7 Clues to Winning You (13 page)

As I sat there at the dinner table, I realized that I hadn’t been involved in any kind of competition since the swim
team. At Meriton, I’d been fairly aggressive about maintaining my grade-point average and my class standing, but that wasn’t a true competition like the Senior Scramble. The only person I had worked against was myself.

Now I found myself completely unprepared to handle a hot desire to win that smoldered inside me. It grew hotter and hotter with each minute closer to midnight that passed. Should I smother and suppress it? Should I fan it? Do I let it consume me? Should I just keep it on a slow burn?

I also had to figure out how to deal with the guilt. I’d never blatantly disobeyed either of my parents before. I’d never even lied to them. I had little doubt that I’d have to lie over the next few weeks. I didn’t like it, but it had to be done. I figured I should practice alone a few times first, though. I’d rehearse like an actor in a play.

Unfortunately, I never got the chance to practice. Right there above my plate of pre-made cheesy chicken casserole, I was forced to improvise.

“So tomorrow,” Mom said, “there are two showings, one at ten thirty and the other at one o’clock.” She delicately coaxed one saucy noodle onto her fork with her knife. “I don’t want any messes happening in between, so everyone needs to be out of the house until after the second showing.” She eased the food into her mouth and gingerly chewed.

Excellent,
I thought.
I’ll probably need all day to search for the first scavenger hunt item anyway.

Then she said, “So we’re going to spend the day at Gran and Granddad’s house. They’ve offered to take us to the club for lunch.”

Gran and Granddad had retired to an exclusive gated community about an hour away. Lunch at their ultra-swanky country club took at least three hours. Plus, there would be visiting time before and after. We wouldn’t be home before five o’clock, I was sure. By then, everyone else in the Senior Scramble would probably have the first item turned in and be on to the second. Or maybe even the third! That strange competitive ember inside me flared up into a flame.

“I can’t go,” I blurted without having thought of what to say next. Big mistake. First rule of lying: Figure out your lie before you open your mouth.

Mom shot me a scolding look. “Why not?”

I shoved a hunk of chicken in my mouth to buy some time. Mom wouldn’t expect an answer until after I swallowed. No talking with our mouths full!

I chewed and chewed and kept chewing as my brain spun. Should I say I was meeting Tara? No, not important enough. Mom would make me cancel. Homework or an essay? Nope. She’d say I had plenty of time tonight and Sunday. My excuse had to be something she couldn’t override and had to happen tomorrow.

I had it.

I swallowed and said, “There’s a special afternoon tea over at Shady Acres tomorrow at one o’clock. I volunteered to help.” I added, “They’re really short-staffed because it’s Saturday.”
Pretty good,
I thought.
Mom’s a firm believer in honoring commitments.
She’d never abide by my skipping out on Shady Acres.

It worked.

“Well, if they’re counting on you, then you should go. Just don’t come home until after the buyers leave from the second showing, okay?” Mom said.

“No problem.” Maybe I didn’t need lying practice after all.

Second rule of lying: Play on your opponent’s sympathies and weaknesses.

“Speaking of the club,” Dad said, “did you cancel our membership yet, Anne?”

Cancel the club? Was he kidding? Mom’s entire social life revolved around the Meriton Country Club. She played golf; she played tennis; she played bridge. We spent every summer at the club pool. She had lunch in the restaurant weekly with all her club friends. They were iconic examples of Ladies Who Lunch.

“Not yet,” she said to her plate. “I want to wait until we have a sales contract on the house.”

Zach opened his mouth to talk, and I could see that it was full of pulpy food. He had selective memory when it came to table manners, much to Mom’s dismay. “How come you can’t stay in the club?” he asked.

Mom answered, but there was a rigidity to her demeanor that I could tell she was trying to repress. “To be a member of the Meriton Country Club, you must live in Meriton.”

“So join the Ash Grove Country Club,” Zach said before slurping his milk loudly.

I knew for a fact that there was no Ash Grove Country Club, but even if I hadn’t known, the shudder that rattled through Mom would have spelled it out loud and clear.
Ash Grove had a public pool, a mini-putt golf course, and a Denny’s. Not exactly country club standards, if you know what I mean.

