The Clique

by Valerie Thomas

  Aude laughs. “That would be great. Can you imagine how my parents would react?” She imitates her father’s voice, “’Audrey, your sisters would never have hosted a kegger and wrecked the house. That lamp cost eight thousand dollars.’”

  “Yeah, your dad would probably kick you out. I’d let you stay with me though.”

  “Thanks, but if I got kicked out I think I’d stay with Kate. She has all my clothes.”

  Hannah smiles. “Maybe, but I have a guest house and fresh pancakes every morning. My parents wouldn’t even know you were there, and my nanny’s super cool.”

  Aude sets her barely-eaten burger back down. “Hmm, tempting. Maybe we should hold off on the if-I-get-kicked-out plans for now, though. I mean, I don’t think it’s gonna happen.”

  “Your loss.” Hannah cracks her neck. “Well, it looks like the boys are leaving. What time is it, Aude?”

  “Uh, about fifteen minutes till the end of the period.” Aude turns in her chair. Dom looks hurt, depressed. She almost walks over to comfort him, before remembering the way he acted at Chili’s.

  Aude and Kate head back to school, returning several minutes before the end of the period. They decide to hang out in the front courtyard until it’s over.

  “Hey, there’s Sean.”

  Aude follows Kate’s eyes to the entrance. She can see Sean gulp and start to turn around. “Did you ever actually break up with him?” she asks.

  Kate shakes her head. “No. I never really—I guess I didn’t want to admit that it was over.”

  “But it’s over now?”

  “Oh, it’s definitely over.”

  Aude smiles. “Then you should make it official. Wave Connor’s number in his stupid face.”

  “Wanna come with me?” Kate frowns. “I could use the moral support.”

  “Sure.” Aude follows her friend as they track Sean down. They find him in the library, sitting alone at one of the wooden tables and pretending to study something.

  “So,” Kate says, taking a seat across from him. “You tried to cheat on me. And then you lied about it.”

  “Huh?” Sean looks up from his book. “Oh… Listen, it wasn’t my—“

  “No, you listen. In case it wasn’t obvious, we’re through. Don’t even bother saying hi in the hallways.” Kate scowls. “You’re just a horrible person, and I never want anything to do with you. Ever again.” And just like that, she stands back up.

  “Honeybuns… It wasn’t my fault. I let one of my friends get into my head and—“

  “I don’t wanna hear your excuses.”

  “Well, maybe you should!” Sean rises to his feet. “I know I was being stupid and terrible and whatever else, okay! But I’m sorry!” He glances to Aude. “I’m sorry.”

  “Apology not accepted,” Kate hisses. “Come on, Aude. Let’s go.”

  “Okay.” Aude follows her friend out into the hall. The bell for next hour rings, but she ignores it.

  “I can’t believe him!” Kate rants. “How dare he—how dare he—“

  “Apologize?” Aude sighs. “Look, I know it probably wasn’t fun. But at least it’s over, right? Officially over.” She tugs on Kate’s wrist to get her to stop walking. “Are you okay?”

  Kate turns to face her, and Aude can see the hint of tears in her eyes. “How can he still make me like this? I’m done with him. We’re over!”

  “I know, Kate. You’re over.” Aude puts a hand on her shoulder. “But that doesn’t mean you can just turn off the feelings you had for him. If you want my advice, go out with Connor, have fun, forget everything with Sean ever happened. Just move on.”

  “But what if Connor isn’t the same? What if he isn’t as good?”

  Aude laughs. “Maybe he won’t be. And then you can dump him too, and move onto someone else.”

  “This isn’t making me feel any better…” Kate sighs. “Is that all relationships are? Just a string of terrible guys?”

  “Well, hopefully not. Hopefully there are some good ones too.” Aude smiles. “But yeah, that’s kinda what dating is. You look through an endless stream of guys you don’t like, until you finally find one you do. And then you say ‘this one is mine,’ and you hold onto them forever.”

  “And Gabe? Is he that guy for you?”

  Aude shakes her head. “I don’t know, Kate. I don’t know.”

  Chapter Twenty-two

  “You wanna sit down?” Jonah spreads a blanket on a patch of damp grass.

