Lovely Vicious by Sara Wolf Read Free Book Online Page B

another person without even an acknowledgement.
    I open the door to the library. Frigid air mixed with the pulpy smell of old books greets me. The librarian eyes my purple streaks but doesn’t say anything. She’s seen worse. I meander down the aisles, looking up and down for him. Finally, I find him in the romance section, leafing through a book with a beefy guy on the cover. I feel my eyebrows shoot up.   
    “You could do the fair maidens of the school a favor and inform them you’re gay,” I say.
    “Didn’t you read the sign?” He asks coolly without looking up. “No harpies in the library.”
    “If I was any fantasy animal I’d be a majestic unicorn, thank you, but I’ll forgive your transgressions. It takes keen eyesight to differentiate a harpy from a unicorn. Also, common sense.”
    He looks up, blue eyes growing irritated. “I don’t have the patience for you right now.”
    “Listen to yourself! ‘ I don’t have the patience for you’ ,” I mock in a deep voice. “You sound like my freaking Mom! Like a parent! Like a really old, decrepit man. You’re what, seventeen? Start acting like it.”
    “They’re spreading rumors about us. It’d be best for you to keep your distance.”
    “Aha! I’ve already thought of that! But let’s be realistic – this is high school. No amount of space between us is gonna stop the rumors from breeding like rabbits.”
    “Your Freudian choice of metaphor is getting ridiculous, now. If you want me, just come out and say it. Get it over with so I can shoot you down.”
    “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Nope. Not happening. You aren’t my type, first off –”
    “I’m everyone’s type,” He says, tiredly.
    “- And second off, have you even seen that marble statue? It’s incredible. You should at least give her a chance, okay? Someone with that much talent has to be cool.”
    He snaps the book closed and picks up another one. “No.”
    “You have to agree it’s an incredible piece of art, creepy stalkerish qualities attached to it or no.”
    “You’re the only stalker I see here,” He sighs.
    “And what about that girl in the PA room? She might not be as pretty as drama club girl –”
    “Who?”
    “Windshield love note girl.”
    “Ah.”
    “ – But she’s so cute! And short!   And she has huge boobs! And she’s got tenacity! But mostly huge boobs! That’s a thing with guys last time I checked! Boooobs!” I make a cupping motion around my significantly flatter chest. “And if she has tenacity she’ll be able to put up with your arrogant bullshit longer! It’s a perfect match!”
    He snorts. “You don’t know anything about me, let alone enough to matchmake me with some pathetic girls.”
    “Stop saying they’re pathetic! They’re nice, okay? You just haven’t given them a chance –”
    He moves so fast I barely have to blink and he’s looming over me, arms on either side of me and that same deadly-cool look in his eyes I saw when he was talking to Evans. A strange pressure threatens to collapse my lungs, but I stay strong. For Kayla. For the sake of the war. I’m strong and I can’t let him see anything otherwise.
    “All they do is grovel,” He snarls. “I am a thing to them, not a person. They worship me because they don’t know me.”
    “Yeah, but you keep it that way – everybody thinks you’re intimidating and hard to approach, just how you like it. You don’t make any effort to be nice, or make friends. It’s easier to be worshipped by people than it is to be friends with them.”
    “What the hell do you know?”
    “I don’t know anything - except that you’re here, in the library, reading corny-ass romance books.” I gesture around me. He holds my gaze, like he’s looking for something inside me, and then backs off. He puts the book back and takes out a few, piling them on his arm.
    “These aren’t for me.”
    “I’ve heard that before.”
    “I have a friend who enjoys them,” he says, voice now