Flawless (16 page)

Her father stood up and walked over to the living room’s baby grand piano. He lifted the lid, and dust sifted into the air. When he pressed down a key, a tinny sound came out. “I guess your mother told you that Isabel and I are getting married?”

Hanna’s heart sank. “Yeah, she said something like that.”

“We were thinking next summer, except that Kate won’t be able to make it then. She’s going to a pre-college summer program in Spain.”

Hanna bristled at Kate’s name.
Poor baby has to go to Spain.

“We’d like you to be at the wedding as well,” her father added. When Hanna didn’t respond, her dad kept talking. “If you could. I know it’s kind of weird. If it is, we should talk about it. I’d rather have you talk to me than steal cars.”

Hanna sniffed. How dare her father think stealing stuff boiled down to him and his stupid marriage! But then she stopped.
Did
it? “I’ll think about it,” she said.

Her father ran his hands along the edge of the piano bench. “I’m staying in Philly all weekend, and Saturday, I’ve booked us for dinner at Le Bec-Fin.”

“Really?” Hanna cried, despite herself. Le Bec-Fin was a famous French restaurant in downtown Philadelphia that she’d wanted to eat at for years. Spencer’s and Ali’s families used to drag them there, and they’d whine about it. It was so snotty, they said, the menu wasn’t even in English, and it was full of old ladies in hideous furs that had heads and faces. But to Hanna, Le Bec-Fin sounded totally glamorous.

“And I booked you a suite at the Four Seasons,” her father went on. “I know you’re supposed to be in trouble, but your mother said it was okay.”

“Seriously?” Hanna clapped her hands. She adored staying in fancy hotels.

“It has a pool.” He smiled coyly. Hanna used to get really excited when they stayed in hotels with pools. “You could come early Saturday afternoon for a swim.”

Suddenly, Hanna’s face fell. Saturday was…Foxy. “Can we do Sunday instead?”

“Well, no. It has to be Saturday.”

Hanna chewed on her lip. “Then I can’t.”

“Why?”

“I just…there’s this dance thing. It’s sort of…important.”

Her father folded his hands. “Your mom’s letting you go to a dance after…after what you did? I thought you were grounded.”

Hanna shrugged. “I bought the tickets way in advance. They were expensive.”

“It would mean a lot to me if you came,” her father said softly. “I’d love a weekend with you.”

Her dad looked genuinely
upset
. Almost like he was going to cry. She wanted a weekend with him, too. He’d remembered the molten lava floor, how she used to talk about Le Bec-Fin, and how much she adored ritzy hotels with pools. She wondered if he shared inside jokes like that with Kate. She didn’t want him to. She wanted to be special.

“I guess I can blow it off,” she finally answered.

“Great.” Her father smiled back.

“For Cornelius Maximilian’s sake,” she added, giving him a shy look.

“Even better.”

Hanna watched as her father got into his car and drove slowly down the driveway. A warm, buzzing feeling filled her body. She was so happy, she didn’t even think about digging out the bag of kettle chips that she’d thrown back into the pantry. Instead, she felt like dancing through the house.

When she heard her BlackBerry buzzing upstairs, she snapped back to attention. There was so much to do. She had to tell Sean she wasn’t going to Foxy. She had to call and tell Mona, too. She had to dig up a fabulous outfit to wear to Le Bec-Fin—maybe that pretty Theory belted dress she hadn’t had a chance to wear yet?

She ran upstairs, opened the BlackBerry, and frowned. It was…a text.

Four simple words:

Hanna. Marin. Blinded. Jenna.

What would Daddy think about you if he knew that?
I’m watching you, Hanna, and you’d better do what I say. —A

18

SURROUND YOURSELF WITH NORMAL, AND MAYBE YOU’LL BE NORMAL TOO

“You’re so lucky you get to go to Foxy for free,” Emily’s older sister Carolyn said. “You really should take advantage of it.”

It was Friday morning, and Emily and Carolyn were outside on the driveway, waiting for their mom to drive them to early-morning swim practice. Emily turned to her sister, running her hand through her hair. As captain, she got free Foxy tickets, but it seemed weird to party so soon after Ali’s funeral. “It’s not like I’m going to go. I have no one to go with. Ben and I aren’t together anymore, so…”

“Go with a friend.” Carolyn smeared ChapStick over her thin, naturally pink lips. “Topher and I would love to go, but I’d have to spend all my baby-sitting money just on a ticket. So we’re going to have movie night at his house instead.”