“Unfortunately, that’s impossible,” she said. Her voice sounded like it had snagged on something in her throat. Her face, however, presented a flawless lady look. “We all must make sacrifices.”

Sure,
I thought.
Everyone except Dad, that is.

How could Mom bear to give up her club membership? How could Dad bear to force her to? Who was this guy? Who had he become? Had he always been like this, but I never noticed? Because until then, I’d seen him as a model father who put his family first. Not anymore, though. I couldn’t believe that his whole superintendent fantasy was going to upend us all. Even Mom. Yet he didn’t care.

I didn’t need any more justification than that to do the Senior Scramble. My guilt evaporated. My resolve hardened. As much as I was doing the Senior Scramble to resurrect my reputation, from that moment on, I was doing it even more to defy my father. I couldn’t wait. I couldn’t wait for midnight and for the hunt to start.

I learned something at that dinner table that would be confirmed many times later in life: the propulsive nature of anger overrides the immobilizing nature of fear, every time.

After dinner, I was on dish duty, which, since there were showings tomorrow, really meant scrubbing the dishes, sink, counter, cupboards, floor, appliances, molding, light fixtures, knobs, cookbook shelf, top of the fridge, and windows. Followed by organization of the pantry, pots and pans, plastic
containers, silverware, and cooking utensils. I truly couldn’t imagine how a cleaning person could finish an entire house in an afternoon. It took me nearly two hours just to do the kitchen. I was tempted to cut corners, believe me. Even to cut so many that the buyers would run away in disgust and horror. But I knew that Mom saw her house as a reflection of herself. The kitchen especially represented her.

By the time I finished, I was exhausted and stank of sweat, grease, and Knock-Out All-Purpose Spray Cleaner. Which, for future reference, isn’t for all purposes. It leaves streaks on the windows and won’t bleach the black mold growing in the caulk behind the faucet. Truly, no sixteen-year-old girl should know this.

Mom came to inspect my work, and once she approved it, I bolted straight upstairs for a shower. She hollered after me to be sure to wipe down the tiles when I was done. On second thought, wipe down the whole bathroom, she said. I called myself an indentured servant under my breath, but I did as I was told. Good, reliable, obedient Blythe.

Maybe not so much anymore.

By the time midnight came around, my body was rested, but my nerves were lit up. They were frantic little live wires coursing and sparking through every crook and bend in my anatomy. I sat at my desk, staring at my laptop and watching more and more members log on to the Revolting Phoenix. The count topped out at 123. So many. I checked the clock on my screen: 11:58. Two minutes until I was fully committed to rebellion. Was I sure? Should I bail?

No.

At midnight, the first clue popped up on the screen and my new, ferocious, competitive spirit kicked in. It obliterated any doubts I might’ve had. I was absolutely, totally, unequivocally sure.

The Senior Scramble was mine.

Welcome to the Senior Scramble: Underground Version!

Due to recent events of which you’re surely aware, the Senior Scramble is going commando this year. No, that doesn’t mean that everyone will play without underwear; it means that we have to work fast. Get in and get out quickly. Strike and then vanish.

Obviously, we must take certain new precautions to protect everyone. So instead of turning in a scavenged item to a senior at a drop-off point, this year contestants will upload a photo of the found item. Yes, this makes it possible to cheat in a variety of ways, but we’ll be on the lookout for fakes and Photoshops.

Any player who submits one will be disqualified.

Besides, if you cheat, you’re a butthole and everyone will hate you.

So play nice.

Once your photo is verified, you’ll receive the next clue. There will be ten clues in all. Be sure that nothing identifying is in the background or foreground of your snapshot and clear any properties from the picture that might point to you.

For security reasons, you’ll only be able to access this site from the IP address you registered under, so don’t count on uploading pictures from your phones.

Also, when you log off the forum, remember to delete your browsing history or use a private browser from the start.

We know you’ve taken great risks to play this year, so let’s make this Senior Scramble the best one ever. Keep your eyes open and your mouths shut. Try not to be seen. Protect each other. And above all, have a fantastic time.

Here is your clue to item #1:

1812–1903 was when I walked around.

