𝔽₳𝜯Ǝ

Shriek

Ever since I'd started dating Becky, Chloe had changed her behaviour toward me drastically.

Before the birthday party, Chloe and I had been best buds. We hung out all the time, watched movies together, studied together, and just generally spent as much time as possible in each other's company. Well, let me qualify that, I spent as much time with her as she would let me. By which I mean that I was always more eager for her company than she was for mine. During sophomore year I basically hung on her every word. If she said jump, I asked if that had been high enough on the way down. During our junior year, I'd relaxed a little and was much more "one of the gangs" than Chloe's pet. Still, though, I was there mostly to be near Chloe. The other three girls were nice, but I didn't mind if one of them was absent. If Chloe wasn't around, then I felt a bit out of place.

After the birthday party, when Becky and I got together, Chloe started going through these weird swings. Some days, she'd behave suspiciously like she was jealous; other days she'd gush over how cute Becky and I were together and practically demand we kiss for her viewing pleasure. When Jeremy was around, she relaxed some, or at least hide it better. If it was just the five of us, or worse, just Chloe, Becky, and myself; things got awkward quickly. One thing definitely changed though, once I started tutoring Becky full time, about a month after the term started, Chloe and I stopped hanging out as just the two of us.

Actually, maybe it wasn't that Chloe's behaviour changed about me, maybe it was that mine changed about her. Especially I think after I started having sex with Becky.

Chloe's projected aura of gibbering stupid lost its power over me I think. I'd had sex - I was having sex; all the time. She became not an untouchable sex goddess, but just a very cute girl, one that I'd been friends with long enough to learn her tricks and charms. She tried to manipulate me, or I stopped falling for it. I lost my crush on her.

I don't think she knew how to deal with that.

Now, I'm not suggesting that Chloe mercilessly manipulated me day in and day out like some kind of puppet master, that's not it at all. But she did know that she had power over me, and would sometimes use it to her advantage. At the time, I never minded. Hell, I was even aware I was being manipulated most of the time. I accepted it as the price to be around her. Becky stopped all that. Either Chloe lost her power over me, or she stopped using it out of respect for her friend. Maybe a little of both I suppose.

Chloe and I had a single class together in the second semester of our senior year, Current Events.

Like the junior class version, this was a class that every senior was required to take, and there was no AP version, so I was taking it at the same level as all of my friends. It was not the only class I had with one of my friends, I had AP Lit. with Jenna, one of her two AP classes. I was the TA for my Lit. teacher again, Becky, and Jeremy were in that one (mostly thanks to my help the previous semester they had managed to make it into a regular class, rather than the basic one, I was very proud of that); and I was the tech adviser after school for the newspaper which Alison was a photographer for.

But Chloe and I, only Current Events.

Truth be told, CE was a 'skate' class for me. Our instructor had also been my instructor for AP World History my junior year and he let me get away with anything short of setting the classroom on fire. As a result, I used the class as a study hall to catch up on work for my much harder classes. The particular class I was in was also loaded with half a dozen cheerleaders, basketball and baseball players, and a couple of other people in the larger circle of friends I was part of now. Most of them were not top students, not remedial by any means, they all managed to keep up their eligibility after all. But Mr Zayne never, shall we say, challenged the class? He practically gave away the answers to quizzes and tests the week before. So I'd keep half an ear out, get the notes from Chloe, read the material, and 'skate' through the class. Mr Zayne never called on me because he could see I usually had my physics book out, or my calculus homework (which was the very next period), and things worked out.

A couple of days before prom, Mr Zayne was going over the Tanya Harding case again, I suppose in a vain attempt to interest the athletes and cheerleaders in actual current events, but the class was having none of it. Mindy and Chelsea were discussing where they were going to get their hair and nails done for prom, and a couple of basketball guys were going over the upcoming NBA playoffs wondering if the Knicks were going to sweep the series (they didn't, Houston took the title that year in game seven), and Chloe was talking to me about our gang's plans for prom night and the after-party. I had about a quarter of my attention on her, a quarter on Mr Zayne's lecture (maybe less), but most of my attention was on finishing up differential equations before the end of the period.

"What colour is Becky's dress, do you know?" Chloe asked.

"Blue I think," I said, not looking up.

"Oh, that'll be very pretty with her eyes," she practically cooed.

I was trying to determine if the variables I was working on in the current problem I was working on with were separable.

"What shade of blue? I think Mindy is wearing blue too," she continued.

"Light blue I think," I replied after a second.

No, they weren't. Were we doing homogeneous equations yet? I didn't think there were supposed to be any in this set.

"So once, again, the question the prosecutors are asking, is 'Did Ms Brown have prior knowledge of the attack?'" Mr Zayne was asking in the background.

I'll just rewrite it as a linear equation, I can solve it that way. That'll be fine.

"Because if it's powder blue I have this cute little hair clip I can give her to wear."

"No way man, the Knicks are gonna sweep it. Four games against Seattle for the title, boom!"

"Seriously Mindy, you should redo your highlights..."

Determine U by integrating DU divided by DX plus Pu which should equal zero.

"It's a really cute clip, it's got these really pretty little light blue semiprecious stones in it..."

Use the value of Z obtained to find P.

"No Sarah, her husband didn't attack Miss Kerrigan, it's alleged that her husband and bodyguard hired a third man, Shane Stant. We already know that they did, the question is prior knowledge on the part of Ms Harding..."

"Seattle? Are you crazy man, no way, it'll be Houston and the Knicks..."

Use the substitution Y=ZP to find Y.

"Jake, are you listening? The clip? Is her dress powder blue or more of a turquoise?"

"What's wrong with my highlights?"

"Oh nothing, I'm just saying you should really make them stand out more that's all. For the pictures."

"Jake?"

Collect terms on the left side, then separate the variables...

"Jake!"

"What?!" I yelled at Chloe.

The whole class went silent. Chloe's cheeks were rapidly turning red and she stared at her desk.

I felt the colour rising to my cheeks as well.

Mr Zayne had turned around and was looking at me, "Problem, Jake?"