They played the game two more times, back and forth, before Claire finally just stopped and stood there, staring at Monica.

Who laughed. “Oh my God, it is the brain-freak. You know freak is only an expression, right? You didn’t actually have to become a circus attraction just for me.”

“It’s the new thing. High-speed tanning. I’m on the way to an awesome summer glow; you should try it,” Claire said. Jennifer actually laughed. She looked immediately guilty. “I’m going to be late for class.”

“Good. That’ll move the bell curve back toward the middle.”

“Only if you actually attended to drag it down.”

“Ooooh, zing,” Monica said. “I’m crushed, because brains are my only asset. No, wait—that would be you, right?”

Claire sighed. “What do you want?” Because it was kind of obvious they wanted something—and probably something other than just the daily harassment. Monica had worked at cutting her off, after all, and Monica just didn’t do work.

“I need a tutor,” Monica said. “I don’t get this economics bullshit. There are fractions and stuff.”

Economics, in Claire’s opinion, was voodoo science, but she shrugged. Math was math. “Okay. Tomorrow. Fifty bucks, and before we get into it, I won’t take a test for you, steal the answers, or come up with some high-tech way for you to cheat.”

Monica raised her perfect eyebrows. “You do know me.”

“Yes or no.”

“Fine.”

“Common Grounds, three o’clock. You buy the mocha.”

“Greedy little bitch,” Monica said. Business deal concluded, she flipped Claire off with a perfectly manicured finger, smiled, and said, “You look like shit. Love the hat—where’d you get it, Cousin Cletus on the short bus?”

Their laughter lingered, along with the exhaust, as the three girls sped off on their usual mission of chaos and destruction.

Claire took a deep breath, pulled the hat down lower over her face, and went across the street to enter the gates of Texas Prairie University.

Claire loved classes. Oh, not the actual lectures, really—professors were, as a rule, not that exciting in person. But the knowledge. That was right there for the taking, as much as you could grab and hold on to—more than you ever wanted, in some classes.

Like English Lit, which she still didn’t know why she had to take, and which was her last class of the day. It wasn’t as if the Brontë sisters were going to make a difference in her daily life, right? Not like math, which was underneath everything from cooking to construction to going to the moon. No, science was definitely cooler.

At least until today, when her attention was temporarily pulled in by the class assignment.