“I’ll watch anything,” Leo said. “Right now I’m into foreign films and Japanese horror.”
“Weren’t a couple of those Japanese horror movies remade in English?”
“There have been a couple. The Ring, The Grudge, and Dark Water are the three biggest.”
“I saw all of those. They were creepy.”
“The Japanese versions are creepier. We should have a movie marathon one night and watch both versions.”
“That would be fun.”
“Doing anything tonight?”
Natalie was caught off guard by Leo’s invitation and it took her a second to answer. “I wish I could, but I’ve got plans.”
Leo busied himself with checking in DVDs that had been returned. “Bummer. Maybe another time. Guess I’ll see you around.”
Natalie could tell Leo didn’t believe her. He probably thinks I turned him down because he’s fat.
Natalie wondered how hard it had been for Leo to ask her to hang out with him.
“I just had an idea,” Natalie said. “If you’re not doing anything tonight, maybe you want to come to the party I’m going to.”
Leo tore his eyes away from the DVDs in his hands. “Where is it?”
“My friend Claudia’s house.”
“Claudia Monroe?”
“Yes.”
An expression of sheer terror washed over Leo’s face. “I think I’ll pass.”
“Why?”
“I don’t think Monster Monroe would like me being there. Besides, she didn’t invite me.”
Natalie waved a hand. “That doesn’t matter. Claudia’s parties are always huge. Lots of people crash. And I’m inviting you.”
“I don’t know. . . .” Leo reluctantly said.
“Think about it,” Natalie urged.
“I’ll think about it,” Leo agreed. “If I decide to go, you’ll see me there.”
“I’ll be looking for you,” Natalie said as she walked out of the store.
And she would.
It would be nice to see a friendly face at the party.
“Wow!” Violet exclaimed as she walked into Jennifer’s bedroom. “You look fantastic!”
Jennifer pressed a finger to her lips. “Shhhh!” she warned. “I don’t want my parents to hear you.”
Violet unzipped her parka and flopped down on Jennifer’s bed. A snoozing Sheba, who was nestled on Jennifer’s pillow, opened one eye, stared at Violet, and then went back to sleep. “They’re all the way downstairs. Why are you being so paranoid?”
Jennifer closed her bedroom door. “So far neither my mom or my dad has seen me in this dress and I plan to keep it that way. They’re getting ready to leave for their weekly bridge game, so I should be safe. If they were to see it, I’m sure one of them would ask me a zillion questions and I don’t want to lie to them.”
Violet held up two fingers and pressed them together. “You’d only be telling a little white lie.”
“Lying is lying.”
“But you’re lying to Claudia,” Violet pointed out.
“That’s different.”
“How?”
“I’m not really lying to Claudia,” Jennifer explained as she put on her gold hoop earrings. “I’m playing a joke on her.”
Violet adjusted her cat-eye glasses and stared at Jennifer. “Uh-huh.”
“And Claudia’s not going to ground me if she finds out the truth!”
“Nooooo,” Violet slowly said. “But she’ll do a lot worse!”
“Maybe she will,” Jennifer admitted. “But I’d rather take my chances with her than with my folks! If Will and I can fool her for a little bit, it will be worth it. Think of all the times she’s been mean and horrible to so many people at school. And she never paid Will for those pizzas!”
“Is Will picking you up?” Violet asked, reaching for the copy of Seventeen that was on Jennifer’s nightstand and flipping through it.
Jennifer checked the time on her clock radio. “He should be getting here any minute.”
“Jennifer! We’re leaving!” her father called from the first floor.
Jennifer stuck her head out her bedroom door. “Have a good time!”
“You too,” her mother said.
“Don’t forget your curfew,” her father added.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be home by twelve thirty,” she promised.
