I raised my chin if anything a little higher. “First, I couldn’t care less what other people say about me, and second, I’m hungry.” And third, I can do without your sympathy, thanks very much.
Shaking my head, I pushed past him into the cafeteria. Henry was sitting there at the back, at our usual window table, along with Grayson, Florence, Emily, and a friend of Florence’s called Callum Caspers. A plate of selections from the salad buffet stood at the empty place next to Henry, which meant that there was ground beef Wellington to go with the cabbage today. I hadn’t been able to stomach the school’s ground beef since I found a fingernail clipping in it one day, as Henry knew, so he had thoughtfully chosen me a plate of mixed salad in advance. That was really nice of him. I’d almost reached the table when the cell phone I was holding rang. Now Henry, Grayson, Emily, Callum, and Florence noticed me, too, and fell silent.
“With you in a minute.” I put the phone to my ear. Mia. I could hardly make out her voice.
“Didn’t you get my text?”
“Giy aaat? Yes, but what’s it supposed to mean?”
“Get out!” snapped Mia. “It says get out! I was typing blind. They know. So get out!”
However, it was too late for that. Florence was already on her feet, standing in front of me with her arms folded. “Is it true?” she asked.
“Er.” Slowly, I lowered the phone. Where was I supposed to get out to, and why?
“Liv.” Henry was the only one whose face looked friendly. And sympathetic.
“This is what Secrecy posted seven minutes ago.” Emily had brought out her smartphone and was reading from it. “PS—I’ve just found out who have Mr. Snuggles on their consciences. Liv and Mia Silver. Obviously it was a childish act of revenge on Grayson and Florence’s grandmother because they don’t like her. So a cultural feature of our part of town that took decades to grow has been the victim of their silly prank.”
Secrecy. She couldn’t know—it was impossible! I felt weak at the knees.
“Is it true?” Florence repeated quietly, but all the same, everyone in the room seemed to hear her.
And they were all staring at me, every last one of them. “Because if so, I’m never going to sit at the same table as you, ever again.” With a last, infinitely scornful look, she ran past me and out of the cafeteria. Emily and Callum followed close on her heels.
Grayson also got to his feet. The expression on his face hurt me almost physically. He looked so incredibly disappointed.
“Grayson…,” I began, without knowing exactly what I was going to say. The one thing I really wanted was for none of this to be really happening. Why couldn’t it simply be a dream?
“I must go—I have to set up my experiment before chemistry,” said Grayson, avoiding my eyes. “See you later. Then maybe you can explain what you two thought you were doing.”
Henry drew me down on the chair beside his and held my hand very tightly. “It’s not so bad, honestly,” he assured me. “Have some salad?”
11
AT LEAST THERE was one good thing about this whole ghastly business: I found that I could now turn myself into a perfect jaguar without a hitch. I looked so deceptively real that even Senator Tod showed proper respect when we unexpectedly met and faced each other.
In human form, I’d certainly have screeched with fright to see him suddenly coming around the corner like that. And then I’d probably have run away, like last time. But my jaguar self instinctively crouched, the hairs rose on the back of my jaguar neck, and I bared my sharp canine teeth.
That seemed to impress Senator Tod. He slowly took two steps backward, murmuring, “Take it easy, nice kitty, take it easy.”
Aha! So he could speak in a perfectly normal way if he wanted to. At close quarters, he didn’t look nearly as menacing as from a distance—the face beneath that slouch hat seemed to be perfectly human. It wasn’t a skull or a zombie face crawling with maggots, as I’d secretly feared, just an ordinary man’s face, the kind that you might see on any street: rather round, a strong nose, lower lip slightly fuller than his upper lip, and pale-blue eyes, although there was a glint in them that I couldn’t quite place, and it scared me. Apart from that glint, however, he had seemed quite harmless.
A deep growl emerged from my throat. No way was I a nice kitty! This was my corridor, and I was feeling like a really nasty kitty today. I’d not had a particularly good week.
“Okay,” he said, taking another step back. “Then I’ll come back another time.” Only when there was plenty of space between us did he turn and disappear around the next corner.