"That doesn't sound like much fun."
"Not really." My voice cracked a bit, related to the acid on my head. "But once I realized I wasn't going to have any friends, the pressure was off, you know?"
She sighed. "I do know."
"So it got kind of interesting. Back in Minnesota we had maybe four basic cliques: ropers, jocks, freaks, and socials. But suddenly I was in this school with eighty-seven different tribes. I realized that there was this massive communication system all around me, a billion coded messages being sent every day with clothes, hair, music, slang. I started watching, trying to break the code."
I blinked and took a breath. My head was melting.
"Go on."
I tried to shrug, which reorganized the pain in new and interesting ways. "After a year of watching, I went on to high school, where I got to reinvent myself."
She was silent for a moment. I hadn't meant to get into quite so much detail and wondered if the acid was seeping into my brain, making it porous.
"Wow." She took one of my hands. "Sounds horrible."
"Yeah, it sucked."
"But that's how you got into cool hunting, isn't it?"
I nodded, which sent a second little trail of acid down my back. My scalp was sweating now, trickles slow and incendiary, like flowing lava, as seen on a certain cable channel associated with wildlife, experimental aircraft, and volcanoes. I forced my mind away from the image.
"I started taking pictures on the street, trying to figure out what was cool and what wasn't and why. I got a little obsessive, which happens sometimes, and started writing commentary. Then that turned into a blog. And about three years ago Mandy saw my site and sent me an e-maiclass="underline" 'The client needs you. "
"Huh. Happy ending."
I tried to agree, but at that moment the only happy ending would have been my head in a bucket of milk. A bathtub of milk. A swimming pool of ice cream.
"I guess that's why your bangs are so long," Jen said.
"What?"
"I've been wondering about your hair. It seemed kind of weird that you were this cool hunter, but you had those bangs hiding your face." She reached across and flicked away a trickle of lava from my forehead just before it dribbled into my left eye. "But now I get it. When you moved here from Minnesota, you lost all your confidence. You had to hide for a while. So it makes sense: You're still hiding some of yourself."
I cleared my throat. "You think my bangs lack confidence?"
"I think maybe you're still scared that you might lose your cool again."
I felt my face flush. The kitchen felt hot and small and crowded. I couldn't tell how much was annoyance, how much was embarrassment, and how much was the acid on my head. I wanted to reach up and tear my scalp off, to scratch the giant mosquito bite that was my brain. The bleach was definitely leaking through.
Jen smiled and leaned forward until her face was inches away. She pursed her lips, and I thought for a crazy second that she was going to kiss me. My anger dissolved into surprise.
But instead she blew lightly, a delicate wind that cooled my damp face, sending a shudder through me.
"Don't worry," she said softly. "I'm going to fix all that. Those bangs are doomed."
I couldn't stay that close, so I laughed and turned away.
She waited until I turned back. "I know how it feels, Hunter. I lost my cool too."
"Not really, though. They just didn't get you."
"No, really. No matter what I did over there, I couldn't crack the code. All those girls in my eighth-grade class probably still think I'm some loser who writes poetry."
"Oh! Body blow," I said, trying to smile. But the memory of my first year in the city wasn't done with me yet. It was always there, a cold lump of clay in my stomach. I remembered the lump growing heavier every step of the way to school. Recalling that awful loneliness had invited it into me again, as if it belonged inside me.
I took a breath and willed myself into the present, where I was cool. Well, burning up actually and hunted by implacable foes and without my cell phone. But cool, right?
"I always thought aluminum foil on your head was supposed to prevent mind reading," I said.
Jen grinned, but only for a moment. "It's not mind reading. Like you said, it's all about reading codes. I just read a different set than you."
"You mean you use your powers for good?"
"Instead of helping giant shoe corporations? Maybe." She stood and dropped a washcloth into the mixing bowl of milk and lifted it, dripping, into the air before my wide eyes. She carried it behind me. "See what you think of my powers after this."
I felt the aluminum foil whisked away, and a cool and sovereign mass descended upon my head, transforming the burning acid into something benign, finally ending my agony.
"Oh…," I groaned.
There were still a few trickles of acid coursing down my neck and flickers of annoyance from being read like a book. It was much better when I was the one reading the codes. Everybody hates old pictures of themselves.
But when I looked in the bathroom mirror, I liked the result.
No pain, no gain.
Chapter 14
I OPENED THE DOOR TO MY PARENTS' APARTMENT NERVOUSLY.
How was I nervous? Let me count the ways. There was the two thousand dollars' worth of clothing on the hangers in my hand—one false move and I wouldn't be getting a refund. There was the mysterious anti-client pursuing me, who might already have this address. And there was my head, which was an entirely new color. Every reflective surface between Jen's apartment and mine had brought me up short. The peroxide stranger stared back at me all the way home, as perplexed as I was by the situation.
"Hello?" I called.
And of course there were my parents, who were going to freak when they saw my hair cropped and dyed. Not that they'd mind—they might even like it—but they were going to ask a lot of questions. And when they found out that Jen-the-new-girl had done it…
I shuddered.
"Hello?"
No answer. No sounds except passing sirens, water running through the pipes, and the ambient buzz of the neighbors' air-conditioning. I closed the door, deciding I was probably safe. My parents' apartment building is more than a century old. Made of stone, it's cool even in summer and always feels secure.
Besides, there's a reason why slasher movies are always set in suburbia or out in the country. New York City dwellings have hardwood doors with metal jackets and dead-bolt locks and bars on the window. You pretty much notice if someone has broken in. Checking under the bed is not required.
I checked the time. It was two hours before I was supposed to arrive at the party. Jen was showing up earlier, separately, to help maintain our anonymity. She hadn't even told me what her disguise was going to be. I had a feeling she didn't know yet.
I hung the clothes in my room, then went to the bathroom and took another long look at myself, watching in amazement as the peroxide stranger mirrored every movement.
As I said, most Logo Exiles cut their own hair, but that's not a skill that always translates to cutting someone else's. Jen had done a good job on me, though. The cut was short and severe, and the acid had left my hair almost white. My still-black eyebrows stood out in lone contrast against my skin, exaggerating every expression. I looked a little like a gangster in a too-hip French movie, but definitely a self-assured one. Maybe Jen was right, and I had been hiding behind my bangs.
Strange. With my entire face at long last showing, I was in disguise, marveling at the sense of dislocation as I played mirror mime with the peroxide stranger. If I didn't recognize me, why should anyone else?