The It Girl (17 page)

Easy scanned the classroom. His pale blue eyes lingered on her for a second. Jenny realized that the only empty desk in the classroom was right next to hers.

“Okay, everyone,” Mrs. Silver announced. “Let’s get right to it, because I know you kids are eager. I’m passing out sketch paper and mirrors now. We’ll start on rough sketches of our self-portraits.”

A collective groan rose up. Self-portraits were the worst.

Easy slowly walked to the desk next to Jenny’s, his eyes focused on her the whole time. He threw his cracked tan leather knapsack under the desk and sat down on the adjacent short metal stool. Then he slowly unraveled his Bose headphones from his neck and wrapped the cord around his slim white iPod. He leaned over and wrote on Jenny’s desk with a stub of charcoal,
Hey
. His handwriting was boyish and spiky.

Hello
, Jenny wrote right underneath it in elegant calligraphy.

Mrs. Silver handed out charcoal, Prismacolor markers, mirrors, and rolls of shelf paper to each student. Jenny stared at her reflection. Her eyes belied the sea of nerves inside of her.
It’s okay
, she told herself.
Callie told you to flirt
. But had Callie told her to have heart palpitations?

“So, did Dalton give you a hard time?” Easy whispered.

“Not really,” Jenny whispered back. She wondered if Callie had told him that she hadn’t made a decision about whether to take the blame or not yet.

“Is Callie giving you a hard time?”

“Callie? Uh, no …” Jenny put the blunt end of her marker in her mouth. “She’s been okay.”

“Well, I hope she’s not putting you through too much shit. She does that sometimes.”

Jenny wondered what that meant. She turned back to her blank sketch paper, well aware that Easy seemed to be sneaking glances at her out of the corner of his eye. Before Old Jenny could stop her and tell her that even though Callie had said she
could
flirt, she shouldn’t, New Jenny giggled and poked Easy with her Prismacolor marker, leaving a big red mark on his forearm.

“What was that for?” he whispered, examining the mark.

“I wanted to give you a tattoo.” She decided that the mark was a nose and added two tiny eyes and a mouth.

“It’s beautiful,” he declared. Then, he grabbed his own blue Prismacolor and wrote on her arm,
HI JENNY
, and drew a frowning, snaggletoothed cartoon character, complete with a curly sprig of hair on the top of its head.

“Is it a portrait of me?” Jenny laughed.

“No … is yours a portrait of me?”

“Nooo. But, I once painted my boyfriend in six different styles, from Pollock to Chagall.”

“My dad has a Chagall in his study,” Easy told her. “It looks kind of like
I and the Village
. I used to stare at that painting for hours when I was little.”

Jenny blinked, caught off guard.
I and the Village
was her favorite. “You … you had great taste for a kid.”

“So, are you still with this boyfriend?” Easy murmured, shyly turning away as he said it and looking carefully into his own little handheld mirror. He made bold charcoal strokes on the blank page in front of him. It was exciting to watch him draw.

“Oh, no,” Jenny answered quickly. She and Nate had only been together for about three weeks, and then he’d totally blown her off on New Year’s Eve. He was older and had probably just been using her to get back at his real girlfriend.

“You must’ve liked him, though. You painted him six times.”

Jenny shadowed an area around her self-portrait’s nose, reviewing the slight lie in her head before she said it out loud. “Well, he liked me more than I liked him.”

“I’m sure,” Easy said softly.

Jenny sucked in her breath and took another peek at his adorable profile. As she switched charcoals, she saw him peek at her, too. So it wasn’t exactly right, but she couldn’t stop herself. Besides, it was what Callie has asked her to do, wasn’t it?

“So Jenny, you know any good secrets?”

Her hand slipped and made a big black wiggly line across her portrait’s cheek. How about Brett coming in at 3 A.M. after Jenny had seen her leave campus with Mr. Dalton earlier that night? That was a pretty big secret. There was also the giganti-cally real crush Jenny had on Easy—another juicy one. “Um, not really,” she responded quietly.

“I do.” Easy offered.

Jenny felt her heart thud in her throat. “What is it?”

He lowered his eyes, then looked at her again. “I’ll write it down, but you have to read it later.”

