"I"m not leaving before I tell you what I know. Which is that I saw Sylvia with blank ballots last Thursday. And I saw her with more ballots on Monday, when we voted for the king and queen. You have to believe me that this is all true. I"m not just saying it because Sylvia and I are fighting. You have to listen. It"s the truth. And it means the election was a sham. So you can"t resign. Or get fired. Or whatever it is you"re about to do. Okay?"
My mom"s face turned white. At first I thought it was surprise, but then I realized she was mad. Beyond mad. She was ash white, and she was going to erupt like a volcano at any moment.
"Mom," I whispered, hoping she"d just listen to what I was saying, but she held up a hand.
"This day," she said, leaning in so she was right in my face, "has already been trying enough. And for you to have the nerve to march in here and hara.s.s me with locker-room gossip-"
"It"s not like that," I pleaded, but my mom wasn"t done.
"This out-of-line behavior is going to stop. If I have to ground you for the rest of your life, I am going to put an end to it. Do you understand me? I am working out the terms of my resignation with the superintendent, Aggie, in part because of the article you let Rod Barris write for the St. Davis Letter. So don"t come in here and try to save the day after you"ve helped make the mess we"re all in."
Jess"s mouth hung open in horror. An overinflated balloon of pain burst somewhere inside me, and tears started rolling down my cheeks.
It"s stupid for me to cry, I thought.
I looked up at my mom, whose face was rock-hard. She opened her mouth to give me another earful, but just then, Mr. Swanson stepped out of his office.
"Gail, please. We have to finish."
"Paul, I"ll be there in a moment," my mom said.
Mr. Swanson turned to go back into his office, but I couldn"t let him just walk away. Even if my mom wouldn"t listen to me, maybe the superintendent would. What else did I have to lose?
"The ballot boxes were stuffed," I called after him. "Sylvia Ness was never the queen. She stuffed the ballot boxes."
Mr. Swanson stopped. "Excuse me?"
"Sylvia Ness isn"t the queen. You should know that before you sit there and let my mom resign," I said. I ignored my mom"s ferocious glare.
Mr. Swanson tapped his sausage fingers together. "That so?" he asked.
"No, Paul," my mom said quickly. "That"s not the case. My daughter is in a very difficult place right now, and I apologize for this intrusion. We can finish our discussion now." She eyed me and grabbed my arm. "You are leaving right now, young lady."
"I"m telling the truth!" I cried as my mom strong-armed me toward the lobby door.
"The only thing you are doing is getting yourself into serious trouble," my mom growled. "I am appalled at your behavior. We"ll talk about it tonight when I get home."
She opened the lobby door and tossed me out. She waited for Jess to trot out behind me before she slammed the door.
Chapter Thirty-three.
MONDAY, APRIL 27 / 11:39 A.M.
When Jess pulled up to my house, there were rotten pieces of fruit and broken eggs scattered everywhere on the front lawn. Someone had shoved a sign deep into the gra.s.s that read PROMGATE-THE PRINc.i.p.aL"S A CROOK!
I groaned out loud. This day was officially beyond bad.
"You seriously want me to drop you off?" Jess asked, surveying the mess.
I nodded, trying to keep my face from folding with horror at the amount of trash on our lawn. "Yeah. You should go back to school. I don"t want you getting in trouble."
"You"re going to get in trouble, too, if you don"t go back. Or more trouble, I should say."
"I don"t really care. Besides, the Martin Pollock Show is coming on in a couple hours. I want to see it."
"Aggie," said Jess gently, "they"re taping today. But the show probably won"t go on until tomorrow or Wednesday. At the earliest."
"Oh."
"Come on, let"s just hang out for a while. Go to the mall or something."
"No, thanks," I said, opening my door. "I don"t really feel like it."
"What are you going to do?"
I shrugged. "Maybe surf the Web or something."
Jess"s face brightened. "Hey! Why don"t we get the boat out and go fishing? It"s a gorgeous day. We"ll put it into Lake St. Davis. You can teach me how you do what it is you do out there."
I shook my head, picturing the beautiful ba.s.s I"d killed on Sat.u.r.day. "I don"t really feel like catching any more fish."
Jess gripped the steering wheel. "Aggie, I can"t let you be alone," she said. "I"m worried you"re going to, like, eat a handful of rat poison or something."
I actually laughed at that one. "It"s been a bad day, but I"m not going to kill myself."
I surveyed all the trash in our front yard. I imagined myself like a turtle, shrinking inside my own sh.e.l.l and never coming out again. At least until college. And I"d stay mad at my mom the whole time, too.
"Aggie?"
"Yeah?"
"You know where your parents hid your cell?"
"Yeah."
"Okay. Grab it and turn it on. I"m officially ungrounding you."
"Ha. Thanks."
I shut the door to Jess"s car and stood watching her until her car had turned out of our cul-de-sac.
As I approached my house, I could see a figure standing on our front porch, hidden in the shadows. I thought maybe it was a reporter until I got close enough to see that it was Fitz.
