Prank Wars (3 page)

“No.” She followed me into my apartment. Tory took up the rear. We ran up the stairs until we reached my apartment on the top floor.

“Agreed,” I said. “So, let’s give him a really good reason to dislike you, shall we?” My mischievous streak was taking over. “I mean, the guy needs a reason, something to ease his conscience. Let’s make this break-up easy on him, poor thing.”

Kim’s lips twisted at the completely ludicrous suggestion. “And what reason could we possibly give him, Madeleine?”

I slammed our front door decisively, making both Kim and Tory jump. “Tell him it was a
wager
.”

“A what?” Kim asked.

I gave her an impish smile and headed for my room, passing our worn green striped couches on my way into the hall. Kim and Tory followed me like I was the Pied Piper. “Tell him that you never wanted to date him in the first place, but the only reason you did was because we made a bet that he would fall for you like some kind of fool. Tell him that we were laughing behind his back the entire time.” Kim gasped. “It’ll be good for him,” I reassured her with a pat on the shoulder. “Like shock therapy. He’ll think twice before he tangles with us girls again.”

Kim looked confused and Tory and I broke into mischievous laughs. It was contagious and soon, Kim was laughing uncertainly along with us. She still wore a puzzled expression, but at least we cheered her up. “Oh, c’mon, that’s crazy.” She flopped on my bed, pulling a throw pillow to her stomach. “I could just imagine. I wish…” She giggled again. “Oh, you are too funny. You girls!”

“Funny?” I stopped laughing. “No, I’m dead serious. Do it.” I sat down at the plotting tables—uh, I’ll explain those later—and opened up my laptop at my desk to pull up Facebook. We all knew that Cameron received Facebook notifications religiously on his phone. I pulled up his account and wrote on his wall. “I’m so sorry to hear about your grandfather. I hope he feels better soon.”

“What are you doing?” Kim asked. Tory smiled cruelly. She knew exactly what I was doing.

“One,” I counted, “two…three.” Kim watched me like I was crazy, but as soon as I counted thirty seconds, I refreshed Cameron’s page and miraculously my comment had been erased. “Hmm? Why doesn’t Cameron want his friends and family to see that his grandfather’s under the weather? Could it be that…?”

“…he’s not?” Tory finished for me. Kim’s tears had magically dried up. She glanced over at Tory, who lifted a brow. “Tell him it was a wager.” She flopped next to Kim on the bed. Now there was a devil on each of Kim’s shoulders—no angel in sight.

After a moment of gauging our expressions to see if we were serious, Kim decided we weren’t and threw her head back. Strangely enough, she was giggling. Her long chestnut hair bounced with her. “Oh, you girls! Thanks for making me feel better. You’re right. I can’t believe I didn’t see it, but…but dumping me was the biggest favor Cameron has ever done for me. If…if…he was playing with me from the beginning then I’m sorry he ever asked me out in the first place.” She slid off the bed, looking strong. “He’s not worth crying about. I’m not some measly river…or a filthy puddle—in your case Madeleine!”

She left my room with a girl-power spring to her step. Obviously she didn’t take us as seriously as we took ourselves. She hesitated at the door. Her expression changed when she looked at me. “You know, I always thought you were the meanest girl in the ward, Madeleine, but you’re just a fake, aren’t you? You
do
have a heart.”

Was that a compliment? I wasn’t sure, but at least Kim’s tears were gone. They’d be back once Kim started remembering the good things about him. We had to make sure that didn’t happen. I waited for the door to close behind her. “We’ll spread the rumor tonight.”

Tory nodded, expecting nothing less. “Very good, captain.” She was enjoying this. I couldn’t expect her to take any of this seriously. She had never experienced a player firsthand. She never dated—
ever
. I supposed it was better than a broken heart. “It’s a double-break-up-weekend too,” she told me in shocked tones. “AmyLee’s boyfriend broke up with her this morning!”

“Is that an April Fool’s joke?”

“Nope.”

That meant the fifth break-up in our apartment complex this week. This one wasn’t too much of a surprise. AmyLee’s latest boyfriend was a snake. His hand was on AmyLee’s, but he couldn’t keep his eyes off the other girls in the room. Every time his eyes rested on me, I treated him to the evil eye—it was my latest scar from this battle of the sexes. “Why did he break it off?”

