Val smiled, “Thanks Derrick,” she pulled him close in a hug; at first the boy stood stiff as a board, but he eventually returned the hug.
“Ahem—may I have your attention?” Colin spoke from the front of the room, “If I may bring this room to order—alright. Ladies and gentleman, our assignment of the day is to fill the gaps in leadership left by recently graduating NHS members; also, if anyone believes that one of the current officers should be replaced, they can make a motion now. So, does anyone want to petition for the removal of any current officers?”
“This should be good,” Derrick whispered, “The only people who motion for an officer’s removal are usually the ones who want the position for themselves.”
Sure enough, one pimple-faced Senior made a motion to replace the club President—Colin—and, once the motion was seconded, named himself as the candidate for replacement. The vote failed; Colin didn’t look surprised or fazed by the attempt to depose him.
There were two more attempts to replace Colin, and one to replace Addison as the Vice President, but they all failed. “Alright,” Colin said, “Seeing that we have no more motions, let’s move onto voting to replace the current vacancies. We have a couple: Treasurer and Recorder—which is a single position, mind you—and Student Liaison. The Treasurer and Recorder position is pretty self-explanatory; the Student Liaison is a relatively new position we created for Charity February. The boy or girl selected for the position will act as NHS’ face, freeing Addison and I to focus on fundraising. So, let’s have some nominations.”
“Do you want to be Treasurer or Liaison?” Derrick asked, jerking his head towards Colin.
“Um—“ I don’t really want either position; the Treasurer job seemed tedious, whereas the Liaison would clearly be nothing more than a figurehead. At least as Liaison I’ll still have a position, and I might not win. “Liaison, I guess.”
“Alright,” Derrick raised his voice, “I nominate Valentina for Student Liaison.”
Colin nodded, “I guess we’ll vote on that first, then. Any other nominations for Student Liaison?” The room was silent; Val looked around, wondering whether everyone else thought the position was meaningless, as she did, or whether they didn’t want to run because of the extra responsibility. “Last call,” Colin announced after a few seconds; no one else moved or spoke, so he said, “Well then, everyone meet your new Student Liaison! Val, get on up here!”
Val took a few steps that took her to the front of the room, where Colin was smiling. She turned around, giving the rest of the club a subdued smile and simple wave.
“Whoo, Val!” Derrick cheered, inspiring fits of laughter.
“Thank you, Val,” Colin said, “If you’d just stand next to Addison here—“ he pointed to Addison’s left side, and Val took her position as instructed. They voted on the next position; Val was amazed when four people were nominated or nominated themselves. Because there were multiple candidates, Colin asked everyone running to give a short speech, which ended up taking up nearly the entirety of the club’s allotted time. Val didn’t pay much attention, so she was unprepared when Colin pointed the winning Treasurer and Recorder to a spot beside her, and Ethan lumbered over.
“Whoa, fancy that,” the tall senior laughed, “Such a small world.”
Val cleared her throat, “Yeah, I guess.” Colin gave a short speech and dismissed the club members.
Before Val could leave, Addison put a hand on her forearm, “I heard about what Porter said to you. You didn’t deserve that.”
“Thanks,” Val wondered how many people had heard about the incident; if Addison knows, probably a lot. A dull part of her was curious if the rumor of Porter being mean to her had spread faster than Friday’s rumor.
“Porter is—“ Addison gulped, “—when I was a freshman, I dated him for four months. It—“ she laughed emotionlessly, “—it didn’t end well.”
“Oh,” Val attempted a concerned look, “Why not?”
“He cheated on me,” Addison shared, “With my best friend. I guess I’m just saying, you were lucky.”
Val certainly didn’t feel lucky, “Oh, thanks.” Addison didn’t say anything else, and after a respectful amount of time had passed, Val left to change for Soccer. Practice didn’t go well at all. Val blamed her emotions, but Mr. Swinn wouldn’t accept the excuse (“You should be able to channel all that hurt and anger into kicking the ball”). Val tried, but after sending the soccer ball soaring off into the distance multiple times she realized that loosing her emotions was not the right decision.