"Hey," I said. "What are you doing here?"
"I couldn"t find you after the a.s.sembly. I got worried. Thought I"d wait for you." Fitz shoved his hands into his jeans pockets. "I know it"s a bad time. But I figured friends show up during bad times."
I plopped down on the porch swing and Fitz followed suit. "Is that what we are?" I asked, rocking back and forth. "Friends?"
Fitz raised his chin a little. "I think that"s a good place to start, don"t you?"
"I suppose."
"Not that I"m saying that"s all we"ll be. I"m not. I just think-I mean, Neil was a pretty big relationship for you. I don"t want to be your rebound guy."
Neil was over. That much I knew. "You won"t be. You"re not."
"I guess I"m just being cautious."
I figured that was fair.
We swung in silence for a while. "My mom resigned today," I said finally.
Fitz nodded and ran a hand through his curly hair. I noticed for the first time that his hands were large-way bigger than Neil"s. I struggled to keep myself from imagining what they might feel like on my skin.
"Is there anything I can do?" Fitz asked. "Anything you need?"
I thought about how, before Neil, I hadn"t been touched in such a long time. "Maybe a hug?"
Without a word, Fitz wrapped his arms around me and held me close. Just like he"d done in the boat.
"Thanks," I said, pulling away after a few minutes. "I appreciate that."
"Anytime," he said. "And, not to be the king of non sequiturs or anything, but there probably wouldn"t be any harm in us going to the prom together after all. If you"re still interested, that is."
I tilted my head. "Prom again, huh? Are we going as friends?"
"How about as friends . . . with potential."
My heart somersaulted. "That sounds about right. Count me in."
Fitz grinned, then hopped down off my front porch and started toward his car, parked a little ways off. He stopped before he reached it. "Can I call you later, maybe?"
"I don"t know if I"ll have my cell much. Maybe we can e-mail?"
"Cool," he said. "I"ll e-mail you."
With a strange new shiver in my heart, I watched him drive off.
I scrounged up some yellow dish gloves and decided to clean up the yard. After all the garbage was stuffed into a black trash bag, I took a shower, half expecting someone to be home by the time I dried off. But no luck. Finally, I sat down at my computer. And there, once again, was the shortcut to the picture of me and Neil.
"G.o.d, Neil," I whispered, "why did you have to be such a complete a.s.s?"
I thought about the way he looked at me in his kitchen, with a mixture of disgust and embarra.s.sment. I opened my settings and dragged the picture to the trash. Then I uploaded a picture of a ba.s.s my dad had caught last summer.
"So there you go," I said aloud to the fish. "Welcome to my computer."
I opened my e-mail, hoping to check it quickly, and was overwhelmed by the number of new messages I had. It looked like over a hundred.
But when I clicked the inbox to see them, my insides twisted.
On and on they went, all of them tying me to the prom fiasco and saying either my mom or I was to blame somehow for what had happened. Pain stabbed my heart as I hit delete over and over. Despite everything I"d done to try to get the truth out, here I was, with waves of hate radiating toward me from the student body.
Suddenly, I spotted a message buried in between all the hate mail.
He"d sent it late Sunday night.
I sat back so far in my desk chair that it rocked on its legs. "Oh G.o.d," I said. Don"t read it! Don"t read it!
Despite myself, I clicked on the e-mail.
Dear Aggie, I"m really sorry 4 what happened with my mom. I didn"t mean 4 things to go like that. U R so special. Plz don"t hate me, k? Maybe we can go to prom? I don"t have a date yet.
Love,
Neil
I blinked a few times to make sure I"d read the whole thing correctly.
I pictured the dance in my head and wondered suddenly if Neil would make me meet him at the school instead of picking me up and driving me there. Maybe he"d ask me to wait for him around the back of the building, near the shop cla.s.ses. I laughed out loud at that mental picture: Neil driving slowly past the back door, and me waiting for him in the shadows, the hem of my prom dress dirtied from the blacktop and puddles.
And what kind of date would that be? A totally lame one, at the very least. And even if Neil showed up at the front door of my house, corsage in hand, I still wouldn"t go with him. Because I deserve better than that, I thought. Because I AM better than that.
Whatever for you, Neil Bromes, I thought, getting ready to delete the e-mail, but then I paused. Maybe this warranted a response.
Neil, You suck. Have a great time at the prom-alone.
Aggie I smiled and hit send.
Afterward, I sat there for a moment. I"d effectively put the last nail in the coffin of my relationship with Neil, but it was okay. At least I"d done it. At least I hadn"t let it drag out on his terms, letting him use me. At least I"d figured out I was better than that.
It was past ten, but still my parents weren"t home. I had my cell phone out but they hadn"t called, and the landline remained quiet.
In the dark, in my pajamas, I"d walked outside to the front of the driveway and pulled the Monday edition of the St. Davis Letter from its plastic bin next to our mailbox. When I was back in my bedroom, I spread the newspaper out on my bed, took a deep breath, and looked at the first headline.