Neil took a breath. "I want to get back together. For real. No more back and forth. I love you, and I want to be with you."
I almost dropped the phone. My hands were trembling.
"Are you there?" Neil asked after a little while.
"Yeah," I whispered. "I"m here."
"Come over Friday. We"ll talk about it. Just you and me. I miss you, Ag. I really do."
Neil was saying all the right words, so why wasn"t I feeling relief?
"Friday when?"
"Late. So we can be alone."
So we can be alone or so no one will see us? I wondered. "Um. I don"t know."
"Aggie, I"m serious. Things will be different after this. You"ll see. I love you so much. Please. Come over. I need to see you." His voice was velvety and earnest. I closed my eyes and could already feel his arms around me. After getting dumped by Sylvia, the thought of being close to Neil sounded like heaven. If he was telling the truth, that is.
"If you"re f.u.c.king with me-"
"I"m not. I swear. Just come over on Friday. I"ll see you at midnight. Okay?"
I exhaled. "Okay. Fine."
"I love you, Ag."
I snapped the phone shut before I let myself say anything back.
When I stepped through the front doors of school, the energy in the hallways was palpable. I headed to my locker staring at the signs that had gone up, sometime over the weekend, in support of Sylvia. They were everywhere.
DEBATE TEAM AGREES THERE"S NOTHING TO SAY OTHER THAN VOTE FOR SYLVIA!
OUTCASTS UNITE! VOTE FOR SYLVIA NESS!.
WHO SAYS QUEENS DON"T WEAR BLACK? CAST YOUR BALLOT FOR SYLVIA!
Not one of them was in Sylvia"s handwriting, which told me she"d probably never started campaigning for queen. The support had just simmered on its own from people who thought it was time to crown someone who wasn"t skinny and pretty and popular.
Jess found me in the hallway and just about ran me over. "Okay, so you won"t believe this. You just won"t."
"What?"
"Marissa Mendez has a black eye."
I arched a brow. "What from?"
"From Tiffany Holland."
"What? How do you know this?"
Jess smiled. "Well, first of all, I saw her. And oh man, is her eye six shades of disgusting. Then some people near my locker were saying it happened because Tiffany finally found out Marissa was s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g her boyfriend. I guess they had it out over the weekend at Jefferson Talbot"s."
I slowed my pace. Jefferson"s. He"d had a party, and I hadn"t been there. It made sense, I supposed. Now that Sylvia and I weren"t friends, I wouldn"t have an in to his parties. And even though I knew neither Sylvia nor I were really his friends, the reality of it smarted.
"Well, let the divas in the school duke it out," I said, reaching my locker. "What do we care, right?"
"That"s just it," Jess said. "The divas are duking it out. It looks terrible. It"s sad and desperate, and who wants to vote for that? If there wasn"t already enough support for Sylvia, there will be now." She paused for a second. "What"s your deal? I thought you"d be happy. Sylvia could actually win this."
"Yeah, well, Sylvia sort of hates me right now," I said. "It"s hard to be happy for someone who tells you to stay away from her."
Jess"s face fell. "Are you serious? When did this happen?"
I shrugged and grabbed a few books. "She told me last week that it wasn"t the best time for her to be hanging with the princ.i.p.al"s kid."
Jess"s blue eyes widened. "What? Why?"
"I have no idea. She also told me she didn"t appreciate how I"d talked about R-" I stopped short before I said his name out loud. Sylvia might hate me, but there was no way I was going to blab who her baby daddy was.
Jess leaned in. "Talked about who?"
"No one. Never mind."
Jess eyed me. "You sure about that?"
"Yes. Leave it alone."
"Okay," Jess said. "Consider it left."
"See you in fencing later, okay?"
Jess nodded. "Sure. See you."
Chapter Nineteen.
MONDAY, APRIL 20 / 8:20 A.M.
The pressure cooker of my emotions all but exploded when Mr. Otts handed out the prom ballots.
"Okay, same drill," he said, walking between seats. "Out of the six people on the prom court, pick one male and one female for king and queen. If you write down two people of the same s.e.x, or if you leave one of the lines blank, your vote will be disqualified."
He dropped the prom ballot onto my desk. It was orange. It was rectangular. With two blank lines on it. The same kind of paper Sylvia had been pulling from her car last Friday.
Fitz kicked my shoe. "Are you okay?" he whispered.
I shook my head. I couldn"t look at him. I couldn"t speak. What the h.e.l.l was going on? How had Sylvia managed to get her hands on an entire box of blank prom ballots? And more importantly-why?
"Come on, Winchester," Mr. Otts said. "Let"s do this. I need your vote."
I scratched two "X"s onto the paper and dropped it into the bag. Mr. Otts moved on, weaving in and out of seats, collecting strips of orange paper.
I put my head in my hands and tried to breathe normally. There wasn"t a reason on earth I could think of for Sylvia to have a box of orange prom ballots that didn"t include cheating. And if that were the case-if Sylvia was somehow s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g with the election-I couldn"t just let it slide. Not while everyone else was campaigning and trying to win the election on the up and up. I hated being such a Girl Scout about the whole thing, but what Sylvia was doing wasn"t cool-and it wasn"t right.
I gathered my thoughts and sorted out my options. I couldn"t tell my mom, that was for sure; otherwise, everything Tiffany Holland had ever said about me being a princ.i.p.al"s b.i.t.c.h would be true. But I could still tell someone about seeing Sylvia with all the blank ballots, right? Or I figured I could also confront Sylvia about it directly, or I could tell myself it was just a stupid prom and I should let it slide.
