs to see. I park towards the front, and make a big show of getting out – piling my books slowly into my backpack and locking my car with exaggerated key pressing. I wave at some people I recognize – Avery, who all but sneers at me as I pass. Kayla runs over to me, but Avery grabs her arm and yanks her back. I flash Kayla a ‘see you later’ smile. It’s better she doesn’t come over and ask what’s up, anyway. I’ve got places to go and people to shock. They’re staring, whispering, but there’s no laughing, and there’s sure as hell no smirks. Boys whistle and a girl asks where I got my skirt. Half of me is terrified with all the attention – my hands shaking and my throat dry. But the other half of me knows this is what I have to do. Not just for the war, not just to prove Jack wrong. I have to do this for myself. For the girl in the picture.
I make my way to first period when the bell rings.
“Hi Mrs. Grayson!” I smile. She does a double-take, like most people are doing.
“I-Isis? Oh my god, you look so - ”
“Different? Awesome?”
“Trampy!”
“Not all of us have the luxury of a college English degree, Mrs. Grayson. Some of us have to hustle on the streets.”
She goes white down to her toes. If only she knew her favorite Jack Hunter was really a high-paid gigolo. She’d flip. And probably hire him for a night two seconds later.
I walk into Trig. Mr. Bernard eyes me like I’m a rabid dog, but I smile really hard and try to look innocent. It works for all of two seconds before Mr. Bernard glances at the door behind me.
“You dented it, Isis.”
“Sorry, Mr. Bernard. It was an unfortunate casualty of war. I’m just here for a second.”
“Well, alright then. But only make it a second.”
I have to stall time until Jack walks in. I see the knife-kid. He’s in Trig with Jack? That’s impressive. I sit at the desk beside him. He nods at me, but his frown remains.
“You look different.” He says, voice croaking. It’s the first time I’ve heard him talk.
“Thanks! You too! New haircut? I bet you did it yourself.”
“A butterfly A-9 buck knife would cut hair pretty good, now that you mention it. Or I could use the classic rib eye backhand.”
“Sounds about right.” I nod, even if I have no clue what the hell he’s talking about.
“Who are you waiting for?” Knife-kid asks.
“That obvious, huh?”
“Jack, then. Screaming at him wasn’t enough?”
“He was the one who put the pictures of me all over school! Hell no screaming isn’t enough!”
Knife-kid nods. “I saw the pictures. I had fun slashing them with my protractor. Nobody should be made fun of like that, I think.”
I don’t know whether to smile at how sweet he sounds or become extremely concerned at how creepy he sounds. I settle for a little of both just as Jack walks in. He walks right by me, and settles in his desk behind me. I turn and watch him take his backpack off.
“Hi.” I wave.
It takes him a moment to recognize me. Or a million. He focuses his gaze on me, then looks boredly to the window. He puts his chin in his hand, studies a pigeon in a tree with utmost intensity, and then all at once his eyes go wide. He swivels his head slowly back to me.
“You,” He murmurs.
“Me!” I chirp.
“What the hell are you doing in that?” He asks, eyes sweeping down to my chest, my legs, and up again.
“Damage control.” I smile. “Do you like it?”
“I’ve seen pigs dressed better.”
“Oh, I don’t doubt that, considering you see one in the mirror every morning.”
“I wasn’t the one who put the pictures up, if that’s what this idiocy is about.”
“I know you didn’t do it. Evans did.”
Jack goes stock-still for all of three seconds before he snarls.
“I asked him to give me a photo of you when you were younger, not plaster them all over the school.”
“But he did it anyway. He knows we’ve been fighting – the whole school does. He probably wanted to impress you so you’d think about applying to more of those Ivy’s, huh? Pity. He really wants you to go to one so he can brag about you to all his little educator friends. No offense, Mr. Bernard.”
Mr. Bernard shrugs, eyes riveted to my butt.
“Really.” I turn back to Jack. “You should’ve known better than to go to Evans. I don’t care if it’s not what you told him to do – those pictures all over still happened. And you made it happen. So I can’t forgive you. Ever.”
Wren walks in just then, a stack of papers in his hands. He plops them on the desk and starts talking to Mr. Bernard about robotics club funding. And then he sees me. Wren’s face is five times more expressive than Jack’s. His mouth pops open and hangs there like an ajar door, and he clears his throat and adjusts his glasses quickly.
“I-Isis. Good morning.”
“Hey, prez!” I get out of the desk and hug him. He makes a strangled-cat noise and adjusts his glasses so hard they fly off his face. I pick them off the floor.
“You okay?”
“I-I’m fine. Um. You look – you look, uh, you look - ”
“Nice?” I offer.
“Really…really nice,” Wren exhales. “Nice doesn’t actually cover it.”
For some reason, the compliment coming from Wren means a lot more to me than the dozens of stares and wolf whistles.
“Are you just going to stand there and gawk, Wren?” Jack sneers. “Or are you going to get on with your presidential business? I’m sure more club advisors have papers that need delivering.”