The Fourth Horseman, excerpt 2

Here's the second excerpt from The Fourth Horseman, the beginning of Chapter 2, in which Suzanne makes googly eyes.

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Chapter Two

When I came to Benowa High School in the middle of spring semester, fresh out of rehab, I hated the place.  The kids were mean and stupid and boring, and I didn't fit in with any of them.  School was a time-suck I had to suffer through until I could get back to my real life, even if that real life involved me sitting up in my room with my dog.  At least my dog was cute.

I fully expected to feel the same when I started this fall as a junior, but things had changed.  Maybe they would have changed anyway because I was no longer new, just another student like everyone else, but I thought it was mostly because I was now associated with Gabriel and Merri Beryl. 

Gabriel was popular because he was a jock, that simple.  He was more popular because he was good looking and nice and because his power as an Earth allowed him to make people like him, but primarily he was an athlete who had already lettered in two sports as a junior.  He was beloved. 

Merri, Gabriel's other older brother, was popular because he was a joiner.  As a senior, he was on Student Council (chair of the Activities Committee), golf team, yearbook, debate, and probably a few others—Merri had a thousand activities all happening all the time.  He was one of those students who made sure the administrative work of school activities got done.  Sometimes I thought Merri had taken one look at Anastase's anti-social life and said "I am going to do the opposite of that."  Just knowing him made me tired.

Merri was always trying to include me in things, inviting me places, introducing me to people.  "This is my brother's girlfriend Suzanne," he would say, hooking an arm around me and dragging me toward the drum major of the marching band, or the captain of his debate team, or a cheerleader, or member of the yearbook staff or chess club.  And I would say hello and make small talk for the briefest possible amount of time until I could wriggle away, but it was too late: I had been introduced.  After that, some of them would say hi to me in the hallway, or talk to me a little bit when we were in the same class, or walk with me if they ran into me in the hall. 

"You're making me have friends," I complained to Merri one lunch period, after he'd called a girl from student newspaper over to our lunch table and made me say hi to her.

He looked up from his plate of macaroni and cheese, smiling.  "It's good for you," he said.

"No, it's not," I protested. 

"You can't live your life in a bubble." He took a bite.

"Irony."  I made a face.  Becoming an Elemental and joining the Beryl Circle meant that I couldn't move permanently away from Benowa, ever.  I could leave, but I would have to come back within two or three months, or I would die.  The restriction hadn't made much of a difference to me, yet—I was in high school and would be here until I graduated anyway—but it would. 

"Right?" he asked, smiling.  "Hey, you're coming to the assembly Friday, yes?"

"There's an assembly?"

Merri rolled his eyes.  "You're annoying."

"Yes, we're coming," I said. "I think we're, like, contractually obligated to come or something."

"You act like it's a trip to the dentist."

"Whee!" I twirled a finger near my ear.

"It's the announcement of the Homecoming Court," Merri said.  "So it's important that you're there. You can't skip."

I stared at him in shock and horror.  No.  No.  It was not possible that I—

"Calm down." He shook his head at me.  "Not you.  Gabriel."

"Ohthankgod."  I slumped in relief.  "I almost died there."

"Why would you be nominated?" Merri asked.  "You don't do anything."

"Yes, thank you, exactly the point!" I said.  “But it would be like you to try to torture me."

"It would, wouldn't it?" Merri smiled.  "Where is his royal highness?"

"He's coming.  He had to stop at his—ta da!" I pointed as Gabriel came through the door trailed by a clump of baby jocks, junior varsity players who wanted to look cool by talking to Gabriel in front of the whole lunch room.  He saw us and waved.

I had learned from knowing Gabriel that popularity was hard.  Back in Milwaukee, I had been one of the outsiders, a member of a clique that thought popular kids were jokes and fools.  But I had been wrong.  To be popular, really popular, at least in Benowa, in addition to money and good looks, you had to be good at something.  Usually that something was sports, but it could be other activities, as long as something sports-related was involved.  Merri, for example, was on the golf team.

But being good at things wasn't enough.  There were plenty of kids on teams who no one besides their own friends really cared about.  To be popular, you also had to be involved with other people.  You had to know about them, hear about them, talk about them.  You had to care. 

There were two ways to do that—you could show you liked people and wanted them to be happy and to like you, or you could hate most people and use them as the butts of your jokes. 

In other words, the only people who were really popular in Benowa were either pretty nice, or pretty mean.  Gabriel, obviously, was the former. 

"What's up?" He slid onto the bench next to me and kissed my cheek.  I leaned up against his shoulder.  I'm not huge on public displays of affection, but as long as there wasn't any tongue, I was willing to participate.  And Gabriel always smelled good.  We had learned about pheromones in chemistry class, and how humans had evolved away from using our senses of smell to seek out willing mates, but our teacher said even though we didn't use pheromones like other animals did, there were still people we would meet in our lives who would just smell right to us.  Gabriel smelled right to me. 

"Merri wants to make sure we're going to the assembly on Friday," I told him.

"We are."  He squeezed me.  "I made her promise."

"I need to make some new friends," I said.  "Then I wouldn't have to hang out with you losers."

"That reminds me,” Merri said, lowering his voice.  "After Gabriel gets done with practice Ana wants to call the Circle.  Can you do it?"

"Sure," I said.  "After 7:30, though.  I have to eat dinner at home."

"Eight?" Merri offered. 

"Sounds good," I said.  "Gabriel?"

"Yep."  He stood up.  "I'm getting pizza.  You want?"

"Nope, I ate."  I gestured to my mostly empty tray.  Without being asked, Gabriel picked it up and, on his way over to the pizza line, set the tray in the rack where all the dirty trays went, because that was the type of person he was. 

"You can act tough all you want, Suzanne Parker," Merri said, "but you were just making googly eyes at your boyfriend and you know it."

"Shut up," I told him. "They weren't googly."

But they were.  They totally were.