Ablaze by Christopher Krovatin

Author:Christopher Krovatin [Krovatin, Christopher]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scholastic Inc.
Published: 2023-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

The rest of the day was a blur. Blast after blast of confusion and disgust rocked Aly. In her sadness and disappointment, she found herself regressing back into her natural middle-child state. She kept her head down and her mouth shut. The web of gossip around her was no longer empowering; now it was like the thornbush in “Sleeping Beauty,” closing in and making her worried it might cut her if she moved the wrong way.

The whole car ride home, Rachael talked about Jamal Greenblatt, a boy in her class who she’d decided was “really interesting.” Mom watched Aly in the rearview but said nothing to her.

At least my visit with the counselor means I can be sullen and she doesn’t ask why, Aly thought.

Once they got home, she went to her room, dropped her bag, and paced a few minutes. She took a deep breath, tried to enjoy the feeling of being home from school, thanked the universe for … for …

She couldn’t think of anything. The exercise felt stupid. Rachael using her as a threat had sucked all the joy out of her life. She tried to let it flow, but it carried her straight into Rachael’s room, bathed in the scent of Lavender Sunrise and Autumn Hayride.

“Hey, all good today?” asked Rachael as Aly closed the door behind her. “I heard you had to talk to Kunhalder—”

“You used me,” snapped Aly, jabbing a finger at her sister. “You used me to get what you wanted. I should have known.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, what is this?” said Rachael with a little laugh. “Als, I would never—”

“You threatened Kristoff Parker in the hall today. You told him I’d burn him if he didn’t get you some kind of camera.”

Rachael’s face fell into a tight, frustrated smile. Aly could read it plain as day—Well, you caught me red-handed.

“It’s not a big deal,” Rachael said softly. “I’m starting a TikTok, and I want it to be really professional, so I just need a better camera than my phone—”

“You told him I’d hurt him with my powers, Rachael! The whole school thinks I’m a pyromaniac freak, Mom is losing her mind worrying about me, and you’re telling people I’m going to burn them alive … so you can get a camera?”

“A really good camera, though,” said Rachael, pulling the handheld camcorder from her backpack. “This thing has ultra‑HD capacity. My feed is going to look straight‑up cinematic.”

“Oh God.” Aly felt tears bite the backs of her eyes as it dawned on her. “This was never about helping me, was it? You just wanted to make sure my powers were real so that you could use them to get what you wanted.”

“First of all, that’s really unfair and hurtful,” said Rachael, putting a hand to her chest. “All I’ve done so far is try to help you, Als. We breathed together, we researched your power—I thought we were really connecting over this.”

“Then why—”

“Second,” Rachael pushed on, “since we’ve established that you do have these

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