Bad Hair Day, page 1
part #2 of Kate Grable Series
ALSO BY CARRIE HARRIS
BAD
TASTE
in BOYS
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2012 by Carrie Harris
Jacket photograph copyright © 2012 by Ashley Lebedev/Trevillion Images All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
Delacorte Press is a registered trademark and the colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
randomhouse.com/teens
Educators and librarians, for a variety of teaching tools, visit us at RHTeachersLibrarians.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Harris, Carrie.
Bad hair day / Carrie Harris. —1st ed.
p. cm.
Summary: Future physician Kate Grable is thrilled to shadow the county medical examiner, but when he is arrested for murder and Kate is left to run the morgue, she discovers that something is killing students—something very hairy and strong.
eISBN: 978-0-307-97419-8
[1. Werewolves—Fiction. 2. Murder—Fiction. 3. Forensic sciences—Fiction. 4. High schools—Fiction. 5. Schools—Fiction. 6. Horror stories.] I. Title.
PZ7.H241228Bab 2012
[Fic]—dc23
2011037078
Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.
v3.1_r1
TO CONNOR, LILY, AND RENEE.
YOU (AND YOUR HAIR) INSPIRE ME.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Most days, I can’t believe my luck. So when I sat down to write these acknowledgments, the first thing that came to mind was something along the lines of “THANK YOU TO EVERYBODY I’VE EVER MET! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!” Only in my head, it’s skywritten in sparkly bubble letters. Because everyone knows sparkles make everything better.
But there are some people in particular I really do need to thank. My family: Andy, Connor, Lily, and Renee. Very few people would put up with my requests to jump off trains with me, or chop watermelons with katanas, or put sugar on your lips and mug for the camera. I think it’s pretty awesome to be part of a family where “weird” is the highest compliment. You make me so deliriously happy. Thank you for making me excited to wake up every day, even if I’m grumpy at first!
My writing partners—Kiki Hamilton, Keri Mikulski, Ellen Oh, Laura Riken, Kiersten White, and Natalie Whipple—are made of the sauce of awesome. And I owe a special debt of gratitude to the members of Class of 2k11 for being my lifeboat in 2011.
Kate Schafer Testerman and Wendy Loggia, you two are rock stars! I feel so honored to know you, let alone work with you. And the rest of the crew at Delacorte Press? You are crazy geniuses, plain and simple.
A special shout-out goes to the shambling hordes online who send my silly videos, tweet with me about stuff that makes me wonder about our collective sanity, and zombify themselves to give me a laugh. Honestly? Hearing from you is one of the best parts of this whole author gig.
Contents
Cover
Other Books by This Author
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
About the Author
“Braaaaains!”
After all the zombie attacks, even the word made me twitchy. Especially when repeatedly moaned by an annoying freshman in the school bus loop at eight a.m. As if I wasn’t annoyed enough already—I’d gotten to school early because the Future Doctors of America program started today. According to plan, we should have been bouncing across the railroad tracks on Washington Ave. right about now. But instead, I stood in the gray winter slush with my fellow FDA students, watching the underclassmen arrive for school and scanning the loop in vain for the bus. It was fourteen and a half minutes late. The program would be starting without me; watching people act like complete morons only added insult to injury.
The freshman elbowed his buddies before putting his backpack on his head and staggering around with his arms outstretched. They laughed so hard I thought they’d burst something. Some people thought the zombie virus was hilarious. Obviously, they hadn’t seen the victims; my boyfriend’s best friend was still in assisted living. Brain damage. So I didn’t think it was all that funny when zombie boy staggered over and accidentally grabbed my breasts, one in each hand. And when I say accidentally, I really mean on purpose.
I knocked his hands off my chest, grabbed him by one backpack strap, and yanked him close enough to talk right in his ear. Or right in his backpack, anyway.
“Listen up, dork,” I said in the most pleasant voice possible, which wasn’t very pleasant at all. “I don’t have the time or the masochistic tendencies necessary to deal with you. So how about you keep out of my way, and I’ll pay you the same courtesy?”
He dumped the backpack on the ground and pushed me off. For a moment, I thought maybe he’d back down, but then his so-called friends started in on him.
“Uh-oh, Damian. I think you pissed her off!” crowed one.
“Look out! She’s gonna stake you!” added another.
“That’s for vampires, you morons,” I muttered, turning away. Not my smartest move. Damian-the-freshman didn’t like being taunted, so he shoved me to save face. It didn’t hurt or anything; I’m tougher than I look. But my backpack spilled all over the ground, and that ticked me off.
I’d never hit anybody before, but this was really the last straw. He was lucky someone interceded before I could swing.
“Hey, calm down.”
Trey Black stepped in front of me. He was a recent transfer from Southern California. Why anyone would want to trade that kind of weather for Ohio winters was beyond me. But here he was, and apparently he’d designated himself the sworn protector of freshman idiocy. I needed to get him together with my brother, Jonah. Jonah was the poster child for freshman idiocy.
