My phone buzzed in my purse and I pulled it out.
VAUGHN: How much do you want me to keep my mouth shut about you-know-what?
My stomach sank. Vaughn was a selfish dope, but not a malicious dope.
So why did that text seem so threatening?
Shielding my phone, just in case, I thought about my response. Jokey? Semi-Serious? Imma-Cut-You-Serious? I walked over to the hallway, hoping for a little bit of privacy.
Don’t be a tease, I typed, deliberately echoing his statement from earlier. With guys like Vaughn, I’d learned it was usually best to pretend that nothing they said was serious. Usually they ended up feeling so dumb that they gave up.
My phone buzzed with a reply almost an instant after I hit send. I jumped, but it was only Teddy.
TEDDY: Be honest. You and Elin and Jenna and Rosie plan to retire together down in Florida someday without me
I shut my eyes, feeling sick—not my normal reaction to a Teddy Text, which was usually a painful sort of delight. To think that Teddy was finally joking around again and I was sitting here, trying to figure out a way to keep Vaughn’s mouth shut about Elin. If Teddy could see the mess I’d landed myself in, he’d never talk to me again.
DAMN. IT.
I closed his text—I would think of a reply later.
My phone buzzed again.
VAUGHN: I think you’d do anything.
I paused.
There was no denying it now—Vaughn was threatening me.
Instinctively, I looked over at the couch where Rosie had been sitting. Jenna would be more likely to know what to do, but Rosie would be less prone to shooting me judgey looks.
But for the first time all night, she wasn’t there. Maybe she was off making out with FDR. I cracked an involuntary smile at the idea.
I strolled over to the couch that Rosie had vacated, focusing on looking Indifferent To It All in case Vaughn was watching. I sat down and crossed my legs at the ankle like a Good Girl.
KET: What do you want?
Hoping the answer was something I’d be willing to give.
It took him all of ten seconds to reply.
VAUGHN: You know what I want.
Get ready for your closeup, Beauchamp.
I shut my eyes and resisted the urge to groan. For one second, the world seemed to stop. I opened my eyes, and everything restarted.
Over in the kitchen, Jenna was doing shots.
And Elin was standing alone in the kitchen. Looking miserable.
And effing Rosie had still not made a reappearance.
I had never taken a naked picture of myself and sent it to someone. Of course, I had received Dick Pics O’Plenty, mostly from Vaughn himself. They didn’t do anything for me and in most cases they made me uncomfortable, but I could almost always laugh them off. When asked to reciprocate, I always declined, usually with a grin or a joke or a kiss.
But despite all my best Avoidance Strategies, Vaughn wouldn’t let it go. And what he really wanted, what he’d regularly begged for, was a Full-On Sex Tape.
Something told me this time a joke wouldn’t get him to back off.
I chewed the inside of my cheeks—the one nervous tic that just looks like you’re practicing a selfie face—and turned my phone over in my hands.
It wasn’t just that I didn’t want to send a guy a naked picture. Mama Leanne and Mom Kim’s Lectures on the Permanence of the Internet had sunk in even when most other Lectures had not. But even if I did feel the urge to document my current level of hotness, who would I send it to? I didn’t trust anyone enough to believe it wouldn’t get passed around. And if a picture was something I didn’t want to do, a sex tape was Something I Didn’t Want To Do. A whole other magnitude of Not Want.
But what did I risk by promising now, and maybe defaulting later? If Elin had a good prom, then I could deal with Vaughn later. Hook up with him one more time, but weasel out of the Audio Visual portion of the evening. It’s not like I hadn’t done that before.
And even if Vaughn told people about Elin’s suicide attempt on Monday, with Elin happy and confident and back with Ben, who would believe him? A few people, sure, but some people already believed Elin had gone to the Cirque Lodge and shared a room with some coked-out Disney star. And yeah, Elin would be pissed, but not nearly as pissed as she’d be if he started running his mouth before she had a chance to get back with Ben.
