The Cutting Room Floor (15 page)

I knock on the door. “Alexa? It’s me. Riley.”

The door clicks and opens an inch. I slide in.

Alexa is staring at herself in the mirror. A cosmetic bag sits inside the sink.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

She shakes her head and more tears stream down her face.

My insides tighten. Alexa is beautiful, and her tears make her blue eyes even more striking. They remind me of Emma’s.

“Tori,” she hiccups. “She said I look terrible and told me to do something with myself.”

I burn up.

Alexa dabs the rest of her tears with a tissue and powders her face. Then she takes a tube of bright pink lipstick and begins to slide it across her bottom lip.

“No,” I say, a little too loud.

I’ve startled her, and she drops the tube in the sink. I move closer and wipe her lip with another tissue. My stomach is doing full-on somersaults now. I force my hand away from her face and into her makeup bag.

I find what I’m looking for. A tube of gloss. It’s amazing that I’ve become a bit of an expert with this stuff.

“Here.” I hand her the tube. “This is better. More natural.”

“Yeah, but I don’t think that’s what Tori had in mind.”

“Don’t listen to her. You’re so pretty, you don’t need all that stuff.”

Her face relaxes, and when she smiles, I know I have to get out of there.

I ignore my hormones and get my mind back in the game. I pass the zombies in the hallway, a creepy comic book villain lurking in the corner, and two sexy (or slutty, as Tori’s been calling them all night) pirates in the kitchen. Then I sneak downstairs to the rec room. Just past the bar is where I saw the statue, that night of the Dirty Deeds. The Degas was sitting on a shelf next to the flat screen.

My fingers tingle. I just
know
it’s Ms. Dunn’s.

It’s dark, so I flip on the light. The statue is still there. I take a quick glance behind me up the stairwell, to be sure nobody’s coming. Then I hurry over to the Little Dancer sculpture.

I pick it up and turn it over, but I don’t get a chance to look.

“What are you doing down here?” A man’s voice jolts me back two feet. He’s walking toward me from the other side of the room. Damn big house—there must be two stairways.

I slide the statue back onto the shelf.

The mayor approaches me. “It’s Riley, isn’t it?”

I clear my throat and slowly release a breath. “Yes, sir. I was just looking for the bathroom.”

“Well, you passed two of them to get down here.”

“Oh, I—“

He moves even closer. “If you’re down here looking for something to spike the punch with, Riley, you won’t find it. This is a dry house.”

“Mr. Devlin, I wasn’t looking for alcohol,” I say, having a strange desire to fit into this party, with these people.

“I’m sure.” He doesn’t buy it. “Why don’t you just go up and join the rest of the party.”

I do as I’m told. Something about him is more than off.

I text Dez to come pick me up ASAP.

DEZ

Riley somehow got out of the Devlin party unscathed and under the radar. But at school on Monday, her name is all the buzz. Apparently I’m not the only one noticing the changes in Rye. She’s almost stopping traffic in the halls.

Yet not everyone is stoked.

Libby charges at me before second period. I can almost feel the target on my head.

What is it with these chick attacks in the hallway?

“Dez, we need to talk,” she barks at me, moving to the corner away from lockers and people.

I don’t follow.

She waves me over, her face all crinkly, telling me she’ll make a scene if I don’t do as I’m told.

I slowly walk over.

“Yeah,” I say, meeting her eyes. She will not intimidate me.

“I want you to back off Riley,” she demands.

“What?”

“Back off, Dez. This film of yours is making her crazy.”

“What do you mean?” I ask, remembering my promise to Riley not to say anything to Libby about the video footage.

“The makeover, Tori, boys. I want you to leave her alone. I see what you’re doing, Dez. I know you want her, but she’s vulnerable right now and I don’t want her to do something she’ll regret.”

“And by something, you mean
me
.” I laugh.

“Don’t be crude.” Libby looks around and lowers her voice. “Riley’s confused. Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed the changes in her.”

“Change is good.” I lean against the wall and cross my arms.

“This is not good, Dez, not good at all. And I don’t want to see her get hurt.”

“What’s the real reason for this outburst, Libby? Is it because Riley isn’t hanging on your every word anymore? Or, because now
she’s
the hot one? Which part
exactly
is getting your panties in a bundle?”

“She’s confused, Dez. If you were a real friend, you’d see the situation for what it is instead of an opportunity.”

“Here we go,” I say, taking pleasure watching her blood pressure rise. “You’re not worried about Riley. Not really. You’re worried that she’s going to choose me over you.”

“Not everything is about you.” She rolls her eyes. “You egomaniac. But I wouldn’t expect a guy to understand.”

“No, I’m sure you wouldn’t.”

“Look, I know you had something to do with Emma breaking up with Riley,” she whispers. “I know it and I will find out the truth.”

Shit. Where did this come from?

I put on my best poker face and try to keep my voice steady.

Give away nothing.

“Okay, Libby, you’re on a roll. What else would you like to add to the list of things that I’m responsible for? World hunger? The Middle East conflict? What else can you blame on me, and where are you going with all of this anyway?”

“Just consider it a friendly warning. I
will
find out what you’ve been up to, Dez, and I will not let you take Riley away from me.”

I hold out my hand, “Well, I guess the only thing I can say is … let the best man win.”

Of course she doesn’t shake my hand. So I slowly walk away, my mind racing, trying to figure out my next move.

“Asshole!” Libby screams to my back.

