Читать книгу Devilish - Maureen Johnson - Страница 13

I’d noticed a long time ago that A3 seemed to have entirely different biological needs. They were all really dry and doing things that seemed like things you do to your exotic lizard, not to your human self. They were huge on lotions, balms, glosses, Vaseline… you name it.

Elsie always carried a small aerosol can of French spring water with her to spray on the undersides of her wrists. I once spotted her in the second-floor bathroom between classes rubbing her knees with vitamin E oil. Lai was always putting drops in her eyes, the theory being that she needed to after clubbing in Boston all night. Maybe the weirdest — and boldest — was Tracey Pils, who was seen on numerous occasions putting Preparation H under her eyes. I have heard that professional models and pageant contestants do this because PH is the best anti-inflammatory on the market. And I think Tracey was a pageant person once. But still. It takes a certain amount of confidence to be seen doing that.

Being lizard-like, they were perfectly suited to this lung-deflating heat. I passed them on the way out the door after school, sitting all in a row on a concrete bench, passing around a tube of shea butter.

‘Hey, Jane,’ Tracey said as I passed. ‘Come here a second.’

I don’t like being ordered around, but I also didn’t feel like causing a scene by ignoring them and walking past. I compromised by stopping and moving a step or two closer so that I was within earshot but hadn’t actually gone all the way over to where they were sitting.

‘How’s Allison?’ she asked. ‘We heard she was sick earlier.’

It was said innocently. There was barely a trace of malice in that stone-white, heart-shaped face of hers. But just that they were asking was enough. The temptation to say something to her that would send her groveling back to the sinkhole she had obviously crawled out of was strong, but I remembered my lecture from earlier in the day. I needed to be moderate. My attacking Tracey wouldn’t help Ally.

‘Recovering,’ I said, as breezily as I could.

‘Guess she didn’t manage to get a little, then?’

‘Yes, she did.’

That wasn’t me who said that. The voice came from behind me. The lanky sophomore from the bathroom trailed up, thin and long as a shadow. Lanalee hooked around in front of me and squared off in front of the A3. Her rust-colored hair was hanging long and free now, all the way down her back. She reminded me of one of those Renaissance women who got locked up in towers and had to let guys climb up their hair to rescue them.

‘I’m her little,’ she said. As she spoke, she was casually unwrapping a Twinkie. She consumed this in three easy bites, snapping the golden crumbs off her fingers.

‘Who are you?’ Elise said, taking in Lanalee in a long and totally undisguised up-and-down glance.

‘Lanalee Tremone. I just transferred her from Bobbin.’

All three of them looked surprised at that one. Bobbin was the best school in the area. It had the highest population of celebrities’ kids anywhere outside of New York or LA, and it was famous for its ‘make your own curriculum’ police. Bobbin students started their own businesses or went to live on goat farm communes in France or staged massive art installations where they all got naked and painted each other’s bodies with condiments. It was about as different from St. Teresa’s Preparatory School for Girls as it was possible to get. Going to Bobbin instantly made you interesting.

‘Why are you here if you went to Bobbin?’ Tracey asked.

‘I got into a little trouble there. My great-grandparents thought I needed a more structured environment, and they were paying the bill.’

This caused a bit of visible doubt in their eyes.

‘What house did you live in at Bobbin?’ Lai asked.

‘Walker.’

‘Walker? I partied at Walker!’ Lai leaned forward. ‘Do you know Paul Weller?’

‘Tall Paul? Yeah. He lived in the room on the corner.’

‘You know Alex Rye?’ Lai asked, her eyebrow arching.

‘Rye? He ended up blowing the door off of his room last year doing a science experiment of a very illegal nature.’

‘Allesandra Fuller?’

‘Look, do you want to borrow my facebook so you can look these people up?’ Lanalee said. ‘I’m not sure you actually know them. And no one parties at Walker anyway. We went to Hepp House for that. I don’t know what you were doing, but I doubt it was very interesting.’

A cool silence now. It was time for the A3 to reload and fire, and they clearly had nothing.

‘Let’s go,’ Lanalee said to me. ‘I’m getting bored. I need more sugar.’

It was a beautiful performance — I had to give that to her completely.

‘How irritating were they?’ Lanalee asked when we had turned the corner of the building. ‘I hate people who always have to ask if you know people. Who cares if I knew them?’

‘Well, they still sound cool,’ I said. ‘It sounds like those are people to know. There’s no one to know here. This school is not a magnet for the to-know people.’

‘Trust me, Bobbin’s just full of rich freaks. It’s not that exciting.’

‘Still,’ I said, ‘it’s kind of an accomplishment to get kicked out.’

‘I know,’ Lanalee said with a long smile. She had very thin lips, but they went on forever. ‘That’s why I made it up.’

‘You were lying?’

‘The part about my double Gs was true,’ she said. ‘They thought this place would be better for me. The school didn’t want me because I applied too late, but the GGs are buying the school a new driveway if I can stay.’

We were standing in the driveway by this point. It did kind of look like testing ground for land mines. Lanalee looked out beyond the soccer fields and over to the golden brick mansion opposite us. It was like looking out to Oz. The grass was, quite literally, greener there — because they had grass in the places that we had asphalt. Some guys were stretched out on this grass. Other guys were lounging on the long marble steps that led up to the front door or were squatting on the veranda and the various urns and bits of statuary, bouncing soccer balls off each other’s heads and snorting.

‘That’s the guys’ school over there, right?’ she asked.

‘That’s St. Sebastian’s.’

‘It’s so much nicer than our school.’

‘Trust me,’ I said. ‘I know. I’ve been talking about this for three years. It’s some old mansion that the church bought. It came with all of this ground, so they built our school over on this side.’

