“This is kind of creepy, you know that right?” Siobhan asked, as she, Jesse, and Noah stood in the parking lot after school, waiting for Alicia to get out of cheer practice.

  “That’s why you’re here,” Noah said as he leaned against the brick outer wall of the school building. “It’s way less creepy than just two guys staking out the cheerleaders’ locker room.”

  “That, and she’ll probably be more inclined to talk to you than us,” Jesse pointed out.

  “I doubt it,” she said, but she didn’t argue any further.

  It took a while but eventually practice ended and the cheerleaders flooded out of the building after having changed out of their uniforms. A few of them glanced their way, but most ignored them and chatted to each other. Alicia was among the last to leave, attention fixed on her phone as she walked.

  “Alicia,” Jesse tried.

  She kept walking, having not heard him. That is, until Noah went up and snapped his fingers underneath her nose.

  “Hey-” Annoyance briefly flashed on her face before morphing into confusion. “Oh, what are you guys doing here?”

  “We needed to talk to you-” Jesse began.

  “Alicia, are you coming or not?” One of the other cheerleaders called out.

  A group of them stood, waiting for Alicia to join them. They threw suspicious looks over at them and for some reason Jesse felt self-conscious under their gaze. He wasn’t used to attention being directed at him, and especially not by popular girls.

  Alicia turned and was about to walk away when he gathered up the courage to say, “It’s about the monsters.”

  He said it in a low voice so only she could hear, and though he couldn’t see her expression, he didn’t miss how she tensed at the word monsters.

  “Just give me a sec,” Alicia told the other cheerleaders. “I’ll catch up with you later.”

  They looked miffed at being ditched in favor of a group of relative nobodies, casting a once-over at them before leaving in a huff.

  “So, what is this about?” she asked, turning to face them, expression unreadable. This was the first time Jesse had really seen her since Halloween, not just from across the cafeteria or with her back to him in class, and he had to take in just how different she looked without her costume. She was almost unrecognizable outside of her cheer uniform and zombie makeup, now wearing comfortable, casual clothes, though her long black hair was still pulled into a high ponytail. The grotesque wounds were gone, revealing warm brown skin that was a few shades lighter than his own, and her natural-looking makeup now focused on accentuating her features instead of trying to make her look scary. A small part of him though that Kevin was right, she just might be the prettiest girl in school.

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  “We went back to Gravewood to talk to Bella,” Siobhan started, and gave her the short version of their trip to the neighborhood and everything they learned there.

  When she was done, Alicia didn’t look surprised. “Yeah, I already knew that.”

  Jesse blinked. “You did?”

  She shrugged. “Well, it wasn't hard to figure out that the potion didn't make us stop seeing monsters.”

  “And you didn't think to let us know?” Siobhan asked.

  Alicia looked caught off guard by the sharpness in Siobhan’s tone, and even Jesse winced.

  “I thought you guys would have realized it too,” she said. “Besides, I just wanted to forget everything that happened that night and get back to my normal life.”

  “Ouch,” Noah grumbled.

  She quickly backtracked. “No, I didn't mean it like that-”

  “No, I get it.” Siobhan crossed her arms. “You want to just forget everything we went through together. Ignore the reality around you.”

  Alicia’s expression hardened. “I'm not ignoring reality, I'm just being practical.”

  “Right, and I guess we're not practical.”

  “Well, I'm not like you!” she snapped. “I'm not a freak that embraces this sort of stuff.”

  The scowl on Siobhan’s face deepened. “I can't believe I thought you were different. You're just like my sister.”

  Even though the two girls were focused on each other, Alicia’s words cut deep for Jesse as well. It’s not like he couldn’t understand what she was feeling; heck, he’d been trying to do the exact same thing. But at the same time, that night hadn’t been completely terrible for her, had it? The more he thought about it, the more he realized that there had been some parts of that whole ordeal where he had actually enjoyed himself.

  “Come on,” Noah turned to leave. “We delivered our message. The princess can do whatever she wants now.”

  The two of them stomped out of the parking lot.

  “Jesse, wait,” Alicia stopped him before he could follow them. For a split second he thought she was going to apologize, but then she asked, “Are you coming to the pep rally on Friday?”

  “Wasn't planning on it,” he told her honestly. He always forgot about pep rallies until the day they happened. Sports just weren’t that high up on his list of priorities, especially with everything else going on.

  “You should. It'll be good for you, help you forget about all that supernatural stuff.”

  “I dunno...”

  “Well, think about it at least,” she insisted. “And try to convince them to come with you.”

  But Jesse wasn’t so sure his life could ever be normal again.