Chosen (House of Night #3)(29)

"I'm not going to change." I was going to say more, but then I thought about the fact that just a few months ago if someone had told me that I'd be making out with a grown-ass man while I had not one but two boyfriends I would have said no f-ing way. So didn't that mean I'd changed?

Aphrodite smiled like she could read my mind. "I wasn't talking about you. I was talking about the people around you."

"Oh," I said. "Aphrodite, not to be mean or anything, but I think I pick my friends better than you."

"We'll see. Speaking of-Shouldn't you be heading to the movies to meet your friends right now?"

I sighed. "Yeah, but no way can I go. I've got to get the blood for Stevie Rae, get her clothes together, and I also want to stop by Wal-Mart and grab one of those GoPhones. I figured it would be a good idea to give it to Stevie Rae so that she could call me."

"Fine. Why don't you pick me up outside the trapdoor in the east wall at about two thirty? That gives us plenty of time to get to Philbrook before Stevie Rae."

"Sounds good. I just need to run up to my room, grab some of Stevie Rae's clothes and my purse, then I'll be out of here."

"Okay, I'll go into the dorm first."

"Huh?" I said.

Aphrodite gave me a look that said she thought I was a retard. "You don't want people to see me with you. They'll think we're friends or something ridiculous like that."

"Aphrodite, I do not care what people think."

She rolled her eyes. "I do." Then she hurried ahead of me to the dorm.

"Hey!" I called. She looked over her shoulder. "Thanks for helping me." Aphrodite frowned. "Don't mention it. And I mean it. Don't. Mention. It. Jeesh." Shaking her head, she hurried into the dorm.

Chapter Eleven

I found the heart locket when I was going through the drawer getting Stevie Rae's clothes. I was with her the night she died, and by the time I got back to our room the vamp cleanup squad (or whatever they're called) had already been there and bad taken Stevie Rae's stuff. I got pissed. Really pissed. And I'd insisted they put some of her stuff back because I wanted to keep things to remember her by. So Anastasia, the professor who teaches spells and rituals (she's really nice and married to Dragon Lankford, the fencing instructor) took me to a creepy storage room where I shoved some of Stevie Rae's stuff into a bag and then dumped it back in what used to be her dresser. I remember Anastasia was kind to me, but she also clearly disapproved of me having keepsakes of Stevie Rae.

When a fledgling dies, the vamps expect us to forget them and go on. Period. Well, I just don't think that's right. I wasn't going to forget my best friend, even before I found out she was really undead.

Anyway, I had grabbed her jeans when something fell out of the pocket. It was a kinda crunched-up envelope that had zoey printed on the outside of it in Stevie Rae's messy handwriting. My stomach hurt as I opened it. Inside was a birthday card-one of those silly ones with a picture of a cat (who looked a lot like Nala) on the front wearing one of those pointy birthday hats and a frown. Inside it said happy birthday, or whatever, like i care, i'm a cat. Stevie Rae had drawn a big heart and written love you! stevie rae and grumpy nala. Sliding around in the bottom of the envelope was a silver chain. I lifted it up to find a delicate silver heart locket dangling from it. My fingers were shaking as I opened the locket. A many-times-folded picture fell out. I smoothed it carefully and, with a little sob, recognized it as a cutout part of a picture I had taken of the two of us (by holding the camera out, smooshing our faces together, and pressing the flash button). Wiping my eyes, I folded the picture back into the locket and clasped the chain around my neck. It was a short chain, so the heart fit just below the hollow of my throat.

Somehow, finding the necklace made me feel stronger, and also taking the blood from the kitchen was way easier than I'd thought it was going to be. Instead of my normal purse-the little designer one I'd found at a boutique at Utica Square last year (it's made of fake pink fur, totally cool), I took my ginormic bag-the one I used to use as a book bag when I went to South Intermediate High School in Broken Arrow, before I was Marked and my life exploded. Anyway, the bag was big enough to carry a fat kid in (if he was short), so it was simple to cram Stevie Rae's dorky Roper jeans, a T-shirt, her black cowboy boots (ugh), and some under things in it and still have room for five bags of blood. Yes, they were gross. Yes, I wanted to stick a straw in one and suck it down like a juice box. Yes, I'm disgusting.

The cafeteria was closed, as was the kitchen, and completely deserted. But like everything else at the school, not locked. I got into and out of the kitchen easily, holding my blood-filled purse carefully while I tried to look nonchalant and not guilty. (I'm really not good at theft.)

I was worried about seeing Loren (who I was really really trying to forget about, not so hard that I took off his diamond earrings, but still), but the only person I saw was a third-former kid named Ian Bowser. He's dorky and scrawny, but also kinda funny. I had drama class with him and he was hilariously in love with our drama teacher, Professor Nolan. Actually, it was Professor Nolan he was looking for when he literally ran into me on my way out of the cafeteria.

"Oh, Zoey, sorry! Sorry!" Ian gave me a nervous little vampyre salute of respect, hand fisted over his heart.