On my way to the cafeteria at noon, I saw something coming toward me that made me stop dead in my tracks. I stared for a second, transfixed, before I burst out laughing.

“Jamie, what the hell did you do to your head?” I gasped, holding my side.

I wasn’t the only one dumbfounded by Jamie, his pink floral button-up shirt, and his peacock-blue hair. A minor traffic jam sprang up around us as I sagged against a row of lockers, laughing too hard to stand. Last week must have been a tame one for Jamie Finn, Marmalade Terrorist’s singer, for then his hair had been black-and-blond and long enough to cover half his face.

“It’s much cuter now,” he said. He scrubbed his hand through his short hair, left some of it sticking up in spiky blue wavelets, and winked at a passing girl. “I checked. School rules say nothing about blue. Suits me, don’t you think?”

“It’s awful,” I told him. “The Dog is going to write that rule in, just for you.”

“Let him,” Jamie cackled, rubbing his hands together, his heavy silver rings clinking. “It’s for Saturday. We go on stage early. I think doors open at seven. You coming to see us?”

“Of course,” I sighed. However, if Jamie noticed my sudden lack of humor, he didn’t show it. He strutted down the stairs to the cafeteria, responding with a grin and a wave to every stare leveled at him, while I slouched along in his footsteps. At the bottom of the stairs, he slithered into a moonwalk so he could talk to me, dragging the stares with him. Including mine. One of his Converse low tops was pink, the other teal.

“Dude, are you gay?” I asked.

“Not a chance,” Jamie said, his eyes innocently wide. He cupped his hands. “I like boobies. Besides, you and your depressingly black clothes don’t make you goth.”

“I like black,” I sighed.

“I know, man. I’m just saying.”

He had a point. In fact, Jamie’s obnoxious taste in dress gave him a great stage presence. Me, I was happy hiding at the edges of things. Artists aren’t necessarily performers. I don’t think I could have worn anything pink, or gotten up on a stage, if my life depended on it.

“So, are you and Leah a thing now?”

I fumbled my lunch tray, but saved everything except the fork, which clattered to the floor and spun under the salad bar. “What?”

Jamie raised his eyebrows. “I heard there’d been a little somethin’-somethin’ going on between you two this morning.”

“No, that wasn’t –” I stopped, flustered. Tried again. “That was –”

“Leah,” Jamie finished for me, nodding. The way he said her name made it sound like the reason for all the world’s problems, though he said it without malice. “She has no idea, does she?”

“No,” I said miserably. I hadn’t realized both Jude and Jamie had figured me out. But unlike Jude, Jamie didn’t shout.

“Tell her,” he suggested as he handed his lunch card to the cashier, a pretty student volunteer. She swiped the card, returned it, and grabbed mine without a second look at Jamie’s peacock hair. He pouted.

The cash register gave a loud, indignant beep when the cashier swiped my card, which spared me the necessity of responding about Leah. In an attitude of supreme boredom, the girl tilted her head to look at the display, then tilted it the other way to look at me. Limp-wristed, she held out my card and drawled, “This thing’s empty.”

Well, shit.

“Do you want to recharge it, or what?” she asked, flipping her hair over her shoulder. “You’re holding up the line.”

“No, I can’t,” I muttered, thinking fast. As hungry as I was, I didn’t want to put the food back, but I only had a few coins in my pocket. My mind flew to my backpack; I couldn’t remember having stashed any money there.

The girl opened her mouth again, but a card materialized in front of her nose and she started.

“Could you use this one, darling?” Jude asked, his accent clearer than I had heard it in a long time. Since he’d come to the States six years ago with his father, his British inflections had faded. He would never sound fully American, but he came close.

Besides that, what did he think he was doing?

“I don’t want your help,” I said loudly.

Jamie, as if startled by the venom in my voice, froze with his pink foot raised mid-step. He looked like a deranged flamingo.

