What's Your Status? (22 page)

“So, um,” Schuyler said, wiping her eyes and looking at me. “What do we do now?”

CHAPTER 13

Song: Spinning/Jack’s Mannequin

Quote: “Implacable fate sat waiting just over the horizon.”

—Tove Jansson

“This isn’t going to work,” Schuyler whispered to me as we entered the lobby of the Hyatt.

“Of course it is,” I said, trying to sound much more confident than I actually felt. “Also, we don’t have any other ideas.”

“But what if they check inside?” Schuyler hissed as we walked across the plush carpeting.

“I don’t know,” I whispered back. “Maybe they won’t.”

“But what if they do?” she asked. She pulled me over to a huge white marble pillar, and we stood behind it. “Listen, Mad,” she said, looking determined, “I think we should go back to my plan.”

I rolled my eyes and shook my head. On the drive to the hotel, Schuyler had told me her plan for dealing with the aftermath of giving away the crown. She had clearly put a lot of thought into it. She was going to confess everything, take the blame on herself, leave town, and
get her father to enroll her in the Swiss boarding school that her stepsister, Peyton, had just been kicked out of. It was pretty much the worst plan I had ever heard.

“Your plan involves you moving to Switzerland,” I said. “We’re not doing your plan. And anyway, it wouldn’t help matters. Dr. Trent is going to hold me personally responsible if anything happens to the crown.”

“You don’t know that,” Schuyler said.

“Yes, I do,” I said. “He told me an hour ago. So this is our only plan for the moment.” I took the jewelry box out of my bag, flipped open the lid, and we both peered inside. Sitting on the dark blue velvet was a plastic pearlescent pink Hello Kitty crown, which, at the top, featured a small picture of Hello Kitty wearing a tiara. We’d purchased it at Small Rascals—they’d had to change their name after they got sued—on the way to the hotel.

“But what’s going to happen on prom night?” Schuyler asked. “I mean, this doesn’t look anything like the Hayes crown.”

“I know that,” I said, closing the lid. “This is just a placeholder. Until we figure this all out. But Dr. Trent is going to know that something is wrong if I don’t bring the crown this afternoon.”

“Okay,” Schuyler said. She took a deep breath and held out her hand. “This is all my fault, Mad. I’ll do it.”

I shook my head. While I appreciated the gesture, I knew I had to try to get the box into the concierge’s possession without raising any suspicion. “Just come with me,” I said, and Schuyler nodded, looking hugely relieved.

We stepped out from behind the pillar and crossed the lobby, Schuyler a step or two behind me. The lobby was more crowded than it had been when we’d been there in the early morning. There were people sitting in the uncomfortable armchairs, and a woman in a long skirt playing a harp in the corner. The desk was at the back of the lobby, and it seemed it had been designed to be intimidating. It was long and wooden and polished to a gleaming surface, with a fancy Putnam Hyatt crest behind it.

I took a breath and walked the last few feet to the desk, behind which a tall, thin man was standing, talking on the phone. There was a shorter woman at the other end of the desk, typing rapidly on a computer, checking in a harried-looking businessman. As I got closer, without looking at me, the tall man raised one finger in my direction, to indicate that I was to wait.

I let out a shaky breath, trying not to panic, and trying not to look like I was trying not to panic. I had hoped that I would be able to get the jewelry box to the concierge right away. With every second that passed, I was getting more and more nervous, and feeling more and more like we were never going to get away with this. Trying to calm my thoughts, I looked ahead of me and saw that behind the desk there was an inlaid door. It matched the wood of the wall behind the desk perfectly; I only noticed it because it was slightly ajar. There seemed to be a small room behind the door. I leaned to the side, trying to get a better view, when the thin man’s volume increased, bringing my attention back to him.

“D’accord,”
he said in a flawless French accent.
“Très bien, Monsieur Fabien. À bientôt!”
He hung up and started typing rapidly on a computer. “May I remind you,” he said in a clipped voice, addressing the woman at the other end of the counter. Now that he was speaking English, it was with a frosty British accent that put Mark’s to shame. “I am not accustomed to dealing with the routine matters that you should be handling. I can’t be the
only
person on staff who speaks French.”

“But, um, you are,” the woman said, sounding terrified. “Since you fired Dominique, that is.”

