"I'm talking about love," I said coyly.
The whole crowd laughed. I had a weapon that was better than any two-hundred-dollar racket: humiliation. To accuse a soccer snob of being attracted to a Gothic girl was one thing, but to use this mushy gushy word in front of a sixteen-year-old macho guy was sure to bring the house down.
"You're really freaking out!" he shouted.
"Don't be so embarrassed. It's rather cute, really," I said smugly and smiled at the goalie. "Trevor Mitchell loves me. Trevor Mitchell loves me!" I sang.
Trevor didn't know what to say.
"You're on drugs, girl," Trevor declared. "Lame comeback, Trevor." I looked at all his smiling soccer snob friends and then glared at him. "It was so obvious the way you felt, I should have known all along." Then I said in my loudest voice, "Trevor Mitchell, you're in love with me."
"Right, you clown! Like I have a poster of you on my bedroom wall. You're nothing but a skank."
The skank bit hurt, but I let the pain fuel me for the next round.
"You didn't go to Oakley Woods with a poster. You didn't dress up like a vampire to impress a poster. And you didn't hide my dad's racket so you could gain the attention of a raging poster!"
The soccer guys must have been impressed by my argument, because they didn't attack me or defend Trevor, but instead waited to see what would happen next. "None of your friends here give me the time of day," I went on. "It's 'cause they don't care about me, but you care. You care like crazy. You're telling me the time every day."
"You're crazy! You're nothing but a drugged-up, freaked-out loser girl, and that's all you'll ever be."
Trevor looked at Matt, who only smiled awkwardly and shrugged his shoulders. There were snickers from his other mates and whispered words I couldn't hear.
"You want me so bad," I shouted in his face. "And you can't have me!"
He came at me, everything swinging, and it was a good thing I had my dad's tennis racket to defend myself against his punches. There must have been something pitiful about a furious jock trying to attack a girl, or maybe Trevor's gang of soccer dudes secretly enjoyed seeing him humiliated, because they pulled him back and Matt, along with the goalie, stepped in front of me like a handsome barricade.
Just then Mr. Harris blew his whistle for practice. There was no time for thank-yous to Matt and the others or "Gee, this has been fun--we'll have to do it again some time." I ran back up the hill triumphantly. I couldn't wait to tell Becky.
Did I really believe Trevor was in love with me? No. It seemed as unlikely as the existence of vampires. Mr. Popular loves Ms. Unpopular. But I had made a good case, and the important thing was, everyone had bought it.
I was finally free.
Chapter 13 A Girl Obsessed
Suddenly other Dullsvillians reported Gothic Guy sightings.
"He's really great looking, but a major weird-fest must be going on in that haunted house!" Monica Havers whispered to Josie Kendle in algebra class.
"He actually came out of his dungeon?"
"Yeah, and Trevor Mitchell spotted him coming out of the cemetery at night and said he had blood dripping from his mouth. And when Trevor drove closer, he suddenly disappeared!"
"Really? Hey, you're hanging out with Trevor again?"
"No way! Everyone knows he's in love with that Raven girl. But get this. I saw that ghost guy at the movies last Friday. Alone. Who goes to a movie by himself?"
"Only a loony loser crazy person," Josie said. "Exactly!"
I rolled my eyes in total disgust.
Then after dinner I was at the 7-Eleven with Becky, picking up soda for my mom, when I noticed a tabloid headline that read, "I Gave Birth to a Two-Headed Vampire Baby."
"Well, it must be true then!" I joked. "Vampires do exist. I read it in the National Liar?"
Becky and I giggled like little girls.
I turned around and there was Gothic Guy standing right in back of me, staring at the candy bars below the counter.
He was wearing Ray Bans, like a ghostly rock star, and was holding a pack of candles.
"Aren't you the guy--" I whispered breathlessly, as if I had spotted a celebrity.
"Next," the clerk said, summoning him to the counter.
He didn't even notice me. I followed him closely but was edged out by a red-haired fitness queen and her tanning bed-addicted friend buying celebrity mags and bottles of imported water.
Gothic Guy took his bag and left the store, lifting his sunglasses as soon as he stepped into the dusk.
The two women leered at him like they had just seen a walking zombie.
"That reminds me, Phyllis," the fitness queen whispered. "I saw that kid at Carlson's Book Store. He's so pale! Hasn't he ever heard of the sun? At least he could use some fake tanning cream. He needs a makeover bad!"
"Did you notice what he was reading?" "Oh, yes," she recalled. "It was a book on Benson Hill Cemetery!"
"I'll have to tell Natalie Mitchell. She's convinced they're vampires!"
"Maybe we'll see the Sterlings in the tabloids next week: 'Vampire Teen Plays Baseball with Real Bats.'" And they giggled like me and Becky had before. "Hurry!" I said, impatiently. By the time Becky and I raced into the parking lot he was gone.
The gossip continued at our dinner table.
"John Garver at the courthouse told me that the Sterlings didn't buy the Mansion, but they inherited it," my dad said.
"Jimmy Fields said he heard they don't eat real food, but bugs and twigs," Nerd Boy added, like only a nerd would.
"What's the matter with you guys?" I shouted. "They're just different--they aren't breaking any laws!"
"I'm sure they aren't, Raven," my mom agreed. "But at the very least, they are strange. Their clothes are bizarre."
They all looked at me--at my black lipstick, black nail polish, blackened hair, black spandex dress, and clunky black plastic bracelets.
"Well, I dress bizarre, too. Do you think I'm strange?"
"Yes," they said in unison.
We all had a good laugh at that one, even me. But deep down, I felt sad because I knew they really weren't kidding, and I could tell they felt sad, too, for the very same reason. The sun had fallen from the sky and the moon was smiling over Becky and me. I was ready for the infiltration in camouflage night gear. I was wearing matte black lipstick instead of gloss, black turtleneck, black jeans, and a tiny black backpack with a flashlight and disposable camera. Mr. and Mrs. Sterling were in Europe. Their Mercedes was not in sight. Creepy Man must have gone to the store, and if he pushed his shopping cart as slowly as he drove, I'd have plenty of time.