As a result of the lousy practice, Val was feeling worse than ever when the team hit the locker room.
Her favorite person in the world was waiting; “I hear you’ve been having a horrible day,” Avery pouted, making her mock-sympathy apparent.
Val glared at the girl, “So what?”
“So nothing. I just enjoy it when a good plan comes together,” Avery beamed.
“What are you talking about?”
“Oh, you know—I’m not saying that I told Porter I’d forgive him if he told you off—and I won’t, by the way, although I appreciate his gesture—and I’m also not saying that I told Jenny exactly what to say to win back those stupid little girls you call friends. But if someone did do that,” Avery’s smile widened, “They’d be pretty clever.”
“You did that?” Val looked at the older girl, dumbstruck.
“No no; aren’t you listening? That would have been harassment, and you could go to the Principal. I’m simply saying that if I were behind what happened today, I would be pretty happy.”
Rather than anger, Val actually found the revelation made her feel better; knowing Porter had been put up to saying what he had, and that Jenny had not acted entirely of her own accord either, was oddly comforting. They may not be the nicest people in the world, Val thought, but at least they still qualify as people, unlike Avery.
“Well?” Avery looked at Val with raised eyebrows, “Don’t you have anything to say?”
Val refused to let the other girl see how much damage she had truly done; she forced herself to shrug, “I never liked Porter anyway.”
Avery laughed, “Right.” She leaned in close, whispering so that only Val could hear, “Just think, little Freshie, this is just the beginning. I have so much more planned for you—this was just me stretching my muscles. The true game is about to begin.”
Chapter 20
“You excited about tonight?” Alex asked as he packed up after Algebra.
No, not at all. “I guess.”
“You don’t seem that excited,” Alex grinned, “Come on, there’s gonna be drinks and a pool, and girls!” He laughed at Val’s nonplussed expression, “Okay, maybe girls isn’t a selling point for a girl, but you get what I mean—it’ll be fun.”
“If you say so,” the closer Alex’s party came, the more Val found herself dreading it.
“I promise it will be. If it isn’t—if it isn’t I’ll give you a lap dance.” The joke managed to elicit a smile from Val.
“I have to get to Geography,” she said, still smiling, “I’ll see you tonight.”
“Agreed. Wear something seductive—that dress you wore to Aaliyah’s party was nice, but I prefer a little more cleavage,” he winked.
Val scoffed; “You’d probably have me show up naked, if it was up to you.”
Alex rubbed his chin, “You know what, that’s a good idea. Why don’t you do that?”
“Because it would be—“ Val laughed, “Whatever, I’ll see you later.”
“Bye.”
In Geography, a couple of students attempted to derail Mr. Andrews again, with little success; instead, they were treated to a lesson on plant life at different altitudes. Val tried to replicate the pictures he put up on the whiteboard in her notebook, but when she looked over the drawings at the end of class she found it hard to discern between any of them.
Everyone else’s drawings were coming along in Val’s Drawing class—Miss And
rews insisted they come to her for approval before they started on the actual project, and Val had tried five times with no success. Even Miro had gotten approval for something he wanted to do—although he’d scrapped the idea of a floating arm after Miss Andrews yelled at him for goofing off. Val spent half the period frowning at her still-dilapidated butterfly, it’s imperfect, just like me. She finally decided to take it up to the teacher and ask for approval one more time.
“Okay, I think I wanna make a bigger version of this,” Val announced, setting her drawing down on Miss Andrews desk.
“Miss Hunter, this is the exact same piece you wanted me to approve yesterday.”
“Yeah, I know, but—I know it doesn’t look like a beautiful butterfly, but maybe it could be like an expression of how I’m feeling now?”
The teacher nodded, “Fascinating, truly fascinating. Hmm, I suppose I will let you move ahead with that, but don’t use it as an excuse to produce subpar work.”
“I won’t,” Val promised; she breathed a sigh of relief as she returned to her spot next to Miro, now I’ll only be a couple of days behind everyone else. Sophia didn’t say anything as she sat down; Val didn’t expect her to. They all worked quietly; Val tried not to count down the minutes until the bell rang, but with no conversation to keep her mind occupied, it wandered to other matters.