  Maddie peers up at the stars. “This was a great idea.”

  “I know, right? Late night picnic.” He inhales slowly. “You could almost forget we’re in the middle of the city.”

  “Maybe, if it weren’t for all the streetlights.” She sits down on the blanket.

  Jonah shrugs and opens the wicker basket. “True enough. I hope you don’t mind pb and j’s.”

  “Not at all.”

  “Good. They’re good, I promise. I brought some berries, too.”

  Maddie grabs one of the sandwiches and forces herself to eat slowly, even though dance practice left her with a huge appetite. Well, it wasn’t her idea to have dinner at eight at night.

  Jonah finishes his sandwich first; he leans back on both hands. “I love fall. Everything smells fresh. It’s like spring, but without the allergies.”

  “Yeah, ‘cause everything’s dying.” Maddie pops the last bit of pb&j into her mouth. “It’s actually kinda depressing, when you think about it.”

  “If you think about it that way, yeah. But next spring, we’ll have a bunch of new plants to look at.”

  “New isn’t necessarily better,” Maddie argues. “In fact, I think new is worse most times.”

  “I don’t know about that... I think new is almost always an improvement.” Maddie can feel the heat of his breath against the side of her face. “Berry?” Jonah holds a strawberry up to her lips.

  “Yes please.” She takes a bite.

  “Ah, this is nice. It’s fun to get away from my family and all the commotion sometimes. You know?”

  Maddie shakes her head. “Since my mom moved out, there hasn’t really been any commotion. Just a lot of empty bottles.” She grimaces. “Sorry, I probably shouldn’t mention that on the first date.”

  “Nah, it’s cool. I don’t drink, personally.”

  “Really?”

  “Yup.” Jonah watches a biker in neon clothes ride by. “I’ve been straight edge for a couple years now.”

  “Oh, interesting. I don’t really drink either. I mean, I’m not completely straight edge, but yeah—I’ve seen a lot of people do stupid things drunk.”

  “Such as?”

  Maddie shakes her head. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “You can tell me.” Jonah frowns. “No? How ’bout I tell you something about me? Secret for secret.”

  “Okay… Well, it isn’t exactly a secret, but this one time one of my friends had way too much and made out with three different guys. At the same party.”

  Jonah laughs. “Did they find out? Which one of your friends was it? The blonde one?”

  “Yeah, the blonde one.” One of the blonde ones, anyway. “Your turn.”

  “Yup.” Jonah rubs his jaw with a knuckle. “Alright, here’s a good one. When I was twelve I got in a fight with a high schooler. I knocked him flat on his ass.”

  Fantastic. Maddie suppresses a yawn. “My turn?” Jonah nods. “I’m glad my mom left, sometimes. It seemed like she was gone a long time before she actually left, and in a way, the fact that she’s actually gone doesn’t feel any different than the past few years.”

  “I know what you mean.” Jonah doesn’t explain; he stands up and brushes off his pants. “I was gonna bring ice cream, but then I realized it would have melted. You wanna get some now?”

  “Uh, yeah, sure.” Maddie stands up and helps Jonah roll the blanket. The grass crunches under her feet as they walk to his car.

  “I think there’s a seven-eleven somewhere around here,” Jonah says.


  “Yeah. You head toward Larkspur and take a right, and then you drive for a bit and it’s on the left.”

  “Okay, thanks.” Jonah follows her directions, and in less than a minute he’s parking outside the 7-Eleven.

  There’s a stripe of white lights around the top of the store, and as Maddie steps into the store, her first impression is of how cheap it looks. The inside is like a collection of every convenience-store cliché possible: day-old hot dogs on a rolling steel sheet, a large Slurpee machine (complete with spilled slush on the counter beside it), and a heavy-browed clerk, who gives them both a nonplussed look. It must be close to closing time.

  Jonah heads for the single freezer. “Häagen-Dazs or Breyers?” he asks.

  “Breyers. Häagen-Dazs is way too expensive.” Maddie glances at the clerk again, only to look away when she notices he’s still looking at her, his fingers playing a tap-dance on the register.

  “What flavor do you want?” Jonah asks, from across the store.

  “Uh, vanilla’s fine,” Maddie calls back.

