The Rift Uprising by Amy S. Foster

myself.

CHAPTER 5
    Violet has outdone herself with the wardrobe selection. She is wearing super-high-waisted jeans and a skinny belt around her impossibly tiny waist. Her gray silk blouse is unbuttoned low enough to show some cleavage. She is covered from head to toe, but the look is far sexier than the trampy, try-too-hard outfits I know the other girls at the party will be wearing. I tried to get away with a sweatshirt and my yoga pants, and honestly it almost came to blows. After refusing to put on a dress, or a skirt, I finally agreed to short Levi’s cutoffs and a cropped black tank. I insisted on my dark brown leather boots with straps, but I did concede to a bunch of jangly bangles. I am wearing my hair long and loose. I almost always wear it back, so even I am a little surprised when I see how long it is—down to the middle of my back. My hair is a Nordic blond with a natural wave. Because I wear it up so often,I have darker-blond highlights that have been tucked away from the sun. I pull the light strands over my shoulders and twist the ends to make it look smoother. When I realize I am preening at my own reflection, I stop. I’m not used to caring about how I look, but for tonight, I realize how much I want to look pretty. Or at least, I want to know that I can be pretty.
    I let Vi put makeup on me. Luckily we both agree that, for me, less is more. I only look good wearing makeup if I don’t actually look like I have any on. Violet has dark voluminous hair and even darker eyes. Her skin, though, is as fair as mine. She can get away with all kinds of crazy eye shadow colors and, unlike me, not look like a hooker.
    We walk to Flora Branach’s house and don’t bother to knock. We can hear the music blasting, so there’s no point. We get more than a few stares when we walk in. I know the boys are imagining all kinds of sexual scenarios when they look at us. What they don’t know is that we’d likely crush their windpipes before they would ever find out what we look like without our shirts.
    The way some of them are outright leering, the prospect of some broken tracheas appeals to me. I find myself smiling.
    The house is jam-packed. I guess we took more time getting ready than I’d thought. Boone comes up behind us and starts dancing right away with Violet. I suppose the fact that they’re grooving to a boy-band song from the nineties in a room full of people takes the sex appeal right out of it. Surprisingly, he’s actually pretty good. Violet starts doing what I can only assume is the Robot. I laugh, and so does everyone else. People don’t, like, dance at house parties. But Vi and Boone somehow make it cool. I’m sure that everyone will join them soon enough. Maybe if I drink enough, I will, too. But it takes a lot for us Citadels to get drunk.
    Flora sees me from the kitchen and starts to shimmy toward me with an extra cup in her hand.
    â€œYou came.” She looks pleased and also strangely wary. The corners of her mouth are turned up into a smile, but it seems forced.
    â€œI did,” I say, smiling back at her. There is an awkward silence for a couple seconds. We both just stand there, grinning like assholes. The thing is, Flora and I used to be absolute best friends. Flora and I had almost every class together in eighth grade and we had an instant connection. We just got each other. We liked all the same things and, with her living so close to me, I think we spent just about every day together. She can be sassy but also really kind. When the headaches came because of the implant, I can vividly remember lying in her lap, her room darkened because the light stung my eyes. She would put a cold washcloth on my forehead and whisper that everything was going to be fine. She talked me through that agony on more than one occasion.
    I repaid her by abruptly cutting her out of my life once I became a Citadel.
    I was mean about it because I was mad, too. I just