Page 7 of Riot Rules

“Who gives a shit if people think it’s weird? I’m wearing bright yellow corduroy overalls. Our outfits couldn’t clash harder if we tried. So what? We came to have fun at a party. Let’s do that, and screw what anyone else thinks.”

Presley steels herself, then lifts her head. “You’re right.Screwwhat anyone else thinks.”

3

CARRIE

SIX YEARS AGO

I’m small for eleven, which makes him mad.

“Well then?” He slams my head against the stained mattress. “Are you? Are you bleeding yet? Answer the fucking question!”

My mother’s boyfriend sucks his bottom lip into his mouth, wetting it, and the sudden look of hunger on his face makes me panic. “N—no, sir. I haven’t.”

His top lip twitches, curling up and exposing his yellowed front teeth. They’re rodent-like. Every detail about Jason has a ratty quality to it, from his thin, greasy hair, to his beady, too dark, inhuman eyes, to the way he hunches over when he walks. He looks pissed.

“Better not be lyin’ to me, you sneaky little bitch.”

“No, sir, I promise. I wouldn’t lie.”

Quick as a striking snake, he grabs me by the hair, yanking my head up toward his, off the mattress. “If I find out you are…” The threat hangs there in the inch of space between his face and mine, sharp as a knife. I nod as much as I can, with him grasping hold of my hair so tightly.

“I’ll tell you, I promise. When I start—” I let out a terrified hiccup, “—I’ll tell you, I swear!”

His grip tightens. Pain prickles across the back of my skull, the roots of my hair protesting. “Good.” He lets go, shoving my head back onto the mattress so hard that my skull bounces off the mattress and my teeth clack together like castanets. “Now git off your ass and git down those stairs. Make me some fucking food.”

4

DASH

Lovett Estates

Fri 6.38 PM

Reply-To: [email protected]

To: Dashiell Lovett

Your economics paper was disappointing. Re-write and submit to Hansen by the end of the week. Include more relevant references. Cull all erroneous, colloquial language. Remember, you are representing not only the Lovett family name but a sacred and respected royal lineage. You embarrass us all when you conduct yourself this way. Your teachers might be satisfied with this kind of lackluster performance, but you will demonstrate tomethat you can do better.

—Dashiell Lovett III, The Rt Hon. Duke of Surrey

A motherfucking A minus. That’s what I got on that paper. I rue the day the academy upgraded their reporting system to an online dashboard. We get our grades early and can keep track of our submissions, yeah, but who gives a crap? Principal Harcourt gave ourparentsaccess, too. My father, who rarely condescends to use technology—“Only poor people have mobile phones, boy. Nothing wrong with using a secretary”—now has Hansen, his personal assistant, check my work. If it’s anything less than perfect, you can bet your fucking ass I’m getting an email about it. That’s the only time when the hypocritewillutilize technology.

So here we are. It’s Friday night. Sitting at the old upright piano in the corner of my room, I’m surrounded by blank sheet music, obsessing over the complex melody that’s looping around in my head. All I want to do is stay here and finish the piece, but no. I’ve disappointed the old man once again, and now I have to re-write an economics paper that does not need fucking rewriting, and—

“COME ON, LIMP DICK! WE GOTTAGO!”

—I’m not going to havetimeto rewrite my stupid paper because guess what? I have to go to a party.

Pax, who so charmingly shouted at me from the bottom of the stairs just now, is driving this train, which automatically means that it will end up derailed, but I have no say in this. The kids from Edmondson High lacrosse team painted a dick on our front door, and so nowthisis happening. They’re having a party, so we go and fuck up their shit. We humiliate them, and then we come home. The end.

Demonstrate tomethat you can do better…