Beautiful Souls Read Free Page B

store space just across the street from where she worked. I continued, “My mom mentioned to me that Mrs. Fitzgerald was opening some kind of store on Main Street, but I don’t think that anyone has heard what kind of shop it’s going to be yet.”
                       My mom owned the antique shop on Main Street right in the middle of the town square, and I wondered why she hadn’t mentioned any more about the Fitzgeralds. Surely she'd found out more by now. On the other hand, we’d all been pretty consumed with our own lives lately, and perhaps it had just slipped her mind. I made a mental note to ask her when I helped out at the shop after school today, just like I did almost every day.
                       Emmy was still talking about the Fitzgeralds, but now she had moved on to the single topic of Luke. She went on and on about how much the other girls in school had been talking him up, and how incredibly cute and gorgeous he looked seemed to be a consensus. Emmy even added that the rumors claimed he resembled somebody from the movie we had gone to see a couple weekends prior. Fat chance , I thought. Rumors tended to be overly flattering or just the opposite.
                       I had only been catching bits and pieces of Emmy’s ramblings at this point, because I had become more focused on the girl that had just come from around the corner at the opposite end of the hallway, heading straight toward us. She was like no girl that I’d ever expected to see in our town, let alone in our school. She had fire-red hair cut into wispy strips that fell perfectly on her shoulders, the brightest, most piercing green eyes I’d ever seen which glowed all the way from the other end of the hall, and she looked to be almost as tall as I was.
                       She was drop dead gorgeous; that fact was undeniable and obvious to anyone that was in her presence. It appeared, by the way she looked and walked, she was well aware of that fact herself. She had to have been none other than the new girl, Zoey. She stopped just short of where we stood, turned abruptly, then disappeared into the classroom just a few feet in front of my locker.
                       Emmy had her back turned toward Zoey, and never even saw so much as one fiery-red wisp of hair. Emmy didn’t even notice that I had switched my focus off of her and onto someone else, but I didn’t think she would have stopped her chattering even if she had.
                     “Well,” I interrupted Emmy, who had continued her incessant  talking throughout all of this. “I think I may have some more to tell you about the new girl by next passing period.”
                       Emmy paused for a brief moment, lowered her eyebrows toward me, then asked, “Why’s that?”
                       “Cause she just walked into my next class,” I answered, still staring in the direction of the doorway Zoey just passed through.
                       I quickly closed my locker door and picked up my stack of Trig supplies resting on the floor between by feet, never once breaking my gaze.
                      Emmy continued her chattering again, this time with a line of questioning. She was spitting out all sorts of things to prod Zoey about. Apparently, she'd thought I should take advantage of sharing a class with Zoey in order to find out as much about her and her family as possible while I had the chance.
                        My mind was still wrapped around Zoey. I didn’t understand it, but I just couldn’t pull myself away. I walked away from Emmy and my locker, my mind’s connection with Zoey leading me toward her. She was like the flame, and I was the helpless little moth.
                       Emmy was still firing a multitude of questions in my direction for me to pass on to Zoey.