I let out a long breath in a vain attempt to calm myself as I bent down to pick up my stuff. Trey had this knack for making me uncomfortable. He had tousled blond hair and surfer-boy good looks, and I wasn’t totally immune to that. But I had a boyfriend, and they were friends, so it felt really wrong when he acted flirty. Or looked at me. Or stood within fifteen feet of me. The fact that he flirted with anything in a skirt didn’t make it any easier to deal with.
“You okay?” He bent down beside me to pluck my calculus book from a mound of dirt-speckled snow. “You look pretty upset.”
“Yeah.” I glared at Damian, who flipped me off before heading to class with his friends. “Just a little stressed.”
“What’s wrong?”
He handed me the book with one of his patented charming smiles, his fingers grazing mine. A girl getting off the bus across from us took one look at him and nearly fainted. I tried to act like the “accidental” caress was no big deal, but I could feel the embarrassed heat in my cheeks. I started stuffing the books into my backpack. The worst part about it all was that he had never crossed the line, so I couldn’t be sure if I was overreacting.
“Just crazy busy this week,” I babbled. “I was up until almost midnight working on my slave-trade paper for American history, and I’ve got a huge pile of FDA makeup work, and I’m still not done with all the Rockathon prep, and my mom’s coming back from Germany this week. After it’s all over, I think I might go into hibernation.”
“Well, if you need any help …” He sidled closer to me. There was no way for me to stand up without getting within kissing distance. My legs started shaking from being crouched over too long, but the only choices were standing and giving Trey the wrong impression or plopping butt-first into half-melted bus slop.
I would have been stuck there forever if Aaron hadn’t walked over. But the minute he did, Trey backed off. Aaron Kingsman—my boyfriend—was smart, sweet, and salivatingly gorgeous, not that I was biased or anything. He was also the quarterback of our football team. I tried not to hold that against him. In return, he tried to pretend I wasn’t a semi-reformed nerd. I couldn’t decide which one of us had the more difficult task.
Trey’s face broke out into a huge grin. Seriously, he adored my boyfriend more than I did. I kept expecting him to tattoo Aaron in a big heart on his arm, but it hadn’t happened yet. Maybe he had put it on his butt instead.
“Hey, bro.” He punched Aaron on the shoulder. “Haven’t seen you in the weight room lately. Where’ve you been?”
“Sorry, just busy,” Aaron replied. He didn’t brush Trey off, exactly, but he pulled me to my f eet and wrapped me in a hug. “Everything okay, Kate?”
I couldn’t complain, not with everything Aaron was going through. He went to visit his friend Mike every week, but the brain damage was so bad that Mike couldn’t remember who Aaron was. And part of that was my fault because I’d unknowingly helped my crazy teacher develop the zombie virus. But I’d cured it too; that had to count for something. So I pushed away my problems and said, “Yeah. Trey helped rescue me from a wannabe zombie.”
Aaron snorted. “You don’t need anyone to rescue you from anything, Kate.”
“Exactly.” Trey looked me up and down behind Aaron’s back.
Luckily, I didn’t have to reply. The bus pulled into the loop and screeched to a stop. When the door hissed open, Mrs. Gilbert, the FDA program liaison, stuck her head out with a slightly panicked smile. I would have been worried except that slight panic was her default setting. I could relate to that.
“All right, everyone!” she said. “We’re running a bit late here, so I’d appreciate it if you’d move move move!”
She clapped to punctuate each move. Either she was on drugs or she spent way too much time watching television shows meant for preschoolers. Or both.
All I wanted to do was get on the bus, but I only made it two steps before Aaron grabbed me by the shoulders. I expected a kiss, but he spun me around instead. Then he opened my backpack. I was just about to ask him what the heck he was doing when he handed me an antibac wipe. My savior.
“You sure you’re okay?” he said, his breath warm against my ear. “Your hands are all dirty, and you look like you swallowed a lemon.”
“I’m just tense today. And some moron dumped my books.” I scrubbed the grime off my fingers and leaned back against him. I could hear the steady beat of his heart. It was the kind of thing I could have listened to forever, although I would have died before I admitted that out loud.
“You know I trust you to take care of yourself, but I’d really love to beat him up for you. Could I? Pretty please?”
“You better not. It would ruin your squeaky-clean reputation. But thanks for the offer.”
“Man, you never let me have any fun,” he said. I felt his grin against my cheek and smiled despite myself. “We should probably move. Mrs. Gilbert’s going to have a cardiovascular event if we don’t get on the bus.”
“God, yes. I’m not much better than she is. The suspense is going to make me piddle.”
He laughed and nuzzled my neck before releasing me. He didn’t understand that I wasn’t kidding about the piddling thing. This program was totally sweet; they selected a few seniors from area schools and paired us up with a bunch of physicians. We only got to shadow them for four half days, and I had a crazy huge stack of make-up work from my morning classes, but it was so worth it. If I was lucky, maybe they’d let me sit in on a few surgeries.
A few minutes later the bus pulled up to the health department, a squat brick building dwarfed by the medical complex surrounding it. I wanted to sprint inside but had to wait for Mrs. Gilbert, who clapped a lot faster than she walked.
