Except that this good deed was awful. I was elated that he—or maybe Melissa and the gang, but someone—had tried to make me look good, and I wanted to throw up at the same time. Because even though I hadn’t done this myself, Mrs. Turner would see it as a reason to make good on her threats. I could almost feel her grip clawing into my upper arm already.
“You are so dead, Graves,” a voice near me threatened. Aimee.
I turned to see Leah’s permed companion, a ripped-up copy of Kyle’s picture of me in her hands. She was going for full-on sinister, but only managed an incompetent menace.
“Yeah, I bet.” A few weeks ago, I’d have been terrified of what she and Leah might do to me. Now she seemed pathetic. “So what’ll it be? Are you going to start a rumor that I’m into witchcraft? That I snort coke off Chippendales’ asses?”
I shocked her into speechlessness for a moment, but she recovered quickly, sending me a smug smirk.
“You really have to make everything all about you,” she sneered, crumpling the photo in her hand. “You wrecked Leah’s relationship with Sean, and now you’re trying to turn the homecoming court into some lame political stunt. But you’ll always be a loser.”
She turned dramatically, trying to toss her hair over her shoulder for effect. Instead, it looked overwrought and soap-operatic, an impression that was only further emphasized when she threw the crumpled flyer to the ground and stomped on it.
Whatever she and Leah were planning, I thought, the Gang of Five would be ready for it.
* * *
“So you’ve decided to join us again for lunch?” Sara looked up at me brightly as Melissa and I arrived at our usual spot. Not that long ago, Helen would have shot her a look of death for sounding so eager to see me, but right now, she looked relieved that I’d decided to show up after ignoring everyone yesterday for nominating me to the court, and then avoiding them after Mrs. Turner decided to blackmail me.
I nodded, sitting down between Jennifer and Melissa. It was about all I could do, considering how tired I was. Meanwhile, Helen looked sprightly and excited and fresh as ever, despite also staying up late. Maybe she’d managed a quick nap while I was talking with Sean, or maybe she had some secret to staying awake that I didn’t know about. I’d have to ask her later. Right now, I could barely keep my eyes focused on my turkey sandwich.
“We need to talk about the posters,” I said, trying to muster the remaining energy I had left into some kind of confrontation. The fear of Mrs. Turner’s blackmail was the only thing propelling me forward. Well, that, and the can of Coke I’d gotten from the cafeteria vending machine. I gulped down a giant mouthful of it, hoping the caffeine and sugar would hit me soon. I waved the can at Melissa. “Did you have anything to do with that?”
Melissa looked guilty—which she should, if she’d done anything to promote my candidacy. She knew I was so angry about the surprise announcement that I’d eaten lunch alone in the yearbook room yesterday, which essentially involved breaking and entering into a space that I knew would be empty until the second half of the first semester, which was when the yearbook staff—of which I was a member—would actually have something to do. I was done seething for now, but the real threat of Mrs. Turner loomed over my head.
“Well, yes and no,” she said, as hedgily as anyone had ever hedged anything. “I... Well, I want nothing to do with that turd Kyle, as you know. And I honest to God didn’t set out to talk to him. But I happened to be at Kinko’s last night to photocopy my zine, because Erik was working and he gives me free copies. And Kyle happened to be there, and I happened to see those were particularly good photos of you, and I happened to get Erik to tell him which ones were best, and I happened to get him to shuffle Kyle over to the super high-res copier and only charge him the shitty copier price, so he had a lot of flyers by the end of the night. But as for giving him the idea to make flyers of those photos and post them everywhere—or even talking to him—no, I did not. The flyers were all his idea, and, as for his reasoning or motive...” She shrugged exaggeratedly. “You’d have to ask him. Only I wouldn’t, if I were you. He’s an asshole, and his cowardly attempt at showing how awesome you are doesn’t count as an apology.”
Her explanation was the most Melissa-sounding thing I’d ever heard in terms of her possibly engineering things from afar. I was the kind of tired where my eyeballs felt like they were going to fall out of my head, and thinking about Kyle’s strange behavior and what it might mean paled in comparison to the fact that the flyers were sure to piss off Mrs. Turner.
