Читать книгу Devilish - Maureen Johnson - Страница 6

So this was how it ended. The revelers had deserted, leaving plates of Spanish almonds and sushi and cupcake wrappers. Now there would be no more grand ballrooms with Assyrian kings and pampered dogs and English pop stars and the A3. No more midnight rides through the skies of Providence. No more Calculus II with Brother Frank. No more stolen moments with 116-year-old boys or staring at the golden brick mansion across the fields. It had come back to this mad room of antique perfume bottles and disagreements.

Only a handful of people would understand the real meaning of this event. The general public would be horror-struck. They would wonder how two best friends, two otherwise unassuming girls on the verge of adulthood, could have ended up like this. There would be new specials and magazine articles: ‘Teen Tragedy Stuns Providence,’ ‘Rhode Island Rampage.’ I would be cast as the brainy troublemaker — the angry little blond punk. Allison would be portrayed as my sweet, devoted friend — the one I had tricked and mislead and taken down this tragic path. The real villain would not appear in the stories at all.

Oh, I had no doubt that they’d blame the whole mess on me, probably just because I had spiky hair and a tendency to talk too much. That was the story of my life. And that life was over.

It doesn’t matter how old you are when you die, I’d been told. When you die, that’s the right time for you. I’d also been told my life was a small price to pay.

I was glad to pay it for Allison.

My hand fell away from the phone. The room grew dark and I felt myself slipping down the side of the sofa, down to the prized Oriental rug. This was my final move in the game, this graceless thud to the floor. There was only one question left in my mind…

Had I played it right?