So I didn’t need Vaughn to shut up for the rest of our lives, or even until graduation. I just needed him to shut up until Elin and Ben had a chance to smooth things over and hopefully have some sweaty prom night sex in Ben’s car.
I bit my lip and then typed out my response before I could chicken out.
KET: Deal.
17
Rosie Winchester
April 18, 7:20 PM
I stepped out onto Fisher’s porch, arms wrapped around myself, wishing I’d worn a coat. (Wishing I had someone to tell me to put on a coat.) Goosebumps broke out over my exposed back and I rubbed my arms, willing some warmth into my skin. I sat down gingerly on the cushion-less porch furniture, wincing as the cold of the metal seat seeped through my skirt, biting into my skin, and settling into my bones.
This stupid dress. Why had I even bought it? When we’d stepped through the door of her legendary party condo, Elin had gushed over Fisher’s dress, a one-shouldered gown that looked like a painting—splashes of orange, blue, purple, and green on a white background, cinched with a gold belt that made her waist seem reed-thin.
Fisher had shrugged off the praise. “I snagged it at thrift shop.” She’d probably spent fifty dollars to look like a character in a movie, and I looked like a total try-hard.
I opened my borrowed clutch, looking for a stick of gum, my stomach sour and churning. I should have gotten something to eat, or at least had more at my house than a can of Red Bull. I took a deep breath, held it. Let it out.
Inside, someone had turned up the stereo. The bass thumped through the closed doors and windows, and for some reason that made me want to cry. I blinked furiously, refusing to let any tears fall, and touched my cold cheeks with my fingertips. Instinctively, I reached under the glasses that I’d forgotten weren’t even on my face tonight.
I should have just met my friends at the dance when I found out about Fisher’s party. Parties were not my thing. I wasn’t like Jenna or Ket—I couldn’t make small talk with people I wasn’t friends with. I wasn’t like Elin, finding the positive in any situation.
(Elin isn’t like Elin anymore.)
Some people were all sunshine, some were all shadow. I was miserable at parties.
(And more miserable, knowing that a normal person would not be miserable.)
The air smelled like metal and wood smoke. The sky was ominous, gray clouds hanging low. Threatening a storm on Jenna’s perfect night. My cheeks burned in the cold, the tips of my ears numbing.
I just wanted to go home. I could take off this dumb dress, take out these stupid contacts, and climb into my mom’s bed. Will would order whatever food I wanted and we could watch old episodes of Adventuretime until I wanted to sleep. Then I knew Will would let me have the bed for the night.
I could finish reading my book.
I could play Call of Duty.
I could write. (I haven’t written since Teddy stopped talking to me.)
Whatever I did … it would be so much more fun than this.
And he’d never say it, but Will would be so relieved. (Would he?) (He told me to go have fun.)
I opened my flip phone, closed it. Opened it again.
He would come to get me, no questions asked.
(You promised Jenna. For Elin.)
(You promised Ket something, too, and you just broke that one.)
I closed my phone. Put it back in my clutch.
I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t want to see Ben, to feel guilty about everything I had just said when he was the one in the wrong. I didn’t want to miss Teddy and wonder if we were ever
going to be okay again. I didn’t want to watch Ket roll her eyes because she wanted to dance and I wanted to hover at the edge of the room. I didn’t want to see FDR, wonder why the hell he was even talking to me. I didn’t want to be the raincloud on Jenna’s big night. I didn’t want to worry about Elin.
My phone blipped with a text. I flipped it open. From Elin: Where are you? I want to go to the dance. Jenna’s drunk, are you good to drive?
I let out a long breath. Bit the insides of my cheeks.
Closed my eyes.
Counted to five.
Opened my eyes.
And typed back, Of course. Let’s go.
18
Jenna Sinclair
April 18, 7:45 PM
If this is what being drunk was like, I didn’t know why I wasn’t drunk all the time. Ket’s jokes were better, Rosie’s annoyance was funnier, and Elin finally, finally wasn’t bugging me. What was to stop me from just being this way, all the time?