RILEY

After the Halloween party, I face another dumping. This time by Tori. She comes to my locker between classes.

“I need to talk to you,” she says in a low voice. It’s odd, because usually she makes a production out of talking—like she’s performing in front of an audience.

“Okay,” I say.

She dives right in. “Dad said he caught you looking for booze at the party.”

“I wasn’t looking for booze, Tori.”
I was trying to find out if your dad killed Ms. Dunn.

“My dad asked around, Riley. Marcus told him you were spiking the drinks.”

Marcus, that snake.
“What? He was the one—”

“I was trying to help you,” she says, cutting me off. “Like I need any more grief from my dad. Do you have any idea how he gets?” Her lip trembles and I can’t help but feel sorry for her. This is the Tori I haven’t really seen before.

“Tori, you have to believe me,” I say. “I wouldn’t do that. And I would never do anything to get you in trouble with your parents, either. Do you want me to talk to them?”
I can’t lose my connection now.

“It won’t help.” Her eyes are watery.

“Don’t you believe me?” I ask.

“It doesn’t matter what I believe, Riley. I can’t have my dad thinking that I’m hanging out with partiers and drug addicts.”

“What about the testimony? Don’t you need that to graduate from church or whatever?”

Tori blows a deep breath out of her mouth. “Yes, I still need it,” she snaps. “I
was
trying to help you, you know. But how do you think all of this looks? Especially to my dad?”

Ah, I knew her whole act was about good PR.

“So that’s it? We can’t be friends anymore?”

“That’s it.” She turns her head. “We’re done.”

“Tori, wait,” I call after her as she walks away. But it’s too late—she’s gone.

Throughout the day, I receive a few farewell snubs from the Rollers. The cold shoulder from Alexa really hurts, but this situation is not nearly as dramatic as my public outing was.

I guess it’s more acceptable to be a drunk than a lesbian.

When I catch up with Marcus, he just laughs.

“That was so uncool,” I hiss at him during rehearsal.

“Dude, I’m sorry,” he says. “But it’s not like you and Tori were going to be real friends anyway. You do know that, right?”

“That’s not even the point.”

“It’s exactly the point. It’s not like the good mayor would’ve ever accepted you as Tori’s friend. Not like he had a high opinion of you—or
any
opinion of you. Not like with me. He doesn’t care what you do, Riley. But if he found out that
I
was drinking, he’d have my ass and then tell my parents. See? I had no choice.”

“Yes, I see,” I tell him. “I see everything now. Thanks for enlightening me.”

I walk away pissed, mostly because I let him make me feel small and insignificant.

I let him win.

Over the rest of the week, I go back to my old ways. I swap out the boots for my old sneakers and my feet are thrilled. I also ditch the curling iron and most of the makeup since I’m no longer required to adhere to the Tori Rollers’ dress code. I use the extra primping time and the new space in my social calendar to make sense of the clues Ms. Dunn left for me. But after my botched attempt at gathering evidence in the Devlin house, Dez’s enthusiasm for detective work has come and gone. Plus, he’s too preoccupied with finishing the film to think about anything else.

I’m on my own.

I start by calling the random phone numbers in Ms. Dunn’s papers. Eventually I find the attorney Ms. Dunn hired when joining the class action lawsuit against religious discrimination in the schools.

Things start to look up, until I discover that Ms. Dunn dropped out of the class action two days after she signed with the attorney. After that, I hit dead end after dead end. Thankfully, I’ve also found no evidence against Libby.

At the end of the week, I’m stuck. So instead of spinning my wheels, I put it all aside for Dez. He wants to show me his progress on the film in the editing suite today. I try to keep up with him as he glides down the hallway. He looks over at me and slows his pace. “I’m sorry. I guess I’m just excited to show you what we’ve got so far.”

“I’m excited to see it,” I say, feigning interest. Though I do want to watch, I can’t help but see Ms. Dunn’s killer at every turn. I just want an end to it all.

At least when I’m with Dez, I feel safe.

We walk by the flat screen that hangs on the wall by the school office—a donation from the Devlins. This is where they display activity information and school news. The red letters that flash on the screen hold me in my place:
All School Meeting Tonight
.

The mayor will be there. I know it. He always has his hands in everything. Maybe we can find out more about his work with the school and his connection to Ms. Dunn. And why she has so much dirt on him.

I grab Dez’s hand and get him to stop with me.

He looks down at our hands, smiles, then raises an eyebrow.

I nod to the screen and he sighs.

I try to release his hand, but he won’t let go. Then his lips curl up in a smile.

“Rye.” He turns me to face him. “I’ll go with you to the meeting so that you can continue your investigation of Devlin. But then will you do something for me?”

“Sure,” I say, flushed a little by his intensity. “What?”

“Let me take you out afterwards.”

DEZ

INT. EDITING SUITE—DAY

DEZ and RILEY sit in front of the monitor. The camera goes back and forth, taking a close-up of each face. RILEY looks nervous. DEZ beams.

DEZ hits a few keystrokes and RILEY’S face appears on the screen.

I know I was going to wait for Riley to make a move, do the smart thing and all that. But all I could hear in my head was Wyatt Earp in
Tombstone
. He kept asking me over and over, “Are you gonna do something? Or just stand there and bleed?”

Well, I was tired of bleeding and decided it was time for action.

It worked. Riley said yes to my proposal. I can barely contain my excitement as we sit in the small editing suite. It’s almost too much to be this close. I want to reach out and touch her.