The Rules

by Nancy Holder

  Robin didn’t like Beth’s version of “fine.” Beth had kissed up to August and every single person here and it had sickened Robin to watch. Beth was practically starving for their approval. It was obvious to Robin that they were only playing along, acting like they liked her.

  Robin was about to say something she knew she would later regret, but she was saved when the members of Maximum Volume returned, climbing onto the stage to play an electrified version of the traditional funeral march. Everything seemed to be fine now, for them, at least. The band ended their song with a flourish, and August appeared on the stage.

  “Thank you, Maximum Volume!” he said into his wireless mike. “They’ll be playing again in a little while, and a final set when I announce the winners. Now it’s hookup time!”

  Cheers rose up as Beth caught Robin’s arm. “We’re exempt. We’re already paired up.”

  “Paired up?” Robin echoed. She saw three girls, two of whom she recognized from school: Heather Smirnoff and Morgan Alcina. A third girl shook her head and laughed. Cage and Larson sidled over to them as they all checked each other out. Robin’s face felt warm. She wasn’t sure she was going to enjoy this “hookup time.”

  August dangled a black bandana. “Who will do the honors? Beth?”

  “Oh,” Beth murmured, sucking in her breath. She beamed at August before starting to walk forward, Miss America on her way to her tiara.

  “Why don’t you have your friend Thea help us out?” August finished.

  Beth flinched but just as quickly recovered. “Showtime,” she muttered. “Do me proud, Thea.”

  Like a stage magician, August gestured for Thea to come forward. She took her time, looking supremely cool. August handed her the bandana, then pointed at Cage. Cage imitated Thea’s runway model gait and planted himself in front of her, bending his knees so that he and Thea were closer in height. August gestured for her to place the bandana over his eyes, and she did, tying it in place.

  While she was doing that, Heather, Morgan, and the third girl dashed over to their purses and pulled something out of them. Perfume bottles. Morgan gave herself a spritz, her shiny curls bouncing as she tipped her head left and right, and Heather tipped a vial over, dabbing it behind her ears. The third girl pulled out a white handkerchief and waved it back and forth in the air.

  The girls moved toward the blindfolded Cage, Morgan and Heather slinking around like pole dancers while the third girl moved her hankie back and forth very, very shyly. She glanced at the band, and Robin saw a quick flare of interest on the bass player’s face, followed by longing and…regret? Robin looked back at the girl, who was twirling in an awkward circle with both arms extended.

  Larson, August, Beth, and the entire band hooted and applauded as the Callabrese girls really put their sexy on. Heather and Morgan performed full-body rolls.

  “Yikes,” Robin murmured, dying of embarrassment. “Um, Beth?”

  “Be cool,” Beth said. “It’ll be fine.”

  Heather blew Cage a kiss and the onlookers chuckled. Cage cocked his head to sniff the air.

  “You know Heather,” Beth said in Robin’s ear.

  Robin did. Heather was one of those blondes with perfect hair, tons of makeup, and big diamond earrings. She was the queen of the drama department, literally, with a mirror in her locker that looked like one of those clapper things they used in movies when the director called “Action!”

  “She’s moving to L.A. after graduation. She got a part in a TV pilot,” Beth said.

  “Yeah, I heard,” Robin replied, and she could hear herself working overtime to sound unimpressed. “Makes sense. Guys think she’s hot.” Which was also kind of bitchy of her, she supposed. Heather was a good actress. She had real talent. Robin was just very nervous.

  The girls circled Cage, still doing their slinky-girl dance moves. He inhaled deeply, then reached out both arms and lunged forward, nearly grazing Heather’s arm.

  “Hot is right,” Beth whispered. “Heather is hot for a teacher. And said teacher is hot for her.”

  Robin jerked back her head, her mouth dropping open in shock. “No way.”

  Beth made a show of fanning her with the clue envelope. “Way. Want to know who?”

  “Beth, you can’t be right. Do you know how careful teachers have to be these days?” Robin said anxiously. “My father had to take sexual harassment training every semester.”

  “Well, it looks like someone else flunked,” Beth retorted.

