Megan nudged me as Tracie finished speaking and the kids in the bleachers applauded politely. "Hey, don't get all silent on me," she whispered. "It sucks that the other Emily got whacked, okay?"

I opened my mouth to speak, but I didn't get a word out before a girl turned around and shushed us. Embarra.s.sed, I clamped my lips closed.

Megan rolled her eyes but didn't say anything.

We sat there, silent, as the rest of the world's most depressing a.s.sembly death-marched to its somber finish and we could finally go home, where I could escape into a book and forget all about dead teenagers and strange mood swings and this horrible sensation that after last night, nothing was quite right anymore in our school or our small town.

Chapter 3.

Big OF Fatty Hambeast After racing through the downpour to my front door, I hugged my dad, where he sat at his desk killing undead hordes in his computer game, then decided I'd distract myself by trying once again to read Lord of the Rings, since it felt like my geeky duty to do so. I didn't last long at that-yes, I know, I should feel horribly ashamed that I can't get past all the hobbit singing to get into the story. Instead I went browsing online.

Maybe it's just me, but hearing about someone my own age, someone I vaguely knew, dying ... it wouldn't leave me alone. Forget my giant DVD case filled with movies about teenagers getting murdered-I'd seen so much CGI and makeup and red-dyed corn syrup that when it came to the idea of another teenager dying it never seemed real. I'd never really considered that one day I could walk outside and get shot, and it would be all over.

So maybe that's why I Googled "Emily Cooke" and spent hours reading about her. There were local news articles about the mysterious murder, of course, and a whole slew of blog posts from people who'd known her, talking about their shock. Some people posted letters of hers they'd saved- Nothing gets your mind off of depressing thoughts of dead teenagers like being called fat on the internet.

It happened the same day as the a.s.sembly. Nothing was on TV that night- it was only early September, after all, and new TV seasons don't start until mid-month-so I was in my room. I'd come home from the horrible downer of school five hours earlier after riding alongside Megan through a torrent of rain that fogged up her windows, the world outside hidden behind a gray mist. I'd say that the weather had matched the day's downcast mood, but I knew that was a joke. The writhing storm clouds would soon give way to blue skies before returning a few hours later along with, like, a flurry of hail or something. No one's mood is as bipolar as western Washington weather.

After racing through the downpour to my front door, I hugged my dad, where he sat at his desk killing undead hordes in his computer game, then decided I'd distract myself by trying once again to read Lord of the Rings, since it felt like my geeky duty to do so. I didn't last long at that-yes, I know, I should feel horribly ashamed that I can't get past all the hobbit singing to get into the story. Instead I went browsing online.

Maybe it's just me, but hearing about someone my own age, someone I vaguely knew, dying ... it wouldn't leave me alone. Forget my giant DVD case filled with movies about teenagers getting murdered-I'd seen so much CGI and makeup and red-dyed corn syrup that when it came to the idea of another teenager dying it never seemed real. I'd never really considered that one day I could walk outside and get shot, and it would be all over.

So maybe that's why I Googled "Emily Cooke" and spent hours reading about her. There were local news articles about the mysterious murder, of course, and a whole slew of blog posts from people who'd known her, talking about their shock. Some people posted letters of hers they'd saved- surprisingly well-written letters that contained amusing haikus and clever, off-kilter short stories about the person she had written to.

Eventually I ended up on Emily Cooke's own blog. I clicked through the pictures of her smiling with her friends, then started to read all the comments from people saying how much they'd miss her.

In the middle of those comments, I saw this: Terrizzle Sept 8, 4:54 p.m.

sad ur dead emily ur much hoter than fat Emily My first thought: "Terrizzle" (real name Terrance Sedgwick) should not be in eleventh grade and writing like that. Capitalization, punctuation, and spelling words out aren't that difficult, especially in what's supposed to be a message to a dearly departed friend ... or a hot girl he wanted to hook up with, whatever.

My second thought: Wait, fat Emily "? There are-or, well, were-only two Emilys in our cla.s.s, which meant...

Oh. Oh no.

