“Let’s go over to the boys’ dormitories!” Alice cried.
“Not tonight,” Catherine said, stepping forward.
“What?” Alice lamented. “But Eliza, you said—”
“She’s right,” Eliza put in. “Tonight should be about us. Let’s go outside and have some fun.”
“Part of being a witch is about communing with nature,” Catherine added, taking Alice’s other hand. “I say we go out and celebrate with Mother Earth.”
Alice let out a disconsolate moan. “But boys are far more exciting than boring old Mother Earth.”
“Oh, come along, you,” Theresa said, rolling her eyes. “We’ll take some of the exercise equipment out of the shed and play in the moonlight.”
“I don’t know why we can’t celebrate just as well with the boys,” Alice pouted.
“Because this is not about the boys,” Eliza said. “This is about us.”
The eleven girls, led by Eliza, Theresa, and Catherine, marched down the hallway as loudly as they could possibly manage, talking at the top of their voices and stomping their feet all the way. Outside, Catherine opened the unlocked equipment shed, and Alice and Bia were the first inside, ransacking the shelves and hooks and emerging with armfuls of hoops. Clarissa went in after them and pulled out the badminton racquets and birdies, while Catherine and Eliza extracted a pair of bicycles with wide handlebars.
“Shall we race?” Eliza challenged her friend with a grin.
Catherine opened her mouth to respond, but Theresa came over and took the handlebars right out of her grasp.
“I’ll race you,” she announced. Then she straddled the bicycle and took off after Bia, Viola, and Jane, who shrieked as they chased the hoops down the slight grassy hill in front of Crenshaw House. Eliza’s heart dropped in response to Theresa’s rudeness, and Catherine looked stunned.
“What was that?” Eliza asked.
Catherine recovered herself. She rubbed her palms together and shrugged. “That’s Theresa. She wants what she wants.”
; “Come on, Williams! Are you going to race me or not?” Theresa shouted back.
Eliza looked at Catherine uncertainly.
“Go ahead,” Catherine said. “I’ll take the next turn.”
“Are you sure?” Eliza asked, even as she straddled the bike.
“Yes. Please. Just . . . beat her,” she said with a laugh. “She’ll be insufferable if you don’t.”
Eliza took off after Theresa, letting the wind whip through her hair and blow away her irritation and surprise over the way Theresa had treated Catherine—her supposed best friend. Theresa had ridden all the way down the hill and was now racing along the tree line, and Eliza pumped her legs to catch up. Lavender, Genevieve, and Marilyn chased after them, running and chanting the Spell of Silence over and over again like a triumphant mantra. Petit Peu brought up the rear, leaping about merrily at the chance to stretch his little legs.
“You can’t catch me!” Theresa shouted over her shoulder, bending low over the handlebars.
“Watch me!” Eliza retorted. She leaned into the pedals as the tires bumped over rocks and tree roots and skidded on dusty dirt patches. Soon she had brought herself even with Theresa, and just before they hit the walkway to the McKinley building, Eliza burst ahead.
“I win!” she shouted, skidding to a stop.
Theresa slid to a halt a few feet ahead of her. Eliza heard her mutter a curse under her breath, but when she turned around, her expression was perfectly placid. “That’s twice now you’ve beat me at a race, Eliza. You’re so athletic, you’re practically a boy.” With that, she rode back past Eliza, giving her a condescending grin as she slipped by. Eliza was left with her jaw hanging open over the insult.
“Do not listen to her,” Marilyn whispered to Eliza, coming up alongside her with Petit Peu in her arms. She scratched the little dog’s head and bumped Eliza with her elbow. Together they watched Theresa as she hopped down from the bike and walked it back up the hill, toward the spot where the rest of the girls played badminton and cheered one another on. “You are prettier than half the girls in Paris.”
Eliza laughed as she dismounted, then slung one arm around Marilyn’s slim waist. “And you are lovely for saying that.”
They walked together up the hill with Lavender and Genevieve trailing behind. Up ahead, Clarissa let out a screech as the birdie sailed wide of her racquet. Then, as if from nowhere, Eliza heard a voice whisper in her ear.
“Turn back.”