Liver cirrhosis, probably.
I snorted at my own silent joke and Ket glanced over at me, an amused smirk on her face. We pushed open the double-doors to the gym and Elin gasped with surprise. I grinned, my brain swimming with endorphins.
Elin wrapped her arms around me in a hug. “It looks awesome, Jen!”
My headache roared back to life, but I made myself hug her back. “I’ve gotta go take care of prom committee stuff!” I yell-lied over the music. “I’ll be right back!” Rosie looked at me, disappointment etched across her face, but before I could start to feel guilty, Ket grabbed her hand and Elin’s and dragged them to the dance floor. I ran off to find Miles or Hannah—whoever I located first.
Everywhere I turned, kids were dancing, taking selfies, laughing, and I couldn’t keep the grin off my face. For the first time since my morning run, I felt energized, adrenaline running through my veins. Prom might have been a bit silly, and definitely more trouble than I had expected, but this—this was the reason I’d busted my ass for two months.
People had been bitching for weeks that we weren’t able to rent out a hotel ballroom for prom. Last year’s seniors destroyed several rooms and a hot tub at the Yarrow after the dance, and no hotel wanted to deal with us without a hefty deposit, but I was not easily foiled. As senior class vice president, I had planned every detail of senior prom. From the flavor of punch—cucumber lime, much harder to spike and way less stain potential—to the trays of refreshments scattered around the gym on long banquet tables. I ordered the warm white Edison bulb lights we strung across the ceiling—LED twinkle lights look terrible in photos—and planned the light sequence for the dance floor with some of the AV kids. I ordered black draperies to hide the brick gym walls and filled enough balloons with helium that you couldn’t even see the ceiling. It was a still a gym, but at least it was a gym that looked expensive.
I gave the DJ explicit instructions to stick to Top 40 dance remixes with non-explicit lyrics, ballads, and a healthy dose of country for the girls, and limit the playlist to no more than two unironically ironic songs each hour. I’d even emailed him a list of twenty acceptable songs that kids wouldn’t be embarrassed to dance to, in case he couldn’t think of any.
He’d written back, “I like your style, kid.”
The theme of prom was “Starry Night.” Usually prom committees picked a sappy country song to close out the dance (“Amazed,” “I Hope You Dance,” and “It’s Your Love” being traditional favorites), but I liked the generic.
My phone buzzed and I fished it out of my purse.
HANNAH: WHERE ARE U???
We have a problem.
Meet in the east girls room.
Normally a demanding, zero-explanation text from Hannah would have my blood boiling. This time, though, I was struck with a case of the giggles. I was pretty sure I knew exactly what had set her off—and it wasn’t the light check.
There were six dances every year—Homecoming, Halloween, the nondenominationally titled “Winter,” Novelty, Sadie Hawkins, and Prom. Since freshman year when my sister Holly demanded I join student council, I had helped on every single one of them. I’d sat at crepe-papered tables selling tickets during lunch, gone on snack runs for upperclassmen, designed advertisements, and fantasized about when I’d be the one calling the shots.
Ket liked to joke that I should skip college and just go into party planning, but that was never the appeal. It was one of those things I wasn’t supposed to say out loud, but it wasn’t even the dances that I liked—it was hanging out with other kids who took things as seriously as I did.
High school is made up of little overlapping worlds. My best friends world, boyfriend world, tennis and track worlds. And I loved my friends, and Miles was the perfect boyfriend, but I needed student council in a way I couldn’t explain to any of them. Teddy and Rosie didn’t want to join anything and Ket made fun of everything. Miles was perfectly happy with basketball and videogames. Even Elin, before what happened had happened, didn’t understand why anyone would do more than the minimum.
But student council was full of kids who high-fived when projects came in under budget and took it personally when the student paper criticized an assembly. Kids who understood that there was nothing wrong with wanting perfection.