After closing the bedroom door, Jennifer turned to the mirror over her dresser and examined herself one last time. The dress was plum-colored and tied around her neck like a halter top. She was wearing high-heeled black slouchy boots with it. She’d used hot rollers so her hair was a wild mane of loose curls, and applied smoky plum eye shadow to her lids and some blush to her cheeks. In addition to the gold hoop earrings, the only other jewelry she was wearing was a bunch of bangle bracelets on one arm.
“Do you think Will will like what I’m wearing?”
Violet’s eyes widened in panic behind her glasses and she dropped the copy of Seventeen. “Why do you care what Will thinks?”
Jennifer shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess my mind is automatically in date mode.”
“Well, get it out of date mode. Remember, this is not a real date. Will is not your boyfriend. This is all fake, remember?”
“Yes, yes, I remember,” she said as she gave herself a spritz of perfume.
Violet sternly pointed a finger at Jennifer. “Good. Don’t forget it!”
The doorbell rang and Jennifer turned to Violet. “He’s here!”
“Talk about timing. He just missed your parents.”
Jennifer took one last look in her mirror before leaving the bedroom with Violet right behind her.
“Why do I feel like an actress about to go on stage?” Jennifer asked as they hurried down the stairs.
“Relax,” Violet said. “You told me the two of you fooled Natalie and Tom last night.”
“That’s different. Natalie isn’t suspicious of me.”
“Just do whatever you did last night.”
“Good advice,” Jennifer said as she opened the front door.
“Ready to enter Claudia’s evil lair?” Will asked as he stepped inside.
“As ready as I’ll ever be,” Jennifer said as she reached into the hall closet for her coat. She could feel Will’s eyes studying her from behind.
“Like what you see?” she asked, turning around with a saucy smile.
Will was silent for a moment. Then he said, “I’m definitely surprised. Who knew you could look so hot?”
Will’s words left Jennifer speechless. He thought she looked hot? That wasn’t what she’d been expecting to hear. But she’d take it!
“You might have to beat the guys off at this party,” Will said.
“Don’t you mean you’re going to have to beat them off?” Jennifer reminded him as she pulled on her gloves. “After all, you’re my boyfriend.”
“Fake boyfriend,” Violet piped up as her eyes worriedly flickered back and forth between Jennifer and Will.
“I’m not the jealous type,” Will told Jennifer. “But don’t worry. I’ll be keeping my eyes on you the entire night. I wouldn’t want you trading me in for some other guy.”
“Shouldn’t I be the one worried about getting traded in?” Jennifer asked. “After all, you’re the one who always has a new girlfriend.”
“I don’t think either one of you has anything to worry about since this is all pretend,” Violet reminded them.
“Are you coming to this party?” Will asked.
Violet laughed. “Claudia would never invite me to one of her parties. She’s been snubbing me since third grade. I’m going home.” Violet gave Jennifer a hug good night. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Good luck!”
Violet left, with Will following after her, leaving Jennifer to turn off the hall lights and lock the front door. When she got outside, she saw Will leaning against the side of a red car parked at the curb.
“No motorcycle?” she asked.
&nb
sp; “I borrowed my older sister’s car. I figured it was too cold for the motorcycle. Disappointed?”
“Well, I was wondering what it would be like to sit behind you with my arms wrapped around you and the wind blowing through my hair,” Jennifer admitted.
“I’ll give you a ride another day.”
“Promise?”
Will crossed his heart. “Promise.” He studied Jennifer from head to toe. “I never saw you as a biker chick.”
“There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Mr. Sinclair,” she said as she got into the front seat.
“Guess I better start finding out,” Will said as he went around to the driver’s side and opened the door. “Because it’s almost showtime!”
Will and Jennifer tossed questions back and forth to each other on the drive to Claudia’s house. They knew their answers but both were aware there was more to their charade than just knowing the right answers.
“Leave most of the talking to me,” Jennifer said. “Girls are always gushing about their boyfriends. Guys usually don’t like to talk.”
“True,” Will agreed.
“A lot of it is going to be body language. Holding. Touching. Like last night.”
