Free Made You Up by Francesca Zappia Page A

on who told you.”
    â€œI figured it out myself,” I said. “It wasn’t hard. Is it German?”
    Miles slapped his pen on his lab notebook. “Why are you here, exactly?”
    â€œBecause they put me in this class. Don’t look at me like it’s my fault.”
    â€œWhy are you here? In this school? In the club?” His voice was too low for our neighbors across the table to hear. “What did you do?”
    â€œWhat did you do?” I shot back. “Because it must have been pretty weird if they made you run the whole club by yourself, without a teacher supervising.”
    â€œNothing,” he said.
    â€œSeriously, though.”
    â€œSeriously, nothing. Now why don’t you answer my question, since you seem so intent on getting information out of me, but refuse to give any up yourself.”
    I looked at the calcium carbonate. “I spray-painted the gym floor.”
    â€œSpray-painted what?”
    â€œThe gym floor, I just said.”
    â€œ What did you spray paint on the gym floor?” The w in “what” came out hard like a v .
    â€œWords.”
    I smiled brightly at the pissy expression on his face. Screwing with him was so unexplainably worth it. I turned back to the Bunsen burner and listened to him seethe.
    Game nights in the concession stand hit occasional lulls, so Theo and I entertained ourselves making plastic cup pyramids and talking about English class.
    I found out that Theo wrote for the school newspaper, which was why I always saw her talking to Claude Gunthrie, the editor. (“I know he looks kind of constipated all the time”—she knocked over a stack of cups in her excitement—“but you haven’t seen his biceps. My God, they’re beautiful.”)
    â€œI feel like I should constantly be watching my back in that class, you know?” I said. “I’ve had a weird feelingabout Ria since school started.” Ria sat near me in class, but all I’d ever seen her do was bat her eyelashes at Cliff and giggle like some kind of perky, latte-fueled automaton.
    â€œRia’s really not all that bad,” said Theo. “You’d think she would be. She’s popular, but she doesn’t go picking for food among us lower beings. Unless she’s looking for a distraction from Cliff.”
    â€œWhy would she need a distraction from Cliff?”
    â€œThey’ve been dating since seventh grade, but the real drama didn’t start till freshman year. Biggest. Shitstorm. Ever. She always accuses him of cheating; he’s always treating her like a trophy. So, like, once a year, she’ll go find a guy to sleep with to make Cliff jealous. Cliff finds the guy, beats the crap out of him, and then Cliff and Ria make up and the whole cycle starts again.” Theo reached over her head to place a cup on top of the pyramid. “No, the people you really want to watch out for are Celia and the Siamese Twins.”
    Celia’s two cronies, Britney and Stacey, might as well have been joined at the hip. I could tell Theo’s brothers apart better than I could those two. I reached around and added to the pyramid’s edge. “Celia gives Miles these looks in English class. Like she wants to eat him.”
    Theo shivered. “Don’t mention that while Boss isaround. She’s obsessed with him. Has been since freshman year, since she started getting weird. Never came out and said it, but you can tell.”
    â€œWell, she’s a bitch and he’s a douche; they’re perfect for each other,” I said, smiling.
    Theo gave me one of those looks, the ones parents give their kid when the kid is talking about something they don’t understand. That look stung more than I thought it would; I shifted and hid behind the pyramid, my face burning. What had I said? What was there about this picture that I didn’t get?
    â€œBored again?” Theo asked suddenly. Miles stood at