“We’ll find out, I’m sure,” Tory said.

AmyLee was a drama queen. She wouldn’t rest until we knew every sordid detail, especially since our apartment was quickly turning into group therapy for the heartbroken. Everyone knew where my sympathies lay; they were never with the male. “He probably wasn’t ready for a relationship either,” I drawled. “It’s growing into quite an epidemic.” I pulled my pen from my dark hair. It fell past my shoulders in a messy tangle and I ignored it, rolling the pen between my fingers. “We live among the most scared men in the world, my friend.”

I wasn’t sure if it was a college thing, a twenty-something thing or even just a guy thing, but where were the manly men? The gentlemen? The men of honor? All over if my mom could be believed. The problem was that if they were manly, they were players. If they were gentlemen, they were scared. And if they were men of honor? They weren’t interested in me. And if they were all three?
They were taken.
Seriously, did we all have to fight for Captain Moroni in the next life? I didn’t know one girl who hadn’t called dibs on him. It was a cat-fight in the making.

“You think these guys are scared?” Tory asked. “Or just playing?”

I shrugged, trying not to think of
him
…and then
him
…and oh yeah, most especially
him
. Yep, Cameron was the straw that broke me. It was humiliating that it had taken so many breakups to know it was stupid to believe
I
could ever have a healthy relationship.

The door opened and my roommate’s head poked into the room. Tory and I jumped guiltily when we saw Lizzie’s face. She always wore celestial white. Today she wore matching pearls in her ears. They made a great contrast against her dark skin. I tried not to look like I was stirring up trouble. “Hey Lizzie.”

Lizzie nodded with the dignified air of an Ethiopian princess. Well, not really Ethiopian—her dad was from Nigeria and her mom was from Washington, but she looked exotic enough. “You’re not holding another of those war meetings again, are you?” she reproached. I tried not to look guilty, but to be honest, I wasn’t sure how. I knew that Lizzie did. That’s why I had offered her the position as my second-in-command in this war, but she refused to take the honor. “Don’t you have to get to class?” she asked.

“I’m skipping it,” I decided on the spot. It was a business class anyway. My business major was one of the many casualties of my break-up with Cameron. There was no way I wanted to pick out happy brides’ wedding cakes when I wouldn’t have one of my own. Two weeks ago, I nixed wedding coordinator and switched to General Studies, which meant I had only one year left of BYU before I was out. I was too old to be here anyway. I started school late, switched my major too many times. And now I was twenty-six. Already, I felt like a spinster.

“Enough is enough,” Lizzie said. “You’ve got to stop these
Break-up Anonymous Meetings
! First Johanna, then Emily…and now Kim? You’re not helping them!”

“What are you talking—?” It was best to plead stupid, but before I could, in stormed AmyLee in tight leggings and boots. I was glad her wrath wasn’t directed at me, but at a supposedly stronger man. She was yet another girl in our apartment complex in need of a battle plan against her ex. I ignored Lizzie’s accusing look and indicated a chair. “Sit down, AmyLee.”

“I’d rather stand.”

Lizzie leaned on the door frame. “Your methods are unhealthy, Madeleine.”

“Look, Lizzie,” I whispered loudly. “There’s only
one
way to get over a man, see him for what he really is. Just consider this my little service project for the Relief Society.”

“Can you believe that jerk?” AmyLee interrupted us with a shout. I turned to our latest dumpee. “He just
wants
to be
friends
.”

“And what’s wrong with that?” a chipper voice called from the hallway. We groaned. It was another one of my roommates, a roommate that never seemed to be burned by men. If anyone did the burning, it was Kali. She danced, yes, danced into the room.

“What’s wrong with that?” AmyLee repeated in a growl, directing all of her rage against the hapless Kali. “Did
she
just ask me what was wrong with that?”

