by Brodi Ashton
“You too,” I said.
“Pip talks to paintings,” Raf said, starting to loosen up again.
I gave him a look. “Not paintings, plural. Just the one.”
Giselle shrugged and turned away.
There were two other students who had the same riding times. One was Mateo Lopez. I waved and he waved back. The other was a girl, a short, chubby redhead whose name I didn’t know. But I’d seen her around. She bounced over to me like a big red ball.
“Hi! I’m Katie.” The girl had what sounded like an Irish accent. “You’re Pip, yeah?”
I cut a glance over at Raf, who shrugged.
“Nice to meet you, but it’s Piper.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Really? Everyone is calling you Pip. You are the girl with the unfortunate tear in her jeans, yeah? A few weeks ago?”
I glanced down at my jeans. Despite my best sewing work, the tear was still obvious. I squeezed my eyes shut and rubbed my forehead. “Yeah, that’s me. I’m also the one who talks to paintings.”
“Oh. Okay,” she said, as if that totally made sense. “Pip. So great to meet you! Good to have you in our riding group. We’re the best group, although it’s weird not to have Rachel here anymore. Isn’t it weird, Raf? She moved away. But you’ll fit in nicely. Do you ride western or English? Most of us ride English, but there are a few outliers. Raf, for one. Anyway, follow me, and you can pick your saddle and your horse. . . .” She continued chatting away at the speed of a gallop as she dragged me to the equipment shed.
I glanced behind me and caught Raf giving me a sympathetic smile. I got the feeling Katie talked a lot.
Once we were all saddled up, we met in a group at the north end of the stables, where there was a trail leading out into the hills behind the school. I was in a western-style saddle. Before today, I hadn’t known there was a difference. Riding was riding. But now I could see that the English saddles were missing the horn, and the English riders held one rein in each hand. The most I’d ridden a horse was for a weeklong horse camp when I was eight years old. I’d learned to hold both reins in my left hand and keep my right hand on my thigh, which made me a western rider.
Raf was also in a western style, but he held the reins in his right hand. He must be left-handed.
Since I’d had the least amount of experience of the group, the stable master gave me a small horse named Gidget. She was so tiny I worried I would squash her, and when it came to walking, she couldn’t keep pace with the others. Which gave me the option of enduring an uncomfortable trot over the course of an hour, or relaxing with a walk and falling behind. I chose to walk, and tried not to think of it as a metaphor for my life.
Until I saw Raf and Giselle walking farther up ahead on the trail, and I remembered this was my chance.
I kicked Gidget and she added an extra boost in her stride. After a few minutes and an uncomfortable trot/walk, the two of us had caught up with Raf and Giselle.
Raf’s horse was a stallion with hooves the size of small Volkswagen Beetles.
“Hi!” I said a little overenthusiastically. I tried to calm my voice down. “Hello. Hey.”
Giselle looked uninterested in my existence.
“Hey,” Raf said. “How did your story on the dance turn out?” he said.
It had been on the front page. He should’ve known how it turned out.
“Great. It made me want to learn the flamenco.”
“Marta would be happy to teach you.” At my confused expression, he said, “She was the dancer.”
“I didn’t know you knew her.”
“Oh, I’ve known Marta for a long time. She used to teach me.” He raised an eyebrow as he said this.
Did this guy ever not imply something? “You make it sound like she taught you more than dance.”
“Let’s just say she taught me many moves.” He looked mischievous.
Giselle snorted. I thought back to the way the dancer had posed with Raf for the picture. She did seem very familiar with him.
“That sounds . . . statutory.”
Raf burst out laughing. “You’re funny. But no, Marta is only two years older than me.”
“Really? She seemed older.”
“It’s the makeup,” he said.
“Ah.”
The three of us rode for a few minutes in silence—Giselle didn’t seem anxious at all to break it—and I stole a glance at Raf’s profile. His profile alone could’ve been a ten-o’clock headline.