  “Okay.” He picks out a container and brings it over to the counter.

  The clerk rings it up. “Three twenty. On the Visa, very good. Thank you, have a fantastic night.” He says the benediction in a way that makes it very clear he couldn’t care less whether or not Jonah and Maddie have a “fantastic night.”

  Jonah unlocks the car and drives back to the park. “Oh shit, I forgot. We need spoons.”

  “That’s alright. We can use the lid.” Maddie pulls the lid off and rips it in half. “See?”

  “Good deal.” He scoops a bit of ice cream off the top. “So, any other secrets to tell?”

  Maddie sighs. She decides to tell him the first one that comes to her mind. “Well, I’m spying on my best friend for someone I barely know, and who I’m sure doesn’t have her best interests in mind.”

  He give a nervous laugh. “You are?”

  “Uh huh.” Maddie looks down at the ice cream carton. “And he told me to tell her I saw her sleeping with my other friend’s boyfriend. He said it wasn’t a lie, but now we know that it was… And I feel really bad about it.”

  Jonah wrinkles his nose. “Damn. It doesn’t matter how you feel about it. That’s screwed up.”

  “Yeah, well, I can’t really back out of it now. He’d tell my friends, and I’d lose them.”

  “Damn,” Jonah repeats. “So you’re gonna keep spying on your friends and lying to them?”

  Maddie’s eyes fall to the leather console. She traces the stitching. “Yeah, I guess. I don’t have a choice. If I don’t, Devon—that’s the boy—he’ll probably tell them.”

  “That’s the right thing to do, though.”

  “He has my mom, okay!” The words come out more desperate than Maddie intended. “I told you she left! And then, out of the blue, she called me, because of him! If I don’t help him, she won’t ever talk to me again.”

  “How could he get your mom to call you?” Jonah asks.

  “Because she wants to be an actress and his dad got her a job.” Maddie looks away from him. “She called me because Devon made her. I know helping him is wrong, and I should stop, but—I dunno, I’m being stupid, I guess.”

  Jonah shakes his head. “Nah, it isn’t stupid. I get ya. If I were in that position, I have no idea what I’d do. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have judged.”

  “No, it’s my fault. I shouldn’t have brought it up.” Maddie taps the pint of ice cream. “I think it’s melting.”

  “Looks like. Here, I’ll just toss it.” Jonah pushes his door open and walks over to a forest green trash can. He returns. “What are you gonna do?”

  “Huh?”

  “I mean, what’s your plan? Down the road? You know your friends hafta find out eventually. What are you gonna do then?”

  Maddie shrugs. “Find new friends, I guess. I don’t know. I never really thought that far ahead. Maybe they won’t find out, like ever.”

  “No plan is a bad plan.” Jonah sighs. “I can tell you what I’d do, but I don’t know if you wanna hear it.”

  Maddie scowls. “Fine, what would you do, genius?”

  “Simple. I’d tell the truth, and figure out another way to get in contact with my mom. You know your friends will take it a million times better if you’re the one to tell them.”

  “I can’t do that. Look, you just don’t know what it’s like at my school. I’m one of the popular girls. I can’t just tell Aude, or her and Kate and everyone else would stop talking to me! And then I wouldn’t be popular, and I wouldn’t have any friends.”

  “You’re blaming your school? Maddie, it doesn’t have anything to do with that. We have popular chicks at Fairview too, and if any of them did what you’ve done, I’d tell ‘em what I told you. Like Coach always says, a good person does the right thing, even when it’s the wrong thing for themselves. I get that it sounds rough, ‘cause it is, but you have to set your selfishness aside.”

  “I’m not selfish!” Maddie huffs. “And besides, you hardly know me! How dare you presume to give me advice, when you don’t know what my life is like!”

  Jonah stares at his steering wheel. Maddie can see his chest rise with a single, long breath. “Aude and Kate.”

  “What?”

  “Those are the friends you’re talking about?”

  Maddie frowns. “Maybe.”

  He rubs the bridge of his nose. “I was going to the bathroom at this party not too long ago, when a girl burst in, worried out of her mind about something happening to her friend. Turns out, her friend was about to get raped. She’d been pumping drinks into her, to get revenge for her boyfriend cheating.” He opens his eyes and finally looks at Maddie. “Wanna guess their names?”

