The Ivy: Secrets (10 page)

“Hmpf,”
Callie snorted noncommittally. “If you ask me—”

“Excuse me,” said a senior girl Callie had only spoken to once during punch, “but are you two roommates?”

“Er . . .
oui
?” said Mimi.

“And you’re Callie Andrews?” said the girl.

Callie nodded.

The girl turned to Mimi. “Great, I need to borrow you,” she said, ushering Mimi away toward the bar. Callie gulped, praying that Mimi would stick to tonic water and thus select her embarrassing Callie stories wisely. So, so many to choose from, Callie thought with a sigh. And one absolutely mortifying secret.

Callie’s eyes fell on Lexi, who had made her way over to Tyler and Clint. Gregory was nowhere to be seen—not that Callie was looking. Her eyes narrowed as she watched Lexi lean in with her hands raised as if to adjust Clint’s gray-green tie. Clint smiled but smoothly beat her to it, tightening the knot himself. Lexi’s hands fell to her sides.

Turning suddenly, Clint caught her eye. Callie flushed and looked away, casting around for Mimi or someone else to talk to so she could avoid—

“Hi,” said Clint, having crossed the room at lightning speed.

“Hey,” Callie replied, her heart thundering in her chest. Why was he leaning so close to her? And why were his lips moving toward her—

“
Agh!
Sorry!” she cried as their noses collided. He had been aiming for her cheek, and she had tilted her head to avoid what she had stupidly (wishfully?) assumed was an imminent kiss on the lips—only she had gone the wrong way and it had come close to the real thing.
Dangerously
close, she chided herself, angling her body to avoid Lexi’s glare. It’s not my fault he’s talking to me! she thought. Not my fault, not my fau—

“So . . . are you ever going to tell me why you’re avoiding me?” Clint said, his playful smile almost masking the serious note.

Because your ex-girlfriend has been blackmailing me with a secret that no one can ever know? Especially not impossibly perfect you—

“You know, finals,” she said, waving her hand dismissively. She could still sense Lexi’s eyes on her. “I should really check on Mimi.”

“Wait,” he said, catching her arm. He paused, seeming to search for something to detain her. Her elbow tingled under his touch, his hand so warm and—

“Callie!” said Lexi, interceding gracefully and leaning in to air-kiss the space next to Callie’s cheeks. Clint’s arm fell to his side. Callie’s elbow still felt warm where his hand had rested not a second earlier. “And how’s my favorite mentee this evening?” Lexi cooed. “Doesn’t she look lovely tonight?” she breezed on before Callie could answer. “I can see why you liked her.” Lexi let the past tense hang, a proclamation undisputed, in the air.

“You’re in a good mood tonight!” Clint said, permitting himself a tentative smile.

“I am,” Lexi agreed airily. “And I think you know why,” she said, leaning in. “It’s Limericks! I
love
Limericks.” She smiled at Callie. “Everyone’s dirty little secrets laid bare . . . to roast!”

Callie swallowed.

“Who did you draw?” Lexi pressed her. “Don’t be shy now . . . Go on, tell us and we can probably help you!”

“Tyler, actually,” Callie admitted, glancing at Clint.

“Tyler!” Lexi clapped her hands together, the very picture of delight. “Well, as Clint can certainly attest, the question there is not a matter of uncovering
what
terrible things Tyler’s done but rather where to start!”

Clint laughed. Even through her claustrophobic feelings of dread, Callie had to admire how swiftly and totally Lexi could take control of a conversation.

“Remember freshman year when Tyler and Bryan were in a fight and Tyler peed in Bryan’s dresser drawer?” Lexi asked with an uncharacteristic giggle.

Clint’s eyes twinkled. “To be fair, Bryan had thrown all of Tyler’s underwear out the window into that huge tree in front of their dorm the day before.”

“Why?” asked Callie, suddenly struck by the thought that Clint and Lexi had once been freshmen. Obvious as it was, the idea took her by surprise: confident, always-knows-the-right-thing-to-say Clint as a freshman? She just couldn’t picture it. Nor, for that matter, could she really picture Clint dating Lexi, though that had obviously happened, too. Suddenly she found herself wanting to know everything: how did they meet and where, what was their first date like, were they in love, and what had happened after to change Clint’s tastes so dramatically that he could possibly be looking at Callie the way he was right now, even with Lexi standing next to her.

