The Fright Night

Chapter 1

"Rochester," Marty peached as I scribbled down annotations in Jane Eyre. His booming voice coming through on my phone spooked me enough to smear the gel ink on the page of the book, leaving a light blue streak going through the word 'fire'.

That word had been printed in that book a considerable amount of times, and it felt like it was starting to catch onto the back of my brain to burn it up. Then I wouldn't have had to read it anymore. I wouldn't have had to do anything anymore! "I hate this book, Liza. I swear, if I trusted anyone else, I'd just pay them to read if for me."

Marty didn't have a job to even come up with the money for an investment like that. He'd be washing dishes and cutting grass for weeks in order to cover a homework helper, and even if he had to do all of that, he'd do it... If only he trusted someone at our school to do it for him.

"It's one of the many perks of being an AP student." I closed the book because I was starting to get tired of reading about Jane as well. Marty was the reason we were even enrolled in AP literature classes... and math... and science which was my weakest suit.

At the moment, I was more interested in hearing what Marty had to say about anything but that book.

I leaned back against my pillow, ready to change the subject. I knew that if I sat quiet for long enough, he'd start to talk about something interesting enough to take us into nine o'clock. I looked at the clock on my wall, and it was only 8:29 pm. At nine, my parents made us stop using the phone. I could possibly waste my last minutes on the phone, blabbing about Mrs. Eyre or, even better, sitting in silence. He finally fell against my vibe and I could hear him rustle on his end of the phone, probably to hurl the book at a wall.

"I don't see why Rochester didn't just blow Blanche off in the beginning. It would have been so much better than sitting through 20 chapters of them still being together." I laughed and pulled up the tips of my hair into my fingers to eye level. I started a search and snip while he rustled on the other end of the phone. "I would have dropped her so fast for a babe like you." I chuckled, holding the phone up with my shoulder. Who knows what Marty would have done with a babe like me, at a time like that. Who knew if he'd even have control of me the way he'd want to at a time like that.

"A babe like me?" I asked him. "Well then we wouldn't have such great literature."

"But he'd have her," he said. He rustled some more and I plucked the split tips of my hair and twirled them off onto my floor. My house was fairly quiet that night. It felt like it was too quiet and calm to be the night before the first day.

For a moment, I promise I'd miss the first day of school, but Marty begged me to show up.

"You'd do that for me?" I asked him. "You'd drop a woman of higher standards for me?" I was trying to hold back another giggle and luckily, my smile did it for me.

Marty was a straight A student, at the top of our class. Our counselors revealed our class rankings the previous year, so that we'd start planning for college. Marty knew since freshman year where he stood.

That year, our senior year, he wanted to get perfect attendance. And he'd also been elected as the class president the year before, so he was planning on attending every mini pep rally and sit-in our school could conjure up.

As for me, I sat in the twenties, spitballing with our best friend Alto. Since grade school, the three of us had been sewn together, and he was the only reason Alto and I weren't at the tail of our class. He was the only reason that we signed up to be in his advanced classes with him, so that he wouldn't have to bare one too many boring english or math lectures alone.

When we signed up, he described the classes as "special" and "fun". But we didn't know that they were special because all of the smart kids were in them, and "fun" to him.