The Trio didn’t get up and move when Val sat down with them at Lunch, but they did their best to ignore her. When Jenny arrived, the conversation picked up, but they did their best to make it clear that Val was not welcome.
“So my dad is taking my sister and I to the coast this weekend,” Ella said, “Anyone wanna come?”
“No thanks,” Jenny declined; Zoey and Sophia declined as well.
“Sorry, I won’t be able to come either,” Val apologized, not sure if the offer had even included her in the first place.
“Darn, that sucks,” Ella looked at Jenny, Sophia, and Zoey in turn, “You’re sure you can’t come?”
Val’s curiosity got the best of her; she had to know how far Jenny’s speech yesterday had lowered her in the other girls’ estimation, “Well, I could go.”
Ella coughed, “Um—“ she frowned, “It’s really a close friends and family thing. It’s cool that you want to go though, I appreciate the sentiment.”
So, Ella, at least, doesn’t even think of me as a friend anymore. “Why are you guys acting like this?” she asked blatantly, “I mean, first Sophia ignores me in Drawing, now you don’t even want to hang out with me—“
“You broke girl code,” Ella answered.
“Exactly,” Jenny agreed, “That and you’re a major bitch.”
Val gasped, “No I’m not—“
“Oh, I’m sorry, I must’ve missed the part where they teach that it’s nice to pretend to be someone’s friend, insult her, and then steal all her friends.” If looks could kill, Jenny’s would have reduced Val to a pile of ash.
“I’m—Jenny, can I talk to you in the hall?”
Jenny shook her head, “Anything you have to say, you can say here.”
Val sighed, “I’m sorry I said those things to you. And I should have apologized earlier, I know. But—I guess that’s it, I’m sorry.” At least my parents would be proud, Val thought; to her, the apology seemed like submission—Jenny had practically forced her into it.
“I—don’t accept your apology,” Jenny smirked, “Go tell it to someone who cares.”
Val looked around the table, hoping to find a friendly face, but came up empty-handed. Without another word, she got up and went to the library to work on homework; at least, that was her plan. As she sat at one of the study tables, Val found herself planning ways to get revenge on Jenny; she was convinced that was the only way to win back the Trio and return things to the way they’d been just a week ago. But how to do it? Val came up with a plan that revolved around provoking Jenny the way she had before; she knew the other freshman was sensitive to jokes about her appearance. Maybe if I start calling her Pig-snout, and just make fun of her every time I see her, like Dylan does to me—
The sixth period bell rang; preoccupied as she was by her thoughts, Val barely heard it. She meandered into English, where Miss Donnely split the period between more discussion on Romeo and Juliet and a lesson on how to write essays. “We will be writing an essay next Friday,” the English teacher announced, “So be prepared.”
English ended, and Chemistry flew by as Val considered how to bring Jenny down; it helped to have her in the class, since Val could look back at the lab where Jenny sat and think of particularly nasty and appropriate insults.
“So I told Porter we’d pick you up around six,” Keenan said after class, “Does that work?”
“Yeah,” Val shrugged, “I’ll be ready.” She went straight home, I don’t think Eco Club is the club for me anyways, she thought as she passed Noah on his way up the stairs to the club’s meeting room; he smirked knowingly. Val almost turned around just to prove his prediction wrong, but realized how petty that would seem—to spend an hour around the awkward, bookish types in that club to disprove a nerd whose opinion she didn’t care about—and continued out to the parking lot. She called a car, and went home; it was only two-thirty. Val wasn’t used to having so much time on her hands.
After much consideration, she headed to her room and booted up her laptop; maybe there will be some good revenge ideas online. There weren’t—or at least, Val couldn’t find them despite numerous searches—so she wound up surfing random sites instead. It was a good way to waste time, and before Val knew it her parents were leaving for—she couldn’t remember where they were going. She checked the time on her computer: 5:06pm. Val got up and walked over to her dresser; she retrieved the clothes she’d been planning to wear to Aaliyah’s party, Since Dad’s not here, she reasoned, he won’t have to worry about what I go out in.
