Never Have I Ever

by Sara Shepard

Page 22

 

  Ethan sat beside her as Emma scrol ed to the most recent tweet. At ten this morning, Gabby had tweeted she’d aced the math test she never studied for.

  “Humble, isn’t she?” Ethan grumbled as he read over Emma’s shoulder.

  “This doesn’t make sense,” Emma said, tapping her index finger against Ethan’s phone. “Gabby made Laurel wait while she finished a tweet this afternoon right before the ceremony. So why doesn’t the tweet show up on her page?” Emma’s eyes widened. “Wait. What if they have secret Twitter accounts?”

  Ethan looked at her as though he wasn’t quite sure what she was getting at.

  “It’s when someone has a public account that they tel everyone about and a secondary account under a code name,” Emma explained.

  “Why would they bother?” Ethan asked.

  “If they have stuff they want to talk to each other about that they don’t want anyone else reading. ”

  “It makes sense. ” Ethan’s voice rose with excitement.

  “And it sounds exactly like something those two would do. ”

  “But how could we figure out what they are? Would the names be an inside joke?”

  “Probably,” Ethan answered. “Or they could be total y random. ”

  “Let’s try fashion designers,” Emma suggested. “Or maybe favorite shoe brands or movies. ” She cal ed up the Twitter homepage and typed in @rodarte, the Twins’

  favorite clothing label. But that Twitter profile belonged to someone in Australia. She typed in other variations

  —rodarteGirl, RodarteFan—as wel as other things the Twitter Twins liked, like Gabby’s al -time favorite movie, The Devil Wears Prada, or Lili’s favorite band, My Chemical Romance.

  They checked the Twins’ Facebook pages to spark other ideas. “They have twin dogs named Googoo and Gaga,”

  Ethan pointed out.

  “Seriously?” Emma groaned and typed it in, but nothing came up—except for a lot of Lady Gaga fan pages. They tried makeup brands, variations on Gucci and Marc Jacobs, celebs they loved, and stores they shopped at. None of them worked. Emma sat back and massaged her temples. What would her secret Twitter account be? A nickname no one would guess? Al she could think of was how Lou, the mechanic at the garage, cal ed her Little Grease Monkey. Or how, when she worked at the New York-New York rol er coaster, some of the guys who bartended nearby not-so-secretly referred to her as the

  “vomit-comet hottie. ”

  “What if Lili and Gabby’s secret Twitter names are kind of embarrassing?” Emma asked. “Like something about Gabby running over Lili’s foot. ”

  “Or when Gabby got stuck in the locker,” Ethan added. Suddenly, they both looked at each other. Emma typed in

  @GabbyPonyBaloney. A profile popped up; the tiny picture was definitely Gabby. Only one girl was fol owing her: @MissLiliTallywhacker.

  “I can’t believe it,” Emma whispered. Her fingers shook as she scrol ed down the page. These tweets weren’t nearly as mindless. Every post she read made the room spin just a little bit faster. First, she read their tweets from August 31:

  @GABBYPONYBALONEY: Do you think we should?

  @MissLiliTal ywhacker: Definitely. No turning back now. It all falls into place tonight.

  And just last week, the night of Charlotte’s sleepover, when someone crept down and strangled Emma:

  @MissLiliTal ywhacker: She thinks we’re so stupid.

  @GabbyPonyBaloney: She’ll know the truth soon enough.

  @MissLiliTal ywhacker: She’d better be careful. . . . And the night of Sutton’s birthday party:

  @GabbyPonyBaloney: She has no clue what’s

  coming. I can’t wait to see the look on her face.

  @MissLiliTal ywhacker: Let’s hope this works. And the tweet Gabby sent just that afternoon:

  @GabbyPonyBaloney: Less than an hour to go. That bitch is going down.

  A locker door slammed in the hal , shaking the nursingstation wal s and making the thick green contents of a big bottle of cough syrup wobble back and forth on the shelf. That bitch is going down. A vision of the hurtling light fixture swam through Emma’s mind. She stared at Ethan. “They’re talking about me. ”

  The argument I’d had with Lili the night of Gabby’s accident flashed through my mind. I’d told her she’d better keep her mouth shut, or I’d ruin her life. But maybe instead, she and her sister ruined mine.

  “Do me a favor and email these to me,” Emma said to Ethan. “Al of them. I can’t risk losing these like I lost the snuff film. ”

  “Done. ” Ethan grabbed the phone back from Emma and started copying and pasting al of the tweets. Muffled classical music from orchestra practice in the next room echoed through the wal s. Suddenly, Emma’s body ached as though she’d run back-to-back marathons.

  “What a nightmare,” she said, slumping against the flat mattress on the cot. “Knowing there are two of them just makes this feel even more impossible. And were they trying to scare me? Or kil me? And if they were trying to kil me, how long before they try again?”

  Ethan murmured a note of sympathy, but didn’t offer any advice. “What I wouldn’t give for a day off from this,” Emma murmured. “A couple of hours off. ” She thought about Friday night. It was hard enough navigating broad daylight with the Twitter Twins. But dealing with a dark Homecoming dance with a haunted house theme, al by herself? She snuck a peek at Ethan. “I have an idea. ”

  Ethan dropped his phone into his pocket. “Let’s hear it. ”

  “What if you went to Homecoming with me?” Emma gestured to the Hal oween Homecoming flyer that hung on the nurse’s wal . It was of a skeleton and a witch doing the tango.

