Free Unhinged: 2 by A. G. Howard Page B

That’s why I’m starting quarterback.”
    She huffs. “Really? Looks more like janitorial skills,” she teases back.
    Corbin laughs and disappears around the corner. Jen gives me a hug and we part for first period.
    I settle at my desk. Morpheus is nowhere in sight, although he is the topic of almost every girl’s conversation and passed note. I manage to read one over someone’s shoulder:
    I heard he got in trouble with his rich English family and was senthere to see how regular people live. Viva American peasants! The
M
comes from his dad, Mort, but he’s rebelling. *drools*
    So, not only is he rich, British, and eccentric, he’s a bad boy and a rebel. Great. Once again, he’s pulling everyone’s strings.
    I sit through an excruciating three periods—two exams and one review work sheet—without seeing him once. I’m guessing he arranged his schedule contrary to mine so I’ll worry about where he is and what he’s up to. Another ploy to knock me off balance.
    In the basement level on the way to fourth period, I decide to ditch study hall and peek in every door of every senior class until I find him, determined to make contact before lunch. The last thing I want is to face him across a crowded cafeteria.
    I slip into the girls’ bathroom to wait for the bell to ring and the hall to clear. The small gray alcove is just under the girls’ and boys’ locker rooms located on the first floor. Faulty pipes run across the dingy white ceiling. Rusty stains branch out like yellow-brown veins, and the scent of mildew hangs heavy on the air.
    It’s just a matter of time till the pipes spring a leak in the gymnasium floor upstairs and ruin everything, which is why the money our class raised for our senior gift will be used for new copper pipes to be installed this summer.
    The tardy bell rings. I wait for voices to fade and doors to shut. Strands of sunshine filter through a hopper window where the wall meets the ceiling. The hinged glass is open a crack, letting in a sliver of fresh air, just enough to make breathing bearable.
    A chorus of whispering bugs and plants drifts in, blending into a nonsensical hum. Cobwebs line the windowpane and ripple in the breeze like ghostly handkerchiefs waving at me.
    I stare at my reflection in the dusty mirror, focused on the redstrip of hair, and imagine the strand moving like the webs—an invisible string drawing it up to dance. As I concentrate, it starts to twine and twist.
    My muscles tense. It’s not safe, using my powers here at school—entangling pieces of my life I’ve tried for months to keep separate. If I’m not careful, the end result could be volatile.
    Ignoring the sense of dread, I concentrate harder until the wave of magic resurges. My hair sways and spins until it’s at a right angle from the platinum strands surrounding it, so much like my horrific dream at the hospital … the sword of blood.
    As if triggered by my memory, an image begins to stir just behind my reflection. My concentration wavers, and the strand of hair falls limp. There’s a blur of white, red, and black checked patterns in the glass, sharpening to the clown from the hospital. It looms there, stretched out of proportion, as if I’m looking into a funhouse mirror. The clown shakes a snow globe in its hands and smiles with teeth sharp and silver like nails. My knees wobble, but I hold my ground, assuring myself I’m imagining it.
    If I turn around, it will be gone.
    Please don’t be there … please please please …
    Gathering my courage, I spin on my heel.
    Nothing but walls and stalls. I take a breath, then face the mirror again. The clown in the reflection has vanished.
    Maybe Dad was right. Maybe I am overdoing it …
    A door in the hallway slams, reminding me of the reason I’m hiding here to begin with.
Morpheus
.
    This has to be one of his mind games.
    I wait for silence and then venture out. I’ve only made it two steps when the familiar snicker of Taelor Tremont breaks the