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

was making fun of me to my face. I could deal with memes. Until I got to the lunch line in the cafeteria.

“Murderer.”

My blood went cold, and I looked up to see who’d said it. It was the girl behind me on line. I spotted her micro bangs and remembered I’d seen her at the abandoned-house party. She’d been sitting out on the stoop, reading a book. There was an odd expression on her face now, almost like admiration.

“Excuse me?” I said.

“You murdered Lux McCray.”

She spoke so calmly that it was unnerving. “I didn’t—” My voice cracked, and I had to start again. “I didn’t kill anyone.”

“Not literally,” the girl continued. “Just her image. With a pair of scissors, right?” She laughed and it sounded strange coming out of her mouth. “You’re the Arts and Crafts Killer of Manchester. Kudos.”

“Don’t call me that,” I said, but she didn’t seem to hear me.

“Move it along, girls,” one of the lunch ladies behind the counter said.

“I don’t pay you to rush me,” the girl growled at her.

I paid for my food and got as far away from the girl as I could, but her words followed me like a dark shadow. I could feel panic start to set in. It made my tray quiver as I tried to unclench my hands. I didn’t even bother to wait for Saundra at our usual table, just headed straight to the back. I didn’t want to wonder whether she’d suck it up and sit with me or just avoid me like everyone else. I would make the decision for her. I picked a new table, the one adjacent to the door that opened to the back alley, where all the garbage got taken out. No one ever sat there. It was perfect.

I took out my phone and tried to steady my breathing. I could’ve distracted myself in a million different ways, so of course I went to Matthew’s Instagram. My fingers typed his name in automatically, like they’d done a million times before. I tapped on the soccer picture again, the last one he’d ever posted. It wasn’t just his smile, or how happy he seemed. I liked to see if there were any new comments. His friends had left all their goodbye messages in the post. They’d stopped a while ago, but sometimes a new message popped up. Nothing today.

“He’s cute.” Saundra peered over my shoulder, getting an eyeful of Matthew. “Is he from your old school?”

I startled and rushed to put my phone away. “Do you mind?”

The wounded look on Saundra’s face made me instantly feel like crap.

“I’m sorry for snapping at you,” I said quickly. “You just scared me.”

“Geez, you’re jumpy. Anyways, why are you sitting all the way over here?”

“You don’t have to sit with me,” I said. “You must’ve heard what Lux’s been saying about me.”

“What, that you pulled that prank on her at the séance? Please. No offense, Rachel, but I really don’t think you have the energy to come up with something so elaborate. Also, I was the one who dragged you to that party. Lux is a known liar who, coincidentally, does not deserve that sweet baby angel boyfriend of hers, but that’s beside the point.”

Saundra either had the attention span of a gnat or she was kinder than I deserved, because she set her tray next to mine and sat down like the whole thing—my pariah status, the snapping—was already forgotten.

I felt my insides twist. Saundra still wanted to sit with me. Even though I sucked. She pitied me, which made me pity myself. I needed to put an end to this pity party before things got even more pathetic.

“I’m serious, you don’t have to sit here. You should leave before someone else sees you talking to me.”

Saundra looked at me, confused and maybe a little hurt. “Rachel—”

I stood. “It’s fine, I’ll go.”

I was already on my way, palms pushing against the exit door. No alarm sounded and nobody stopped me.

Manchester wanted me there about as much as I wanted to be there.

I didn’t go far. Central Park was across the street and it was a nice day. I planned to take one of my usual aimless, lazy strolls to forget about how shitty everything was. But before I did that, I stopped at one of the hot dog carts at the entrance. I’d never gotten around to eating lunch.

“Two hot dogs, please.” Someone ordered from behind me. I spun around to tell off whoever had cut in front of me.

“Do you want yours with ketchup?” Freddie asked.

It took me a beat to answer. “And mustard.”

He made a face but it faded quickly. “One with ketchup and one with ketchup and mustard, please,” he told the vendor.

“What are you doing here?”

“I saw you leave the lunchroom. Got curious.”

“So you decided to ditch, too?”

“Mhmm.” Freddie handed the vendor a couple bucks and accepted the dogs wrapped in foil. He opened one up, saw the mustard, and handed it to me.

“Thank you,” I said as I took it.

“You’re welcome.”

We walked farther into the park. I ate my hot dog silently as I tried to figure out Freddie’s deal. Not just his motives for being here right now, but also the super-secret club he was a part of. The guy was kind of an enigma.

There was a dichotomy in everything about Freddie. He was slim but not scrawny. Sinewy, maybe. But if he were on a football field, he’d get plowed, easy. His hair was close-cropped and tidy on the sides, but the top was loose and messy and fell over his eyes. His eyes were nice. Deep brown and shrouded with so many lashes it looked like he wore liner. But his glasses threw enough of a glare to obscure them most of the time. It was like he was almost complete, but not quite. Almost put together. Almost perfect.

“So why’d you run off?” Freddie asked.

“Why’d you come after me?”

“I told you. Curious. Your turn.”

I took another