The Complete Private Collection: Private; Invitation Only; Untouchable; Confessions; Inner Circle; Legacy; Ambition; Revelation; Last Christmas; Paradise ... The Book of Spells; Ominous; Vengeance (9 page)

“What’s she doing?” Constance asked.

Noelle was on her way toward our table. My heart was in my throat.

“I don’t know.”

Noelle stopped right next to us, picked up my tray full of food, turned around, and brought it back to her table without a word. She dropped it next to Kiran and raised her eyebrows at me. Kiran laughed and wiggled her fingers teasingly. Taylor ducked her face behind her curls and flushed. Ariana lowered her book for the first time and looked around, confused. At the far end of the table, Natasha looked peeved and Leanne stared.

“Uh, I think she wants you to go over there,” Diana said.

I had to agree. I shot her and Constance baffled looks, then rose and lifted my backpack. Noelle had made quite a scene, so everyone in the cafeteria was now watching my progress. As I slid
past Dash and Kiran, I kept waiting for somebody to trip me, for the ground to go out from under me. But nothing happened, and finally I sat.

“If you want to sit over here, just sit over here,” Noelle said. “No one’s stopping you.”

I had a feeling it was the best invitation I was ever going to get. I tried not to look as thrilled as I was.

“Hi, Reed,” Taylor said, her cheeks pink.

“Hi,” I replied. Ariana smiled at me and returned to her book. Natasha and Leanne ignored my arrival, but I couldn’t have cared less.

“So. There’s something we need you to do for us,” Noelle said.

My heart thumped and I was overcome by a rush of embarrassed heat. Of course. She had only brought me over here to execute some new task. What did she want now? New toast for her turkey sandwich?

“Okay,” I said slowly.

“We need you to break up with Kiran’s Dreck boy for her.”

Kiran went ashen and my heart seized. I looked at her in a panic and saw that her eyes were wide with accusation.

“I didn’t tell,” I blurted.

Noelle lit up with a grin. “Oh! So you
knew
about it?” she said, looking from me to Kiran. “That’s interesting. Are you two, like, confidantes now or something?”

“Noelle,” Kiran said. “I—“

“Don’t worry. Glass-licker didn’t tell on you,” Noelle said. “Your little geek has a blog. Were you aware? And he’s not too good
with the aliases, I must say. One of the guys stumbled across it and e-mailed it to everyone in school last period.”

Kiran looked as if she were going to throw up. Throw up, then faint, then die. My heart went out to her.

“A Dreck boy, Kiran. Really,” Ariana said, her tone almost sympathetic. “Did you think we weren’t going to find out?”

She reached for Kiran’s hand in an almost motherly manner. Kiran let Ariana hold her for a moment before pulling away. She swallowed hard and shook her hair back, adopting a nonchalant demeanor. Leaning her elbow on the table, she picked up a carrot stick from her plate.

“Whatever. We were just fooling around,” she said. “It’s not like I care.”

She was lying. We all knew she was lying. But I had a feeling it didn’t matter.

“Well, good. Because everyone knows it is unacceptable for a Billings Girl to date a Drake boy,” Noelle said. “It’s just not done. And since a Billings Girl can’t date a Drake boy, it stands to reason that she can’t break up with one either. And that, my little glass-licker, is where you come in.”

“This should be good,” Leanne said.

“Tell him, in no uncertain terms, that it’s over,” Noelle said, staring me down. “Tell him Kiran no longer wants anything to do with him. Tell him she thinks he’s a pasty loser with a puny, shriveled little
thing
and she never wants to speak to him again.”

No one moved. I glanced at Kiran. I could tell she was being
ripped to shreds inside. And I had the distinct feeling that Noelle had chosen particularly harsh words in order to punish her friend. My heart pounded in my ears, my eyes, my temples.

“That’s what you want me to say?”

“Word for word.”

I swallowed hard, struggling not to choke. “Now?”

“No. Next Wednesday,” Noelle said sarcastically. “Yes, now.”

“Uh . . . okay,” I said. I looked at Kiran. “What’s his name?”

“Like it matters,” Noelle said.

“It’s James,” Kiran replied. She flashed a glance at me and I recognized a glint of desperation. She really did care about this kid. How could she let her friends make me do this? Just because of some stupid image issue? Why didn’t she stand up for herself? For him?