“Piece of cake,” Will said. “We did a pretty good job fooling Natalie and Tom.”
Jennifer knew last night had gone well. But like she told Violet, Natalie wasn’t Claudia. They were going to have to be on their guard the entire night. They couldn’t afford any slipups.
When they arrived at Claudia’s house, a line of cars was parked in the driveway, as well as double-parked in the street.
“Looks like there’s already a huge crowd,” Will said as he parked behind the last car in the driveway. He took Jennifer’s hand in his. “Ready?”
Jennifer squeezed his hand, fighting against the butterflies in her stomach. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
“We can do this,” Will said. “We can.”
Jennifer didn’t say anything. She just nodded, wishing she had Will’s confidence.
Claudia’s entire house was lit up. It was a huge McMansion with three floors. As they approached the front door, they could hear music blasting.
“I don’t believe it,” Jennifer said as they walked inside.
The house was decorated for Valentine’s Day. There were tons of red, white, and pink balloons floating in the air. Pink and red streamers were draped around the staircase leading to the second floor and foiled hearts and cupids were pinned on the walls. But what got the most attention — and shocked Jennifer — was the huge pink banner strung across the living room that said VOTE FOR CLAUDIA AND CHASE! The flat-screen TV in the family room showed nonstop clips of Claudia and Chase, dating all the way back to freshman year, and there were poster-size photos of Claudia and Chase hanging from the ceiling of every room with invisible wire.
They had walked into a shrine devoted to Claudia and Chase.
“I feel like we’re in enemy territory,” Will whispered.
“Me too,” Jennifer whispered back as she stared into a bowl of candy hearts. She picked one up and saw it said CLAUDIA LOVES CHASE. Another said: C + C 4EVER.
“Talk about confidence,” Will said. “I guess she figures her nomination is in the bag.”
Jennifer dropped the candy heart back into the bowl. “There’s a difference between being nominated and winning.”
Will looked around the party. “So where is the Evil One?”
“Good question,” Jennifer said, wondering exactly the same thing.
“Where’s Claudia?” Eden asked Natalie.
“I think she’s up in her bedroom. Why?”
Eden didn’t wait for an answer. She was too angry. Instead, she stormed up the stairs to the third floor. When she got to Claudia’s bedroom, she didn’t bother to knock and barged right in.
A startled Claudia looked away from the mirror at her vanity table, where she was sitting and applying her lipstick.
“Did you forget how to knock?”
“How could you do this to me?” Eden wailed.
Claudia capped her lipstick and picked up a hairbrush. “Do what?”
“Invite Keith to your party! He’s here. With his new girlfriend!”
“What was I supposed to do?” Claudia asked as she started brushing her hair. “Not invite him?”
“Yes!”
“How could I? He’s one of Chase’s best friends.”
“And you’re supposed to be my best friend.” Eden hadn’t really wanted to come to Claudia’s party, but Claudia had given her a massive guilt trip when she’d called that afternoon. Finally, she had caved in and said she would come. “You could have warned me so I wouldn’t have been blindsided when I walked through the front door and found them in the living room. Do you know what it was like for me to see Deena sitting on Keith’s lap?”
Claudia put down her hairbrush. “It slipped my mind.”
I’ll just bet it did, Eden thought darkly. She knew how much Claudia loved causing drama.
Sometimes Eden asked herself why she was still friends with Claudia. True, there were times when Claudia could be kind and thoughtful. Often she would invite her to spend long weekends with her family at their house in the Hamptons during the summer, or at their ski lodge in upstate New York during the winter. She was always giving her clothes she didn’t want anymore — some with the price tags still on them. Their friendship went back to junior high, when they had found themselves with identical schedules. Because they were in the same classes, they often ended up talking between periods or during lunch. As they got to know each other, they started hanging out after school and soon they were making weekend plans together. It continued when they started high school and Natalie became friends with them.
