Truth or Dare (17 page)

Because, as we all agreed, she was crazy.

The amethysts were pretty, though. I loved how rough they were, like purple icebergs, and how they changed when you held them to the light. All my best collections were like that—always there, always the same, but different every time you looked at them.

Well, I told myself, if Aunt Shelby ever did open that Herb 'n' Legend store, I might start a stone-and-crystal collection. Agates and jaspers and quartzes, maybe others. That would definitely be a cool collection, even if they didn't have magical powers.

Despite the fact that I wasn't sleepy, I crawled into bed. I pulled out some bins from underneath the mattress—the sea glass, the shells, and the marbles. And instead of doing homework, or reading, or calling my ex-friends, or calling Val, or calling my aunt, or figuring out how I was going to survive all the hundreds of days left of school and all the millions of days left without a mom or any friends, I organized my collections until I fell asleep.

WELL, AT LEAST I DON'T have to wear padded bras anymore
.

That was my first thought when I woke up the next morning, still dressed in my clothes from Wednesday. Now that I was officially friendless, I didn't need to fool anyone anymore. Even the boy I liked hated me, so who would peek at my nonexistent chest? Nobody. Woo-hoo, right?

I pulled off yesterday's bra, tossed it into my closet, and put on Nate's baggy old Maplebrook High School tee, with nothing underneath. Everything would be so
much simpler now, I told myself. All I needed to do was get through school with no drama. Just keep my head down and take notes. And when it was three o'clock, run.

That was my plan. And it worked great too—through homeroom, art, and French. But then PE happened, and everything fell apart.

For starters, I got to the locker room a minute late, because Mademoiselle Schecter, the French teacher, wanted to chat with me about the fact that I hadn't turned in Thursday's homework. She was so sweet about it, looking into my eyes with so much understanding and concern that I almost burst into tears. I didn't, but by the time I got to the gym locker room, I was still a little shaky.

And when I got to my locker, I saw that someone had taped a sign to the door:

LIAR.

Right away I recognized Abi's handwriting. I ripped it down without saying a word, changed into my yoga pants, crumpled the note into my pants pocket, and took my place on the gym floor for attendance.

We were still on the volleyball unit. The second I lined up for Team A, Abi, Mak, and Jules walked across the net to join Team B.

Who cares? Who cares
? I chanted in my head. We played for about five minutes. The score was tied 1–1. When it was my turn to serve, I didn't score a point, but I hit the ball okay. In fact, well enough for Ruby to high-five me, despite the invisible sign I wore around my neck:
NO ATTENTION, PLEASE—THE MANAGEMENT.

“Nice serve, Lia,” Ruby said.

“Thanks,” I said, looking at her from the neck upward.

Then it was Mak's turn to serve. When she bounced the ball a few times, she looked dangerous, as if she had a strategy. Maybe she did, I thought, because suddenly she hit it—
thwunk!
—straight at my chest.

I screamed.

Abi laughed.

The pain was sharp—hot and tingling, not like anything I'd ever felt before. But even as I felt it, even as it took my breath away, I thought:
That laugh belonged to Abi
. No one else had a laugh like punctuation. Like a combination question mark and exclamation point:
Omigod, did you see THAT?!

“Sorry,” Mak called out. I ignored her, yelling at myself not to cry in front of my ex-friends, whatever it took.

Ms. Bivens, the gym teacher, came running over. “Lia, are you okay?”

“Fine,” I muttered.

She put her hands on my shoulders. “Never say you're fine when you're not. Come with me.”

She led me to the sideline. “Well? What happened?”

I could have said something like,
Oh, I just screamed in agony because our team messed up, and you know how intense I get about volleyball, Ms. Bivens.
But I couldn't lie. When the volleyball hit my chest, it knocked the invisible sign from my neck. And even if it hadn't, Abi's laugh had made me furious. I refused to pretend I hadn't heard it. So I told Ms. Bivens what happened.

She frowned. “Does your chest still hurt?”

I shook my head.

“But your feelings?”

I shrugged.

“Abi and Mak, could you please step over here for a moment?” she called loudly.

“Ms. Bivens,” I begged, “please don't—”

She blew her whistle. “Let's go, girls.
Now
.”

“But I'm about to serve,” Abi protested.

“It can wait.”

Abi and Mak exchanged glances. I thought I saw Mak mumble something and Abi shrug in response as they walked over.

“Ms. Bivens, it was an accident,” Mak said immediately. “I'd never hit anyone on purpose. And if my serve
hurt you, Lia, I'm really sorry.” Her face looked pinched in a way I could tell meant she wasn't lying.

I nodded. “Okay.”

Ms. Bivens seemed satisfied. “All right, Makayla, you can get back on the court now. Abi, why did you laugh?”

Abi blinked. “I don't know. When Lia screamed, it just surprised me, I guess.”

“That's not true,” I snapped. “You laughed because you thought it was funny.”

Her eyes widened. “I did not.”

“You also put this on my locker, didn't you?” I yanked the crumpled paper from my pants pocket. “A sign that says ‘Liar'?”

“It doesn't say ‘Liar.' It just says your name. ‘Lia R.' ”

“Oh, come on,” I said scornfully. “Why would you put my name on my locker? Just to be
nice
?”

