"That aggie's mine!" The grit of the urchin's teeth might have undermined her smile, but Charley wasn't about to let her opponent spy any weakness. She lined up her shot, the divot in her stone wobbling back and forth under a dirty fingernail. The prize was straight ahead, and at the last second she swiveled her aim and fired.

"For the last time, it's en't marbles. Not even a jot!"

Charley couldn't risk rolling her eyes, they were far too busy tracking her stone as it rolled. The divot caught on their uneven playing field, as she knew it would. Only it spun straight clear of the prized gobstone in the middle this time. The urchin rocked back on her knees, grabbing her head with a loud, agonizing, "Noooooooo!"

The squirt of awful liquid spewed out from the stone, and she only missed getting a faceful with one guarded hand. Charley turned it around, making a face at the dripping, smelly liquid that was her reward for losing.

"Hey! It's you!"

A voice from above drew a look from the irate urchin, enough to miss stopping her challenger's quick movement. With nary a breeze, the other urchin swooped a hand at the prized gobstone and was alight on heels that barely made a sound in retreat. Charley's head whiplashed, staring first at the place where her opponent had just sat, then up to the boy whose intervention had cost her the chance at the perfect gobstone.

"You hidgeot! I was boutta win that too," Charley told the idiot boy. Who in their right mind interrupted a gobstones match? When her eyes met the face of this game-ending villain, her face settled into a glum look of defeat. It was that awful upper year boy who didn't play games. Now she really did roll her eyes.

"You owe me a gobstone!"

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