Messy (35 page)
Authors: Heather Cocks,Jessica Morgan
“Knock knock, Madame Kermit-relda,” said Chaz Kelly, heaving open the curtains as if he had heard Max’s last thought and was determined to make her regret it. Chaz was dressed in a too-tight police uniform, with an avalanche of doughnut crumbs down his front that suggested he felt
very
strongly about realism. He hooked his thumbs through his belt loops and wriggled his hips in their polyester sheath.
“You’re not a strip-o-gram, are you?” Max asked warily.
“You wish, bro,” Chaz said, grinning and smacking his belly. Max actually laughed. “No, Kermit, dude, you are officially under arrest.”
“Cute,” Max said. “But I have customers.”
“The laws of the carnival cannot be ignored, and I have here a warrant,” Chaz intoned.
“You have got to be kidding me.”
“You’re being cited for… wait, let me see here… ‘unlawful disrespect of the mighty turban,’ ” Chaz said, waving
at the crushed lump of satin on Max’s empty chair. “And your penance is wearing it in jail.”
“You’re mental. And how did—”
“I have informants,” Chaz intoned. “Come with me, please, dude.”
He snatched the turban and forcibly plopped it onto Max’s head as she wracked her brain for who could have done this and, therefore, whom she would be shunning for the foreseeable future. There seemed to be only one person who would delight in teasing her this much.
“I am going to kill my brother,” Max fumed.
Chaz frowned. “Why would you do that? Dude’s a nice guy, even if he is an emo angst bag.”
Chaz grabbed her arm and dragged her from the tent. They looked like members of a Village People cover band as conjured by the court of King Arthur.
Chaz deposited her inside a rectangular area about the size of three parking spots, marked off by wooden posts joined by just enough chicken wire to prevent climbing. “Soon you will face your accuser,” Chaz droned as he padlocked the door. “
Sayonara
, scumsucker!” Then he winked. “Nothing personal, Kermit,” he whispered. “I’m totally not mad about that macaroni thing. It turned out to be really delicious.”
Max wrinkled her nose and looked around at the makeshift prison. It was full of freshman boys who had been imprisoned by their female classmates as part of some asinine mating ritual, a couple of humorless-looking mothers
(including, Max could swear, Jennifer Parker’s) who may have had it coming, and one very drunk Magnus Mitchell, who was leering at one very quiet Mavis Moore.
“What are you in for?” Max asked.
“Magnus had me arrested for public displays of hotness,” Mavis said. “Then he had himself thrown in here for public drunkenness so he could ask me about my intestine.”
“I love that thing,” Magnus slurred, gazing adoringly at Mavis. “I want to wrap myself in it. So
cozy
.”
Max blinked. “I don’t understand today,” she said, reaching her hands up to remove her turban.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” said a familiar male voice. “It specifically says in your citation that you have to keep it on.”
Max whirled around and looked right into a pair of warm gray eyes.
No, that’s not right. He doesn’t go here
, her mind said stupidly.
“Keep… the turban?” her voice said, equally stupidly. Her entire vocabulary seemed to have abandoned her, along with, it felt like, most of her internal organs.
Maybe Mavis could knit me a couple.
But Mavis was too busy patting Magnus’s head as he rested it in her lap and sang a very sloppy and lyrically suspect version of “Dancing Queen.”
I cannot believe Brady Swift is watching me sweat buckets in a turban.
“I’m just kidding. You can take it off, if you want,” Brady said. His grin was wide.
“What are you… okay, I
really
don’t understand today.”
His smile got wider. “Brooke totally called it. She said you’d be confused.”
“Wait, Brooke
knew
you were having me arrested?” Max shook her head, as if trying to eject the cobwebs. “Can’t you guys go on a date that doesn’t involve me?”
“You think I’m so lame that my idea of a date involves chicken wire?” Brady said, feigning offense. “I’m not here with Brooke. I want to talk to you, but I heard a rumor you aren’t answering your phone. So, drastic measures.” He made a sweeping arm gesture at the prison.
Okay, it’s beyond not understanding—today is officially speaking freaking Swahili.
Max fleetingly wished her costume included a mask, so she could process this without also trying to maintain a calm facial expression.
Brady dropped his hand and fiddled with the top button on his shirt. “Shoot. I’m better when I memorize lines. But let’s start with, why didn’t you just tell me you were writing Brooke’s blog?”
Max looked down at the grass. “I’m sorry I lied. But it wasn’t only my truth to tell.”
“You are the Knitting Queen, young and sweet, only seventeen,” Magnus crooned.
Mavis nodded thoughtfully. “True,” she said.
“I kind of can’t believe I didn’t figure it out myself,” Brady mused, ignoring them. “I was having the hardest time reconciling Brooke in person with the girl who was so funny and smart on her blog. I mean, not that Brooke
isn’t funny or smart, but… well, you know her. It was like…” Brady chuckled ruefully. “I was about to say, ‘two different people.’ ”
“Because she was,” Max finished for him. “I guess we both were.”
“I really
liked
the girl who was writing that blog,” he continued. “And I really liked you—the real you, the one I hung out with in person. I wish I’d known it was the same girl.”
“See that giiiirl, watch that
spleen
, dig it, the Knitting Queen,” Magnus continued, dissolving into a cackle.
Brady cocked a skeptical brow. “This is not as romantic as Brooke suggested.”
“Romantic?” Max’s airway felt constricted.
“Yeah, the jail part was actually Brooke’s idea,” Brady said. “So was making you wear the turban. She seemed to think it would feel more soapy. Something about someone named Bucky.” He shoved his glasses back into place. “But now that we’re standing here separated by chicken wire, I can’t remember why I listened to her.”
“Wait, she thought it would make
what
feel more soapy?” Max asked, not caring anymore if she sounded dense.
