Lindsey Lunarly's Arc

Chapter 1 of 2

Lindsey Lunarly wanted her yellow star crest at the very top of the honors leaderboard, and the exam that decided it was in two days. She sat at her white desk in Honors Hall, phone open to what she thought were her study notes. She scrolled. "Mall snacks. Lip gloss. Who Mina likes." She scrolled faster. Every page was a shopping list or a gossip note. Nowhere had she written a single fact from class. She dropped the phone in the yellow star pen holder and pressed her hands to her face. The pack was gaining on her. She needed an edge, and she had nothing but errands and secrets. Stella came in without knocking. She dropped onto the bed, glasses pushed up in her long hair. "You look like you lost the list," she said. "You never lose the list." "I lost the notes," Lindsey said. "I never took any. It's all this." She turned the phone around. "Two days. I'm going to crash." Stella read the screen. She did not laugh. "You track who owes who a spot the same way," she said. "Color-coded. Every trade. You never forget a debt." "That's different." "It's exactly the same skill," Stella said. "You just point it at the wrong subject." Lindsey stared at her. It was true. Her secret note tracked twenty people and never slipped. She could do that. She just never aimed it at the exam. The door opened again. Brennor stood there, holding a stack of worn cards. He looked at Stella, then away, quick, the way he'd been doing all month. Stella caught it and said nothing. "Practice cards," Brennor said. He set them on the desk. "Coach makes us drill this way. Question one side. Answer the other. You forget it, it goes back in the pile. You quit lying to yourself fast." He shrugged. "Figured you honors people didn't know we did that. We're not just legs." "Thanks," Lindsey said, surprised. "Stella said you were drowning." He glanced at Stella once more, then left. Stella watched the door close. "He's trying," she said flatly, to no one. Lindsey grabbed her yellow journal and tore it in half down the spine. One side for cards. She started rewriting her notes as trades, the way she tracked spots. Fact owed. Fact paid. Missed one, back in the pile. Her system, aimed right at last. By midnight the desk was buried in cards. She quizzed herself until she stopped missing. The blind cramming was gone. She had a real method now, and two days to run it. Stella stood to leave. "Top of the board," she said. "Do it, and half the school will owe you a spot they can't afford." Lindsey laughed, then stopped. Stella wasn't joking. If she won, the pack wouldn't just fall behind. They'd come for her.