The Chosen by Celia Thomson Read Free Book Online Page A

pillow.
    She was barely awake two hours later when she came stumbling downstairs. There was her mom, with doughnuts and coffee for breakfast. She dumped them onto the table, attaché case still slung over her shoulder, and beamed at Chloe.
    “They had that chocolate kreme-with-a-
k
you like so much this morning …,” Anna started. “Wait, you look
terrible
. What happened?”
    “Thanks,” Chloe grumbled. That was the humorous part; now came the difficult one. Would she start the whole avalanche of lies all over again?
I’m just really stressed out about my makeup trig exam tomorrow. I could barely sleep
. Two sentences, fourteen—no, fifteen words, and her mom would let the whole thing drop. And if shetold the truth?
Hey, Mom, my human boy, uh, friend, well, I found him half dead on the street last night when I was prowling around at 2 a.m., so I took him to the people who sort of held me captive for several weeks
.
    She and her mom looked each other in the eye, and each paused too long.
    “Well, some coffee will make you feel better,” her mom finally said, turning her head quickly away.
    Chloe came the rest of the way down the stairs, feeling both infinitely relieved and extremely disturbed. Uncomfortable.
You’re not supposed to feel uncomfortable with your mom
. That was for best friends you betrayed with gossip, guys who said they didn’t like you back that way, and guidance counselors who were pretty sure you had weed in your locker. You could be
mad
at her … but
uncomfortable?
It just didn’t seem right.
    “Thanks,” Chloe said, stuffing her mouth with as much of the doughnut as she could cram in, like she did when she was little. “Hey, shpeaking of …” It was hard to form the words around the delicious, thick, totally fake nondairy kreme. “Could you help me study tonight? I want to run some practice proofs.”
    Chloe meant it as a sort of peace offering to her mom, and it turned out to be exactly the thing to say: Mrs. King smiled, almost as broadly as she had before and tucked a stray wisp of her hair behind her ear. “Absolutely! We’ll get Chinese and make a girls’ night out of it.”
    “Girls’ night with trig,” Chloe said flatly, raising an eyebrow.
Uh-oh, I’m beginning to sound like Kim
.
    Her mom leaned over and kissed her on top of her head.
    “Girls’ night with trig. Gotta run, don’t forget to—”
    “Lock up, yeah, yeah. Got it.”
    Chloe watched as her mom grabbed her purse and her glasses and whirlwinded out the door, a dust devil of Ferragamos and Anne Klein. Then she looked down at the rest of her doughnut and sighed.

    At school Chloe walked in a daze through the halls, watching the early-morning bustle of students making what use they could of the few free minutes before the day began. The National Honor Society kids were putting up posters about some volunteer thing or other they wanted to get people involved in. The geeks were in a huddle, avidly discussing last night’s episode of
Stargate
. The cheerleaders were trying to sell Halloween candygrams to everyone who passed. For a dollar you could send a piece of candy with a note to anyone in the school and have it delivered to his or her homeroom on Halloween morning. In middle school, they had been cheap hard suckers. Now they were little wrapped Godivas.
    Every year on Valentine’s Day, Easter, Halloween, and Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa/Diwali, Amy and Chloe had sent each other mysterious notes from“secret admirers,” with the sitcom philosophy that boys would see how many candygrams they each got and assume that Amy and Chloe were popular and desirable. Never worked, of course. Not that Amy had even needed them the last few years.
I wonder if she’s going to be sending one to Paul?
    “Candygram?” a television-perfect little cheerleader suggested in a peppy voice. Her body was tiny and she wore the home-game uniform, complete with tiny red-and-white skirt. She stood on her toes a little,