Fairest (An Unfortunate Fairy Tale, #2)

Mina almost choked on her cookie, she was laughing so hard. Nan always had a different way of looking at the world. They finished their lunch discussing the hot versus cute point ratings for all of the kids in their class.

It wasn’t until Mina caught movement over her best friend’s shoulder that her smile died on her lips. Every muscle in her body tensed as a familiar tingling raced up her spine, her only warning that something magical was at work.

The movement came again, and she tried to pretend indifference to the fluttering movements coming from the locked Biology cabinet. She knew what was stored in that particular glass cabinet. She had seen the preserved bodies of the chickens, frogs, and even a two-headed pig. Year after year, they had been floating lifeless in their jars of formaldehyde.

The Kennedy students had even nicknamed the two-headed pig Twinky. Mina never gave credit to the names and preferred to ignore the creatures suspended in the liquid glass coffins. But she could no longer ignore them because the dead specimens were moving. Twinky himself, with both heads, started to struggle in the jar. His mouth opened wide, and she could almost hear the silent squeals echoing in the classroom.

She faltered mid-sentence with Nan, and quickly began to gather up her uneaten lunch. Mina glanced out of the corner of her eye to see one of the frogs swimming happily back in forth in his jar.

Nan complained, “Hey, I’m not done with that.” She tried to snatch another chip from Mina’s tray.

“No, we are definitely done,” Mina shot out hurriedly. She tried to pick up the tray and turn Nan toward the door and away from lab cabinet that was now slightly shaking from the frenzied movement coming from within.

But Mina wasn’t able to carry the trays and both crutches and she began to lose the tray and all of the food on it. Nan caught the trays and dumped them into the nearest trash can. “If you really wanted to get out of here, you could have just told me,” she answered somewhat annoyed.

Mina was proud of her recovery. “I just remembered. I overheard a senior saying that they were dissecting various brains on these tables today.” It was an obvious lie, but one that seemed to get Nan moving in the direction of the door.

“Oh, that is disgusting! I should have never even brought our lunch in here. I’m surprised we could eat with all of those Frankenstein animals in the cabinet anyway.” Nan began to turn her head and point to the aforementioned cabinet, when Mina heard a distinct clicking sound. Without looking, she knew it was the chicken tapping his beak on the jar, desperately trying to break free.

She pushed Nan bodily through the door as the clicking sound grew louder.

“Did you hear something?” Nan turned and tried to crane her neck back into the classroom.

“Nope,” Mina answered quickly, too quickly.

“I thought I heard tapping?” Nan looked at Mina.

“Uh, you did.” Mina began to tap her fingers impatiently against the metal support of her crutch.

Nan’s head tilted to the side. “No, I could have sworn it sounded like glass.” Nan couldn’t press the argument further because the first warning bell rang.

Mina closed the lab door firmly behind her and started a frenzied hopping toward her next class, hoping Nan would follow her lead. She didn’t. Mina stopped when she realized Nan wasn’t behind her. She turned and looked over her shoulder at her blonde best friend who hadn’t moved from her spot outside the Biology lab door.

Nan’s face was furrowed in confusion as if she was listening intently for something, but it was obvious she couldn’t hear anything over the sound of rushing feet and slamming lockers. She made a move toward the door as if to open it.

Mina was helpless and stared at her friend in horror. What could she do? Thinking fast, she pretended to fall again, but this time with fanfare. She was so desperate to gain attention she even threw her crutch into the path of an oncoming student and screamed loudly as she flopped hard on her butt on the cold hard floor, right in the middle of the hallway.

Her cheeks burned with embarrassment as Frank, the unlucky student tripped by her wayward crutch, fell on top of her.

“Ouch!” Mina cried out.

“Sorry! Oof, sorry again,” Frank mumbled as he tried to extract himself from the mess of his tangled backpack, Mina’s crutch, and the hands that came out of nowhere to help them up. But the spectacle did its job as Nan released the biology door handle and raced to rescue her.

After the incident and the gawkers cleared the hallway, Nan smiled brightly and pulled out her camera phone.

“Six!” she laughed while pointing it at both of them and clicked the phone.

Chapter 15
A knock sounded at the door. Mina and Charlie were spread out on the floor playing a card game and both looked at each other expectantly.

“You get it,” Mina stated.

Charlie smirked at his sister, crossed his arms, and shook his head no.