“Don’t worry,” I said, taking another hit of caffeinated sugar. “I want nothing to do with him, and I don’t want his help.” I glanced at Helen, debating how much I needed to rehash Mrs. Turner’s blackmail. I knew I should tell everyone, but I burned with humiliation every time I thought of it. It also didn’t feel wise to talk about it out in the open. “At any rate, we need to start campaigning for Cady because I do not want to have to ride around in a convertible waving like the queen.”
I wasn’t lying, exactly, but I was hiding the real reason I wanted to campaign for Cady. Helen started to say something in protest, but I shook my head in warning. Fortunately, no one else seemed to notice our exchange, or if they did, they didn’t know what it was about anyway.
“Awww!” Sara let out an overly loud sound of disappointment and wrinkled her face into a pained wince. “It’s going to suck if I have to be up there by myself, if I get it. I don’t want to do this any more than you do, but we had more trouble thinking of freshmen and sophomores than juniors and seniors. For whatever reason, the seniors love our campaign. But I don’t know them, and I don’t really know anything about Cady, other than she picked out a ‘So what if she did?’ patch on the first day of the campaign, even before...”
Sara glanced over at Helen. I could tell what she was about to say, and I didn’t think Helen would get mad, but... “Even before someone trashed Helen’s locker, she told me that she thought the rumors were, and I quote, ‘fucking hypocritical garbage,’ thought up by ‘the tackiest human alive.’ And again, that was before everyone else jumped on the bandwagon, so...”
I almost spat out my Coke at the words hypocritical garbage. I didn’t know Cady that well, but it was promising that she was so blunt in her support. She was one of those girls whose mom had pushed her into beauty pageants when she was younger. She somehow ended up rebelling against it by developing a sailor’s mouth, but never looked anything but pretty and put together.
“I dunno, Sara,” I said. “Sounds like you’ve tapped into the essence of Cady Jenson. I think you’ll be fine.”
“Yeah. I guess it’s fine.” Sara’s face said it was the opposite of fine. “But I’d rather be up there with you and Melissa.”
I wanted to sink into the concrete steps. The gang hadn’t picked me for the homecoming court in order to make me miserable, or because I could be a half-assed substitute for Helen. They’d picked me because I was one of them, and now I was going to have to let them down.
* * *
Along with every other girl nominated for the homecoming court, I sat on the gym bleachers after school, half listening to Sister Catherine’s long list of rules for the upcoming week. I didn’t need to hear this. We were going to campaign for Cady, who supported us and who’d been second runner-up at Miss Teen Louisiana last year. In a normal year, even without politics, she’d be the obvious choice. Everything was going to be okay.
My head drifted downward, sleep taking over. Melissa poked me, sharpest elbow in the world digging into my side. I jolted awake.
“Miss Graves, please sit up.” Sister Catherine looked at me with the kind of stern face only a nun could muster.
I forced myself into an upright position, but I was still too tired to pay attention.
Melissa’s presence on my left buffered me from Leah somewhat, but I could feel her smug vibrations radiating toward me
at Sister Catherine’s correction.
“Good luck beating an actual beauty queen,” Leah sneered. It was meant to make me nervous, but I had an entirely different reaction. Somehow, after Leah’s comment, a tiny vengeful kernel within me wanted to win. If only to beat her. And then I remembered that I wasn’t running against Leah, but Cady, and I wanted Cady to win.
Sister Catherine droned on with more rules and regulations. The winners got to wear not one, but two non-school-uniform outfits for homecoming. We were supposed to wear “age-appropriate business casual dresses or skirts” to the football game. Hillary Clinton pantsuits and Barbara Bush pearls were the only kinds of business clothes that came to my mind, and I kept pondering what “age-appropriate business casual” was while Sister Catherine reiterated the rules for the selection process, described how we should act when we heard the announcement of who made it into the court, and stressed our proper comportment for the football game and dance.