“I think it was just your typical roommate drama,” Lexi said with a shrug. “They lived in a double that those PETA people would probably consider inhumane for a pair of chickens.”

An image of Vanessa trashing her room flitted through Callie’s mind. But then she pictured Vanessa returning from the library or wherever else she had gone to avoid the getting-ready festivities that evening and sitting in C 24 all alone. Callie frowned.

“Speaking of freshman year, remember that time in Justice when Sandel cold-called Tyler and made him stand up and take the microphone?”

“Yes!” said Lexi with a smile. Callie tugged at her dress. “Sandel asked him if he had anything he’d like to share with the class and he said—”

“‘Cindy, I think I’m in love with you and would very much like to take you to dinner this Friday night!’” Clint finished, erupting into laughter.

“Cindy?” asked Callie, looking back and forth between them.

“Cindy was Tyler’s TF,” Lexi explained, shaking her head. “More than one freshman boy was in love with her. . . .”

“But Tyler was the only one who was crazy enough to announce it in front of the entire class,” said Clint. “Classic Tyler. Overconfident to a fault. Reminds me of sophomore year when we had to dress up as Catholic school-girls for Fly Initiation and perform a Britney Spears song on the steps of Memorial Church at noon, only Tyler got the time wrong. He showed up at eleven, but he turned on his stereo and sang ‘Baby One More Time’ by himself anyway, belly shirt and blond wig and all.”

Despite Lexi’s continuing, spine-chilling proximity, Callie cracked a smile.

“Somebody caught the whole thing on their Flip cam and that was the end of his presidential campaign,” Clint said with a wink.

“He means for the United States, not the Pudding,” Lexi added, smirking at Callie’s half-horrified, half-confused expression.

“Right,” said Callie. How silly of me.

Clint had reached the bottom of his scotch. He rattled the ice cubes in his glass. “I think I might be due for another one of these—then the
real
secrets will start to come out!”

Lexi caught Callie’s eye.

“Can I get you anything?” Clint asked, touching Callie’s arm.

“I’ll have a white wine,” said Lexi.

“Callie?” said Clint.

“I’ll . . . have the same.”

“What kind?”

What do you mean “what kind”? Uh, white!

“Chardonnay for both of us,” Lexi said.

Oh.

“Be right back,” said Clint.

Callie took a deep breath. Lexi turned to face her. “I think you got all the information about Tyler that you’ll need,” she said pointedly.

“People,” Anne Goldberg suddenly called, clapping her hands. “The staff has just informed me that dinner is almost ready. Please draw your present conversations to a close and begin making your way to the dining room.”

Thank you, God, and thank you, Anne! Excusing herself with no more than a tight smile, Callie headed straight into the dining room. She exhaled with relief when she spotted her name card in the middle of the second of four long banquet tables, next to Marine Clément on the left, and OK Zeyna on the right. Taking her seat, she marveled at the decadence—even her senior prom hadn’t seemed nearly this fancy. She closed her eyes, determined not to let thoughts of prom take her on a perilous trip down memory lane. . . .

“
Oh-la-la
, have
I
got the dirt on
you
!” Mimi sang, sliding into the chair next to Callie.

“Me?” squeaked Callie, sitting up in her chair.

“No, not
you
silly—Brittney!” said Mimi, grabbing the index cards near her plate and uncapping the pen next to her knife with delight. “Brittney, Brittney . . .
oh,
Brittney.” Mimi hummed happily, scribbling down a few lines. “Where to start . . . Get anything good on Tyler?” she added.

“Yes, actually,” said Callie, picking up her own pen and staring at the card in front of her.

“I’ll give you a hundred dollars to switch seats with me,” a BBC British-accented voice suddenly whispered in her right ear.

Callie smiled and leaned over to read the name next to OK’s plate: Anne Goldberg.

