THE VAMPIRE UNDERGROUND

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER ONE

When her alarm clock ignited with piercing unfriendliness a few minutes past 6 A.M., Brin didn’t hit the snooze button. She sat up, shook her head in frustration, and swung her pillow at the clock. When it smashed against the bathroom door, her cat jumped off her tower and investigated the loud noise. 

“Did I break it, Cleo?”

The petite cat, no longer a kitten, didn’t answer her. Instead, she yawned, curled up into a ball, and fell back to sleep.

“You’re a big help,” Brin said, rolling out of bed and crawling past her cat to the bathroom. She turned on the light and peered up at the shower door. She wanted to cry.

It was official. Winter vacation was over. School was back in session. She was to unhappily welcome five more miserable months of suffering, through English with the dreadful Ms. Beedle, through French with the nasty Mr. Jickling, and through Algebra 3-4 with the inaptly named Mrs. Hugs.

However, she knew this was the semester that mattered, the one before senior year, the one where her grades would actually make a difference when she applied to colleges next fall. She couldn’t slack off. She couldn’t skate by with a modicum of interest. As her mom kept insisting, Brin had to focus.

Thank God for Intro to Film, she thought.

As Brin pressed her feet against the shower door and rested her head against the cabinet under the towels, she reached up to the sink to grab her cell phone, which had been charging most of the night. She scanned through her Contact List and tapped the appropriate button.

Her buddy answered right away. “Hello?” The male voice on the other end sounded more tired and miserable than she.

“Hey. You awake?”

“I am now.”

“What do you say we ditch?” Brin said, sitting Indian style on the cold bathroom floor. “Nobody ditches on the first day back.”

“Yeah, because the first day back is easy.” She could tell he was getting out of bed, because she could hear his dog Sam begging for food in the background.

“I still think we should ditch, Ash. It’s not the worst idea I’ve ever come up with.”

“No,” he said. “There’s a silver lining at school today, and you know exactly what that is.”

She sighed. “I know what that is.”

It had been something Brin, and especially her best friend Ash, had been waiting for with great anticipation since the class was introduced last year at Grisly High. It was a class only for juniors and seniors, so last year they had to wait. But now Brin and Ash were signed in, sworn in, and in the system, ready to enjoy the semester-long Intro to Film.

“What do you think he’s gonna show first?”

“I don’t know, Ash.”

“Citizen Kane? That would seem the obvious choice.”

“I don’t know.”

“Or Gone With the Wind? No, that one’s too long. It would take us more than a week to finish it.”

“We’ll find out later today,” she said.

Brin could tell Ash was smiling on the other end. “So you’re not gonna ditch?”

She shook her head. “I guess not. I’ll see you soon.”

Brin hung up the phone, awkwardly stood up, and peered at her pale disaster of a face in the mirror. She leaned forward, noticing a small pimple above her left eyebrow. She promptly squeezed it.