“What’s your horse’s name?” I said.
“Spartacus.”
“Of course it is. C’mon, Gidget.” I clicked my tongue.
I ducked as we approached a low-hanging branch and, in doing so, nearly lost my balance. Raf shot out a steadying hand. He rode his horse as if he were as easy to master as riding a tricycle. Giselle cut a sideways glare toward me.
“I would ride Spartacus everywhere if I could,” Raf said. “I would switch him with my own car, if possible.”
“Sure,” I said. “You could avoid those high gas prices. Hay is cheaper.”
Giselle rolled her eyes. Loudly.
“And with Spartacus,” Raf continued, “you would never find yourself in those annoying high-speed chases.”
I looked at him. “You sound like you speak from experience.”
He pressed his lips together and nodded, making his hair flop perfectly over his eyes. You wouldn’t think hair could flop perfectly, but his did.
Remember the story.
“What happened?” I said.
“Just last weekend, as it turns out. We were in Georgetown, perhaps exceeding the speed limit, when we saw the flashing lights behind us.”
“And you led them on a chase?”
“Goran Kovic was driving. He cannot afford to get another speeding ticket. He would be deported back to Croatia.”
“So what did you do?”
“We found the nearest embassy—the Russian embassy. And we pulled in. The guard at the gate knows me, and he saw the diplomatic plates and opened up. At that point, there’s nothing the police can do.”
I just stared at him. This was the kind of stuff I needed. It was also the kind of stuff that infuriated me.
He shrugged in this totally European way. “Diplomatic immunity has its perks.”
I thought about my three speeding tickets. There were no special plates or embassies to help me avoid three hundred dollars in fines.
“Where are we going tonight?” Giselle asked.
I had to assume she wasn’t talking to me.
“No text yet,” Raf said.
I remembered the passwords Mack had told me about. There was no way I would be getting a text with the secret party information, but Raf would have a phone and he would most definitely get the password. If I could get his phone . . . I thought about where it was right now. Maybe in his back pocket?
I decided to distract him. “What else do you get away with?”
“Well, there’s drinking.”
“What drinking?”
He held his right hand out, palm up. He did that a lot before speaking. I wondered if he’d developed the habit while his brain translated Spanish into English.
“Here, you cannot drink until twenty-one, yes?”
I was learning that when Raf said yes? like that, he rarely meant it as a question. He meant it like someone would say you know? or something like that.
I still answered it like a question. “Yes.”
“So the embassies are technically built on the territories of the countries to which they belong. And most countries outside the US allow drinking at the age of eighteen.”
“But you aren’t eighteen yet,” I pointed out. I spotted a phone-size bump in his back pocket.
“Yes, but most countries are more relaxed than the US about underage drinking laws. In Spain, for instance, we grow up having wine at the dinner table. I had my first glass when I was two.”
I thought about what my dad would say if I ever brought wine to our dinner tab
le. A few years ago, he’d headed up the “Not a Drop before Twenty-One” neighborhood volunteer campaign. And so far, it had worked for me. I hadn’t had one drop.
“Last year, another American, Jackson Everett, came to a party at the French embassy. I remember he had used a mayonnaise jar to smuggle vodka from his parents’ liquor cabinet. The jar still had remnants of mayo in it. Within fifteen minutes of arriving at the party, he’d drunk the entire thing. He spent the next two hours retching in the toilet. Perhaps if he had grown up with accessible alcohol . . .”
I shrugged. “I’ll have to try that theory out on my dad.”
Raf nodded encouragingly. “Yes. Tell your dad to call my dad, and they can discuss.”
I drove within five miles per hour of the speed limit. I made the full S-T-O-P at the stop signs because if I got another ticket, I wouldn’t be able to afford the insurance on my car. More proof that this was the story I was meant to write.
“Have you ever had to work a day in your life?” I said.
His eyebrows furrowed. “No.”
“Of course. Because you have people for that.”
