Spoiled (13 page)

Molly closed the sliding door behind her and raised her face to the sky. The L.A. air still had a little heat to it, even
after sunset, but it felt so much better than the canned oxygen pumping through Brooke’s room.
Their
room.

Except, no. It was still Brooke’s room. The floor plan matched Molly’s old space across the hall (except bigger), but Brooke
oozed out of every nook and cranny—from the Barbie pink color scheme to the eleven thousand mirrors. Molly couldn’t believe
Brick’s idea of parenting involved immersion therapy with a girl who’d spent the week smothering her, then hung her out to
dry when Molly needed her most.

She’d wanted to believe Brooke’s sob story in Brick’s study, but Brooke’s recent firm, ominous cold shoulder said otherwise.
This was more than just a tantrum; it was a really bad portent for the future. She could imagine Charmaine’s reaction: “What
did you expect from a person who made you wear chintz?”

Dejected, Molly flopped down in the chair farthest from the bedroom window. Between moving, getting drunk, landing on a tabloid’s
website, and having a hangover in front of the father she’d only just met, Molly had done more living in one week than in
her entire sixteen years. What was next? Flunking out of school? Immaculate conception?

Her phone buzzed.

OMG ARE YOU A HOMEWRECKER?

Charmaine had been texting her all day, as dribs and drabs of the night before leaked onto the Internet. Aside from the photo
of her passed out at Brooke’s feet, someone had posted a creative lie on
Hey!
’s message board that Molly drunkenly hooked up with Pete Wentz.

Molly texted back:

I WILL NOT DIGNIFY THAT.

Her head spun, partly from her hangover and partly because she was on her second bedroom in less than a week. Unpacking was
taking forever—Brooke’s closet was the size of a studio apartment, yet she swore it wasn’t possible to clear more than a three-foot
stretch of hanger space. Molly probably could’ve pressed the issue with Brick, but as nice as he’d been about the passing
out thing, she counted that as one strike. She refused to get the other two, in case Brick decided letting her come here had
somehow ruined things and then she wound up with no parents at all.

Buzz.

PETE WENTZ, HUH?

She knew Danny was teasing, but it hit a nerve. Gritting her teeth, Molly dialed him.

“I never pegged you for a groupie,” Danny greeted her. “What was it like to make out with a dude who wears eyeliner?”

“Beats kissing a guy who thinks Skittles hide the taste of chewing tobacco.”

“Ooh, good one,” Danny said. She knew he was grinning. “Those photos online were
crazy
.”

Molly just sighed. “Tell me about it,” she said.

“Are you okay? Do you need me to come there and kick anyone’s ass?”

The tenderness in his voice made the tension in Molly’s spine ebb a bit.

“I still don’t get how you drink so much beer,” she said. “I feel like my head is going to explode, and I’m so exhausted.”

“That’s because drunk sleep doesn’t count,” Danny said. “You’ll feel better tomorrow. What did your dad say? Was he pissed?”

“Not really,” Molly admitted. “It was kind of amazing. He actually
understood
. It was probably the third time we’ve ever talked but he totally got me.”

Danny snorted. “Lucky. My dad gets mad if I have a Coke.”

“He’s your coach. He’s just looking out for you.”

“You two always did get along. He tells me every day how much it sucks that you’re gone,” Danny said, lowering his voice.
“And he’s right, Molls. It’s not the same.”

“I know,” she said. “I’d much rather be in your basement than all over the Internet.”

“I keep trying to imagine you surrounded by all those photographers, and in every mental image, you are screaming and running
away,” Danny said, sounding amused.

“It was so insane. I’m starting to understand why celebrities attack the paparazzi with umbrellas.”

“I’m proud of you for getting through it, babe. And you looked beautiful.” He paused. “When you were upright.”

“Gee, thanks.” She laughed. “And thank you for not asking about Brooke.”

“That one kinda spoke for itself.”

