Model Misfit

In a very non-literal way, they sort of do.

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o, by the way.

If you think a polite but firm conversation with my bully six months ago totally fixed everything between us, you’ve obviously never met Alexa. Or me.

Or any other teenage girl.

I want to pretend Alexa and her friends aren’t waiting for me, but a quick glance at her face tells me otherwise. She’s practically salivating. That’s the not-so-great thing about the last day of school: no repercussions.

“Hey,” she says sharply, taking a step towards me. “Manners.”

I instinctively look for another exit. But, short of using Toby to hurdle the fence, there’s no other way out of the school. So I duck my head and try my hardest to become completely invisible.

Thanks to not being a member of the Fantastic Four, this doesn’t work.

“HEY,” Alexa says again, blocking my path. She glances briefly at Toby. He scratches at the inside of his ear and then sniffs his finger. “Did you have fun in that exam, geek? Bet you did. I bet it was the best fun you’ve had in ages.”

I flush slightly. She’s absolutely right: it was awesome. When I got to the essay question about the life cycle of a star, I actually got a bit dizzy with excitement. “Maybe,” I say with the most non-committal shrug I can muster.

“Bet you knew all the answers, didn’t you, you total spod.”

I shake my head. “Only about ninety-three per cent of them.”

Everyone snickers – I don’t know why: that’s still a solid A* – and Alexa scowls at me. I try to walk away, but she blocks me again. “So you’ve heard about the massive house party I’m having tonight?”

The answer to this question is obviously: yes. There are Eskimos in Siberia who woke up this morning, fully aware of the house party Alexa is having tonight.

“No.”

“I’ve heard about it,” Toby interrupts eagerly. “You’re having tiny jellies, aren’t you? Alexa, they sound brilliant. I’ve always found normal-sized jellies unhygienic. All those different spoons. It’s much more sanitary to have lots of little ones each, isn’t it?”

Alexa ignores him. “A guy who used to be on TVis coming. So it’s technically a celebrity party.”

Toby nods sagely. “No green jelly then. Just awesome red and purple, right? My mum makes mine in the shape of a rocket with liquorice where the engines would be.”

Years from now, historians will look back at records of these days and wonder how Toby managed to get through them alive.

“That’s nice for you, Alexa,” I say, finally managing to dodge round her and start walking in the opposite direction.

“So, Manners” – and she clears her throat – “Want to come?”

I stop mid-stride. Apparently when people have their heads cut off there are five or six seconds when they can hear and see and blink, but they can’t move because they’ve already been severed in half.

That’s sort of how I feel now.

Slowly, I turn back round. “Pardon me?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Nat come out of the school doors, pause and then start legging it towards us.

“Do you want to come to my party?” Alexa says, her face totally blank. “We’ve got a TV star, so you’d be the perfect celebrity addition. A model.”

“Really?”

“Yeah,” she says slowly, and the smirk appears again. “And if we fancy a dance, we can tie you to the ceiling by your feet and spin you round really fast. You can be our very own human disco ball.”

Then she points at my face and bursts into hysterical laughter, and a few nano-seconds later everyone starts snickering behind her.

It takes thirty minutes for a human body to produce enough heat to boil half a gallon of water. I think from the temperature of my cheeks right now I can probably cut that down to eleven or twelve, maximum.

Why didn’t I just keep walking? What’s wrong with me? Other than a gold face and an entire lack of survival instinct, obviously.

“Bite us, Hockey-legs,” Nat snaps, suddenly appearing next to me. “As if we’d want to go to your wannabe party.”

“As if I’d want you to want to. I’m still scrubbing the loserness off my doorstep from your last visit.” Alexa sneers. “Anyway, why the hell would I want her,” and she points at me like I’m a bit of toenail stuck in a carpet, “in my house, spreading her geekiness around? There’s no level of cool that can cure that. I’d have an epidemic on my hands.”

She spins round and adds, “Nobody wants that, right?” Then starts ceremoniously high-fiving her friends.

As if I’m not still standing there with my cheeks burning.

As if I don’t matter.

As if I never will.

As if nothing has changed at all.

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count slowly to ten, and then I take a deep breath, reach into my pocket and pull out a small bit of crumpled-up paper.

I tap my still-triumphing nemesis on the back and hand it to her.

“What the hell is this?”

YOUR

GEEK, YOU’RE FACE IS BRIGHT GOLD.

“You-apostrophe-r-e is a contraction of you are, Alexa,” I say. “If you needed help with grammar, you should’ve asked.”

There’s a stunned silence followed by a couple of desperately suppressed snorts, and I suddenly wonder whether everyone likes Alexa as much as they pretend they do. Or whether some of them are only here for the ‘celebrity’ parties and tiny jellies.

Alexa’s smirk has finally gone. “I know the difference,” she hisses furiously. “It was a typo.”

She scrunches the distinctly handwritten note back up and throws it hard at my face. It hits my left ear with a small pop.

“What do I care, anyway?” she adds. “School’s over. Nobody in real life cares about that kind of rubbish.”