Here's a fun fact about me: Like the partial truth I'd told Dawn the night before, the last thing I ever wanted was for guys like Terrance to look at, think about, or talk about me to other people. The mere idea was completely terrifying. Even so, I guess I had always sort of fantasized that a guy would see me and get past the ponytail and the gla.s.ses and the giant sweatshirt to discover how insanely awesome I am, then come and whisk me off into that magical teenager fairyland where everyone else gets to prance around.

But nope. A guy, some random guy at school, looked at me and thought, What a heifer. What a pig. And then wished, if anyone named Emily had to die, that it had been me. The "fat" one. That way he could continue to think about Emily Cooke's hotness without having to feel weird about how she's now lying on a cold slab in a morgue somewhere.

I blinked and stared at the screen some more, feeling like there were crowds of pretty teenagers standing in my room and ogling me, judging me. I could almost see long gone Sarah Plainsworth giving me that withering glare of hers. My cheeks burned, and though I didn't really believe the words I was about to say, I whispered to myself, Tin not fat."

It didn't matter what I said to myself, though, because I knew this to be true: All that mattered was how others perceived you. If others saw me and thought, Big ol' fatty hambeast, then that's who I was. And now everyone at school would see this and know all about what Terrance Sedgwick thought of previously invisible me.

The clock ticked away on my computer from 8:07 to 8:11 and still I couldn't stop from sitting there, staring at my computer screen and feeling utterly embarra.s.sed by that one stupid comment.

And then, at 8:14, my guts twisted and I gasped.

A ma.s.sive shudder ran through my body, as though the ground was quaking beneath me, and I fell out of my chair onto the floor. I clutched my stomach, clenched my teeth, and felt my toes curl. Another twist inside my gut and I dry heaved, but my stomach was unwilling to release whatever poisons I was sure were swirling inside of me.

I tried to call out, but the only sound I could make was a pitiful squeak.

Not that anyone would hear me if I did yell, anyway-my dad was downstairs with his headphones turned up while he played his game, and my stepmom and Dawn were out. Whatever this was-a seizure?-wasn't stopping, and I couldn't breathe, and I couldn't move, and no one could help me, and oh G.o.d was I going to die?

And then, as the red digital numbers on my nightstand alarm clock switched to 8:15, it was over.

I felt... different.

I felt good.

I lay on the floor, my breathing calming as my heart slowed from a frantic pounding to steady, confident thumps. I arched my back and stretched my arms above my head, cricking my neck as I did. My entire body felt stiff, atrophied from lack of any appreciable amount of movement. This wouldn't do at all.

I grabbed the edge of my desk and pulled myself to my feet. Emily Cooke's blog was still open on my computer screen, Terrizzle's message of my fatness front and center. I read it again.

And I laughed.

"Oh, please," I said aloud. Seriously, Terrance of all people should not be calling people fat. The boy wasn't exactly svelte himself.

I turned to my right and caught my reflection in the mirror. The image was blurry even with my gla.s.ses on, so I squinted to see better. Hoodie two sizes too large? Check. Completely plain face and hair? Double check. No wonder Terrizzle thought I was a fatty.

But I could show him, couldn't I? If bad teen romantic comedies taught me anything, it's that gla.s.ses-and-ponytail girls are always in need of emergency makeovers. So I snapped the gla.s.ses off my face and let my hair down. Without the gla.s.ses I didn't need to squint anymore-I could see fine.

And though that shouldn't have made any sense, at that moment all I thought was: Wicked.

I tilted my head. Better, but not quite right. I tore off the oppressive hoodie and T-shirt I'd had on underneath, then studied my torso, clad only in an old-lady bra my stepmom had bought me. My hips and chest? Sure, they were wider than some other girls', but in a definite old-school, busty-pinup-girl sort of way. But my waist was more or less narrow, in no way fat unless your idea of fat was anyone above a size zero, in which case you needed your head examined.

Ten minutes later, I regarded myself in the mirror again. I'd raided the part of Dawn's closet dedicated to her clubbing clothes and had a brand-new look: a slinky, sparkly, and backless gold shirt that accentuated my decolletage, a black miniskirt, and some tall, black, spiky-heeled boots. With a pair of dangly gold hoop earrings to finish the ensemble and my eyes and lips done, I looked like Dawn normally does when she's ready to hit the clubs. Which is to say, less comically sleazy than I'd looked the night before.