“Why can’t you say it?”

“Because it’s a secret.” He scribbled something in charcoal on a piece of scrap paper, folded it three times, and handed it to her.

Jenny took the note and shoved it into her pocket. Then something suddenly occurred to her. Callie had briefed her on how she should flirt with Easy, but maybe Callie had told Easy the exact same thing.
Just be nice to Jenny: hang out with her a little, make it look like you guys like each other
. Jenny could totally see that happening.

Her heart sank. Was that it, and nothing more?

As soon as the bell rang, she rushed into the first stall of the Jameson House girls’ room and opened the note. In chicken-scratched, blurry charcoal letters it said:

The owls at Waverly talk. Maybe they’ll talk to us together sometime.

Jenny creased the note into smaller and smaller folds and shoved it in her bag. There was no denying that she had a full-on crush on Easy Walsh. Everything about him, from his dark messy hair to his sumptuous, uneven mouth, to his love of Chagall, to his navy-blue-ink-stained hands.

She finally emerged from the stall and stared into the smeared sink mirror. She didn’t know what she was looking for—maybe evidence, like a physical sign, that something monumental was happening.

Because she was pretty sure Easy was honestly flirting with her. Not because Callie had told him to but because he wanted to. She wasn’t sure how she knew, but she
knew
.

Email Inbox

To:
[email protected]

From:
[email protected]

Date:
Friday, September 6, 3:33 P.M.

Subject:
Fw: Upcoming Disciplinary Committee hearing

Brett,

I’m forwarding you this e-mail from Marymount, below, since it’s about the upcoming DC hearing. Thought you should know.

And thank you for joining me for dinner last night. It was very … refreshing.

See you soon,

EFD

Begin forwarded message:

 

To:
[email protected]

From:
[email protected]

Date:
Friday, September 6, 2:20 A.M.

Subject:
Upcoming Disciplinary Committee hearing

Dear Eric,

As you know, the first DC case of the year, involving Easy Walsh and Jennifer Humphrey, is scheduled for Monday. I’d like to make sure we set a no-tolerance precedent with this case.

However, Mr. Walsh is a legacy and his parents are donors, which obviously causes some complications. It’s a shame, because I personally reviewed Miss Humphrey’s application and think she’s a terrific addition to the Waverly art program, but someone has to take that fall for this. If she’s found guilty, I’m afraid we’ll have to expel her.

Let’s make sure we start the year off on the right foot.

Thanks in advance,

Dean Marymount

Friday afternoon, Brett sat in the locker room before the first day of field hockey practice tugging at the silver Tiffany
étoile
ring Jeremiah had given her over the summer. The thing was stuck on her finger, but she wanted it off. As soon as she’d sunk into the plush black leather seats of Eric’s family limousine—he’d had a car take her back to Waverly since he was sailing back in his boat—she’d been in Eric withdrawal. They hadn’t even kissed, but she felt like she could still smell him on her. That delicious Acqua di Parma. And this morning’s café au lait had tasted like L’Evangile Bordeaux.

“Hey,” a voice beckoned shyly.

Brett turned to see Jenny sitting next to her on the long, forest-green bench, pulling socks over her shin guards. Her wild brown hair was pulled back off her face in a high ponytail, and she wore gray Champion sweat shorts and a cutoff lavender-colored T-shirt with an orange Les Best logo, which was an edgy, preppy-girl-goes-crazy label based in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District. Brett had felt bad for Jenny when she received Eric’s e-mail, but that was what you got for getting in bed with Callie … and Easy. “Hey,” Brett said back.

Jenny squirmed, pretzeling her legs, as if she had to pee. “So, I think there’s something you should know.”

Brett stared at Jenny. Was she going to fess up about what had happened that night with Easy? Or maybe Callie had confessed something about Tinsley’s expulsion? Whatever it was, Brett definitely wanted to hear it. “What?”

“I … I saw you get in. In the middle of the night. And I know where you were.”

Brett stared at her, feeling her lips curl up the way they did when she got scared. “
What?
” Her voice was barely audible.

