Airhead

‘Great, great,’ Mr Greer said, taking both slips and not even looking at them. ‘Class, this is Nikki Howard. She’s a new student who’ll be joining us for the rest of the semester. Nikki, grab an empty seat… I think there’s one over there… ’

He pointed to my old seat. Of course.

I went towards it, my head ducked, pretending I couldn’t hear all the whispers as I slid into my old seat. Christopher, I’d noticed when I’d risked a glance at him, was awake, for once.

And that wasn’t the only thing about him that had changed:

He’d cut his hair.

I didn’t mean to suddenly stagger to a standstill and stare at this guy who was supposed to be a stranger to me, but it was pretty hard not to, since I hadn’t — ever — seen Christopher with hair above his neck. Gone was the long blonde curtain that had swept past his shoulders for as long as I could remember — certainly since middle school, and all through high school. He now wore his hair in a cut indistinguishable from Whitney Robertson’s boyfriend, Jason Klein. In fact, if I’d just glanced in Christopher’s direction, I might even have mistaken him for Jason Klein, that’s how close the resemblance was now. There was nothing at all to tell him apart from the rest of the Walking Dead. He was even wearing what appeared to be a pale green polo shirt with his jeans.

What had happened? I know it must have been upsetting and all, watching me die (sort of) right in front of him, and going to my memorial service and all that.

But upsetting enough to have turned him preppy?

‘So, Nikki, just to get you up to speed,’ Mr Greer said, startling me from my full-on open-mouthed astonishment, ‘we’re doing five-minute persuasive arguments on a topic of the student’s choice. I won’t expect you to have anything ready for this week, but if you feel up to it you can try next week.’

‘OK,’ I said quickly, tearing my gaze from Christopher and sliding into my seat. I automatically flipped open my brand-new notebook — anything to take my mind off what had happened to Christopher — and stared blindly straight ahead.

But it was really hard to concentrate on what McKayla was saying. I couldn’t stop thinking about Christopher and his hair, even though, now that my back was to him, I couldn’t see him any more.

What had happened to him? Had the Walking Dead assimilated him, just like they had my little sister? How could this have happened in such a short time? I realize I’d been gone over a month, but still! How could he have cut his hair like that? He’d resisted the Commander for so long-

And then I died, and bang… resistance was suddenly futile? No! No, that was just so wrong!

Not that his haircut looked bad. Quite the opposite, actually. Even Frida would have to admit Christopher looked good. Really good. This was an alarming development I wished she’d warned me about. Supposing Christopher, now that he had this new look, was actually attracting female attention? I mean, besides mine.

No. It wasn’t possible. The only female attention Christopher had ever attracted before was mine, and he hadn’t even been aware of it (or at least, that I’d been female).

But he looked really, really good now. I mean, I always thought he looked good. But now everyone had to have noticed how good he looked. What if he was going out with someone? Oh, why hadn’t I thought to ask Frida what was going on with him, romantically? A lot can happen in a month — obviously. I mean, look at me. Talk about makeovers… I had a whole new body. Not to mention a new face, name, Social Security number…

As if the fact that I suspected my best friend might be cheating on me with other girls (only not really, because he never knew I’d liked him that way in the first place, plus, he thought I was dead) wasn’t bad enough, I kept getting the feeling that everyone in class was looking at me.

I was probably only being self-conscious.

But a quick glance up from the doodles I was making in my new notebook confirmed it: I wasn’t imagining things… everyone was staring at me. The minute I looked up, every head in the room swivelled quickly away from me… except, when I pretended to drop my pencil and swung down to pick it up and took a quick look in his direction, Christopher’s head.

Christopher’s gaze was fastened on to McKayla.

He hadn’t even noticed me! What was up with that? Why was he even awake anyway? He always slept through first period. Was Christopher going out with McKayla? No way. McKayla was head of TAHS’s business club. Business club. No way could he like her. All she could talk about was how after she graduated from Harvard, she was going to revolutionize Wall Street. Christopher couldn’t like her. He couldn’t possibly…

I could see I was going to make a lot of progress thinking in that direction.

Frustrated, I began doodling harder. I drew a tiny poodle, this one of Cosabella. Lulu had promised last night to look after her while I was in school all day. The poor thing had whined and yelped when she’d seen me leaving the loft without her. I didn’t know much about dogs, but this didn’t seem like the most stable behaviour. Had Nikki really taken her dog EVERYWHERE with her? Because Cosy certainly acted like it was a federal offence if she was left behind.

I was dreading the mess I’d find at home when I got back. I highly doubted Lulu was the most responsible dog-sitter. I was fairly certain there’d be some major carpet-scrubbing to do tonight.

Oh well. Nikki’s fingers needed limbering up anyway. They were basically useless. I couldn’t draw a thing with them… not even a measly poodle. What had Nikki Howard done with her hands all day anyway?

You can only put on so many layers of nail polish, right?

‘Psst.’

I looked over my shoulder, hoping Christopher was the one pssting me. Only he wasn’t. Whitney Robertson smiled at me.

Yeah. Whitney. Smiled. At me.

The next thing I knew, a folded-up piece of paper sailed in my direction. I caught it.

When I unfolded it, I realized it was a note.

A note from Whitney.

I didn’t know what to do. Whitney had never thrown me a note before. I saw her fellow Walking Dead member, Lindsey, twinkle her fingers at me. Like, hello! She was smiling, as well.

Instinctively, and before I could stop myself, I smiled back. Wait! What was I doing? Smiling at the Walking Dead?

Ducking my head so that Nikki’s hair fell down to hide my face, I looked at the note.

Hi! it said, in curlicue writing with a flower dotting the i. Welcome to TAHS! We’re so excited to have you here. I’m Whitney Robertson. I know you probably get this a lot, but seriously — I’myour biggest fan. I know a lot of people say that, but in my case, it’s really true. I’ve been an admirer of your work since you first started back in print ads.

Anyway, I know it must be weird for you, starting a new school and all. So I just wanted to say Hey! And if you have Period B lunch, there’s totally a place for you at our table! We’re by the salad bar. XXX000

Whitney

Then she put her cellphone number.

I stared at that note for a long time. A lot of different responses went through my head as I read and then reread it. I thought about crumpling it up and throwing it back in her face.

Then I thought about writing a response, and saying that I’d heard all about Whitney and how mean she’d always been, and that I wouldn’t sit with her and her friends at lunch if they were the last people on earth.

But I didn’t end up doing either of those things. Because — and I know this sounds bizarre — but I really didn’t think Nikki Howard would do either of those things.

Not that I was actually trying to BE Nikki Howard of course. At least, not at school.

But since I WAS her, I just… I don’t know. I just couldn’t see Nikki Howard — what I knew of her anyway — caring about what some twerpy girl like Whitney wrote to her in a note.

I guess that’s because, when I looked deep down within myself, I just couldn’t be bothered to care about Whitney any more, or her stupid oneupmanship. I had too many other problems.

Like that my best friend couldn’t even bring himself to make eye contact with me. Still, I knew if I didn’t acknowledge her note at all she’d feel slighted. And I didn’t need to make a new enemy my first day. Even if she wasn’t exactly a NEW enemy.

So I flipped my hair back, turned in my seat and smiled at her.