‘But why do the guys get that gorgeous place and we get this thing that looks like a bunker?’

‘Parking lot,’ I corrected her. ‘Our school was designed by a guy who was famous for making multi-story parking lots. He just made rooms where the parking spaces used to be and made staircases instead of ramps. I’m not kidding.’

I wasn’t either. My dad knew the guy. He taught architecture at Brown, until they realized how awful all of his buildings were.

‘This place is just confused,’ she said. ‘They put guys in the nice building. Why? Guys ruin stuff. And then they separate us with this…’

She lost her words and waved at the eight-foot cyclone fence that separated our soccer fields.

‘It gives the place that prison-camp feel,’ I said. ‘It’s nice. I heard they were actually going to put razor wire on top, but it was against some kind of law.’

‘I’m not going to be able to handle this,’ Lanalee said, her long face drooping.

‘Well,’ I said, ‘if you went to bobbin, it might be hard to get used to. But it’s survivable.’

She bit her lip for a moment.

‘Hey,’ she said, yanking a rose-stone school ring of her long, pale hand, ‘before I forget, can you give this to Allison? I haven’t been able to find her.’

I put it on my thumb. For a moment, I wished this girl could have been my little. I wanted to steal her… but then I felt bad. No matter what, Ally had had a much worse day than I had. She deserved Lanalee.

‘Can I ask you something?’ she said. ‘That story on the Junior Judges page about Allison. Something about the prom. What was that all about?’

‘Ally just had a bad experience,’ I said, twisting the ring down to try to keep it on my finger.

‘What happened?’

‘She met a guy,’ I said. ‘It didn’t work out. She was really upset.’

This was really a mild retelling — like saying that the sinking of the Titanic was a little problem with a boat on a cold night.

‘There’s more to it than that,’ Lanalee said. ‘Isn’t there? You can tell me. I like her. I just don’t want to say the wrong thing, you know?’

She cocked her head in a curious manner. I hesitated. I hated this story, but Lanalee had proven herself, both my signing on with Ally and by taking on the A3. She had earned the right to know.

‘Okay,’ I said, lowering my voice. ‘It’s not a secret, but she doesn’t like talking about it, so don’t bring it up, okay?’

‘Understood,’ she said.

‘Ally really wanted to go to the prom last year,’ I said. ‘School events mean a lot to her. But she had no one to ask.’

‘But there’s a school full of guys right there,’ Lanalee said, pointing.

‘They don’t let us mix much here at the gulag,’ I explained. ‘And Ally sometimes finds it hard to meet people in person. So, she went online, to some Boston teen dating site.’

‘Ah,’ she said knowingly. ‘E-love.’

‘She met this guy who called himself Hawkster…’

‘Hawkster?’

‘I know. She got kind of… obsessed. I kept trying to warn her about getting too crazy about someone she didn’t know, but she didn’t want to hear that.’

‘What about this countdown?’ Lanalee asked.

‘She started doing this countdown thing, ticking off each week, day, minute, hour, and second to anyone who said hello to her. She texted me at random points to give me the count. She left notes in my locker with times on them and nothing else. One time she wrote “5 d, 6 h, 37 m, 14 s” on the back of my hand. But it was cute — she’s not crazy.’

‘Okay,’ Lanalee said with a nod. ‘She was a little wound up. It happens. I’m with you.’

And she was with me. Her face was intent, studious.

‘The thing is,’ I went on, ‘they made this deal that they wouldn’t exchange pictures, or even real names, until a few hours before. Al got all dressed up, had her hair done, everything. She sent off her picture… and the guy went silent. She thought maybe he’d left his house already, so she went to the prom and waited. All night she checked her cell phone. She called me at home to have me check her e-mail.’

‘You were at home?’

‘My boyfriend and I had just broken up,’ I said, waving my hand. ‘We weren’t planning on going anyway. The point is, web guy went subsonic. Dead. She waited for three hours before she gave up and called me to go and get her.’

‘Oh, wow,’ Lanalee said. ‘That sucks. Did she ever hear from him?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘She never did. She never really got over it. She always thought it was her picture. It made her hate the way she looks.’

A black Lincoln Town Car sidled up the drive, carefully plodding its way among the holes.

‘That’s my ride,’ she said. ‘Take this.’

She reached into her bag and pulled out a small lavender card with her name, address, and phone number printed in dark purple script.

‘My grandmother always gets me these things,’ she said. ‘They’re supposed to be for events, society things. Don’t laugh. They’re great to take to parties. Really.’

I wasn’t laughing. I was feeling the heavy, fine card stock. It had a rosy scent. This kind of little touch, combined with the Bobbin and the driveway stories, meant that Lanalee came from one of those families. Those families that went sailing off Newport at spring break, who had friends who lived in brownstones or mansions in Federal Hill, and had Uncle So-and-so’s old Yale sweater in the trunk of the car, just in case they needed an extra layer when they went skiing.

‘Have to go,’ she said, loping to the car. ‘But I’ve decided. Allison will be my project for the year. I need one, or I’m not going to be able to cope. We’ll make it right.’

This was all rattled off in one breath and punctuated by the muffled slamming of the car door. The car remained still for a moment, then a loud burst of opera rumbled from within. Whoever was driving hit the gas, sending the massive car off on a kind of extreme rally drive, almost taking out Sister Philmonilla as she watered the flowers at the base of the statue of St. Teresa. Sister put her hand to her heart to steady herself and looked at me disapprovingly. I knew she was about to come over and lecture me on safe driving, even though I had nothing to do with it, so I pretended not to see her and quickly turned and jogged down the driveway.