Everyone in this story is 18 or older.
I
Jenny stopped short at the sound of Tara's voice, ready for the inevitable taunts, the insults, the mockery. Even though they'd been weirdly nice the past several days. Jenny didn't trust them, didn't trust their new nice-girl image the two of them conjured up, Tara and Kristin. She knew that Emily had started talking to Tara. She knew that Emily had gone to Tara's house last night, but her friend didn't say much about it today.
She seemed different.
For one thing, she didn't bother to wear a bra today, and most of the boys in school fell over each other trying to catch a glimpse of her hard nipples protruding through her blouse fabric. Even the male teachers couldn't stop looking. The female teachers noticed, of course, but they didn't say anything. They just looked uncomfortable. Or lecherous.
Which Jenny also thought extremely weird.
Later that day, she caught Kristin and Tara practically pinning a flushed Emily against her locker, but when Jenny looked more closely at her friend, she realized Emily seemed excited about something. Even a little.
Turned on.
Stop it.
Stop thinking that way, Jenny.
You're a good girl.
And so is Emily.
Even as she scolded herself, she had watched Emily walk out the door, Kristin and Tara on either side of her, their arms around her waist. Then she had seen Tara's hand drift down to cup Emily's butt. Emily jerked away, looked up at Tara, and giggled.
Tara's hand went back to Emily's ass, and Emily didn't move it away.
Now, today, Emily acted completely different.
She ignored Jenny. She ignored Jefferson.
She clung to both Kristin and Tara.
Her clothes were barely acceptable for school, dark fishnet hose under a tight plaid skirt, thin pink blouse, unbuttoned to show her cleavage.
Without a bra.
Jenny barely recognized her face in the heavy mascara and eyeshadow she wore, and Emily's lips gleamed a brilliant and glossy red.
Once, bursting through the restroom door, Jenny bumped into Kristin and Emily in an embrace. Kristin let go of Emily, but Jenny could have sworn that they had been kissing. Emily's face was flushed, and her hair tangled.
She looked happy, a grin was fixed on her face, and her eyes were red and narrow. Jenny noticed that her perennial cross was missing.
In its place she wore a tight, lace collar, red.
And a delicate silver heart on a delicate silver chain.
Kristin smiled at Jenny.
"Hey, Jenny, are you coming to Tara's tomorrow tonight? She's going to have some of us over to watch movies."
Jenny ignored her.
"Hey, Emily," she said, "I need to talk to you. Is anything wrong?"
But Emily was already following Kristin out the door, her hand in Kristin's hand as the other girl led her.
The restroom stank of air freshener and something else Jenny couldn't identify. Something rank, acrid, and bittersweet.
***
Jenny didn't see either Kristin, Tara, or Emily the next day.
Then, just before school ended, Tara showed up and confronted her in the hall, close to her locker.
"Hey, cutie," she said.
Jenny stiffened. Then she pulled her history book from her locker before turning around to face Tara.
"What do you want, Tara? Where's Emily? Where've you been today?"
Tara didn't seem to mind Jenny's rudeness.
She shrugged.
"Around. You can skip classes every now and then, you know."
Jenny felt embarrassed, stuck-up, and a little self-righteous. She hated feeling that way, sometimes. But around people like Tara, she just couldn't help it.
She was such a slut.
She and Kristin both.
And now they were messing with Emily.
Getting her to skip school.
How bad was it going to get?
Jenny quickly looked away from Tara's intense green eyes. She looked down, catching the movement of Tara's left hand.
She was pulling at her necklace, fingering a green pendant between her thumb and index finger, and when Jenny looked more closely, she saw it was shaped like a green bird in flight, a green dove perhaps.
It was so delicate and pretty, and the green shimmered and sparkled.
Jenny stared at the bird moving between Tara's breasts, held up by her slender fingers, without blinking or marking the passage of time. The greens wings beat slowly in the small cage of Tara's hand. The green bird seemed to flutter or float between the hills of Tara's bust, and its eyes glittered gold, like fire. Suddenly Tara's voice broke into her head, swimming with thoughts of the bird.
"So, you're going to come, then? You're going to come tonight? Emily will be there. She'll come, too."
Jenny nodded, her mind almost a perfect blank.
Still, she found the words to say, "Uh-huh. I'm coming. I'll come tonight."
Tara dropped her bird, which landed against her tight blouse, tight green cotton under which her breasts swayed full, ripe pears ready to be tasted.
Jenny's mouth felt dry.
So dry.
"Good," Tara said. "I can't wait to see you there!"
Jenny turned to leave.
"Just a second, cutie pie. I have something for you. Just a little present to say I'm sorry for all the mean things I've said about you."
Tara held out a small red box.
"Maybe you can wear it tonight?"
Jenny took the small box. Her face felt warm, flushed.
For some reason she was blushing, and she hardly murmured a thank you before trotting down the hallway to her mother's car waiting in the parking lot.
II
Jenny studied herself in the mirror.
Her long, oval face with its wide flat cheekbones and long, straight nose, slightly upturned at the end, seemed so plain in comparison with Emily's face.
Or with Kristin.
Or Tara.
The mirror fogged up again, and she wiped the glass with a small towel hanging on a chrome ring attached to the wall. Her hair was wrapped in a large blue towel, and another towel wrapped around her body, just above her modest breasts, not nearly so pronounced as Tara's bosom.