I cleared my throat and stood. “I guess I’ll . . . be right back.”

Slowly I walked over to James’s table. Overhead, rain pounded down on the skylight and a flash of lightning briefly lit the room. Everyone in the cafeteria was staring at me. I saw several printed out pages of what must have been James’s blog on the tables. When I arrived at the end of the Dreck table, all the guys looked up. Everyone but James, who seemed to be pointedly ignoring me. From the red blotches on his face, he knew I was there, but he kept his attention trained on his manga.

“Uh . . . James?” I said, wiping my hands on my jeans.

“Who are you?” he asked, not looking up.

“I’m Reed,” I replied. “No . . . uh . . . Kiran sent me over here.”

A couple of the guys snickered and flashed grins at me. James looked up. I saw that he was actually quite handsome, in a pale, lab-troll kind of way. His eyes were a warm brown behind his glasses and he had a kind, if roundish, face.

“Excuse me?” he said, his brow knitting.

I recited what Noelle had said in my mind. There was no way I wanted to tell this poor guy all that in front of his friends, but I knew that I had to. If somehow it got back to Noelle that I deviated from her script, I knew she would hold it against me.

“She said it’s over.” I pressed my lips together. “She said she no longer wants anything to do with you.”

James’s jaw clenched.
“What?”

I took a deep breath and soldiered on. “She said . . . she said you’re a pasty loser with a puny, shriveled little thing and she never wants to speak to you again,” I said quickly.

“Oh! That’s just wrong!” one of the kids at the table cried. A few laughed, but most looked as sickened as I felt inside.

James shoved away from the table, his chair clattering against the empty one behind it.

“Where’re you going?” I asked in a panic. At the Billings table, Noelle glared.

“Where do you think I’m going?” he said through his teeth. “If she wants to say all that she can say it to my face.”

My heart lurched and I grabbed his arm, stopping him. Somehow I knew that I couldn’t let James the Dreck humiliate Kiran in front of the entire school. Somehow I knew that would
render this mission a failure. And I couldn’t have that. Not now. Not after I had been given a second chance.

“Hey! Buddy! Get a grip!” I said firmly. “I said she doesn’t want to talk to you. You were a mistake, all right? A moment of temporary insanity.” I glanced over my shoulder at the table, then leaned toward him, lowering my voice to a near breath. “If you go over there, we’ll both get ripped to shreds. Don’t do it.”

I glanced back at Noelle. She eyed me expectantly.

Please, please, please, don’t do it, James.

Finally, he took a deep breath and deflated.

“Can you tell her . . . can you tell her I’m sorry?” he asked quietly.

He’s sorry?
He’s
sorry? Was he kidding me?

“Just don’t tell her when her friends are around,” he said. “Wait till you’re alone.”

He understood everything. That much was clear.

“Sure,” I whispered, tears stinging my eyes. I was that stunned by my own reprehensible actions. That humiliated by his mature response. I had no idea when I would ever have the chance to get Kiran by herself—I had never seen her without at least one of her friends by her side, except for the time she was with James—but I would do it if I could. I figured I owed this kid that much.

James grabbed his stuff and skulked out of the room, much to the glee of his audience. I was almost surprised when they didn’t applaud.

Slowly, I walked toward the Billings table, willing myself not to heave. But when I saw the amused expressions on their faces, the
barely-contained misery on Kiran’s, I realized I was in desperate need of some air. I walked right past them and out the double doors, pausing under the rain-soaked eaves. Thunder rumbled overhead and I hugged my stomach, struggling not to cry. What had I just done?

“Think it’ll all be worth it?”

My hand flew up as Thomas pushed away from the wall. His dark jacket was soaked and raindrops dripped from his hair.

“What the hell? Why are you always lurking?” I demanded, scared half to death.

Thomas smiled slowly and leaned toward me. Even in all the roiling emotion, my heart had the temerity to respond.

“Don’t get in over your head, new girl,” he said. Then he looked me up and down. The covetousness in his eyes both flattered and unnerved me. It was as if he believed that I in some way belonged to him. “I don’t think I could handle it.”

For a split second he loomed even closer, I could feel his breath on my face and I knew for sure he was going to kiss me. But instead he smiled and turned and walked off into the rain.

