Free This Savage Song by Victoria Schwab Page A

heard her mother went crazy. Tried to drive them off a bridge .
    The words brought back not one memory but two. Two different worlds. Two different Kates. One lying in a field. The other stretched on the pavement. One surrounded by rustling quiet of the country. The other surrounded by ringing silence.
    She brought her fingers absently to the scar beneath her hair, traced a metallic nail around the curve of her ear. Disconcerting, to be able to feel but not hear the drag of nail on flesh.
    Just then the doors burst open, and a boy stumbled through. Kate’s hand dropped away from her ear. The boy looked a little lost and a little ill, and she couldn’treally blame him. He’d come from the cafeteria, and that place was enough to set anyone off balance.
    â€œBad day?”
    He looked up, startled, and she recognized him.
    Frederick Gallagher. The new junior. Up close, he looked more like a stray dog than a student. He had wide gray eyes beneath a mop of messy black hair, and a starved look about him, bones pressing against his skin.
    She watched him open his mouth, close it, open it again, only to offer a single word. “Yeah.”
    Kate tapped ash off the cigarette and pushed herself up to her full height. “You’re the new kid, right?”
    One black brow lifted, just a fraction. “So are you,” he shot back.
    The answer caught her off guard. She’d expected him to be a mumbler, or maybe a groveler. Instead he looked straight at her when he spoke, and his voice, though soft, was steady. Maybe not a stray dog, then.
    â€œIt’s Katherine, right?”
    â€œKate,” she said. “Frederick?”
    â€œFreddie,” he corrected.
    She took a drag on her cigarette. Frowned. “You don’t look like a Freddie.”
    He shrugged, and for a second they stood there, sizing each other up, the moment stretching, the gazegrowing uncomfortable until his gray eyes finally broke free, escaping to the ground. Kate smiled, victorious. She gestured to the patch of pavement, the border of grass. “What brings you to my office?”
    He looked around, confused, as if he’d actually intruded. Then he looked up and said, “The view.”
    Kate flashed a crooked grin. “Oh really?”
    His face went red. “I didn’t mean you,” he said quickly. “I was talking about the trees.”
    â€œWow,” she said dryly. “Thanks. How am I supposed to compete with pine and oak?”
    â€œI don’t know,” said Freddie, cocking his head. Stray dog again. “They’re pretty great.”
    She tucked her hair behind her ear and caught Freddie’s glance. It didn’t linger. There was a flush in his cheeks, but it wasn’t all embarrassment. He really did look ill.
    â€œI’d offer you a chair,” she said, tapping ash on the pavement.
    â€œIt’s all right,” he said, slumping back against the adjacent wall. “I just needed some air.”
    She watched his chest empty and fill and empty again, gray eyes leveled on a low bank of clouds. There was something about those eyes, something present and distant at the same time.
    Where are you? She wondered, the question on the tipof her tongue. “Here.” She held out the cigarette. “You look like you could use one.”
    But Freddie waved his hand. “No thanks,” he said. “Those things’ll kill you.”
    She laughed, soft, soundless. “So will lots of things around here.”
    A rueful smile. “True.”
    The bell rang, and she pushed off the wall. “See you around, Freddie.”
    â€œDo I need to schedule an appointment?” he asked.
    She waved a hand. “My office is always open.”
    With that, she stubbed out the cigarette and went inside.
    By the end of the day, Kate was untouchable.
    Word had obviously spread—at least through the senior class—about her stunt with Charlotte in the girls’