“It’s Leah’s,” Jude responded, shoving his hands in his pockets as the girl grudgingly swiped the card. “Quote, ‘He’s too skinny as it is, so make sure he eats.’ She gave it to me as the eleven o’clock crowd left.”

He took the card back, oblivious to the admiring glance the cashier tossed at him. “I’m sitting over here.”

Then, as if nothing had happened, he walked away. Truce, again. He still wasn’t happy, but at least he wasn’t going to take it out on me anymore. I followed.

“It’s noisy in here,” Jamie said, swinging his leg over a bench across from Jude. He picked up a roll and stuffed half of it in his mouth. “Must be the rain keeping everyone in.”

I copied him, but didn’t try to talk with my mouth full. How Leah knew I’d maxed out my lunch card was beyond me. The rain streamed down the cafeteria windows in gray and silver sheets. Every table in the cafeteria swarmed with laughing, shouting, studying students, and I saw other seniors who, like us, chose not to leave campus for a McDonald’s burger in favor of staying dry.

Jamie nudged me. “Did you bring the designs? Mikey said we could have new swag by show after next if you have them. He really liked the original logo you did for us.”

“Oh, yeah. My portfolio is in my bag.” I nodded at my backpack, resting on the floor between us. With the events of the morning, I had almost forgotten about the job. Mikey (Marmalade Terrorist’s manager) had agreed to pay me for further band artwork.

Jamie hooked a strap of my bag around his ankle and hitched it closer. Jude leaned across the table interestedly as Jamie produced a black Itoya folio.

“You can take the book with you,” I said. “I sketched out all four designs that you guys asked for, t-shirt and hoodie versions. There are two that I converted into baby doll tees, too, for the girls.”

Slurping his soup on purpose to annoy the cheerleaders sitting next to us, Jamie shoved the folio at Jude one-handed and continued to paw through my bag, but Jude grinned at me. “This is great, K. I’ll put these up on Marmalade’s MySpace after school. You wanna come over and help?”

“Sure,” I said, absently opening a bag of chips. I didn’t have to be to work until four, which would give me a chance to use Jude’s dad’s computer to check DrunkDuck for new comments on my comic. I could walk to the coffee shop from Jude’s place in five minutes.

Jamie suddenly pulled a crumpled piece of paper out of my backpack and waved it at me.

“What’s this?”

I spoke around my fork. “ACTs are this weekend.”

“Yeah, I know,” he said, raising his eyebrows – which weren’t, thankfully, blue. “I’m taking it on Sunday. Twitch and Rohit aren’t taking them because they’re juniors. Are you going to?”

“I wasn’t, but . . .” I trailed off, staring at the paper, and then shrugged. “Yeah, sure. Why not?” Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if Jamie was there, too.

The bell rang, accompanied by the immediate shrieks and groans of benches shoved across linoleum, and the cacophony of a hundred people rising, packing up their things, talking, laughing, yelling.

“See you Saturday!” Jamie hollered, his pink shirt clearly visible as he sprinted out of the cafeteria.

I chuckled. “As if he won’t see us every day this week.”

“He’s an idiot,” Jude said with a shrug. He tucked a loose strand of hair behind his ear and swung his bag over his shoulder.

“Hey, Jude –”

He stopped, looking at me questioningly.

“Thanks,” I said at last, gesturing at my empty lunch tray.

Agate eyes studied me, and then Jude’s lightning-quick grin flashed. “Make sure she comes,” he said.

“Yeah,” I sighed. How had I gotten into this mess? “Sure.”

Reviewer Shout Out! My thanks go to TheDarkScribe and Narq. This week, my shout-out goes to:

"This Tainted Magic" by Rockstar with a Vendetta ~ A camp follower is the lone survivor of a violent skirmish with centaurs. Mistaken for a boy, she is unwittingly thrown into war and must use her forbidden and uncontrollable magic to protect both her prince and herself from powerful, traitorous mages.

Go read it and review it!