Emily glanced at her sister. Carolyn was a senior and looked just like Emily, with reddish-blond, chlorine-dried hair, freckles across her cheeks, pale eyelashes, and a strong, compact, swimmer’s body. When Emily was named captain, she worried that Carolyn would be jealous—she
was
older. But Carolyn seemed completely fine with the whole thing. Secretly, Emily would have loved to see her wig out about something. Just once.

“Oh hey!” Carolyn perked up. “I saw a funny picture of you yesterday!”

Emily’s field of vision narrowed. “Picture?” she repeated hoarsely. She thought of the photo booth picture A had texted her yesterday. A had spread it around. It was starting.

“Yeah, it’s from the Tate meet yesterday?” Carolyn reminded her. “You look…I don’t know. Ambushed. You have this funny expression on your face.”

Emily blinked. The picture Scott took. With Toby. Her muscles relaxed. “Oh,” she said.

“Emily?”

Emily looked up and made a tiny, inaudible gasp. Maya stood a few feet away from them on the street, straddling her blue Trek mountain bike. Her curly, brownish-black hair was clipped out of her face, and she’d rolled up the sleeves of her white denim jacket. There were dark circles under her eyes. It seemed weird, seeing her at such an early hour of the morning.

“Hey,” Emily squeaked. “Um, what’s up?”

“This was the only place I thought I could actually catch you.” Maya gestured to Emily’s house. “You haven’t said a word to me since, like, Monday.”

Emily glanced over her shoulder at Carolyn, who was now rooting through the front pocket of her purple North Face backpack. She thought again of A’s note.
How
could A have gotten those pictures? Didn’t Maya have them…or had there been others?

“I’m sorry,” Emily said to Maya. She didn’t know what to do with her hands, so she placed them on top of her mailbox, which was a miniaturized version of her house. “I’ve been sort of busy.”

“Yep, sure looks that way.”

The bitterness in Maya’s voice made the hair on the back of Emily’s neck rise. “W-What do you mean?” Emily snapped.

But Maya merely looked blank and sad. “I…I just mean you haven’t called me back.”

Emily pulled the strings of her red hoodie. “Let’s go over here,” she murmured, walking to the edge of her property under a weeping willow tree. All she wanted was some simple privacy, so Carolyn wouldn’t listen in, but unfortunately, it was kind of sexy under the tree’s thick, concealing branches. The light was a very pale green, and Maya’s skin looked so…dewy. She looked like a wood sprite.

“I have a question for you, actually,” Emily whispered, trying to block out all sexy-wood-sprite thoughts. “You know those pictures of us, from the photo booth?”

“Uh-huh.” Maya was leaning so close, Emily could almost feel the tips of her hair grazing her cheek. It felt, suddenly, like she’d grown a billion extra nerve endings, and they were all tingling.

“Has anyone seen them?” Emily whispered.

It took Maya a minute to respond. “No…”

“Are you sure?”

Maya cocked her head, birdlike, and grinned. “But I’ll show them around, if you want….” When she saw Emily cringe, the teasing sparkle in her eyes dimmed. “Wait. Is this why you’re avoiding me? You thought I actually
did
show them around?”

“I don’t know,” Emily mumbled, running her foot along one of the willow’s big exposed roots. Her heart was beating so fast, she was pretty sure it was setting some sort of new world record.

Maya reached out and took Emily’s chin in her hand, tilting it up so that Emily would look at her. “I wouldn’t do that. I want to keep them for myself.”

Emily jerked her chin away. This could
not
happen in her front yard. “There’s something else you should know. I’ve…I’ve met someone.”

Maya tilted her head. “What kind of someone?”

“His name’s Toby. He’s really nice. And…and I think I like him.”

Maya blinked in disbelief, as if Emily had told her she’d fallen in love with a goat.

“And I think I might ask him to Foxy,” Emily went on.