“Then hire someone else,” he said, still not looking up from his computer screen. “An intern. I don’t care. Yes?”

This last statement was directed to me. Startled, I tried to get my bearings. “Oh. Hello,” I stammered. “I’m looking for the concierge?”

“And found him,” the man said with a tight smile. His voice was more pleasant now, but falsely so. It was somehow more frightening than when he had been yelling. He pointed to a gold name tag on his suit that I hadn’t noticed before.
Mr. Patrick,
it read,
Head Concierge.

“Oh,” I said. “Oh, good. Well. Okay. So we…” Here I turned to indicate Schuyler as well. Despite having three inches on me, she had somehow managed to make herself smaller, and was hiding behind me.

“Hi,” Schuyler said in a whisper, poking her head out and then disappearing again.

“We’re from Putnam High School, and we’re supposed to drop off our tiara with the concierge.”

“Are you…” Mr. Patrick typed something into his computer and then looked up at me. “Madison MacDonald?” he asked.

I swallowed hard. “Yes.”

“I’ve just heard from your headmaster,” he said.

“Assistant,” I said before I could stop myself.

Mr. Patrick looked at the computer again and then back up at me. “Yes,” he said. “Quite. He wanted me to contact him as soon as the item was delivered. I understand it was supposed to be here yesterday.”

“Yes,” I said, feeling myself beginning to sweat. “But there was…an unexpected delay.”

“Naturally,” he said with another small, completely humorless smile. “Well then?” He reached out his hand for the jewelry box, and trying to look like there was nothing at all unusual about the contents, I handed it to him. Behind me, I heard Schuyler let out a small whimper that I hoped was covered by the harp. “So,” Mr. Patrick said, resting his hand on top of the case, “I am going to take this item into the temporary possession of the Putnam Hyatt, where it will be secured in our house safe. At ten thirty
P.M
. this Saturday, I will return said contents back to the person who dropped them off—in this case, you. Does that sound acceptable?”

“Sure,” I said, hoping he wouldn’t notice that my hands had started shaking. I clasped them behind my back. “But, um, why ten thirty?”

“I have here that it was at the request of your headmaster,” he said, looking at the screen.

“Assistant,” Schuyler piped up from behind me.

“Yes,” Mr. Patrick said. “That’s right. It seemed that he was worried about security. Your crowning is scheduled to take place at ten thirty-five, so I am under instructions to release it no more than five minutes prior to that.”

“Ah,” I said, trying not to think about how Dr. Trent had managed to squelch any plan I might have been starting to come up with. Mr. Patrick started to open the lid, and I began speaking as quickly as I could, to distract him. “I see. Quite. Yes. And I understand that there’s another prom happening here the same night? Um…Hartfield High’s prom?”

“Yes,” he said, lowering the lid. “You’re correct. Though apparently, they do not have the same sort of treasure you do, as there has been no request from them to use our safe. If I may…” he said, beginning to lift the lid again. “I’ve heard
such
things about this crown….” He raised the lid and I closed my eyes, just wanting the fallout to be over as quickly as possible.

“Mr. Patrick? Sorry to bother you again.” I opened my eyes. It was the girl at the other end of the counter, cowering behind her computer. Mr. Patrick lowered the lid and turned to glare at her. “Mr. Fabian is on the phone again, and I can’t seem to…”

“Fine,” he snapped. He motioned her over. “Lock this in the safe. It is not to be removed until ten thirty on Saturday. Can you handle that?” She nodded, and he moved down to where she had been standing, picked up a phone, and began speaking in French again.

The woman picked up the jewelry box without opening it and walked through the door behind the desk. A moment later, she returned, empty-handed. “You should be all set,” she said. “Was there anything else?”

“No, no,” I said quickly, incredibly relieved. “Thank you so much for your help. We’ll be going now.” I turned, grabbed Schuyler’s arm, and we hustled out of the lobby. I wasn’t even paying attention to where we were going; I just knew that we needed to get out of there ASAP.

I pulled Schuyler out the first exit I saw, and we’d been walking for a few moments before I realized that I’d taken us down the World’s Longest Corridor. We walked a few more feet; then we both collapsed onto the first of the resting benches.

“Oh my God,” Schuyler said.