“Maybe for a thousand,” she whispered back, yanking OK down by his sleeve. Exactly the price for my Pudding membership.

“Will you take a check?”

Callie rolled her eyes. She was about to whisper that a thousand dollars couldn’t buy Mimi’s love when she spotted Clint making his way around the table. Callie watched him take the seat across from her several people down, just out of earshot. He smiled at Callie, then held up his index cards and mimed writing on them with a pen.
“How’s it going?”
he mouthed.

She looked down, a tiny smile playing on the corners of her lips. Writing in bold capital letters, she quickly scribbled on a note card and held it up: Haven’t started yet!

Clint grinned. As the people next to him began to take their seats, he uncapped his pen and wrote back: Need any help?

Callie reached for a fresh index card, but before she could think how to reply, she spotted Lexi rounding the other side of the table with Gregory at her heels. Seeing Callie, Lexi gave her a cheerful wave. Callie frowned. Looking back toward Clint, she shook her head no and stared at the tablecloth, waiting for the salad course to arrive.

Two appetizers, one main course, and some indeterminate number of wine refills later (since the amount in the glass optimistically never seemed to dip below half full), Anne Goldberg was in the midst of summoning the room to attention, dinging her champagne glass with a fork and looking a little wobbly on her feet. “Attention! Attention!” she called, the noise in the room gradually dying. “It is almost time to begin! I will now read the order from my list—my list!” she cried, stopping and searching the pockets of her dress. “Where is it?” She continued searching, taking another sip of champagne. “Oh, hell,” she muttered. “Who wants to go first?”

There was silence for a moment, but then a steady chant began to build: “Neos, neos, neos, NEOS, NEOS, NEOS!”

“C’est moi!”
yelled Mimi, leaping to her feet.

The room burst into applause.

“Ahem,” Mimi lifted her glass in a toast:

Raucous laughter rang out across the room, followed by hooting and more clapping. “Bravo!” a boy yelled from the table closest to the kitchen. “Encore!”

Even Brittney was laughing good-naturedly. “What—I don’t get it!” she yelled. “Just kidding. Africa has, like, lots of countries. I earned that B!”

Triumphantly Mimi took her seat. “Wow,” said Callie, tearing her latest index card into ten little pieces. “That was . . .”

“Incredible.” OK beamed at Mimi.

Anne Goldberg was back on her feet. “Will the veteran who has Mimi please stand!”

“Ah,
merde
,” Mimi muttered. “Shit, shit, shit.”

“You deserve whatever’s coming,” OK said, leaning across Callie, who had begun frantically scribbling on a fresh card, trying to think what rhymed with
drawer
.

A sophomore girl Callie knew very vaguely stood and waited for the noise to subside.

“Hmm,” Mimi murmured over the cacophony that followed. “Could have been far worse.”

The neophyte who had drawn the veteran girl’s name—a sophomore boy Callie had never spoken to—stood and began to deliver his limerick. Then the next person, and the next, until the waiter was setting a plate of dark chocolate torte drizzled with raspberry sauce in front of Callie. She barely glanced at it, frowning at her half-finished limerick and crossing out the second line.

“Er, miss?” said the waiter.

“Yes?” asked Callie, realizing that he was still hovering over her.

“I have a note for you,” he murmured, sliding a folded index card halfway under her plate, “from the gentleman.”

“What gentle—” But before she could finish, he was gone, refilling OK’s champagne flute.

Her eyes flitted around the room, and then Callie plucked the card out from beneath her plate and unfolded it under the table:

You look cute when you’re concentrating.

She read it twice, an enormous smile spreading across her face. When she looked up, Clint was grinning back at her, which would have been confirmation enough even if she hadn’t recognized his handwriting.

“NEXT!” Anne’s voice boomed above the crowd.

A girl who Callie thought might be one of Lexi’s roommates stood up on the other side of the room.

“Not me!” a girl yelled from the table closest to the door. “Sexy Hansel forever!”

“Take it back!” OK yelled, leaping to his feet. “Er—kidding,” he called quickly. “My turn, is it?” He picked his index card off the table and held it out in front of him.