“It’s okay,” Jenny said quickly. Brett’s face grew paler and paler, making her eyes look huge and dark. Jenny had contemplated whether or not it made sense to say anything to Brett. The thing was, Jenny wasn’t so great at keeping secrets. She wasn’t someone who would tell the whole world, but she always had to tell at least one other person. It made carrying the secret’s burden a little easier. So why not tell Brett’s secret back to Brett?

“You don’t know anything,” Brett muttered, turning away to look at the freshly raked playing field.

“Look, please,
please
don’t worry,” Jenny pleaded, her voice growing squeaky. “Your secret is safe with me. Honestly. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.”

From the middle of the field, Coach Smail blew the whistle. “Girls! Gather around!”

Brett stared at Jenny. Was she serious, or was this some sort of ploy? Could Jenny be trusted? Last year Brett and Callie and Tinsley used to sit around in their room at night and talk about every detail of their days, no matter how mundane or spectacular. They’d been the kind of best friends who are almost like sisters, because they loved one another so much that even when they pissed each other off, they knew they were still going to be each other’s bridesmaids someday. But the Tinsley/E fiasco had made Brett a lot more suspicious. If Callie could betray Tinsley like that—not that Brett knew exactly what had gone down, but still—who knew what she would do to Brett?

“You better not tell anybody,” Brett warned, ignoring Jenny’s annoyingly innocent expression. She couldn’t possibly be that innocent, especially if she was from the city.

“Look, as far as I’m concerned, we never had this conversation,” Jenny insisted loyally. “But … I just want to make sure… . Are you okay? ’Cause you seem, like, a little distracted.”

Brett gripped her hockey stick and stood up. No one ever asked her if she was okay, not even her parents, and she wasn’t sure how to answer. “Um, I don’t know. Can I get back to you on that?”

Jenny smiled eagerly. “Sure. See ya!” She picked up her stick and jogged toward the middle of the field, where the team was waiting.

“Hey!” Brett called. Jenny turned, and Brett noticed that weird, familiar glimmer about Jenny again—like she was channeling Tinsley, like they had the same special something seeping out of their tiny pores.

Jenny turned to find Brett jogging toward her. “Look, what-ever happened with you and, um, Easy?” Brett said quietly. “Well, I shouldn’t tell you this, but Marymount wants to make an example of you, to, like, set a precedent for the year. So … I’ll try my hardest to keep you from getting expelled, but, well, I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

“Oh.” Jenny’s shoulders slumped.
Expelled?
“Um, thanks.”

Celine Colista, who had olive skin, straight black hair, and full lips coated with
MAC
Rabid lipstick, ran up to them, kicking up grass behind her with her cleats. “Jenny, did Callie give you the cheer yet?”

Jenny shook her head.

“Cheer?” Brett asked.

“Yeah. Jenny is going to be part of our
cheer
,” Celine explained very slowly.

Brett nodded uneasily. Then Celine turned back to Jenny. “C’mon. Let’s go talk to Callie.”

Callie was sitting on the long metal bench alongside the field, rewrapping her field hockey stick with tape. She looked up just in time to see Celine and Jenny running over.
Shit
. Benny and Celine just weren’t going to let this cheer thing die.

“Callie,” Celine cooed. “Did you write the words yet?”

“I’m working on it.”

“Well, you have to hurry!” Celine whined. “Okay, fine, we can finish them at the party tonight.” Celine winked at Callie and then trotted to center field.

Jenny turned to Callie. “Party?”

“Yeah,” Callie replied, looking down at her field hockey stick. “It’s a pre-Black Saturday thing. Girls only. You have to come. We all dress up!”

“As what?”

“Well, it’s a secret until the last minute. But it’s tonight, probably in Dumbarton’s upstairs common room.”

“Tonight?” Jenny looked crestfallen. “I have to go to a new students’ ice cream social thing tonight.”

“Whatever. You can get out of that.”

“No, the e-mail said it was mandatory.” Jenny shrugged. “I should probably go. But I’m really excited about Black Saturday. There’s a secret party then too, right? And this cheer sounds cool.”

“Well, the cheer’s so not a big deal. You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to.”

“No, I do!” Jenny couldn’t keep the shakiness out of her voice. The girls were all talking to her, and she felt more included than she ever had before, but she was also about to be expelled.