"I've noticed," I said.

Across from me, I heard Jack suck in a breath. Surreptitiously glancing at him from behind my hair, the first thing I saw was the stricken expression on his face. Before, when I'd been snarking at Geneva, there'd been fear, but this was somehow worse than that. The abstract horror on his face snared my attention and I looked away from Geneva's flapping lips even though I could hear every word she said.

"I think I can help you," she was saying. "After all, Lily's always been a friend of mine. I think I could talk to her, get her to back off a little."

"Really?" I murmured distractedly, my eyes locking with an obsidian gaze full of dazed panic. Sweat dripped off of Jack's face like rain from a thunderstorm. Was he all right? His usually tanned face had blanched white as limestone, tinged faintly green. Trying to keep focused on the Red Queen, I added, "And here I thought the Red Queen and the White Queen were rivals."

"Oh, you heard about that, did you?" She tittered like Airhead Barbie on "repeat," grating on my nerves.

I only nodded, keeping my eyes on Jack Knightly.

His throat worked convulsively, as if he were about to barf. Was he sick? The pools of sweat at his temples had plastered his blond hair to his forehead. I reached out, one hand sliding slowly across the table top, and he jerked away from me like I'd bitten a chunk out of him.

"Jack? Jack, are you okay?"

"I, uh... I don't feel quite myself," he mumbled, running a hand through his drenched hair. "Sorry, I just... I feel a bit ill."

"Suck it up, Knightly," Geneva snarled, and I reacted immediately, without thinking.

Yet another of my stellar, bad idea.

"Hey, shut up! He's sick, leave him alone!" Like the childish, juvenile teenage girl that I am, I shoved her lunch tray down the table, away from where we sat. An instant hush from the rest of the cafeteria punched my eardrums. I punched it right back with, "Who do you think you are, anyway? You send your little lackey to call me like I'm your dog, you invade my personal lunch space, you lie to me, right to my face, and then you treat one of my friends like dirt!"

I didn't know where any of this was coming from, but I could've ranted about it all day. Ever since the paint incident yesterday, I'd been sweating for a fight - with anyone. Add all the pranks of today to my irritation meter, and I was about to blow my gasket sky-freaking-high.

"How dare you!" Geneva lunged to her feet, her red hair flaming, her green eyes spitting poison. "You, you're nothing compared to me. How dare you!"

"Oh, shut up, Red," I snapped, stung by the "nothing" part. Nothing, was I?

She tensed up. I should've expected what happened next, but when her hand darted out and her palm made first contact with the side of my face, I'll admit I was a bit surprised. How many people were going to slap me this year?

I reared back and planted my fist squarely in her face.