  “Aude and Kate?” Maddie looks at Jonah, praying he’ll say no. Or maybe Ha, just kidding! And she can hit him and tell him the joke isn’t funny.

  Instead, he gives a slow nod.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Kate hears a knock on her door. She sets her homework down and jogs down the stairs. There’s another knock just as she reaches the door. She pulls it open. “Hello?”

  “Hey.” Devon’s lips turn up in a small smile. “I was hoping I could talk with you.”

  Kate looks at the setting sun. “Now?”

  “Yeah. It’s, uh, kind of important.”

  “Uh huh.” She purses her lips. “Well, what is it?”

  “Can we go for a walk or something? I feel kinda awkward just standing here.”

  “No, I don’t think so. It’s late.” And, she thinks, I wouldn’t feel safe walking with you.

  Devon frowns. “Please. I just wanna talk.”

  “Then talk.”

  “Not here. Just walk with me, it’s a good night for it.”

  Kate glances at the closet. Her mom keeps some pepper spray in there, somewhere. “Just a second.” She closes the door and rifles through one of her mom’s purses, a black one with silver trim, only to come up empty-handed. Maybe it’s—oh, wait, duh. She checks the shelf above her head, finds a compact red bottle behind the sunscreen, and shoves it in her pocket. “Okay, let’s go.”

  “Okay.” Devon waits while Kate locks the door. He takes the lead, turning right at the end of her driveway.

  “So what did you have to talk about?” Kate asks.

  Devon sighs. “I wanted to know why you’re so—why you don’t hang out with me anymore.”

  “I have a project.”

  “Kate, I know that isn’t true.” Devon kicks a rock on the sidewalk. “Here, let’s go across the street. Look, you freaked out on Monday. I just wanna know why, and then I’ll leave you alone.”

  “I dunno, I just felt bad about what we did to Aude. I mean, can you imagine having to go to a doctor to prove your innocence?”

  “Doesn’t sound all that bad to me.” Devon shrugs. “That’s just like a normal gynecological appointment, right? Except he looks for the—you know.”

  Kate shudders.
“Just the idea of some creepy guy feeling around in there, looking around—it wasn’t like her normal doctor. She said she had to search for one who was even willing to agree to a test.”

  “Meh, I don’t see it. Hold on, you’re ignoring me because of something we both did? That doesn’t seem fair.” Devon’s brow wrinkles. “I was just trying to help you, remember?”

  “Yeah, but the way you did it was—cruel.” Kate starts to take a right, but Devon grabs her arms and guides her straight forward.

  “It wouldn’t have been cruel, if Maddie and I had been right,” he argues. “The only reason you’re thinking differently now is because we weren’t. And besides, it all worked out. Right? You two are friends again, you dumped Sean, and got your revenge on Aude.”

  “She hasn’t even asked about it yet. I mean, she has to know I was the one who took that video. Why wouldn’t she ask?”

  “The simple answer?” Devon shrugs. “She’s afraid of what you’ll say. You told me how hard she worked to fix your friendship. So she won’t do anything to complicate things, for a while.” He points to a white house at the end of a cul-de-sac. “Oh, look, there’s Amanda’s house. Mind if I go over? I heard she was sick today, and I want to make sure she’s okay.”

  Something about the way he asks makes Kate pause. “Uh, you know Amanda?”

  “Yeah.” He smirks. “I have other friends besides you. Come on, let’s go check on her.”

  “I dunno. She hasn’t been—since she stopped being class president, she’s been sorta mean to me.”

  “Hmmm, alright. Well how about I just knock on the door, see if she’s okay, and then we leave? You won’t even have to go inside.”

  Kate frowns. “Fine.” She follows Devon down the cul-de-sac and up to the door.

  Devon knocks a couple of times, but no one answers. “That’s weird.” He cocks his head. “It sounds like there’s someone inside. Wait here.” He hops the wrought-iron railing and walks over to a ground-floor window. From where Kate’s standing it looks like the blinds are closed, but Devon must be able to see something.

  “Oh shit!” he whispers, ducking his head and turning back to Kate. “Don’t look.”