Just then, another option presented itself when Jefferson Talbot showed up at our door. He was the student council representative who was supposed to round up all the ballots for counting. He seemed like the right person to mention this to. Not a teacher, but not just a random student, either. Of course, I had no clue what I"d say to him, but I still had a couple seconds to figure that out.
After Jefferson left, I dashed over to where Mr. Otts was sitting. "Can I have the bathroom pa.s.s, please?"
"Sure," he said, barely looking up. I grabbed the laminated square and trotted out of the room. I caught a glimpse of Jefferson turning the corner at the end of the hallway and broke into a jog to catch up with him. I was almost to the end of the hall when, of all people, Sylvia came from out of nowhere and barreled into me.
"Jesus," she cried as our torsos crashed. I stumbled, and Sylvia fell.
"Oh my G.o.d," I said, thinking of her baby. "Are you okay?"
"I"m fine," she replied, getting to her feet. As she did, her oversized army surplus bag, stuffed to the core, spilled its contents. A mess of smaller bags-all of them glittery with faux fur-and orange ballots scattered onto the floor.
"What the h.e.l.l," she said, sweeping up the ballots and bags. "Watch where you"re going."
My chest hurt from where we"d smacked together. I watched her scrambling for a second before my brain clicked into gear.
"What are you doing with those?" I asked.
"None of your d.a.m.n business," she replied, still not looking at me. Once she had collected all the orange paper and the bags, she stood up and started walking away.
"Hey," I said, grabbing her arm, "where are you going?"
She shook me off. "Don"t touch me." She finally met my eyes. Her expression was a mix of fear and anger; her whole body was trembling.
"Sylvia, what"s going on?" I lowered my voice. "What are you doing?"
"Nothing," she said. Her chest was heaving. "You never saw me here, got it? If I hear you ever tell anyone about this, I will come after you and beat you until you"re paralyzed. Understand?"
A revelatory white light exploded in my head. I suddenly knew why Sylvia didn"t want to be friends with me. She was stuffing the prom"s ballot boxes so she could win the election, and she was worried that, if I found out, I"d tell my mom on her.
"Whatever you"re doing," I said, "just stop it now. It won"t work."
"What won"t work, Ag? You think you know something?" She started walking away again.
"Sylvia-"
She cut me off by flipping me the bird, then turned the corner and disappeared.
Without wasting another second, I ran the other way and tried to catch Jefferson. Sylvia might threaten to beat me senseless, but I couldn"t let her go rigging the election. I wove through hallways and peeked into cla.s.srooms until, finally, I spotted Jefferson in Mrs. Wagner"s office, handing off several bags of ballots.
"Hey!" I cried. "Wait!" I didn"t make it in time. Jefferson stepped out of the office and closed the door.
"Can I do something for you?" he asked.
"The ballots," I said, trying to catch my breath. "You can"t let Mrs. Wagner count them."
Jefferson studied me. "Excuse me?"
"They"re wrong. I think they"ve been tampered with."
He gave me a small smile. "You think our electoral system has been compromised? I"m intrigued. Tell me more."
"Cut the s.h.i.t," I said. "I"m serious. We need to go look at the ballots. I think Sylvia Ness swapped them out just now."
Jefferson"s smile vanished. "You don"t say."
"I do say. I just saw her in the hallway with a mess of orange paper. I don"t know, but I had to tell someone. I mean, I saw her with a box of blank ballots last week, except at the time I had no idea they-"
"Whoa, whoa," Jefferson said, putting an arm around me. "Easy there, Tex. It"s no big deal. I"ll go in and talk to Mrs. Wagner, if you want."
I squirmed out from underneath his arm. "You will?"
"Sure," he said. "I"ll go in and make sure the ballots are legit. You head back to cla.s.s. If you don"t hear from me, a.s.sume everything is on the up and up."
"And if I do hear from you?"
"Either way, my guess is that you won"t hear d.i.c.k. If I go into that office and it turns out things aren"t on the up and up, then this school is going to get whipped into a conspiratorial frenzy faster than you can say coronation."
I nodded. It all sounded right. But then Jefferson just stood there with his hands in his pockets-rocking on his heels like everything was so chill-and I suddenly had the feeling that Jefferson was really good at making people believe things were under control even when they weren"t.
"You"ll tell Mrs. Wagner," I said. "For sure?"
Jefferson smiled. It was meant to be rea.s.suring, but I shivered instead. "I got this. I promise."
I headed back to cla.s.s only after I"d watched Mrs. Wagner"s office door close behind him.
Second period, Ms. Rhone had us waiting around for the election announcement, but it never came. "I guess we"ll fence until they interrupt us," she"d finally decided after fifteen minutes had pa.s.sed and still no Mrs. Wagner.
"Something"s going on," I told Jess as we paired off. I looked around to see if Sylvia had come to cla.s.s, but once again, she was gone.
"What do you mean?" Jess asked.
I almost didn"t reply, but the words were pressing against my throat. I needed to talk to someone-someone who would listen-about all this.
"You promise not to tell anyone what I"m about to say?" I asked.
Jess held up her deformed hand. "Scout"s honor," she said. Her missing fingers meant that she didn"t make much of a scouting sign at all.