“She claims the photo isn’t what it looks like, but little bits of last night keep coming back to me. I think she hates me,
Danny.”

“You’ve seen too many TV movies with Charmaine,” he scoffed. “I bet she’s—ha-ha, stop it, Weebs, I’m on the phone!”

Molly frowned. “Where are you?”

“I’m over at Smitty’s house. We’re playing Mario Kart against some kids in Japan—oh, damn, Weebs, you just got smoked.”

“I wish I was there,” she said. “Everything is so much easier at home.”

“No, you don’t,” Danny said. “And remember what your mom used to say—what’s easy isn’t always what’s right. L.A. will get
better, I promise.”

“That’s true, because I’m not sure it can get any worse,” Molly said, so tragically that she had to laugh at herself. “Wait.
Yes, it can. I start school tomorrow with a bunch of people who have already seen me passed out drunk on the ground.”

“So you can only go up in their estimation,” Danny said. “Speaking of which, Smitty wants to know how come you never went
out drinking when you lived
here.
Ha! You’re such an ass, Smitty.”

“I should let you go,” Molly said, trying not to sound lonely.

“Yeah, maybe this isn’t the best time,” Danny replied. “I hate that you’re so far away. Wanna Skype on Thursday?”

“It’s a date.” Molly smiled at the balcony railing. “I love you like Pete Wentz loves his flatiron.”

The distance between L.A. and West Cairo suddenly felt more like two
hundred
thousand miles. And thanks to Danny’s brainiac denial strategy, Molly didn’t know if she was supposed to be seeking comfort
as his girlfriend or just a wronged buddy. After the last six months, Molly was so sick of trying to interpret her own emotions,
she kind of just wanted Danny to take charge and tell her how it was between the two of them.

Buzz.

OK, THEY RETRACTED THE WENTZ THING.

Molly shoved her phone into her pocket. She didn’t feel like talking to Charmaine about the scurrilous facts and fictions
of her big Hollywood debut right now. Instead, she had real problems. Like where she was going to put her clothes. And which
of them she was going to wear when she started school the next day.

Originally, she’d planned to ask Brooke. That clearly wasn’t going to happen; Brooke had all but thrown her into the fire
pit down by the hot tub, and that was just one party. If she was capable of doing that practically right in front of their
father… well, Molly didn’t want to think about what she might do next.

“
DON’T PARK THERE
—that’s
way
too far away. Walking in the heat will wilt my hair.”

Molly swerved away from the offending parking spot.

“Okay,” she said. “How about that one, right up front.”

“Ew, no, that’s
way
too close.”

Molly slammed on the brakes and exhaled.

“Perhaps you should just point to where you think I should park,” she said through gritted teeth.

“Like I care.”

As Brooke flipped down the mirror and rechecked her lip gloss, Molly resisted the urge to speed up and then slam on the brakes,
and instead pulled into a spot a few feet closer than the first one Brooke rejected.

“Interesting choice,” Brooke said. “That is, if you enjoy hiking.”

The whole drive to school had been like this. Molly had learned to drive on Laurel’s peeling Oldsmobile, which had the gearshift
attached to the steering wheel and velour bench seating in both rows, and wouldn’t play FM radio unless you turned the lights
on and off three times. By contrast, this car ran so smoothly, Molly thought she could probably stop steering altogether and
it’d still get her to school safely. But she couldn’t enjoy driving it because every time one of her hands so much as drifted
past ten and two, Brooke shrieked that they were going to die.

Brooke slid out of the car and slammed her door so hard the whole Lexus shuddered. She stormed away without a word, furiously
yanking down the hem of her Tory Burch minidress as she went. Colby-Randall Preparatory School technically did have a dress
code—somewhere in its four-page section of the student handbook, Molly had read that skirts shouldn’t be higher than three
inches above the knee—but obviously Brooke felt that it, like rules of social interaction, were just piddling suggestions.