“You know, Pip, you get this little dimple in your cheek when you’re being condescending.”
“Well . . . I . . .” I huffed a breath out. He was right. I was being condescending. I was supposed to be unbiased.
“It’s not like I don’t want to work. Work actually seems like it could be fun.”
I tilted my head skeptically. “I spent the summer before my sophomore year dipping pinecones into red cinnamon-scented wax for rich people to use in their fires. Two months after school started, my skin was still dyed red and my pee smelled like Christmas.”
“See? What could be better than holiday-scented urine?”
This made me laugh, despite myself.
“Finally,” he said. “A smile.”
At that moment the sun was shining on Raf just so, making him unfairly stunning. He gave Spartacus a click-click with his tongue, and suddenly I thought about his tongue. Whoa. Where did that come from? I flicked my cheek with the end of my rein, to slap some sense into myself. This was not a cute boy. This was the personification of my life’s struggle.
Raf arched an eyebrow.
“It was a bug. On my face,” I said.
“Okay. Like I was saying, I would get a job if I could. If my dad would allow it.”
“Well, singing for tips isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” I said skeptically.
“I didn’t ask to be born into privilege.”
“Your dad won’t let you get a job?” I said.
“Part of it is because I’m not a citizen here. But the bigger part is my dad won’t let anything get in the way of my education.” Raf frowned. I think it was the first time I’d seen him frown. Really frown. It made his whole face darker. “My dad has a plan for me, and a job would get in his way.”
“What’s his plan for you?”
He shrugged, but not in the European way. More in a brush-off way. “Rule Spain. And then, if there’s time, take over the United States as well.”
I got the feeling he wanted to stop talking about it, so I changed the subject. I didn’t want to push my luck.
“Did Jackson Everett survive the night?”
His face lost a little bit of its darkness. “No one knows. What happens on Embassy Row . . .”
“Stays on Embassy Row?”
He tilted his head. “I was going to say ‘could fill a book,’ but your way is good too.”
Giselle kicked her horse into a higher gear. Even on horseback, she still looked like she belonged on a runway. Her horse, too. They could do a fashion spread for Horse & Hound. I wasn’t sure whose calf muscles were more defined, hers or the horse’s.
“Raf!” She said his name almost like an exotic dog bark. Rrruff. “What’s with the pace?”
“Just helping our new friend feel at home.”
Hearing about his life of privilege had the opposite effect from making me feel at home. Raf had no idea what real exhaustion was. He didn’t have to figure out how to pay for gas. He thought having a part-time job was . . . cute.
Giselle flipped her hair as she guided her horse back to join pace with Spartacus. She nonchalantly handed Raf a silver flask. “We’re good for Chang’s yacht tonight.”
Raf took a swig and then handed it to me.
“What is this?” I said, holding the flask up to the light.
“It’s Ambassador Bouchard’s twenty-five-year-old single-malt scotch.”
I sniffed it and made a face.
“Smells good, yes?”
“It sort of smells like . . .” I closed my eyes. “Band-Aids.”
Raf looked thoughtful. “Maybe that’s because of the cresols from the peat.”
I shook my head slowly. “I have no idea what you just said.”
“It’s chemistry,” Giselle said. “Raf is kind of obsessed with it.”
I handed the flask back to Raf. “Thanks, but I think I’ll pass.”
Raf took it, glugged another gulp, and handed it back to Giselle, who threw her head back in a most unladylike manner and swigged some. She was every guy’s fantasy. Gorgeous like a model and yet could chug like a frat boy. There was no competing with that type.
Not that I was competing with her.
“So, you guys are going yachting?” I said.
Giselle snorted. She even made that sound eloquent.
“I’ve never been on a boat,” I added, as if it weren’t obvious.
It was awkwardly quiet for a moment.
“Good luck with that,” Giselle said.
“Thank you?” I said.
Raf seemed like he sympathized with my boatless plight, but in the end, he just shrugged.