After Sister Catherine finished her lecture, she made us walk in pairs across the gym to a row of folding chairs opposite the bleachers, where we were supposed to sit like ladies for the announcement. I think “proper comportment” translated into Sara’s rod-straight posture, because Sister Catherine smiled approvingly at her while scowling at the rest of us. Despite her repeated warnings about sitting nicely, I more or less collapsed into my folding chair. I could barely keep my eyes open, let alone my spine rigid.
When I wasn’t nodding off, my mind drifted stubbornly toward the flyers with my face on them, and Kyle and Leah. Kyle hadn’t said anything to me about the pictures, and I’d started to suspect Melissa had more to do with it than just getting Erik to steer Kyle toward the better copier. But it also wasn’t like her to not take credit. So my mind kept circling back to Kyle, and what any of this was supposed to mean. If it meant anything.
“Ladies, be sure to cross your legs. Miss Graves, please sit up.” Sister Catherine’s words yanked me back to the gym. I kicked myself internally for thinking about Kyle. It wasn’t like I was still interested in him anyway. Right?
“Sister Catherine! So glad I found you!” Mrs. Turner darted delicately across the gym floor, her kitten heels clacking the whole way.
It only lasted a moment, but I swear I saw Sister Catherine grip at the rosary at her waist like some cognitive behavioral therapy tic before turning to face the guidance counselor.
“Yes, Mrs. Turner?”
Mrs. Turner took Sister Catherine’s acknowledgment as encouragement to scuttle closer to our group. Her gaze raked over us, and she flashed her tiny pursed-lipped smile before settling into a look of stern approbation.
I looked left and right. Melissa shook her head at me. Leah smirked. Angelle looked eagerly at Mrs. Turner. Everyone else looked bored.
“Now, ladies, there is every reason to take this seriously,” Mrs. Turner said. “But you might be aware of some, shall we say, inappropriate campaigning going on.” She looked squarely at me, her round black eyes full of fury. “If I catch any of you wearing anything inappropriate or passing along any illegal materials, I’ll make sure Sister Catherine knows. And you will be off the court.”
She nodded her head with great finality, unaware that Sister Catherine was standing next to her, shaking her head. Her hand had wandered back to the rosary at her waist. She had to be praying for enough patience to not smack Mrs. Turner.
“Mrs. Turner, I’m sure you mean well,” Sister Catherine said, an edge creeping into her usually level voice. “But none of these girls has done anything inappropriate. Each has produced tasteful campaign materials within the school’s guidelines. And do I have to remind you that I am the dean of discipline?”
Mrs. Turner flinched but quickly recovered. The tight smile was back. “Now, Sister Catherine, I do, as you said, mean well. And I believe you are unaware of the emotional impact that the more questionable elements of this campaign have had on the girls. Addressing that sort of thing is my job, and several girls have already told me how threatened they feel.”
The idea of anyone feeling threatened by the actual content of any of the homecoming posters was ridiculous. The So What? campaign wasn’t threatening anyone, either. The only threatening thing that had happened in any campaign was Mrs. Turner threatening me and Helen—and Aimee threatening me in the hall.
“I’m sure you’re prepared to handle their emotional stress when and if they do come to you,” Sister Catherine said, as though she wasn’t all that sure anyone would willingly enter Mrs. Turner’s office. “But as long as they are maintaining their current standards of behavior in their exemplary campaigns, I don’t see what the problem is.”
Mrs. Turner pressed her lips together again. “I see. Well, ladies, I wish you all good luck. I’m sure Sister Catherine is a good judge of your campaign tactics.” She started walking toward the door, tiny shoes clack-clacking against the wooden floors. Midway across the basketball court, she turned, and a bright, gloating smile stretched across her face. “And I’m sure Principal Richard will intervene if anything else comes to light. We wouldn’t want there to be a scandal, would we?”
Sister Catherine’s face turned bright red against the light gray of her habit, but she stayed quiet. Letting Mrs. Turner have the last word was the only way to get her out of the gym.