I was definitely stepping up my game and was well outside the realm of "chaste." The main goal was to look like some fat teen guy's late-night fantasy. Perfect for how I planned to mess with Terrance's head.

I opened the bedroom door, then hesitated-I could probably slip past my dad, engrossed as he was in his video game. When his construction jobs slowed down like they always did this time of year, my dad spent all his free time playing online role-playing games. He was oblivious during the best of his endless days of online gaming, but I didn't want to chance it.

So I turned to my window. It was dark outside, but there was a depth to the darkness that I needed to explore. I raised the window. The rain had petered out sometime during the evening. A cool fall breeze rushed into my room and blew back my hair, smelling of damp leaves and excitement.

As with the night before, I used my desk chair to boost myself up, then stepped one foot out the window. Unlike the night before, no one called me, no one barged into my room to see if I was okay.

I ducked my torso through the window, then my other leg, and balanced on the windowsill. Clouds billowed above in a moonless sky, and the glistening road beneath me was empty. I could hear the neighbor kids next door watching something on TV.

With a quick breath, I placed my heeled boots against the siding of the house, tensed my arms to push myself free, and leaped.

For a few elated seconds, I flew through the air, weightless and hollow and completely fearless. I sensed the ground approaching before I saw it, and as I arced down I pulled my body into a crouch and positioned my feet in preparation.

I landed perfectly, silently. On spiky heels. On a sidewalk about thirty feet away and twenty feet down from my bedroom window.

You know what I realize now? Of course the leap was something clearly not in the remote realm of possibility for normal, average, everyday Emily Webb. But on that night, with the adrenaline pumping and excitement skittering across my skin, I didn't thinking anything of it, as though leaping from my second-story window was something I did every time I felt like going out.

I slowly stood. Making sure my top and skirt were straight, and my hair still in place, I turned east down the empty road. Terrizzle's house was that way. I knew because Megan lived near him, and we'd of course seen each other around the neighborhood. Which was probably how he knew about me in the first place, seeing as how we didn't have any cla.s.ses together.

I stood on the sidewalk beneath the flickering streetlight and thought, The only thing better than embarra.s.sing Terrance would be embarra.s.sing him in front of a witness.

So, first stop: Megan's house.

Stop after that: Terrizzle's place.

After that: Who knew? I had hours to go before morning. And I intended to have as much fun as those few hours would allow.

Satisfied and unable to stop grinning, I strode down the street, determined to own the night.

Chapter 4.

What am I?

I intended to go straight to Megan's house. Really, I did. But as I strutted down the street that first night, distractions surrounded me. Around me, houses were dark under the black sky, shrouded in the shadows of the towering evergreens that rose toward the starry night. From each house, yellow light glowed through curtains and blue light shimmered from TVs.

I could feel the snapping of the electricity coursing through the power lines over my head. It sizzled against my skin as I walked beneath the streetlamps, making the fine hair on my arms bristle. I stopped in the sulfurous glow of one streetlamp, closed my eyes, and spread my arms, taking it in. It reminded me of the one and only time Megan and I had gone to a tanning salon.

Megan. Right. I was on a mission.

Back to business, I lowered my arms and moved on. A few of my neighbors' front lawns were over manicured, choked with carefully tended trees and rosebushes. Overwhelming the scents of wet gra.s.s, leaves, and flowers was the thick stench of an animal farm along with some sort of sharp chemical odor. Whatever manure these people were using was totally nauseating.

A car horn blared, and headlights blinded me. I shielded my eyes as brakes squealed, felt a rush of air as a b.u.mper came barreling toward me. I leaped back as the car jerked to a stop, an inch away from hitting me. Only then did I realize I'd left the sidewalk and had been standing in the middle of the road, driven there by the stink of all the fertilizer and chemicals.

The car that had almost hit me was boxy, its engine loud and grumbling. A total junker. The guy in the driver's seat leaned out his window and threw his hand in the air.

"Get out of the road!" he shouted. "Stupid b.i.t.c.h!"

What did he just call me?

I lowered my arm slowly. The guy's hair was greasy and long, his eyes rimmed red.

I didn't move. "I'm not stupid, and I don't respond well to name-calling," I said. "Say it again and see what happens."

