Hidden Moon by K R Thompson Page B

where you’re going. Just because you have a vehicle now, doesn’t mean you can just go anywhere. I still need to know where you are, understood?”
    “Yes.” I mumbled. It wasn’t even eight o’clock yet, and already I was getting into trouble.
    Brian picked me up, his usual happy self again. We rode to school and I updated him on what he had missed the day before. The cheerleading escapade, the trip to the nurse, and the enemy that I had in a certain blonde cheerleader. I left out anything that pertained to Adam. I wasn’t sure why, but I felt guilty. It wasn’t like either of them had asked me out.
    Brian pulled into our regular spot. Then he saw Ronnie over by the door.
    “I need to go catch up with her before she goes in, she has notes I need. I’ll see you in there,” he said, jumping out of the truck.
    “Sure.”
    Adam was in his same spot, waiting for me.
    “I take it you found him alive and well.”
    “Yes,” I frowned. He was acting as if I had done something wrong. “Okay, I give up. What’s the problem?”
    “No problem,” he said. His voice was at odds with his eyes. They were burning with anger. He was lying to me.
    I shrugged, and started walking. If he wasn’t going to talk to me, I wasn’t going to worry about it. He kept up with me easily. His nostrils flared and his nose scrunched up as if he had smelled something he didn’t like. He still didn’t speak, only stepped to the side to let me go through the door first.
    I can smell him. He touched your cheek. Did he kiss you? Why did you let him? What about me? D on’t you care? The voice whispered in my head.
    He didn’t say a word when we split and went down either side of the hallway toward class. I didn’t see him again until English and still he stayed silent, not acknowledging me as I slid in next to him.
    Fine, if that’s the way it’s going to be, I thought. I moved as far to the edge of the desk as I could get without falling out into the floor. I bent over my book, ignoring him. My hair bounced over my shoulder, shielding me in a thick blonde wall as I tried to concentrate on my book. I heard him take a deep breath.
    “I’m sorry,” his voice wasn’t much more than a whisper. It made me wonder if I had imagined it. I ignored him and sat there contemplating the fact that I might be going crazy. After all, normal people don’t hear voices in their heads.
    Ms. Barker came in and started class, and I stayed at my little corner of the desk, as if I had never heard him or anything else that whispered through my mind.
    After class, I felt the desk move as he got up. He hesitated for a second, as if trying to decide whether or not to wait for me. I didn’t say anything, so he left. I followed a few seconds later and found Brian outside the door with a big scowl on his face. It vanished when he saw me and a smile took its place. “Hey, are you ready? They’re loading up the buses for the field trip.”
    We found a seat in the back of the last bus and it ambled down the road. It stopped just shy of turning on to my road and turned instead into the parking lot behind the carved, wooden sign of a howling wolf.
    We had arrived at The Village.
    “Okay, children,” a nasal, high-pitched voice shrilled through the air like a siren the second we got off the bus.” Your attention, please.”
    The clatter and noise subdued. I looked to the front of the group to the thin, bird-like woman with facial features so pinched, it gave her the appearance of one who had eaten sour grapes.
    Hmm, so far Brian has Mrs. Graham pegged , I thought, smiling to myself, maybe there’s a reason they gave her the job as school librarian. I don’t think she’s meant for many speaking roles. Maybe that’s why she takes her role as field trip leader so seriously.
    The librarian’s thin lips compressed into a tight line, and big red blotches popped up like little red apples on her sharp cheekbones. A few students continued to talk, ignoring