Now I lie forever here beneath the freezing ground.

Find that spot and of my stone a picture you must take.

One more hint: the place I am is right beside a lake.

GOOD LUCK, PLAYERS!

THE GAME’S AFOOT!

He used the phrase. What an adorable geek.

Okay, so clearly the clue was referring to a grave. I needed a picture of a certain grave. The problem was, I had no idea where the Ash Grove cemetery was. Or cemeteries. There could be a few. There probably was only one near a lake, though. Hopefully it would be a small cemetery so there wouldn’t be too many graves to check before I found the one with those exact dates.

I pulled up a satellite map of Ash Grove. I scanned every inch of the entire township, but I didn’t see a lake anywhere. There were a few ponds in housing developments, but there weren’t cemeteries anywhere nearby.

I opened another tab and Googled cemeteries in Ash Grove, PA. Maybe if there were only one or two in town, I could just search the whole cemetery for the grave.

There were six cemeteries. Six! Two public and four church ones. There was no way I could search every grave in six cemeteries.

I had a brain wave: maybe
lake
was actually a word in the name or address of the cemetery. I scrutinized each name and address, but the word
lake
didn’t appear anywhere. Oh, no! Maybe Lake was the name of the person buried next to this guy. How could I possibly find this? What was I going to do?

I knew what I was going to do. As soon as my family left tomorrow morning, I was going to drive by those cemeteries and see what I could find out. Maybe if I was lucky, I’d notice a junior or two somewhere. Reconnaissance was definitely in order.

I scribbled down the dates from the clue. The rest I could remember; I wanted as little physical evidence as possible around. I logged off, double-checked my history, and shut down my laptop. I shoved the paper into the bottom of my purse and then crawled into bed. My body still thrummed with the adrenaline that had rushed through it when the clue first appeared. It wasn’t until sometime after one o’clock that I finally fell asleep.

I woke to the sound of my mother clucking and sighing in my doorway. I peeled open one eye and knew right away that she was already at DEFCON 1. She didn’t think I was awake,
so she made no effort to disguise her displeasure. Her eyes darted around my room and finally settled on my open eye.

“Why are you just waking up now?” she asked. “It’s after nine! I need you to get up and straighten up this room right away. Please.” That was one of those
pleases
that didn’t really mean “please.” It meant “do it now.”

I didn’t argue, even though my room looked fine. My clothes from yesterday were on the floor, there was some stuff on my desk from last night, my curtains were half-closed, and I was presently in the unmade bed (the horror!), but those things would take two seconds to fix.

It didn’t register with Mom, though. Ever since our house went on the market, she’d developed a black-and-white attitude: a room was either picture perfect or it wasn’t. It didn’t matter whether there was a pile of laundry on the floor or just a pair of socks, her reaction was the same.

“I’m up,” I said, pushing myself up on one elbow to prove it. I squinted at the bright slivers of sunlight cutting through the thready clouds and skewering my eyeballs.

“I want everyone out of the house by ten o’clock. This room had better be in order.” Then almost as an afterthought, she said, “Where are you going before you need to be at Shady Acres?”

The question caught me off guard. I hadn’t made something up to cover the fact that I planned to spend all morning stalking cemeteries. My sleep-fuzzed brain wasn’t functioning at full capacity yet, so I just started babbling random excuses. “I’m meeting Tara. Um, at the library. To research. A paper. She, uh, has to … research one too.” So lame! “We
have to have some book sources. I mean, I do. For mine. I don’t really know about hers.” Stop talking!

I faked a yawn and watched my mother for signs of suspicion. She was focused on the state of my bookshelves, though, so she didn’t seem to notice my string of poorly executed lies. “Just make sure this room is decent,” she said, and walked out.

I fell back on my pillow even though I wasn’t tired. My spontaneous lying had flipped every switch in my body to the On position. My heart thudded in my throat, and my eyes were open so wide that it felt like the lids had retracted completely inside. I took a long breath and let it seep slowly from my lungs.

When I’d finally settled down, I got out of bed and immediately made it. If Mom came back to check on me, which she most likely would do any minute now, at least that much would be done. She’d be satisfied with even a little progress because it meant that the job had been started.