  “You don’t know that,” Robin insisted. “If this is just gossip, it could really hurt someone. Even get them fired.”

  Beth threw up her hands. “Only the guilty. And I do know. I know it’s true.”

  Robin was thunderstruck. She didn’t know what else to say. Did her dad know? Was it someone who had been over to the house? Before her dad’s accident, her parents had been very social, inviting other teachers and the lacrosse team over for dinner all the time.

  Cage inhaled again. There was a big, goofy grin on his face as he held out his hands and began to advance on Heather. Blowing him a kiss for the benefit of the onlookers, she darted out of his way.

  “Morgan,” he guessed.

  “Nope,” August said. “Try again.”

  Cage lurched in the vague vicinity of the third girl but she stayed out of his way. She was wearing a green top with loose sleeves with a matching sweater wrap over it.

  “That’s Praveen. She has the coolest clothes,” Beth said reverently. She looked from Praveen to the sweater she had on, smiled, then lifted her chin. Robin translated: Beth and Praveen were wearing the same shade of green. It must be the color of the week.

  “Praveen goes to Porters. It’s a private school,” Beth said.

  “How does August know her?” Robin asked.

  “Praveen used to hang out with Alexa. His sister. You know about her, right? She died.”

  “I heard,” Robin said. It had been all over the school. Rumors had flown: that she’d OD’d, cut her wrists, been murdered. The story that stuck was that she had drowned in the country club swimming pool. Even when the news had been fresh, Robin felt bad about the level of her own ghoulish curiosity. But then her father had gotten hit and tragedy was no longer a spectator sport in her world.

  The doctors told them that Brian Brissett would live…but that he would be paralyzed from the waist down. “Tough times don’t last. But tough people do,” her mom said.

  But how did you get tough? What made you weak? Was it just the way you were born, like being athletic? Had Alexa missed out on the survivalist gene, or was she just unlucky? She had only attended Callabrese High for a year and a few weeks, and half the school gossip had been about her meltdowns and over-the-top antics.

  I think I’m tough. Robin tried the thought on for size. Or maybe I just know that someone’s got my back. I’ve got my family.

  That being the family she had lied to tonight to come to Club Pervo.

  “It’s Morgan!” Cage shouted as he grabbed Morgan around the waist and whirled her in a circle. He buried his face against her neck.

  “Yup!” she laughed. “You cheated. You could see through the blindfold!” She batted his shoulder and yanked off the black cloth.

  Cage made a show of covering his mouth in horror. “Morgan, honestly. I would never cheat.”

  August guffawed into his mike. “Tickets are now on sale for Cheater Theater. We’ll let it go. We’ll get a new blindfold for the next round. And how about you do the honors this time, Robin?”

  “No, that’s okay,” Robin said, waving a hand at him.

  “Just. Do. It,” Beth murmured. “Please.”

  Sheesh. “Okay, I’m in,” Robin said as Larson reached up to get a bandana from August. She didn’t want to touch him. She thought he was a slime bucket.

  “Okay, no more lurking, bachelor number three,” August said, and he turned his head toward the shadows. “Dude, you show up late and then you don’t mingle.”

  Dark on dark�
�a shape glided through the black perimeter of the room and moved in front of the coffins occupied by the writhing figures. It was about six feet tall, and as it passed behind a lantern, the warm light cut out a silhouette. Slightly turned up nose, broad shoulders and chest, with almost no butt on long legs. Robin’s heart stuttered. It was Kyle Thomas. She hadn’t known he would be here.

  “Hey, Robin,” he said, smiling at her. Right at her.

  His velvety brown, sun-bleached hair was longer now that her father couldn’t order him to cut it. His letter jacket, T-shirt, and jeans looked as elegant as the tux he’d worn at this year’s winter formal, to which he’d brought some girl from another school.

  “Hmm,” Beth murmured beside her. “Do we have something to share?”

  Robin was absolutely certain there was nothing she wanted to share with Beth about her secret crush on Kyle.

  Despite all her best intentions, Robin swallowed hard when Kyle smiled quizzically at her. She translated that smile: she was not a rich kid, not a hanger-on, not a partier, so what was she doing there?

