Morganville (Justin Bieber)

Chapter 6

I watched the clock - some old-style wall clock, with hands - crawl slowly up to, and last, eleven o'clock. Professor Hamms is starting the lecture, I thought, and felt a nauseating twist in my stomach. This was the second way in a row I had missed school. In my whole life I had never missed two days of school back-to-back. Sure, I read the text book already - twice - but lectures were important. That was how you found out the good stuff, especially in classes like physics, where they did practical demonstrations. Lectures were the fun part.

It was Thursday. That meant I had a lab class later, too. You couldn't make up lab class, no matter how could your excuse.

I sighed, forced myself to look away from the time, and opened up my calc II book - I had tested out of calc I, could of test out of calc II, but I thought maybe I might learn something new about solving linear inequalities, which had always been a problem for me.

"What the hell are you doing?" Justin. He was on the stairs, staring at me. I hadn't heard him coming, but that was probably because he was barefoot. His hair was a mess, too. Maybe he'd been asleep.

"Studying" I said. Flipping to the next page.

"Huh" he said. Like he'd never actually seen it done before. "Interesting" he vaulted over the railing three steps from the bottom and flopped down on the leather couch next to me, flicking the TV on with the remote next to him, then changing inputs. "This going to bother you?"

"No" I said politely. It was a lie, but I wasn't white ready to be, you know, blunt: it was my first day.

"Great. Want to take a break?" He asked.

"A break?" I frowned.

"That's when you stop studying-" he titled his head to the side to look at the book. "Okay, whatever the hell that is, and actually do something fun. It's a custom where I come from." He dumped something in the centre of my open book with a plastic thump. I flinched and picked up the wireless game controller with two fingers.

"Oh come on you can't tell me you've never played a video game" Justin laughed.

Truthfully, I had, once. I didn't like it that much, he must of read my expression because he shook his head.

"This is just sad. Now you have to take a break. Okay, you've got a choice horror, action, driving or war" Justin said seriously.

"Those are my choices?" I blurted out.

He looked offended. "What, you want girl games? Not in my house. Never mind, I'll pick for you. Here. First person shooter" he yanked a box from a stack next to the couch and loaded a disk into the machine. "Easy. All you have to do is pull the trigger. Trust me. Nothing like a little virtual violence to make you feel better"

"You're crazy" I shook my head.

"Hey, prove me wrong. Unless you think you can't" He didn't look at me as he said it, but I felt it sting anyway. "Maybe you're just not up to it"

I shut my Calc II book, picked up the controller, and watched colourful graphics load onto the screen. "Show me what to do" I ask.

He smiled slowly. "Point. Shoot. Try not to get in my way"

He was right. I had always thought it was kind of creepy, hanging out in front of a tv, killing virtual monsters, but damn it wasn't. It was fun. Before too long I was flinching when things lunged out from corners of the screen, and whooping just like Justin when some monster got put down for the count.

When it ended for me, he screen suddenly showed a snarling zombie face and red splashes of blood, I felt it like an ice cube down my back.

"Oops" Justin said, and kept on firing. "Sorry. Some days you're the zombie, some days you're the meal. Good try, kiddo"