So this is how it’s going to be.
Molly suspected as much when Brooke killed all the lights in the room and went to bed while Molly was still trying to unpack,
but she still couldn’t quite believe it. The one person who could’ve been her life raft was ditching her. Again.

Molly launched herself into the warm Los Angeles
morning air and stared up at the grand, ivy-covered stone mansion that loomed before her. Colby-Randall’s website had explained
that the school—a luxe old estate hidden almost below street level at the foot of the Hollywood Hills—started as one house
donated by an old studio exec, and then annexed a bunch of surrounding properties to give itself a vast wooded campus. And
it
was
impressive. It looked more like an Ivy League college than a high school. Or, at least, more like what Molly
imagined
an Ivy League campus looked like, since she’d never seen one of those, either.

Molly willed her feet to move, but they didn’t. She’d never been the new kid in school. In fact, they’d never even
had
a new student in her class in Indiana. People moved away, like when her friend Karen’s dad got transferred to Chicago when
they were in third grade, but no one ever seemed to move
to
West Cairo. She had no idea how to handle being the newbie, other than climbing back into the car and driving home to Indiana.
Or into the Pacific.

“Don’t just stand there—you’re gonna be late.”

Molly started, and turned. The tiny girl who’d spoken—she couldn’t have been more than five feet—appraised Molly quickly and
then pulled her green bob into a nub of a ponytail. “Gutsy call on the backpack,” she said as she walked past.

Molly glanced down at her Jansport and wondered what was so courageous about it. Books needed to be carried.
But then she looked up at the fracas bubbling around the main building’s arched double doors. Students were yelping and throwing
themselves into one another’s arms, screaming high-pitched greetings as if half of them hadn’t just seen one another Saturday
night at Brooke’s house. Some of the girls were wearing tiny miniskirts paired with unseasonably furry boots, others sported
designer jeans so tight they could’ve been painted on, and one familiar-looking raven-haired girl had the straps of her sandals
wound up around the legs of her denim. They looked like the pages of
Us Weekly
come to life, and not a single one of them had a dingy old pack slung over her tiny shoulders; instead, they carried massive
purses with shiny, elaborate buckles, or satchels stamped with the Louis Vuitton logo, which Molly doubted had been purchased
out of the trunk of some dude’s car. Even the green-haired girl, Molly recalled, had been carrying something made of leather.

As Molly made her way toward them, she noticed several people in her peripheral vision—and a few directly in her line of sight—elbowing
each other and pointing. People stopped talking and stared, brows furrowed, like they were at the zoo and Molly was an exotic
animal they’d never heard of before.
Behold, Los Angelenos, the world’s only Skittish Hoosier in captivity.
It was like a really bad sequel to Saturday night.

Forget all that. You can do this
.

Molly forged ahead through the double doors. Inside, Colby-Randall was breathtaking, with gleaming wood
floors, lead-paned windows, and an elaborately carved ceiling. The overall effect was somewhat negated by the standard-issue
metal lockers lining the walls and the smell of Lysol and pencil shavings that was apparently universal to every high school
in the world, but Molly could still tell that she’d stayed in hotels that weren’t this fancy. They were actually piping in
classical music over the PA system.

Not that you could really hear it over the din. Molly pushed her way through the crush until she found her designated locker.
Leaning against it was a chiseled Adonis-type with his arm slung carelessly around the shoulders of a pretty but pointy-faced
girl.

“Hi,” Molly said gingerly. “I’m so sorry—I think that’s my locker.”

“No problem,” the guy said, rolling off it calmly. But the girl shot Molly a dirty look, then gave her the once-over.

“Is that from the Gap?” she asked.

Molly looked down at her dress—a basic, deliberately inoffensive dark gray jersey sundress—and nodded. The girl stuck her
nose so far in the air that Molly could spot-check her sinuses.

“
Ew
,” she said, and grabbed the boy’s arm as if she was suddenly afraid this meant Molly was liable to jack her wallet. “Jake,
let’s go. It’s so
dingy
over here.”