  Kyle, Kyle, Kyle. He was the big everything at Callabrese High—class president, Ice King at the formal, and lacrosse team captain—a position her dad had given him before his accident. Robin couldn’t get it out of her head that with a couple more team meetings at their house, Kyle would have finally realized there was more to Robin Brissett than the fact that she was his coach’s daughter.

  “Will this do for me?” Kyle asked, reaching over to one of the round tables covered with black tablecloths positioned around the room. He picked up an oversized black napkin and waited for Robin.

  “Thea, why don’t you go ahead and cover up Larson’s eyes?” August asked.

  “How’s your dad?” Kyle asked quietly as he handed the cloth to Robin. He smelled like cinnamon, one of her favorite things. He squatted down, facing her, and as she reached up to position the cloth across his eyes, she realized she would have to put her arms around him to tie the blindfold behind his head. His face would practically be buried in her chest. Her pulse began to race. How many times had she daydreamed about being held by Kyle? Sometimes at practice, when she had waited for her father, she’d stared at him, memorizing the shapes of his muscles, the way he moved. Lacrosse was an aggressive sport—some said brutal—and she figured herself for some kind of cavewoman because it was thrilling to watch Kyle in action, playing with everything he had.

  “He’s good,” she said automatically. He looked at her and she shrugged. “Pretty good. It was hard sitting out this season. He was really touched when the team came over after you won the CIF championship.”

  “Maybe he could coach from his wheelchair,” Kyle said.

  “He’s going to walk again,” Robin said. She sounded terse. She smiled to take away the sting. “And I am going to kick your ass in this scavenger hunt.”

  “Are you guys finished with the marriage proposals?” Heather asked, rubbing her arms. “I’m freezing…and tie it tight, Robin,” she added.

  Robin wanted to be Kyle’s partner in the hunt. But August had already decreed that she, Beth, and Thea were to be a trio and there was no way she was going to play the hookup game. And besides, what if Kyle didn’t wind up with her? Then she’d have to be with Larson, the man slut.

  Her elbows brushed against Kyle’s shoulders as she tried to secure the blindfold without getting too close. She fumbled awkwardly and Kyle reached up to help her, his fingers twining with hers and causing Robin to catch her breath. Behind them, someone whooped and the lead guitarist started playing the melody of “Go Ahead and Show Me,” the love ballad that had put Maximum Volume on the fast track to rock stardom.

  “They’re playing our song,” Kyle said, grinning.

  If only, she thought.

  NOT ALL CHEATERS CAN WIN

  KYLE’S RULE #1: Anything worth doing is worth doing well.

  Robin finished blindfolding Kyle and moved away. He was sorry to see her go. A jumble of emotions he had not anticipated feeling tonight were flooding through him. He hadn’t expected outsiders. This kind of party was way out of her league. These people were pretty despicable. If Beth had dragged her here, then she was no friend of Robin Brissett. Of course, Beth didn’t actually have friends. She had people she used.

  He didn’t want to stumble around smelling perfume like a bloodhound. This was actually a fairly tame version of the hookup game, and Kyle wondered if August had decided to change the rating to “safe for all ages” because of Robin and that other chick. Thea. Of course, he’d heard that Thea had been around. None of the guys talked trash about Robin except to say that she looked hot with all that curly red hair and that she was probably too smart to go to bed with any of the losers who went sniffing around her. So to speak.

  She’ll definitely give me a run for my money tonight.

  To decrease his tension, he stuck his arms out and mimicked walking like the Frankenstein monster, which got a couple of laughs.

  “Okay, never mind the blindfolds,” August said. “Take ’em off. Let’s just move it along.”

  It wasn’t like August to move it along. He always seemed to get off on turning these games into contact sports. But it was fine with Kyle to switch gears. He pulled off his blindfold, to find Robin staring straight at him. She quickly looked away.

  “So I don’t get Morgan?” Cage said.

  “Depends,” August replied. “Now listen. Here are the rules.”

  “We know the rules,” Cage said.