31
On Friday afternoon, Helen shoved me into an overcrowded dressing room stall in the juniors department at Maison Blanche and slammed the door shut before I had the chance to bolt. Over her arm, she’d slung a huge stack of dresses—some shiny, some silky, and one a hideous blend of lace and animal-print crushed velvet that made me think she’d lost her solid sense of fashion.
I’d been campaigning for Cady since Monday, much to Helen’s annoyance. She thought I should push ahead and press the advantage Kyle’s flyers might give me. Melissa got it, though, and she’d kept silent while I told everyone around me that they should vote for Cady, and to disregard the various photocopies of me that had appeared in the halls. Mrs. Turner pursed her lips every time she saw me, but otherwise, she left me alone.
Now, since it looked like we might pull this off without getting expelled, Melissa and Helen were playing dress-up-the-nerd with me. With my catalog of potential dresses selected, Melissa had stayed in the homecoming gown section of the department store, theoretically looking for a dress of her own. I suspected she was waiting outside as a guard in case I escaped my dressing room prison cell. I sat on the mauve velvet chair that was wedged into a corner of the dressing room and watched Helen arrange the dresses in an order that mystified me.
“I don’t see why I have to buy a dress now.” I crossed my arms. “We don’t find out the results until Monday. Plus, hello, I’m campaigning for Cady. I don’t need a dress.”
Helen slouched against the louvered door of the dressing room, put her hand to her forehead, and closed her eyes, a dramatic indication that she was done with me.
“You are so going to win,” she said. “If only because the universe knows it’ll drive you crazy. And even if you don’t, you’re still going to the dance with Sean, remember? If the two of you look halfway decent, you can remind that scumbag Kyle and that bi—that brat Leah that you are both forces to be reckoned with. Now, please try on something reasonable before Melissa comes back with another of these hideous monstrosities. She has to be joking with this one.”
She had paused to look at the repulsive leopard-and-lace dress. She was right on both counts. Sean and I had agreed we would go to the dance together, so I was going. Also, that dress was a joke.
Helen yanked the ugly dress out of the pile, held it at arm’s length, and wrinkled her nose. Then she looked at the label, and her eyebrows rose.
“Hmm. Betsey Johnson. Ugly and expensive. Didn’t know they carried her stuff here. Maybe we can find you a floral one by her instead. Those are nice.”
She tossed the Betsey Johnson dress over t
he back of my chair.
“What’s first?” I asked, reluctantly rising to my feet. I might as well get through this torture.
“This.” Helen held up a long satin dress so dark blue it seemed almost black. Its slinky fabric pooled on the floor in an elegant puddle. “It’s perfect. It’s the one.”
“Are you serious?” I asked. “That’s going to make me look two feet tall. I can’t wear long dresses.”
Helen snorted and mumbled something like “As if you know anything about fashion.” I let it slide. Moving to the second pile, she handed me a short purple taffeta dress and crossed her arms in front of her chest as she watched me put it on.
I slid the dress over my head, and Helen zipped it up for me. It fit perfectly, but I looked like a grape. Or maybe an eggplant, with very little up top and a giant, belled-out bottom. Either way, I looked like I could go to the dance with the guy dressed as a bunch of grapes in a Fruit of the Loom commercial.
“That’s awful.” Helen scanned me up and down. “You need to try on the blue one.”
I looked at the blue dress again. It slinked against the wall, a streak of midnight in a sea of poufiness. I couldn’t wear something like that.
“Maybe at the end. I’m too short for it.”
Helen muttered something about “tailors” and “it’s their job to shorten hems.” She pulled another short dress off the rack, black this time. Like most short dresses in the juniors department, it looked like it had been in the store since 1987. They all took the same shape, with an off-the-shoulder neckline, tight bodice, and poufy skirt, in different fabrics and colors.
“You’re ruining my order,” she grumbled. “While you put that on, I’m going to get Melissa. And I’m taking your jeans with me, so don’t get any ideas about leaving.”
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