Brady wrapped his fingers around the wire. “Me asking for a second chance,” he said. “Or a first chance. Whichever.”
Max felt faint. “Madame Esmerelda thinks she needs to take five,” she said, yanking off the turban. “I can’t have this conversation dressed as Merlin’s mother.”
“But you
do
want to have this conversation.”
Max could barely look at him. “I do.”
“Okay, good,” Brady said, exhaling with relief. “I was afraid I’d have to arrest you more than once. I would have felt like a dumbass having that cop chase you all day.”
“Well. You
are
kind of a dumbass,” Max said.
Brady looked surprised, then chagrined. “That’s fair. I kind of am. But come on, you were dating Mr. High School Jock, and he was all over you, and…”
Max heard the jealousy in his voice and let out a bleat of laughter. “Oh, that is so over,” she said. “It never even really began.”
“Oh, good,” he said, looking relieved. “I didn’t want to have to fight him for you. That guy is ripped.”
Max took a deep breath. “I don’t know, though, Brady,” she said ruefully. “This seems a little nuts to me. Like, if I’m so great, why were you after Brooke in the first place? I mean, I know she’s Brooke, so she’s, like, a goddess, and I’m just sort of a runt, but—”
“No way,” Brady interrupted. “You’re just as beautiful as Brooke is. Although I miss the green hair, so I hope that’s negotiable.”
Max felt light-headed. She didn’t think it was the heat this time.
He rested his head against the wire and gazed at her. “You have to understand, it just didn’t occur to me not to take the blog at face value. I was attracted to the point of view. Actually, I was attracted to
you
, but you seemed
more into being friends, and then Brooke fell into my lap… kind of literally, actually, at times,” he said, laughing. Then he cleared his throat. “I do wish I had asked a few more questions, but by the time things really stopped adding up, you were gone.”
“Avoidance is my trademark,” Max mumbled.
“Well, hopefully dating girls who are in prison isn’t mine,” he quipped, tapping the fence. “Can we maybe start over? If there’s anything I’ve learned from being an actor, it’s that the second take is generally superior to the first.”
Max tilted her head and stared at him until he blushed a bit. She nodded. “Okay. Take two.”
“Excellent,” he said, visibly relieved, and shoved his hand through a hole someone had torn in the wire earlier in the day. “Hi. I’m… Taylor,” he said. “Taylor Swift.”
“It’s a loooove stooooory, baby, won’t you say yeeeeeees,” sang Magnus, who was now somehow wearing Max’s turban.
Max let out a genuine laugh. Suddenly, she felt freer than she had in her whole life. Even if she was standing in a prison.
“Pleased to meet you, Taylor,” she said, beaming, shaking his hand and letting her grip linger. “I’m Maxine.”
Suddenly, something caught her eye in the distance, over Brady’s shoulder. It was a watchful Brooke, beaming out from under the brim of an enormous pink cowboy hat. In that moment Max understood what Brooke had
meant by
I’m working on it.
Max had never even asked what happened between her and Brady. She’d just assumed any guy worth his Y chromosome would choose Brooke. But she’d never bothered to wonder what any girl worth her X chromosome would do.
As she looked back and forth from Brady to Brooke, Max silently thanked the universe for shaking her out of the tiny, cynical confines of her paisley-papered bedroom and into a world where she did more than just snark from the sidelines—one where, somehow, impossibly, magically, she got a boy
and
a Brooke. Not just a Brooke, but… God, it sounded so damn sappy, Max wanted to smack herself for even thinking it: a
friend
. Max had spent a lot of time around movie sets in the last month, but she never thought the drama in her own life would have this kind of happy ending. It couldn’t have worked out better if she’d written it herself.
Although, technically, maybe she had.
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WE BARELY CAUGHT OUR BREATH
from
Spoiled
before we dove into
Messy
, and we owe so many people eternal gratitude for keeping us sane (and on deadline). As always, our family and friends gave us peerless support, especially Alan and Kathleen Cocks; Kevin, Dylan, and Liam Mock; Alison, Mike, Leah, Lauren, and Maddie Hamilton; Julie, Colin, and Nicholas O’Sullivan; Maria Huezo; Jim and Susan Morgan; and Elizabeth Morgan. We’d be remiss if we didn’t thank our delightful agent, Scott Hoffman; publicist Lindsley Lowell; and lawyer Ed Labowitz; and, of course, our wonderful, encouraging, and wise editors, Elizabeth Bewley and Cindy Eagan, who always know how to save us from ourselves. Additional thanks to the Poppy team, including Pam Gruber, Sara Zick, Ames O’Neill, Mara Lander, and the genius Liz Casal, whose cover designs gave our babies a face so pretty it puts Brooke Berlin’s to shame. Extra heartfelt gratitude goes to Jen Pray for her bean-wrangling skills; Gretchen McNeil, for knowing how to get us off a variety of emotional ledges; to Joe Zee and Megan McCafferty, whose early love for
Spoiled
renewed our energy to write
Messy
; and to J. K. Rowling, whom we have never met, but who came like fiction’s guardian angel to remind kids and adults alike that reading is not just cool, but rewarding. Finally, a huge Intern George–sized hug to Fug Nation, the most intelligent, generous, loyal, and supportive readers a website could ever have. Without you, we’d just be two girls who type a lot.
spoiled
Also by Heather Cocks & Jessica Morgan
Authors’ Note:
This is a work of fiction. Characters, places, and events are the product of the authors’ imaginations and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons (living or dead) is purely coincidental. Although some celebrities’ names and real entities and places are mentioned, they are all used fictitiously.
Copyright © 2012 by Well Played, Inc.
Cover images © Shutterstock
Cover design by Liz Casal
Cover © 2012 Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the authors’ intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the authors’ rights.