Yeah, there were Josh Bowmans too—popular people who had never volunteered for anything before but needed a résumé line like “student class president” for college applications. Last year, I’d thought about running against Josh for president. My sister, ever the realist and last year’s senior class president, talked me out of it. I was just-popular-enough to win the VP position, and to be entirely honest, that wouldn’t have even happened if Holly hadn’t helped me. Sometimes I think popularity can be genetic—I inherited most of mine. Nepotism: the practice of those in power favoring family and friends.
At least Josh knew he didn’t want to work hard. As long as he got some credit, he stayed out of my way. But Hannah Larson was a different story. The junior class president, a tremendous brat, and a Grade-A pain my ass, Hannah had actually suggested that we hike the price of prom tickets twenty dollars to raise money for next year’s prom and get back into the world of rentable hotel ballrooms. When I pointed out the obvious problem with that—Why should this year’s seniors subsidize next year’s dance?—she just stared at me, like, “So?”
But as much as I’d love to blame her, it wasn’t Hannah’s exhausting antics that had sucked the fun out of finally being in charge of prom.
I knew I should just get this Hannah business over with, but I took my time wandering up to the bathroom, tracing my fingertips along the rows of metal lockers. The halls were shadowy and my dress made little whispery sounds against the tile floor, my heels clicking softly, making the school seem almost regal. Why didn’t we wear ball gowns all the time? I felt like a fucking princess.
I loved this school—if I weren’t leaving it for even more school, I might have been upset at the prospect of graduation. I hadn’t taken every AP class I could fit into my schedule just to pad my résumé. Learning something new about how the world worked, whether it was macroeconomics or comparative government or psychology, made my pulse pound with more excitement than watching a tennis ball fly off my racket, sailing just inside the line, my opponent miles away from being able to return.
When I got to the bathroom in the east wing, Hannah and Sings Praises were already waiting for me. I almost laughed when I saw their faces. How long had they rehearsed this little confrontation?
At least twice, I’d imagine.
“What’s up, ladies?” I said cheerily, glancing in the mirror to check my hair. Still perfect, thanks to Rosie.
“We have a problem,” Hannah began.
Querulous: whiny, complaining.
“Oh?”
“The prom queen results are … off.”
I furrowed my brow, not even caring if I was overacting. “I thought no one was supposed to know the results until Josh opened the envelope at crowning?”
“Irregardless,” Sings Praises began.
“Regardless,” I corrected automatically.
Sings Praises pursed her lips and paused as a couple of sophomores walked into the bathroom. “Regardless, we feel that there must be some mistake with the results.”
“Oh?” I said, injecting as much innocent confusion as I could into my tone. “How so?”
“Elin Angstrom was elected prom queen,” Hannah said flatly, apparently indifferent to being overheard.
I smiled. “Well, that’s nice!”
Hannah curled her lip in disgust. “Give it up, Jenna. We all know Elin is your best friend and there’s no way she won. You did something and I’m going to prove it.”
Sings Praises glanced at Hannah uncertainly and I raised my eyebrows—it would seem that Hannah was going off script.
Not that I was surprised. The girl was pathologically incapable of following directions—apparently, not even her own.
“A computer program tallies the results of the voting,” I said, all studied patience.
“No one is going to believe that a coke whore like Elin got the most votes,” Hannah snapped.
My cheeks started to burn and I felt my resolve to stay calm start to crack. “Well, if the computer says she won, she won,” I said, dropping the smile and putting my hands on my hips. “And if you want to cause a big scene about it, be my guest.”
Of course Elin hadn’t really won. Hell, I’d gotten more votes than she had. But while I was a firm believer in democracy for countries, I’d never been that impressed with the democratic process in high school. Fisher Reese had won, but she’d already been Homecoming Queen and hadn’t seemed particularly delighted with that honor, so why did she need this one?
When the Truth Unravels Page 8