“I know,” I agreed. We sat in silence, and I tried to think. All I’d been focusing on was getting a temporary tiara into the Hyatt so that Dr. Trent wouldn’t be suspicious. But I had no idea what to do now. Somehow, I had to get the real tiara back from Isabel. And then get the real tiara into the safe. Which was locked.

“You know, I think Switzerland is supposed to be nice,” Schuyler said after a moment. “They have chocolate there. And cuckoo clocks.”

“You’re not going to Switzerland,” I said. “Let’s just think a minute.” I rested my head in my hands and tried, but my brain felt worn-out, like it had been through far too much today to be expected to come up with things like plans.

“I’m just saying, this is not the way to handle things!”
I heard a familiar-sounding voice say. I looked up and saw, to my surprise, Dave and Lisa coming down the Endless Hallway toward us. Schuyler looked over as well, then turned back to me, eyebrows raised. I shrugged. I had no idea what Dave and Lisa were doing there.

“And all I’m saying is that we need to be able to talk about this like…Oh. Hi.” Dave, spotting Schuyler and me, stopped speaking midsentence. He and Lisa seemed equally surprised to see us. “What are you two doing here?”

“Did you ask her to meet you here?” Lisa asked Dave, looking furious.

“Who?” Schuyler asked, looking perplexed. “Me? Because no.”

“Madison,” Lisa said, practically spitting out my name.

I blinked at her. Too much of what had gone wrong today had been at least partially my fault. But my exhausted brain could not begin to fathom what I had done to Lisa. “Wait,” I said. “What?”

“Oh, I just thought,” Lisa said, “since you and David are having such big
conversations
these days…”

I looked at Dave, frowning. It occurred to me that Lisa was truly angry to a degree I’d never seen her before. Not only was she full-naming Dave, she hadn’t yet spoken a word of French. “I don’t understand,” I finally said.

“Lisa,” Dave said coldly, and suddenly I could see that he was just as angry with her as she was with him, “is apparently mad about the conversation we had at Putnam Pizza.”

“What conversation?” Schuyler asked.

“Exactly,” Lisa glowered.

“Wait, what conversation?” I asked, trying to think back. I’d talked with Dave at Putnam Pizza on…Monday. Monday felt like three years ago. “Oh,” I said, remembering. I’d told him about the Nate misunderstanding. And then he’d gotten upset about him and Lisa…. It started to dawn on me that I probably should have mentioned that part of the conversation to Lisa. But it had been completely eclipsed in my mind by Brian’s Melissa bombshell. “That.”

“Yeah,” Lisa said, glaring at me. “Ring a bell now?”

“Lisa, I’m really sorry—” I started.

“What conversation?” Schuyler interrupted.

Dave squinted at her. “Have you been crying?”

“The conversation,” Lisa said to me, “that you failed to mention to me for
three days.
The one where you talked to Dave about how you’re going to sleep with Nate on prom night—”

“You
are
?” Schuyler asked, turning to me, shocked.

“Wait a second,” I said quickly. “I never said I was going to sleep with him—”

“And all I said,” Dave interjected, matching Lisa’s rising volume, “was that Madison has been going out with Nate for, like, a second—”

“Two months,” I amended quickly.

“While we’ve been going out for a year. And that your insistence on waiting until Bastille Day is—”

“So what are you saying?” Lisa asked, her voice getting a little trembly. “That you’re no longer willing to
wait, just because
Madison
is going to sleep with someone right away?”

“Hold on a second,” I said, feeling that things needed to be cleared up. “I never said that I—”

“But you’re thinking about it, right?” Dave asked, turning to me. Lisa and Schuyler turned to me, too, and I suddenly felt very put on the spot.

“I…don’t know,” I stammered. I hadn’t decided anything, but I hadn’t ruled anything out yet, either. “But it’s a completely different situation.”

“Thank you!” Lisa said triumphantly, then looked confused that she’d just agreed with me.

“Right,” Schuyler said. “I mean, Nate’s not a virgin. We don’t think.”

“Well, how do you know that I am?” Dave asked, sounding a little flustered. Schuyler and I just looked at him. Did he truly not realize that Lisa told us everything? Also, he was currently wearing a T-shirt that pictured a robot fighting a bear.

“Anyway,” I said, feeling that we ought to move on, “I don’t see what this has to do with me.”

“It has nothing to do with you,” Dave said. “Except that I used you as an example, that’s all, just to start a conversation.”