For makeup, Val settled on a blue eyeshadow and pink lipstick—normally, she would have forgone the combination as too bold. Val’s phone buzzed on her desk; it was a text from Keenan, “Hey, we’re outside.” Val frowned, trying to find a place to stow her phone; it didn’t fit in her shorts’ pockets. She gave up on the endeavor and went outside; Keenan stepped out of the car to greet her.
“Wow, you look amazing!” He beamed, “You ready to go?”
“Yup. I don’t know if I locked the house, but—“ Val waved a hand at her door, “—oh well, it’s a gated community. Let’s go.” Keenan climbed in the back, leaving the passenger’s seat open for Val; she glanced at Porter as she got in.
The drive over to Alex’s house was long and awkward; Keenan was obviously trying his best to make conversation, and Val indulged him as much as she could, but Porter was tense and silent. When they arrived, he muttered, “Keenan, I’m just gonna make the rounds and then head home.”
“But you’re our ride home!” Keenan protested, “You’ve gotta stay for at least a little while!”
“Fine, but I’ll—I’ll be wherever the booze are if you need me.” He stumbled ahead of Keenan and Val.
“I didn’t know your brother drank,” Val said.
“He doesn’t,” Keenan frowned, “For some reason, he’s not himself tonight. He tried to pretend he was sick, but I told him he promised to take us.”
“Oh,” the door to Alex’s house was wide open, held there by a thick wooden wedge. Val entered, looking for familiar faces.
“Hey!” Aaliyah waved to Val’s left, “Good to see you!” she hugged Val.
When they broke apart, Val smiled, “Good to see you too.”
“Yeah,” Aaliyah nodded, “So is Porter here then? I thought I saw him walk in.”
“Yeah, he said he’d be where the ‘booze’ is.”
“Alright, I’ll go talk to him about—well, you know. Wait here,” Aaliyah’s face set in a neutral expression as she turned.
“You don’t have to,” Val held out an arm to stop her friend.
“I know,” Aaliyah replied, “But someone h
as to, and God knows you’re too nice to do it. Don’t worry, I won’t say anything that’ll scar him for life.”
Val laughed; Aaliyah paused and smiled back at her friend before heading off to where Porter was standing, sulking by a huge metal drum.
Alex approached from the crowd; Keenan grinned at his friend, “What’s up?”
“What’s up?” Alex tilted his head in an acknowledgement of the greeting; he turned to Val, “Enjoying the party?”
Val shrugged, “We just got here.”
“Ah, well, you should mingle. Meet some of the guests. There’s this one girl from St. Mary’s I invited—a cheerleader—who swears she can put both feet behind her head. Now that’s flexibility.”
Val shook her head, “That’s great. Anyone else I should look for? Or look out for?”
Alex nodded, “Your wannabe boyfriend is here.”
“Who?” Keenan asked interestedly; it was better than Val’s question, which one?
“Ethan—“ Alex grimaced at Keenan, “It looks like you’ve got your work cut out for you, dude. He’s a tall guy, and strong to boot.”
Keenan laughed, slipping an arm around Val’s waist, “That’s alright, Val’s too into me to even think about anyone else. Isn’t that right?”
Val nodded absently. Across the room, she could see Porter and Aaliyah, looking like they were having a lovely conversation.
“—did you hear me?” Alex asked.
“Sorry, what?”
“I said, ‘there aren’t any strip poker games here’,” Alex grinned, “So you don’t need to worry about getting roped into something like that. Come on, mingle! It’s a party.” He walked back into the crowd.
Val looked at Keenan and shrugged; “Come on, let’s join the rest of the party,” he said.
“Alright,” Val resigned herself to the inevitability of being forced to pretend to like more people she’d just met; sometimes it seems like that’s all my life is anymore.
Val struck up a conversation with a girl in a sparkly blue dress whose name she didn’t catch, “I love your dress,” she complemented, hoping it didn’t sound too cliché.
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