The Chaos Read Online Free PDF

the boom box and picked it up. “Start acting like you want to be on the team, Scotch. Or so help me, we going to do it without you. And wear track pants next time. Nobody want to watch you dance with all your business hanging outside.” She sighed and headed out the door.
    She used to stand up for me and the clothes I wore at school, where my parents couldn’t see them. She used to go shopping with me.
    Ben laughed. “Don’t listen to her, beautiful,” he said. “You look amazing in those shorts. Wish I had an ass like that.”
    “You have a perfectly lovely ass. What? Is not like I haven’t noticed.”
    “Still,” he continued, “I think there’s too many letters in the word ‘shorts’ to describe what those are.” He cackled at his own joke. The three Horseless Head Men bobbed up and down in time with the sound of his laughter. Gave me the creeps.
    I held up my Raw Gyals skirt. “I don’t know why she’s carrying on like that. This is what we’re going to be dancing in.”
    Ben wolf-whistled. “Wow. That’s hot.”
    “Like you’re such an authority on girls looking sexy.”
    “Gyal pickney, don’t give me none of your facetiness.” He waved my smart-mouthing away with a flick of his fingers. “I know hot when I see it.”
    The skirt really was short. “What’m I going to tell my folks?”
    “About what?”
    “They think I’ve been rehearsing for some stocious modern dance recital.”
    He gaped at me, then burst into howls of laughter, staggeringaround the room and holding his belly. When he stopped for air, I said, “I’m serious, Ben. They want to come and see us dance on Wednesday night.”
    That only made the laughing worse. He mimed wiping tears from his face. “Girl, why you even told them what you were doing?”
    Frustrated, I threw my hands up. “I had to tell them something! You know how they are; they wouldn’t have let me stay after school to practice otherwise!”
    “Glory know about this?”
    “Lord, no.”
    “So when you going to tell her?”
    “I don’t know! What’m I going to do? They can’t come!” My parents would each bust a blood vessel if they saw me getting buck onstage in a four-inch-long skirt and bloomers. My mom kept saying that she knew the hazing at LeBrun High hadn’t been my fault, but she still wanted me to act all modest and shit anyway, “Just so you don’t present a target, Sojourner.” She didn’t know anything.
    Finally, Ben looked serious. “Lemme think about it, sweetie. We’ll come up with something, okay? Don’t fret. What’s the top look like?”
    Have I mentioned how much I love my friend Ben? I showed him the top. “I’m going to wear a long-sleeved T-shirt underneath, though.”
    Ben goggled at me. “You? Miss Sojourner Scotch Bonnet ‘nobody cyan’t make a sweater tight enough for me’ Smith? You’re going to cover up a part of your precious body?”
    For the umpteenth time, I dragged at the sleeve of my sweatshirt to make sure it was covering my arm all the way down to my wrist. Ben’s eyes followed the movement. He opened his mouth to say something. I cut him off with,“Let’s go. I gotta change.” At least I could still show off my legs. For now.
    We left the gym. I fought the impulse to look behind me to see whether the Horseless Head Men were following, to shove the door closed so they couldn’t follow. Not that that seemed to make a difference. Bloody things were everywhere nowadays. I must really be losing it.
    Ben and I headed in the direction of the girls’ change room.
    When I’d first started seeing the Horseless Head Men, they’d been almost invisible; I’d only been able to see them when the light hit them at certain angles. But every day, they got more solid, more real. Mom might say it was a ha’nt; a ghost. Actually, she’d be more likely to say I was hallucinating and book me into the nuthouse down on Queen Street so one of her colleagues could pry my brain open with a can opener, just like