The idea had just occurred to Emily, but it felt okay. She liked that Toby wasn’t perfect and didn’t bother to try. And if she tried hard enough, she could almost forget the complication that he was Jenna’s stepbrother. And if she took a boy to Foxy, it would negate those photos from Noel’s party and prove to everyone she wasn’t gay.

Er, right?

Maya clucked her tongue. “But isn’t Foxy tomorrow? What if he has plans?”

Emily shrugged. She was pretty sure Toby didn’t.

“And anyway,” Maya went on. “I thought you said Foxy was too expensive.”

“I was, um, named the captain of the swim team. So I get to go for free.”

“Wow,” Maya said, after a pause. It was as if Emily could
smell
Maya’s disappointment, like it was a pheromone. Maya had been the person to convince Emily to quit swimming. “Well, congrats, I guess.”

Emily stared at her burgundy Vans. “Thanks,” she said, even though Maya clearly hadn’t meant it nicely. She could feel Maya waiting for her to look up and say,
Silly. I’m just kidding.
Emily felt a surge of irritation. Why did Maya have to make this so difficult? Why couldn’t they just be normal friends?

Maya sniffed loudly, then pushed through the tree’s branches, back into Emily’s yard. Emily followed, only to realize that her mother was at the front door. Mrs. Fields’s close-cropped hair was stiff and blown out, and she had her
Don’t mess with me, I’m in a hurry
look on her face.

When she noticed Maya, she paled. “Emily, time to go,” she barked.

“Sure thing,” Emily chirped. She had
not
wanted her mom to see this. She turned back to Maya, who now stood next to her bike at the curb.

Maya was staring at her. “You can’t change who you are, Emily,” she said in a loud voice. “I hope you know that.”

Emily felt her mother and Carolyn staring at her. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she cried just as loudly.

“Emily, you’re going to be late,” Mrs. Fields warned.

Maya gave Emily a parting look, then pedaled furiously down the street. Emily swallowed hard. She felt so ambivalent. On one hand, she was angry at Maya for confronting her—here, in her yard, in front of Carolyn and her mom. On the other, she had the same feeling she did when she was seven years old and had accidentally let go of the Mickey Mouse–shaped balloon she’d begged her parents to buy her at Disney World. She’d watched it float into the sky until it was no longer visible. She’d thought about it for the rest of the trip until her mom said,
It’s just a balloon, sweetie! And it’s your fault you let go of it!

She trudged back to the Volvo and gave Carolyn the front seat without a fight. As they pulled out of the driveway, Emily glanced at Maya, now a tiny dot in the distance, then took a deep breath and put her hands on the back of her mother’s seat.

“Guess what, Mom. I’m going to ask a boy to the charity thing tomorrow.”

“What charity thing?” Mrs. Fields murmured, in a voice that said,
I’m not happy with you right now.

“Foxy.” Carolyn announced, fiddling with the radio. “The annual thing that the news covers. It’s so big, some girls get plastic surgery for it.”

Mrs. Fields pursed her lips. “I’m not sure I want you going to that.”

“But I get to go for free. Because I’m captain.”

“You
have
to let her go, Mom,” Carolyn urged. “It’s
soooo
glamorous.”

Mrs. Fields glanced at Emily in the rearview mirror. “Who’s the boy?”

“Well, his name is Toby. He used to go to our school, but now he goes to Tate,” Emily explained, leaving out where Toby had been for the past three years—and
why
. Luckily, her mother didn’t memorize every detail about every Rosewood kid Emily’s age, like some mothers did. Carolyn didn’t appear to remember the name, either—Carolyn never remembered scandals, not even juicy Hollywood ones. “He’s really sweet, and he’s a really good swimmer. Way faster than Ben.”

“That Ben was nice,” Mrs. Fields murmured.

Emily gritted her teeth. “Yeah, but Toby is much, much nicer.” She also wanted to add,
And don’t worry, he’s white,
but she didn’t have the nerve.

Carolyn twisted around in her seat. “Is it the boy in that picture I saw of you?”

“Yeah.” Emily said quietly.

Carolyn turned to their mother. “He’s
good
. He beat Topher in the 200 free.”

Mrs. Fields gave Emily a little smile. “You’re supposed to be grounded, but after all the circumstances of this week, I suppose you can go. But no plastic surgery.”