He loomed above like a dark cloud. “It’s me, Josh—don’t you remember?” His smile faltered. “You tutored me last month for my math test. Which I got a sixty-five on by the way!”
I stared at him blankly.Does he want me to speak?
People didn’t talkto me outside of my tutoring service; they talked at me.
They commented on the holes in my clothes and asked if I really lived with feral dogs in the woods.
They joked that I had fleas.
Josh tipped his head back and burst into laughter (nothing was funny). “I’m soexcited. It’s my highest grade ever.” He patted my shoulder.
The locker rattled behind me as I flinched away.
Since I was tall for a girl, most of the guys in our school were near my eye level, but Josh was built large.
“I know we agreed to leave your payment in your locker,” Josh said with a strange expression. “But I wanted to talk to you in person.”
He handed over three food vouchers.
I took them quickly and folded them carefully in my pocket, then pushed away from the lockers as I hurried past him toward the library.
“Wait up!” Josh—who I now vividly remembered because he thought six times seven was sixty-seven and didn’t believe that zero was a number (someone needed to put him down)—ran up beside me on my left.
I couldn’t see him.
My chest tightened with panic.
“Stop worrying, he smells weak. You have nothing to fear,” Nyx said with a hiss. “But... I will bite him to death for you because I’m generous and helpful. You’re welcome.”
“You’re not bitinganyone,” I whispered.
“What was that?” Josh’s voice was muffled and distorted, so it took me a second to decipher what he’d asked.
I didn’t answer.
The metal detectors of the library came into view, and I hurried my pace.
Josh stepped in front of me, and he reached for my face.
I swallowed a scream.
I froze.
Waited for the blow.
He wrapped his finger gently around one of the gold curls that had escaped my hoodie. “You know—you’renothow they say you are. Your eyes are actually really pretty,” he said softly.
Thanks, and you’re actually really stupid.
Internally, I scoffed.
Externally, I was silent and frozen with fear.
“Wait, kid,” Nyx said. “Isn’t this the guy who couldn’t multiply?”
Her voice pulled me out of shock, and I took a lunging step toward the library.
Josh moved with me. “So what do you say, are you interested in . . .” He wiggled his eyebrows up and down, then paused like he was waiting for me to say something.