Cursing, the guy pressed on the gas and the car roared. Exhaust, tinted red from his taillights, billowed out the back. Tires screeched as he lurched forward, right toward me. He apparently wasn't bothering to swerve.

I stepped calmly back toward the sidewalk, a rush of wind blowing back my hair as he zoomed past. We could have left it at that. But before the guy pa.s.sed all the way, he reached his left hand out his window and threw something over the roof of his car. Right at me.

My hand shot into the sky before I'd even realized I was about to be smacked in the face. I lowered my hand to discover that I had s.n.a.t.c.hed an oversize plastic Taco Bell cup out of the air. Watered-down soda and half-melted ice clinked inside.

The guy had thrown his drink at me. Well, now, he shouldn't have done that.

Name-calling, trying to run me down? I could maybe forgive that-I had been standing in the middle of the road, after all. But throwing things was totally uncalled for.

I gripped the cup tightly, plastic crumpling, and sprang forward. Arms pumping and sticky soda spilling out of the cup, I raced down the street, my heels clacking against the asphalt.

The guy's brakes complained as he paused at the end of the street at the stop sign. So what if he threw drinks at teen girls walking on the street? At least he obeyed basic traffic laws.

What a guy.

I stopped right next to his window7, breathing easily despite how fast I'd dashed. The guy was checking the road to the right, didn't even see me-until he turned his head left to make sure it was safe to go. Then he jumped back in his seat, startled.

"What-," he sputtered.

"You dropped something," I said.

I lobbed the Taco Bell cup into the car. It smacked his chest, hard, and syrupy brown liquid splattered his windshield and across his shirt. I jumped back to avoid being splashed.

Jaw tensed, the guy fumbled with his seat belt and the car door at the same time. "What the f-!" he started to scream.

I laughed wildly, totally exhilarated. Someone messed with me, I got even-a concept that before today had been totally foreign to me. Totally foreign to simpering daytime me, that is, who reacted to any sort of aggression by ducking her head, apologizing, then hiding in her room until it all blew over.

This was so much more fun.

Before the guy could finish getting out of his car, I turned and ran north down the street, feeling like I was flying. Even in heels, I made each bounding step with ease, some part of me just knowing how to move like an Olympic athlete. I heard the guy following, ranting and raving, his footsteps plodding. He gasped for breath after only a brief chase, and I felt a little disappointed-there was no way this guy could keep up with me. How boring.

So I slowed down, turned around, and jogged backward. He lumbered forward, soda dripping from the ends of his stringy hair. Behind him, his car sat running in the street, the driver's-side door wide open.

"Come on!" I called. "Are you really gonna lose a race to a girl in a miniskirt and heels? I mean, really."

"You're ... you're crazy!" he gasped as he drew close. "Ill-"

"You'll what? Pa.s.s out after making another few insults? Is your plan to beat me down with that barbed wit of yours? Or do you have more trash to throw at me?"

I stopped altogether and put my hands on my hips. The guy-completely out of shape despite being stick thin-stumbled toward me, panting.

Then anger surged over his face. His muscles tensed-first his jaw, then his arms, then legs-and I knew, I just knew, that in two more steps he'd leap at me.

So when he did, I simply stepped to the side. The guy barreled forward, grasping at nothing. He tripped over his feet and fell to his knees, landing with a crack against the wet sidewalk. Hissing in pain, he rolled onto his side.

I stood over him. "I'm tired of playing," I said. "If you see me again, just drive around."

With that, I turned and sauntered between a row of hedges into someone's dark backyard, leaving the stoner behind me.

I stopped, taking in my surroundings. The porch light was off, but I could make out a partially inflated kiddie pool by the sliding gla.s.s doors. Inside it, brown leaves and evergreen needles floated atop stagnant rainwater. Next to the kiddie pool there were a few dirty, cracked plastic lawn chairs. The rest of the backyard-the gra.s.sy area-appeared to be empty.

I started to hike across the backyard when a thought hit me. What am I?

It seemed a useless thought, coming from the daytime part of my brain that I wished would stay hidden. What was I? I was Emily Webb. I was hot, and I was smart, and I was quick enough to chase down cars on a whim.

Duh.