Turned out I didn’t have to figure out a way to get Kiran alone. When I walked out of Bradwell the following morning with Constance and the others, she stood up from the nearest stone bench in the quad. I could see the nervousness in her eyes.

“I’ll see you in class,” I told Constance as I split away.

Kiran drew herself up with a breath as I approached. By the time I got to her, any uncertainty was gone and her imperious, blasé demeanor was back in place.

“Hi,” I said. My turn to be uncertain.

“What did he say to you?” she asked point-blank. “Not that I care. I just need to make sure that he got the message.”

Lies. All of it. Lies.

“He got the message,” I told her. “Don’t worry.”

She stared. The gold flecks in her eyes seemed to pulsate. “Well? What did he
say?
”

I cleared my throat. “He said he’s sorry,” I told her. “He said to get you alone and tell you that he’s sorry.”

Kiran blinked. “He said that?”

“Yeah,” I told her, my curiosity overwhelming. “Why would he say that after what I did to him?”

“I don’t know,” Kiran said, shaking her head as she stared past me. She cracked the briefest of smiles. “That’s James.”

I smiled too. We were sharing a moment here. An actual moment. Kiran was letting me see a part of her that she would never let Noelle and the others see. I was sure of it. Her big eyes suddenly filled with tears.

“Hey. Are you all right?” I asked.

Instantly she refocused. When she looked at me again she was all business. “We never spoke,” she said.

My heart thumped. “Where do they think you are?”

“None of your business,” she said. She rolled her eyes at my flinch. “Look, I know you didn’t tell them about him and I appreciate that, all right?” she said under her breath as if, at that very moment, they were listening. “But I need you to do it again. This conversation never happened. It goes with you to the grave.”

What are you so afraid of? What are you so
afraid
of?

I wanted to scream it, but I bit my tongue.

“Okay,” I said.

“Good.” She nodded resolutely and slipped her dark sunglasses over her eyes. Just before she strolled off, I could have sworn she muttered a thank-you.

“You’re getting enough to eat?” my father asked me.

“Yeah,” I told him. “The food here is good.”

Not a total lie. It was at least better than the food at Croton High. I propped my feet up on the small shelf under the pay phone. My butt already hurt after just two minutes on the small wooden bench. There were no phone jacks in the rooms, so everyone on the floor was supposed to use this one public phone. Everyone I knew had a cell, though. I was the only resident who ever used it.

“I miss you, kiddo,” my father said.

It was weird talking to him on the phone. Aside from quick calls to ask for a ride, I had never talked to him on the phone in my life. I imagined him sitting at the table in the kitchen, the sports section open in front of him, and the image depressed me. With my finger I traced the words “Slayer Rules!” had been etched into the wall.

“I miss you, too, Dad.”

“I’m looking forward to parents’ weekend,” he said. “We both are.”

My heart thumped. I had read about parents’ weekend in the Easton Handbook, but I had blocked out its existence. I couldn’t imagine my parents here any more than I could imagine them on Mars. I also couldn’t imagine them making the drive without my mother bitching and whining the entire time. Why my father actually thought it was an attractive idea was beyond me.

“I’d better go,” he said. “Mom wants to eat dinner.”

“Okay,” I said. Now I saw her sitting there as well, glowering at him over a tray of gray meatloaf.

“She says hello,” my father said.

No, she doesn’t.

“Okay. Bye, dad,” I said.

“Love you, Reed.”

“You, too.”

I hung up the phone and took a moment to catch my breath. It was amazing how each phone call pulled me back there so entirely. To that misery, that fear, that darkness. Each time I spoke to my father, I had to recompose myself. Remind myself that I wasn’t there anymore. And then, just as I did every morning that I didn’t wake up to my mother shouting at me from her room to get up and bring her her morning pills, I would smile. My life was my own now. I was still getting used to it.

A rap on the glass door of the booth made me jump. Constance’s eager face looked down at me through the foggy glass.

“Come on! You’re missing it!” She waved maniacally for me to follow her, then ran. I sighed and hoisted myself up.

It was Sunday evening and all the girls on my floor had gathered in the common room to watch some random reality show. It was all they had talked about all day. I had never seen it before and that was the subject of at least half an hour of incredulous conversation after dinner. Now I was finally going to see what all the fuss was about.