  “For the new girls,” August shot back. “Rule number one: No cheating. None. Cheating does not happen.”

  Everyone cheered and laughed as if he’d told the best joke. Everyone except Kyle. He wasn’t into cheating. Never had been. And he hoped that Robin Brissett didn’t think he was.

  “I’m serious. No cars, no cell phones, no help. You go past the perimeter, you are done. I have spies this time. They will report you and you will be disqualified.”

  “That would be horrible,” Larson drawled.

  August ignored him. “Rule dos. Once you open your envelopes, match your clue up with your partner’s. Each of you has half and together you will go after one object. And, please, the object is not to fulfill your lust. So try to restrain yourselves from running off and finding a dark corner before you even solve the first clue.”

  “Yeah, baby,” Larson said.

  Kyle glanced over at Robin. As the night went on and people got loaded, she was not going to believe what she was seeing. And it would only get worse….

  August continued. “The answer to the clue will be a solid object, since Beth’s attempt to use ‘concepts’ last time didn’t pan out so well.”

  Beth turned beet-red. August was definitely not feeling the love for her tonight. Kyle wondered what was up.

  “The envelope for your second item will be attached to your first object. Do not touch other people’s objects. Do not steal or mix up their clues.”

  “Watch your objects, girls,” Robin deadpanned, and Kyle flashed her a grin. She saw it, blushed, and looked down at her shoes. She was adorable.

  “Rule the third: bring back your items in the order you find them to this warehouse. Each of you will have a clearly marked place to pile your loot. I will check it in. At that time you will get the dreaded Truth or Dare.”

  “I hate that part,” Heather muttered.

  “That’s because girls with lots of naughty secrets always have to pick Dare,” Larson said.

  “Shut up,” Heather snapped.

  “That’s like six rules, August,” Cage said.

  “Rule number four,” August continued, ignoring him. “Everybody must follow their clues to the end. No detours or going backward.”

  “Rule number four is redundant,” Larson said.

  “Tough crowd,” said Robin, and Kyle chuckled.

  “Rule number five: feel free to misdirect, confuse, and lie to anyone who is not your partner.”

  Another cheer rose up and Th
ea high-fived Beth, who gave her a please, we are not twelve eye roll but high-fived her back.

  “Rule six: do not maim anyone!”

  “Damn it,” Cage said. “Now it’s no fun at all.”

  “That’s nine!” Kyle added, and some of the others laughed. Robin grinned at him.

  August was unfazed. “First done wins. I will be keeping track. Of everything. If you break the rules, you will pay.”

  “Wahaha,” the singer slurred into her mike.

  “Since this is the last hunt, I have upped the budget on the prizes, as you have all been speculating. The two members of the winning team will each get a personalized prize. Heather, for example, could meet a casting agent who is a friend of my family. He’s looking for a young ingénue for a new kids’ show.”

  Heather caught her breath. August continued.

  “Cage could win a meeting with a football scout. Everyone has one. I’ll think of something for you, Robin,” he said, nodding in her direction. “Each person’s prize is printed on their clue card. But if anyone bails out of the game, no prize.

  “And for the winning team, there’s a choice of prizes for them to share.” He held up a finger. “Option A: you and a date can ride to prom in the same limo that the Rolling Stones used when my parents took them to San Francisco to check out our new restaurant.”

  “Oh my God, that is so cool,” Thea said, and the others nodded in agreement. Kyle wondered if August was just making that up or if it really was the same limo.

  “Or you can have what I think is the most amazing prize of all,” August said. “Everyone knows I’m something of a hacker.” There were nods. “Well, check this out. In their infinite wisdom, the administration of Callabrese High has created an internal computer dropbox. Into this dropbox, all the teachers of all the classes at our school are busily uploading their final exams. And their answer keys.”

  Over the ensuing hubbub, August raised his hands. “Yes, my friends, that means every single final. And, of course, Mr. Blanchard, our IT teacher, has added the seven deadly rings of security.” He snickered. “Which I, of course, hacked past. I have the security protocol, including the numerous passwords, and I will give it all to two lucky winners…unless you would rather have the limo.”