The Mary Shelley Club by Goldy Moldavsky (ebook reader for manga TXT) 📕

a freak until I looked him up.” She tightened her grip on her clay, leaning into my personal space. “You’re lusting over a dead boy.”

Everything changed in a flash, dimmed just a little bit. And all the breath I was missing seemed to rush through me in a violent gust.

“Matthew Marshall Matthew Marshall,” Lux kept chanting.

I was starting to feel hot, my starched uniform shirt taking on the texture of steel wool. Sometimes being reckless wasn’t a choice. Sometimes it just happened without me even thinking about it. I grabbed the first thing I saw on one of the shelves, only realizing it was a pair of scissors as I raised them over my head.

Everything went dark as I plunged the flashing blades toward her.

 8

“TELL ME AGAIN what happened.”

The only other time I’d been inside the assistant headmaster’s office was on my first day, when he’d welcomed me to the school and told me that he was sure I’d make a fine addition to the “bright young minds” of Manchester Preparatory.

“She pulled scissors on me!” Lux said. The force of her words propelled her body forward so she was leaning halfway over AssHead’s desk. “She was about to kill me!”

I sat across from AssHead (a nickname for assistant headmaster that I definitely hadn’t come up with but that there was no way I wasn’t going to use) and tried not to shrivel under his disapproving stare. I was trying not to do a lot of things. Trying not to look at Lux sitting beside me. Trying not to let my nerves take over my body. For now they only controlled my hands, which were starting to twitch as I picked at the edge of the armrest.

I was shaky with not only the realization of what I’d done to Lux, but also what I could’ve done to her. I’d imagined killing her. I’d seen it so clearly. It was only when Lux screamed and Paul ran into the supply closet to see what all the commotion was about that I dropped the scissors and realized what I had almost done.

“Settle down, Ms. McCray. Ms. Chavez, can you tell us your version of the events?”

My version of the events, as I remembered them, was as follows: I had white-knuckled a pair of scissors and held them between Lux and me, their double blades forming one sharp tip pointed right at her. I remembered the look on Lux’s face, how her eyes went wide with terror. I remembered the long moment that passed between us. And I remembered that the only reason things didn’t go completely to hell wasn’t because I’d conjured up some self-control. It was because Paul had seen us in the closet and popped his head inside to see if we were finding things okay. If he hadn’t done that, I honestly didn’t know if we’d both be sitting here right now.

Hence the shaking hands. I hadn’t just scared Lux. I’d scared myself.

But I didn’t say any of this to AssHead. The deal I’d made with my mom—the one that kept my life devoid of more therapists and counseling and outside intervention—was that I keep my grades up and make friends. Getting expelled would effectively cancel out both of those things. So I shrugged. “I was getting a pair of scissors.”

“To kill me with. She’s a psycho. What is she even doing at this school, honestly, can you tell me?”

“Is it possible you got scared and only thought Rachel was threatening you?” AssHead asked.

“I’m not an idiot,” Lux said. “I know what she was doing. She’s come after me before.”

AssHead’s eyebrows quirked. “Oh?”

“At a party,” Lux continued. “She pulled a prank on me and practically tore out my hair.”

“I didn’t touch your hair.” But I said it in the low, sheepish voice of someone who sounded very guilty.

“It was your prank. Don’t pretend it wasn’t!” Lux said.

AssHead sighed. I didn’t know him well enough to know what he was thinking. But whatever he was about to say next looked like it pained him. “You hear of these things happening in other schools in this city. But not here. We have a zero tolerance policy for any sort of violence.”

Lux’s entire posture changed and she looked at me triumphantly. I had to admit, even when gloating, she was a Maybelline ad. It was deeply annoying.

“But,” AssHead continued, “there is no evidence of actual violence here. Only the perceived threat of violence.”

I let myself relax a little. I wouldn’t get kicked out and this might not even affect my mom.

“Perceived?” Lux said.

“You say she threatened you with scissors; Ms. Chavez says she was just taking them off the shelf. Your art teacher says he didn’t see anything but two students in the closet. It’s your word against hers.”

“I screamed,” Lux said. “Why would I scream?”

“Because you hate me?” I suggested.

“I don’t believe this,” Lux said. “She’s crazy. Ask her about the prank at the party. Ask her!”

AssHead humored Lux and looked at me. “Do you care to elaborate on this ‘prank,’ Ms. Chavez?”

The ‘prank’ was the reason for all of this. If I’d never gone to that stupid party, I never would’ve bumped into Lux in the first place. If I hadn’t laughed at her, the whispers about me, the posts, never would’ve started.

I swallowed hard. I knew who was really behind that prank. I could’ve told her right then that there was a club at this school and she’d gotten caught up in their fun. I could’ve really blown it for them with just one word, taken the heat off me and delivered a true, clearer target.

But I either cared about this group too much or I didn’t care about myself at all, because I said, “It was me.”

Lux was not expecting that. AssHead seemed surprised, too.

“You see?” Lux said. “So are you going to expel her or what?”

“Well, no. Since the prank didn’t happen on school grounds, there’s not really anything we can do about