  Ethan took a step back. “Emma . . . ”

  Emma cut him off before he could give her an I-hatedances spiel. “We could look into the Twins together. I won’t have to handle everything myself. And it could even be fun. We can dress in goofy costumes, OD on the amazing cupcakes the caterer is bringing, dance—or not dance, if you’re real y opposed. We can laugh at al the people who are real y into it. ”

  Ethan’s hands twisted together in his lap. “It’s not that I don’t want to go. It’s that . . . wel , I’ve actual y asked someone else. ”

  Emma blinked. It felt like he’d just dumped a bucket of cold water on her head, and for a moment her brain was fil ed with nothing but static. “Oh!” she said, a few moments too late. “Oh, wel , great! Good for you!”

  The look that crossed Ethan’s face was comical y grouchy, almost petulant. “I mean, you said you just wanted to be friends. You said you weren’t interested. ”

  “I know! I did!” Emma’s voice took on the annoying chirpy quality it always got when she tried too hard to sound upbeat. “I mean, it would have been as friends. But this is total y for the better. I’m so happy for you! You’l have so much fun!”

  The room suddenly felt too smal to fit both of them. Emma leapt to her feet. “Um, I should go. ”

  Ethan stood, too. “What? Where?”

  “I-I should get back to the auditorium. ” Emma fumbled for the door. “They’re stil holding the party. I should help out. Plus, al my stuff is stil there. ”

  “But . . . ” Ethan slung his bag over his shoulder and fol owed her, but Emma did not want to discuss it any further. She gave him the most carefree wave she could muster. “I’l cal you later,” she promised, even though she couldn’t imagine doing so. She speed-walked into the hal , turned a corner, then col apsed against a bank of lockers. The hal was quiet, the final bel of the day not yet having rung. Emma could hear her own ragged breathing. A sob rose in her throat, but she quickly swal owed it down. “You had your chance,” she whispered furiously. “You made your choice. It is for the best. ”

  A cackling sound floated down the hal . Emma froze, listening. There was another sharp exhalation of breath around the corner, a second triumphant-sounding snort. A shadow spread across the floor. Had someone been watchin
g her? Listening?

  She sprinted down the hal , but when she rounded the corner there was no one there. When Emma breathed in, she could detect the faintest scent of coconut in the air. And when she looked down, she saw a few tiny, glittering shards of glass on the ground.

  She crouched down to touch one of the pieces. The amber-colored glass perfectly matched the glass in the light fixture that had nearly shattered her skul .

  Chapter 20

  Creepy Vampires to the Left,

  Stalkers to the Right

  “Velcome!” A pimply-faced teenager in a satin Dracula cape, plastic fangs, and a penciled-in widow’s peak leapt into the doorway of Scare-O-Rama, Tucson’s best-stocked Hal oween store. “Can I help you? You girls look good enough to bite!” When he laughed, he sounded like the Count from Sesame Street.

  “Ew, no!” Laurel said, brushing past him. Dracula covered half his face with his cape, shunned vampire-style, and scooted away to his perch behind the counter. It was Thursday after school, and Emma and Laurel were on the hunt for their Homecoming costumes. Truthful y, al Emma had wanted to do for the rest of the night was lie in Sutton’s bed in a tight, safe bal and thank her lucky stars that the light fixture hadn’t been a couple of inches to the left, but she’d final y relented after Laurel’s constant badgering. The dance was tomorrow, after al —time was running out. And even if she didn’t have a date, she had to attend in style. But just venturing into the world felt dangerous, like Lili and Gabby could be anywhere or do anything.

  Emma kept checking their private Twitter accounts, but they hadn’t posted anything new since Gabby’s tweet that afternoon. She needed more on them—something

  concrete, unequivocal. But she’d scoured Sutton’s bedroom, house, iPhone, social networking sites, two lockers, and everywhere else she could think of. Laurel took Emma’s arm and guided her to the racks of costumes cramming nearly every inch of the store. Pitchforks, sparkly top hats, slasher masks, and spiders hung on the wal . Fun-house mirrors made Emma’s body look either lumpish or taffy-stretched. Predictably, “Monster Mash” blared over the stereo, and Dracula and his coworker—a tal girl stuffed into a leather bustier—bobbed along to the beat. Laurel strode up to a rack of southern bel e hoop skirts and touched the faux taffeta. “I’m thinking of something retro. ” She tied a bonnet under her chin and posed to the right and left. “What do you think? Is it me?”

  Despite her exhaustion, Emma smiled. “It’s definitely you. ” They both col apsed into giggles. For once, Emma actual y felt close to Laurel, almost like she was a real sister. The only thing missing here was Sutton herself. What I wouldn’t give for Emma, Laurel, and me to be shopping together right now, trying on stupid witch hats and fake noses. Having a true blood sister would change so much. Emma and I would be instant family, a different kind than I’d ever experienced. There would be no jealousy that my parents loved her more than me. We would be bound together always; I would try my hardest for us to have the best relationship possible.