Clearly they were going to be stingy with the invites. Raf’s phone was sticking up from his back pocket. How hard would it be to grab it and find out the code word for tonight’s party? Unfortunately, picking pockets was one journalistic skill I had yet to hone. But maybe if I distracted them, and then reached over . . .
“Pip?” Raf said.
Uh-oh. He’d caught me staring at his butt. “Uh, there was a . . . thing.” My cheeks flushed and I turned away.
Apparently, it was time to stop pandering to the new girl, because Giselle and Raf took their horses to a faster pace that poor Gidget couldn’t match. I didn’t bother trying to keep up.
High-speed chases. Drinking on school grounds, not to mention on horseback. (Did drinking on horseback count as a DUI?) Parties on yachts. Not inviting the new girl. Seemed to be a typical day in the life of the privileged. How did these guys get away with it all?
Giselle and Raf were going to retire for the evening on some exotic yacht while I had to go home and admit to my parents that I was failing to excel at this school and then ask them if I could borrow some gas money. Where was the justice in this new world?
Same school. Different planets.
Maybe they didn’t deserve me poking around their lives, but poking around couldn’t do any harm for now.
Saturday, Charlotte and I went to see His Girl Friday at the dollar theater. It was an old Cary Grant movie about two reporters who fell in love and were working to get the biggest scoop of the year. Even though it was decades old, it captured the spirit and competition of the journalism world. Plus, Cary Grant. Afterward, I told Charlotte about my idea to do an exposé on the DIs.
“Going undercover?” she asked.
“Yep. I’m posing as a scholarship student and everything.”
She laughed. “And you think this will be the story?”
“I think it’s my best shot.”
She raised her water bottle. “Then I say, time to go Nellie Bly on ’em.”
I clinked my water bottle with hers. Next week, I would be so convincing, Nellie Bly would be sitting up in her grave and giving me a high five.
11
The next time I saw Raf, it was Monday morning and we were on the same bus for a fi
eld trip to the National World War II Memorial. He didn’t sit next to me, and I worried maybe my unrestrained opinions might have turned him away for good.
I looked for an empty seat and spotted one in front of a guy named Franco. I’d seen him with the DIs, and he was also in my economics class. We hadn’t been formally introduced, but maybe he could be another source. He was sitting next to a guy named Dembé who was from somewhere in Africa.
I sat down. “Hey, Franco.”
He looked up. “Pip,” he said.
“It’s ‘Pipe,’” I said. “So where are you from?”
“Brazil,” he said. Then he turned to Dembé and continued whatever conversation they’d been having, completely ignoring me.
Mack got on the bus then, spotted me, and sat next to me. “Hey,” she said.
“Where’s Faroush?”
“He opted out of the field trip. He has asthma, so he gets to use that excuse whenever he wants. I wish I had asthma. I hate these things.”
“Why?”
She nodded toward Professor Berg—the school’s most boring teacher. As the doors shut and the driver pulled out the professor stood up and started telling us the history of the World War II Memorial, and I began to wish I had asthma too.
The memorial consists of fifty-six granite pillars, arranged in a circle around a plaza and a fountain, with two arches, one each on the north and south ends. Each pillar is engraved with the name of a US state or territory. When the bus parked, Professor Berg gave us a quiz and fifteen minutes to wander around and find the answers.
I started right in on it.
“Don’t waste your time,” Mack said. “We never have to turn them in.” She glanced over my shoulder as something caught her attention. “That guy is gonna kill himself.”
I turned around and saw a bunch of students at the base of one of the pillars looking up at Rafael Amador, who was scaling the granite.
“What is he doing?” I asked Mack as we ran over to join the spectators.
“Besides desecrating a national monument?”
A couple of guards in blue uniforms ran over to the pillar and started yelling for Raf to come down. He didn’t look like he was about to comply. I thought about how someone should be documenting this, and then I remembered that Jesse had given me the staff camera to take pictures of the memorial.
