Eleventh Grade Burns(24)

“Learning all that he can about us, I’d wager.” Otis turned his attention to the class, introducing himself and running down a list of things they could expect this year. Vlad couldn’t help but smile. Otis used almost the exact same words that he had used the first time Vlad had seen him in eighth grade, telling the class that they could call him by either his first or last name, so long as the obligatory “Mr.” proceeds their choice.

“I thought he wasn’t on your roster.”

Otis passed papers out to the kids in the front row, who began the well-rehearsed routine of passing them back. “As did I. But according to Principal Snelgrove, he is—no doubt some maneuvering on behalf of the Slayer Society. It’s not as if they haven’t hacked a computer or two in their time.”

Vlad shook his head, overwhelmed by stress at Joss’s close proximity. The last time Joss was this close to Vlad’s back, Vlad ended up in the hospital. He breathed out, “So what now?” then caught himself and thought those same words to Otis, who had a stark eyebrow raised.

“We do as he’s doing. We wait. And we watch.”

It was a sound plan.

Only one problem. Vlad had a feeling he and Otis weren’t the only ones Joss was watching.

Across the room, Meredith smiled in Vlad’s general direction, but Vlad would have bet his life that she wasn’t smiling at him.

He slumped in his seat and prepared himself for the longest school year yet. The hour crawled by, but at the end, he’d relaxed some with the knowledge that Joss wouldn’t stake him in school—if anything, he had to worry about his nightly visits to the belfry.

Once class finally ended, Otis bid them all goodbye, and Vlad ducked out the door. He was just opening his locker when Joss walked by. Joss muttered under his breath, “Don’t you just love the color pink in the late summer sun, Vlad?”

Vlad whipped around, knowing Joss was making a snide observation about Meredith, but before he could do or say anything, Henry had picked Joss up by the collar and slammed him against the lockers. Joss merely smiled.

Mr. Hunjo ripped the boys apart. His voice boomed out into the hallway. “McMillan! And ... McMillan! Office! Now!”

Joss blew a kiss at Henry, taunting him. Henry’s fist flew through the air, but Joss ducked it effortlessly. Mr. Hunjo grabbed them each by the collar and dragged them down the hall, barking that he had had just about enough out of the both of them.

To be honest, so had Vlad. He was already tired of Joss’s presence, and Henry had been absurdly overprotective lately. After all, if anybody deserved to take a swing at Joss, Vlad did, but Henry was trying to beat him to the punch, literally. Actually, he had once already.

Shutting his locker door, Vlad headed out the front doors. After a glance around for Eddie Poe and his all too present camera, he hurried to the side of the building. Several kids were walking by, so he had to stand there and look casual until the coast was clear. Once it was, Vlad did something he’d never done before—he floated up to the belfry in broad daylight. When he reached the window, he landed lightly on the balls of his feet and stepped inside.

The room was just as he’d left it. His father’s leather chair was placed against the wall to his left, a small table covered with half-melted candles nestled beside it. Two large bookcases had been painstakingly lifted in pieces to Vlad’s sanctuary and reassembled. The books that had once graced the room in high stacks were now lining the shelves neatly, but for one or two that Vlad had shoved haphazardly on top of the others on his way out after a long night of reading. Beside the bookcase Vlad had hung the framed picture of his father. He could see Tomas’s face no matter where he stood in the room, and he rather liked that. He smiled briefly at the picture as he dropped his backpack to the floor. “Hi, Dad.”

He pulled his journal from his backpack—pausing only briefly to remember the night Meredith had given it to him—and a pen. After plopping down in his dad’s chair and rereading every entry he could find about Joss, he flipped to an empty page and began formulating the best way to take a slayer peacefully out of commission.

After an hour of staring at the blank page, Vlad gave up and closed the book.





9


SAME DOG, NEW TRICKS

VLAD CLOSED HIS LOCKER after anatomy and physiology and released a very deep breath. So far, he’d managed to avoid both Joss and Meredith all day long, and he was nearing the home stretch, quite literally—one more class and he’d be home. Two days of high school down. Only about five million to go.