“Someone wanted to give you a note, and they asked which was your locker. I can't help it if your name is Lia R.”

“Abi, that is such a bunch of—”

“It was Graydon.” She smirked. “It was a love poem.”

“It was not! Don't lie!”

“Hold it right there, girls,” Ms. Bivens ordered. If she could have blown her whistle at us, she would have. “This is sounding like a personal conflict, not a gym issue. If you can't resolve it yourselves, I suggest you take it to a guidance
counselor. All I want to say here is that in
my
gym, we don't laugh at a classmate's injury. Understood, Abi?”

Abi nodded, but her lips were tight.

“All right, then. Return to the game.”

As Abi jogged off, Ms. Bivens turned to me. “Simple suggestion for you: sports bra. To protect your girls.” She gestured at my chest.

“Oh, but I don't have—I mean, I don't need a bra.”

“Don't be too sure, Lia. I know that scream when I hear it.”

♥  ♥  ♥

At home that afternoon, I locked myself in the upstairs bathroom. I pulled off all my clothes and took inventory.

No visible hair anywhere. No waist or hips.

But were breasts finally happening? I wasn't sure; it's not like I'd suddenly come down with a bad case of cleavage. But if I stood sideways and held my breath, I thought I
might
be seeing some faint puffiness. Maybe. Possibly. And if I were, it would explain why the volleyball pain had been so . . . painful.

Did I actually need some girl protectors, after all?

Huh, I thought.

Maybe I did.

DINNER THAT NIGHT WAS SPAGHETTI and salad, which Nate and I made together while Dad grated some parmesan cheese and set the table. The three of us had just sat down to start eating when the kitchen phone rang.

We looked at each other. When Mom was here, she refused to let us answer the phone at dinnertime.
It's probably just a telemarketer
, she would say.
If it was a
real
person, then he or she should learn to respect our dinner hour!

Did we really spend an entire hour eating dinner with
her every night? I couldn't remember. We always did start the meal at the same time, though—six thirty. These days we ate when Dad got home, sometimes at six, sometimes as late as seven forty-five. Dad said that since we were so unpredictable with our meal schedule, it didn't seem fair to punish people who wanted to talk to us, so he always answered the phone.

While Dad spoke quietly to the caller, Nate and I ate our spaghetti, not talking so we could eavesdrop. Finally Dad said, “I'll put her on.” Then he handed me the phone.

My heart bounced. Who could possibly be calling
me
? “Hello?” I asked.

“Niecelet!” Aunt Shelby shouted. “Bad me for ruining your dinner! How
are
you?”

I told her it was fine; I was fine; everyone in the family was fine. By the time she'd told me about the cats (all were great, except Stinkbug, who had a nail infection, which she was treating with a special cat-foot herb she'd read about online), I was upstairs in my bedroom with the door shut.

“So listen to
this
,” Aunt Shelby said breathlessly. “Guess who called me today!”

I told her I couldn't guess, so she might as well just tell me.

“Vaaaaal,” she said, as if the name had three syllables.

“What?”

“Yep. She said you'd accused her of torturing me in middle school?”

“Omigod. I never said torture, I swear!”

My aunt laughed. “Relax, buttercup. She actually called me to
apologize
. She said she didn't remember the locker room business when you first mentioned it, but the more she thought about it, the more it came back to her and the more she realized how hurtful she'd been back then. Can you believe it?”

“No,” I answered truthfully. Then I added, “Although Val can be really nice sometimes.”

“Well, she couldn't have been nicer on the phone today! So apparently it
is
possible to outgrow the Mean Girl routine!” Aunt Shelby laughed again. “And afterward we had a wonderful conversation. Did you know she's into crystals?”

“No, I didn't.”

“I even told her about my stores. She seemed really interested. I'm thinking of asking her to invest in Herb 'n' Legend, because I'm pretty sure your dad's not gonna.”

“Awesome.”

Aunt Shelby paused. “Okay, buttercup, what's wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Don't lie to your aunt. Something's up; I can hear it in your voice.”

I chewed the inside of my cheek. “It's no big deal. I've just lost every single one of my friends. Including Abi.”

“You did? When? What happened?”

I suddenly realized how exhausted I was. Not talking, keeping your head down, took effort. Almost as much effort as telling lies and keeping your stories straight.

So I told her everything: about the Truth or Dare game, and Abi constantly fighting with Mak, and Marley quitting the game and also our group. About the fake My First Period story. About the
LIA R
sign and how Abi laughed when the volleyball hit my girls. Even the part about fake-kissing Tanner. Even the part about not kissing Graydon.

Aunt Shelby listened without interrupting. When I finished, she said, “All right, Lia. Here's what you're going to do. Invite your friends—just those four girls—to your house on Saturday. Say it's your birthday party.”

“But that's ridiculous. My birthday isn't until April, and they all know it!”

“Say it's an early birthday. Or a half birthday. Or an anti-birthday. I'll bake a cake. What kind would they like?”

“Chocolate,” I said immediately. “Like the kind Val made us as cupcakes. But what's the point of inviting them to
anything
? I told you they
hate
me. They won't come!”