"Spring is in the air," Melanie said to Cassie and Laurel, closing her gray eyes momentarily and taking a deep breath in. "You can almost smell it, can't you?" Cassie slammed her locker shut and inhaled, but all she could smell was the same school hallway scent of sweat, paper, and ammonia.
"It was a rough winter," Laurel said. "I think that has something to do with it." She had adorned herself appropriately this morning in a floral-print dress. "The spring equinox festival is going to be huge this year." There was a bustling excitement to their surroundings -
voices seemed louder, footsteps quicker, everyone appeared more lively and animated - everyone had spring fever. Then Cassie remembered that the new principal was being announced at this morning's assembly. Maybe that was the source of all the new energy in the air? She was eager to meet the man who would be in charge of their school, especially after their last principal turned out to be Black John in disguise. But Melanie and Laurel were probably right - it was this weekend's spring festival that had everyone keyed up. Their schoolmates were all planning their outfits and debating over who'd be a worthy date. Nobody cared who the new principal was.
"It's a good sign," Melanie said. "A celebration of new beginnings is just what this town needs." Cassie wanted to be as excited as everyone about the coming spring, but her heart felt heavy in her chest. Her disastrous attempt to talk to her mother the previous night was still weighing on her.
Just then Chris and Doug Henderson swept by on Roll erblades, laughing as they tore through the crowded hallway. Their forward momentum blew their disheveled blond hair back from their identical blue-green eyes. They slowed down only to hand out star-shaped flowers to whichever pretty girls they passed. Suzan, carrying a wicker basket full of the flowers, jogged behind them to keep them supplied.
"What the heck was that?" Cassie asked.
"Chionodoxa luciliae," Laurel said.
Melanie gave Laurel a shove. "In English."
"Sorry." Laurel smiled. "Those blue flowers. They're called glory-of-the-snow. They're one of the first signs of spring."
It occurred to Cassie then that even the Henderson twins, who'd lost their sister, Kori, just last fall, were embracing the new season. She could try a little harder to have a more positive outlook. "I think I've seen those flowers," she said.
"They're in the rock garden behind the gymnasium."
"Not anymore they're not," Sean said, laughing loudly. He walked toward them with a bouquet of the blue flowers in his skinny outstretched hand and hesitantly offered them to Cassie.
"Thanks, Sean," Cassie said, but before she could accept the bouquet, Faye stepped in and swiped it from accept the bouquet, Faye stepped in and swiped it from Sean's hand. She sniffed at the buds and then shoved them back onto Sean's chest. "Run along to the assembly and find some other pathetic girl to give those to," she said.
Then she turned to Cassie. "I need a word with you." Faye was wearing all black, as she often did, but her outfit today was tighter and more revealing than usual.
Cassie gave a nod to Melanie and Laurel. "It's okay," she said. "Go ahead to the auditorium. I'll see you there." She'd promised herself she would show no fear to Faye, no matter what. She couldn't allow herself to be afraid to be alone with her, especially at school, where it was safe to assume she'd be protected from any abuse Faye could inflict upon her.
Faye, of course, wasted no time making her point. "I know you're new to this whole leader thing," she told Cassie. "But even you should recognize you won't be able to play fair for long."
"I don't know what you're talking about." Faye scoffed, like it was beneath her to have to explain herself. "Don't play innocent with me, Cassie. It doesn't work."
Cassie glanced up and down the empty hallway and put her hands on her hips. "If you actually have something to say to me, Faye, then say it. But if you're just trying to intimidate me, you're not succeeding."
"Liar." Faye reached out to lightly brush aside the few strands of hair that had fall en in front of Cassie's eyes, and Cassie jumped back.
Faye smiled. "Here's what I have to say. Power always Faye smiled. "Here's what I have to say. Power always creates enemies. It divides people into two types, good and bad. If you really want to be a leader of this Circle, then you need to pick a side."
Cassie remembered Diana once saying that power was only power - it wasn't good or bad. Only the way we use it is good or bad, she'd said. But even Diana had changed her opinion about this.
"I've already chosen a side," Cassie said.
The star ruby around Faye's neck glistened. It was the same color as her lipstick. "No, you haven't," she said.
"There's something in you that proves you're daddy's little girl. You can feel it inside you. A darkness. I know you can." Cassie hugged her books tighter to her chest. "You don't know anything."
"Isn't it exhausting trying so hard to emulate Diana when really you're just like me?"
"No. Because I'm nothing like you."
Faye let out a deep, throaty laugh and took a step back.
She'd accomplished what she'd intended. Cassie was significantly rattled.
"Better hurry up," she said. "You don't want to be late to the assembly." She pulled a tube of lipstick from her bag and applied another slash of dark pigment to her lips.
"Want some?" She held the bloodred tube out to Cassie. "I think it's your color."
In a flash of anger Cassie thought to swat the lipstick right out of Faye's hand. But that would be giving her exactly what she wanted. She was trying to push Cassie into giving in to her lowest impulses, to be as brash and reckless as she was.
But Cassie wouldn't do it. She wouldn't give Faye that satisfaction. Instead, she turned her back on her, and when she did, she caught sight of someone she hadn't seen before. A boy. Faye noticed him, too.
Together, they watched him walk up the hallway. He was tall and muscular with light brown hair, and he must have just finished working out, because he was wearing warm-ups and sneakers. He carried a gym bag in one hand and a lacrosse stick in the other.