But over the last year, Claudia had started to change. She’d always been a bit mean . . . but never to Eden and Natalie. But more and more, Claudia was showing her nasty side to them and Eden didn’t like it. Neither she nor Natalie deserved to be treated this way. Not when they were supposed to be Claudia’s best friends.
“What am I supposed to do?” Eden asked.
“Ignore them!” Claudia exclaimed, walking to her bedroom door. “Have a good time. This is a huge house. I’m sure you can find someplace to hide from them, although if I were you, I’d find a hot guy to dance with and show Keith that you’ve moved on!”
After Claudia left, Eden went over to the vanity table and checked her appearance in the mirror. At least she had pulled out all the stops with her outfit. It didn’t look like she was nursing a broken heart. She was wearing a strapless white silk ruffle top and a short chocolate-brown suede skirt with matching boots. To bring more attention to her dangling chandelier earrings, she had pulled her hair back into a slick ponytail. She looked pretty and confident. She only wished she felt that way.
She wanted to go home, but she couldn’t leave. Not yet. If she did, Deena and Keith would think they’d scared her off, and she wasn’t going to let them think that! So she went down to the kitchen and decided to get a soda. She’d stay for an hour and then leave.
But when Eden entered the kitchen, she found another nasty surprise.
Leaning against the kitchen counter, having salsa and chips fed to him by a tall cocoa-skinned girl with blonde dreadlocks, was her ex-boyfriend Luther. After the girl would pop a chip into his mouth, Luther would give her a kiss. She’d then kiss him back before popping another chip into his mouth.
It was obvious to Eden that they were boyfriend and girlfriend. She could tell by the way they were acting.
Eden ducked out of the kitchen before being seen. She didn’t want to talk to Luther and meet his new girlfriend. Like Keith, Luther had never given her a reason when he’d broken up with her last summer. He’d said, “I’m just not feeling it anymore.”
At least he’d done it in person and not by text message.
Now that the kitchen and living room were off-limits, where else could she go?
She decided on
the rec room. It should be safe down there.
Eden headed down to the basement, and as she got closer, she could hear music blaring. It was an old Madonna song from the 80s. At the sound of the music, Eden found herself swaying. She loved to dance.
As she grooved to the music, Eden noticed a couple dancing together in a corner. Even though it wasn’t a slow dance, they had their arms wrapped around each other’s necks. But they were more focused on kissing than dancing. As they stepped out of the shadows into the light, Eden’s eyes widened in shock.
The guy holding the girl was Malcolm, another one of her ex-boyfriends.
Had Claudia invited all her exes?
Eden no longer wanted to dance. Before Malcolm could see her, she left the rec room and went back upstairs, where she found her coat buried under a pile in the front hallway.
“Where are you going?” Natalie asked as she passed by her.
“Home!” Eden exclaimed.
Before going home, Eden stopped at the supermarket. If she was going to feel sorry for herself, she needed to do it with some ice cream. She grabbed a small basket and headed for the ice cream aisle. After finding containers of Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Fudge Brownie and Mint Chocolate Chunk, she decided she needed a can of whipped cream.
She was walking down the dairy aisle when she saw the last person she expected to see on a Saturday night.
Dexter.
And he was with a pretty girl!
For Eden, it was the last straw. Everyone she knew was paired off. Even a brainiac like Dexter!
Was she the only person who was all alone on a Saturday night?
Before Eden could stop herself, tears were falling down her cheeks.
It was at that exact moment that Dexter turned around.
“Eden?” he asked in shock.
Eden quickly wiped away her tears, embarrassed to have been caught crying.
“Is everything okay?” he asked, coming over.
“Everything’s fine!” she exclaimed, trying to smile.
“What are you doing here? I thought you’d be at Claudia’s party.”
At the mention of Claudia’s party, Eden remembered why she had left and the tears returned. And this time, there was no holding them back. “Everything’s not fine,” she sobbed. “I’ve had the worst night of my life. I ran into three of my ex-boyfriends and they all have new girlfriends.”
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