The health department conference room was the exact color of Silly Putty, and it smelled like the inside of my gym locker. This failed to dull my excitement, though; I practically bounded into a seat. There were about ten other seniors there from St. Michael’s and St. Joe’s, the local Catholic schools. A few of them glared at the seven of us, like it was our fault that we were twenty minutes late.
The doctors waited at the front of the room in a single-file line of awesome; I barely restrained myself from falling at their feet and salaaming. As a distraction technique, I tried to figure out which ones were the surgeons. My two best bets were the woman with the razor-blade cheekbones and the man on the verge of hair gel overdose. Definitely not the hulking guy who reminded me of a shaved bear in a lab coat.
It probably wasn’t smart to judge them based on appearance. I, for instance, was destined to be a world-renowned surgeon, but between my long brown braid, square-framed glasses, and boyish figure, I looked more like the kind of girl who works in a library and spends Friday nights having deep, meaningful conversations with her cats.
Of course, it didn’t really matter. I didn’t care which surgeon I got matched with, even if it was the hair-impaired bear. I was just looking forward to a week when I could babble about how cool medicine is without anyone looking at me funny. Aaron was usually the only person I could do that with, and even he had his limits.
Aaron sat on one side of me, chatting with Trey about basketball; the seat on my other side was empty until the bear man took it. He had to be almost seven feet tall and wasn’t exactly thin. The folding chair creaked under the strain as he turned in my direction.
“Good morning,” he said. “I’m Dr. Burr.”
“Kate Grable.”
His hand engulfed mine. His fingers had approximately the same circumference as my thighs, but his grip was surprisingly gentle. I began to reevaluate my earlier assessment. He totally had surgeon’s hands.
His name didn’t ring any bells, and I’d memorized the surgery listings on the Bayview Hospital website. I was just about to ask what kind of medicine he practiced when Mrs. Gilbert said, “Shall we start?”
I instantly developed butterflies in my stomach, along with an intense urge to throw my arms wide and scream “Finally! I’ve found my people!” I couldn’t decide how that would be received, though, so I restrained myself and acted all blasé instead. I wasn’t fooling anyone, but no one could say I wasn’t trying my best.
“We all know why we’re here,” Mrs. Gilbert said, “and we’re running a little late, so let’s skip the formalities and get right on to the matches, shall we? Elle Dickensheets, Aaron Kingsman, and Trey Black, you’ll be working with Dr. Dickensheets in orthopedics. Dr. Dickensheets?”
The hair gel addict stood up, displaying his laser-bleached teeth in what I assumed was supposed to be a smile. It didn’t quite reach his eyes. But I could tell that Aaron was thrilled, because orthopedics was his first choice. He squeezed my hand and followed Dr. Dickensheets out of the room without looking back.
And the process went on. Pretty soon everyone was gone. Everyone except me, Mrs. Gilbert, and Dr. Burr.
“Kate,” Mrs. Gilbert said, practically bouncing with excitement, “since you’ve got such a special background, we’ve got something unique planned for you that will give you more hands-on experience. Have you met Dr. Burr?”
I nodded, and Dr. Burr rumbled. Mrs. Gilbert took it as an affirmative response.
“Oh, good,” she gushed. “Then I’ll let you two get further acquainted. You don’t need me, right? Of course you don’t. Toodles.”
She wiggled her fingers at us and hurried to the door.
“Excitable, isn’t she?” Dr. Burr said after it closed behind her.
“Uh … yeah.” I knew I should wait for him to explain, but I had all the patience of a hyperactive squirrel. “So what kind of medicine do you practice?”
He scooted his chair around to face me and leaned over with his elbows on his knees. Now I could actually look him in the eyes instead of having to crank my neck back like I had a flip-top head. It was a definite improvement.
“Well,” he said, “I’ll be completely honest with you, Kate. I’m not in surgery. The surgeons tried to claim you based on your … ahem … clearly stated preferences. But I haven’t had a student in two years, so I got first pick. I’d be honored to work with the girl who cured the zombie virus.”
I felt both flattered at the compliment and disappointed at the lack of surgery in my future, and I knew that both showed on my face.
“All I ask is that you give me one day to introduce you to my work, and if you’re not interested in staying, I’ll let you go with Dr. Gonzalez,” he told me. “She’s head of surgery.”
I couldn’t turn down the offer without offending the giant physician with ursine tendencies, and that didn’t seem like such a good idea. I swallowed the lump in my throat. “That sounds fair. What kind of medicine do you practice?”
He stood and smiled down at me from a ridiculous height. “I’m the county medical examiner.”
Dr. Burr and I descended into the underbelly of the health department. We lived in a fairly small county, so the morgue was tucked into the basement instead of having its own building. Strangely enough, in all my medical-related stalking, I’d never been there, probably because you had to go through a labyrinth to find the darned thing. All our medical buildings were linked underground. This seemed like a great idea until you were alone in the tunnels at night and convinced that the corpses from the morgue were chasing you. Not that this had ever happened to me; I just had an overactive imagination and a history of random zombie attacks.