We all cringed a little bit, but Kali stood her ground proudly in her gladiator sandals. Think unrepentant China doll with dimples, lots of blonde curly hair, elegant cat eyes, a little rude, but with the best intentions in the world. When a guy wants to be friends with Kali, it means he wants to date her. But when a guy wants to
just be friends
with a girl like
us
say, well, we know we’re getting the runaround. I stepped protectively in front of the blonde and smiled calmly at AmyLee, redirecting her anger to the correct party. “Tell me what
he
did to you.”

AmyLee laughed without humor. “Can we forget for a moment that I didn’t even know Brad was alive until two months ago? Then he started hounding me, asking me out, complimenting me, and making me feel— oh, crazy I know— like I was the most special girl in the world to him. And now, just when I get attached, really really attached, he wants to run?”

I snickered; it was getting too predictable. AmyLee’s face got even redder at my unnatural reaction, and I shrugged. “He wants to play games, does he? Let’s play a game then. It’s called turn him up sweet and dump him on his face. I want cookies made, girls. Tender little notes. Steak.” They straightened, seeing I was serious.

Tory’s nose wrinkled. “But who can do that?”

“I don’t know. You’re the Relief Society, figure it out!” I kicked off my black and white plaid flats and paced the green shag carpet in my bare feet. Prank wars were my element,
not
pretending to have everything in common with a guy just to get a boyfriend. “First, we’ll make sure every girl in his acquaintance gives him the cold shoulder until he’s begging for a date. Then we sic our flirtiest, most beautiful gal pals on him, the ones without an ounce of human decency.” I glanced behind me at Kali. She was scratching the red polish off her nails. “Do you cook?” I asked her.

She grimaced, still managing to look gorgeous through that nasty little look. “Are you joking?”

“I can cook,” AmyLee managed to hiss through her anger.

“Good. By the time we’re through with him, he’ll want a normal girl so bad that he’ll take another go at you…and when he does, simply remind him that you
just want to be friends
.”

Her lips puckered. “But what if I don’t?”

“Don’t worry.
He does
, but this time you’re the one who will be dumping him on his head. Do yourself a favor and get him where it hurts this time, will you?”

“His heart?”

“No, AmyLee, his ego.” I crossed my arms, full of all sorts of good deeds this morning. I was eager for more. Maybe Kim was right. Maybe I wasn’t the meanest girl in the ward. It didn’t feel like it though. “Make sure it happens,” I told Tory.

AmyLee sighed, but she left much calmer than she had entered. Usually the angry girls got over their men better than the broken-hearted ones did.

As soon as she was gone, Lizzie pinned me down with her brown eyes. “Madeleine!” Her voice was stern as usual, and I didn’t take it as seriously as I should—also a usual occurrence. “This really isn’t the best way to handle this, you know.”

I brushed my hair out of my face and managed an innocent smile. “I know.”

“So, why are you doing this?” Tormenting men got my mind off them? It made me feel less like a victim? There was no wrath like a scorned woman? Habit? I wasn’t sure really.

“Hey, where’s my Jell-O?” I heard the staccato sound of spiked heels on the kitchen floor and we all hunched over guiltily. Only one person made my heart quicken in fear. Sandra must be home. “Who took it?” The cabinet door slammed shut. “You know better than to mess with me. I will have your heads!”

Uh oh.
The Jell-O might’ve ended up in the guys’ toilets or maybe their shower heads. I wasn’t actually sure. We listened to Sandra’s heels catch on the gross shag carpet in the hall outside as she came for us. I had no idea why a classy dame like her even stooped to walk on such a floor, let alone rent it. It was anybody’s guess why she had signed the lease this last winter semester.

“Lizzie!” Before Sandra could say,
move it
, Lizzie stepped aside, allowing Sandra to glare into my crowded room. Our roommate was a steely-eyed brunette, cold and gorgeous. She was way too classy for a college student and looked like she should be wrapped in a mink, not wearing skinny jeans. Everything Sandra wore was designer from her snakeskin heels to her baby doll shirt and Chanel bag. Her gaze went past a smirking Kali, a fiery-eyed Tory, and then straight for me. “What’s going on here?”

“Therapy.” I steeled my eyes to match hers. “Would you like some?”

She snorted. “I guess it makes sense. Shrinks are usually more messed up than their patients.”