I nod. I’m going to agree with everything he says if it gets me off the hook.
“The boy from Ms. Jones’s class got expelled and now they’re coming after the best students any way they can. Even if it means making up bald-faced lies.”
I bite my tongue. This was no lie. Whoever turned me in knew what I was doing in that basement. And there was only one other person down there that night.
Mr. Bertrand raises his eyebrows. “I’ve been very impressed with your performance as of late, Kiki. Very impressed. I hope you’ll keep it up.”
I grin. “I will.”
“And stay out of trouble,” he says, shaking his head. “It appears that spies are everywhere.”
I don’t remind him that he was the one who put them there.
My legs shake the entire walk back to Chandler Hall. Yes, I got off the hook and, yes, Mr. Bertrand called me one of the best singers, but that doesn’t change the fact that someone snitched on me. Or that it could happen again.
So who was it? The only two people who knew about the basement piano thing were Jack and Norman. Jack, as far as I know, has no motive to sabotage my scholarship chances. He’s here for golf and to earn some pre-law credits. But, at the same time, Norman said he was going to hurt me. Is this how he was going to do it? Did Norman know he was the mole?
On the other hand, Norman. He also knew I was down in the basement of Chandler Hall singing with Jack. And he does have a lot to gain by getting me kicked out of here. He hasn’t been singing well lately. He doesn’t have one of the top voices in our class.
But he said he liked me. He said we were friends. When I asked him about turning me in to Bertrand, he flat-out said he’d never do that to me.
Not that I’ve never heard that load of bullshit before. My best friend was Beth, after all.
As I pull open the door to Chandler Hall, I try to psych myself up. It’s Friday night. I have a date with Jack that I’ve been super excited about for two days. I’m going to head up to my room and get dressed up. I wish I had thought to bring even one Project Earth T-shirt with me from home, because I’d totally wear it tonight. Jack likes me for who I am, and who I am is a giant nerd.
I step into the hallway that leads to the stairwell up to my room, the hallway that ends in Unit Six. Norman is sitting outside Chet the RA’s room, underneath the “Unit Sex” sign. He stands up when he sees me, as if he’s been waiting for me. His face is paler than usual. Probably from guilt.
“Kiki.” He runs toward me.
I shake my head and beeline toward the stairwell.
He gets there before me and blocks my entrance. “I need to talk to you.”
I try to push past him, but he gets in my face. He’s like a gnat.
“What do we need to talk about?” I hiss. “The fact that you sold me out to Bertrand?”
His face goes even whiter. “What?”
I fold my arms, feeling my cheeks burn with rage. “He pulled me into his office after choir today and said someone told him that I was down in the basement singing with Jack on Saturday night.”
“That wasn’t me, Kiki. I swear. I told you. We’re friends.”
“That’s kind of a loaded word in my experience.” I bite my lip to keep my emotions in check. I don’t want my face to get blotchy for my date with Jack. I wipe my eyes. “Then who did it?” I ask. “The only people who knew about it were you and Jack. Did he tell on me? Is that why you were trying to keep me away from him? Is he secretly trying to get a music scholarship or something?” I shake my head.
“No,” he says. “That wasn’t it.”
“Then what was it?”
Norman glances down the hall to Unit Six.
I try to push past him again. “Excuse me, Norman. I have to get ready for my date with your roommate.”
Norman’s shoulders drop. “Kiki, that’s why I was waiting for you.” He closes his eyes for a moment, then opens them. “The date’s off,” he says.
I’m pissed. Who does he think he is? “I just got grilled by Bertrand about the basement singing thing. There is literally nothing you have on me, nothing you can do to stop me from going on that date with Jack.”
Norman steps aside, clearing a path for me. “Kiki, there’s something you need to know. Jack’s girlfriend is here. She’s in our room with him right now.”
chapter sixteen
Kiki Nichols @kikeronis: Date’s off. Sad face.
Smart Singer Girl @smartsingergirl: You okay?
“His what?” I ask.
“Girlfriend,” says Norman. “Jack has a girlfriend. I met her when I went to his parents’ for dinner and then when I saw you guys hanging out in the basement that same night, and the way he was looking at you, I got pissed at him. What a dick.”
Glancing toward the Unit Six hallway, I let this sink in for a few seconds. “There has to be some mistake.”
“He introduced her to me as his girlfriend,” Norman says. “On Saturday night and today.”
I feel numb. I feel like the blood has drained out of my body. “He said she’s his girlfriend?”
Norman nods.
I try to make sense of the situation, to work through Jack’s thought process. “What was his plan? He made a date with me two nights ago and now his girlfriend is here. Was he supposed to break up with her between the time he asked me out and tonight? Was he just going to string both of us along?”
“I don’t know. Either way, doesn’t seem like a really good plan.”
I laugh, because what the fuck?
“I didn’t want to see you get hurt,” Norman says. “I was hoping to keep you away from him until the end of camp.”
I nod, not trusting my voice all of a sudden.
“I wanted to run out the clock,” he says. “For both your sakes. I mean, I like Jack. He did an idiotic thing, but he’s been decent to me, at least, this whole time. He drove me to the pharmacy when I needed medicine for a toothache, he brought me to his parents’ house for dinner—”
My shoulders shake with the sobs I’m trying to stifle. I pull my hands up into my sleeves.
Norman puts his arms around me. He hugs me. I can’t remember the last time anyone hugged me like this, like a friend. It makes it even harder to hold the tears back. But I do. I bite my cheek and pull away from Norman. I straighten myself up, blinking furiously. “I’m okay.”
Norman stares at me like he knows I’m obviously bullshitting him. “What do you want to do?” he asks slowly, nodding toward Unit Six.
I sigh. “I don’t know.”
“We could get out of here,” he says. “Andy has a car. We can go grab dinner, see a movie—”
“But I can’t let him just get away with it, can I?”
Norman frowns.
“You sure they’re in your room?”
He nods.
I consider the situation. Maybe Norman is wrong. Maybe Jack meant “girl friend,” not “girlfriend.”
Yeah, right. How often does a straight guy refer to a friend who’s a girl as a “girl friend?” I need to see this for myself.
I blow out a long, slow breath. “Let’s go in.” I want to rip this bandage right off.
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
Norman hesitates a moment, then takes a step toward the boys’ hallway.
“Hey, wait.” I grab his arm.
He turns back to me.
“Thank you,” I say. “For…” I shrug.
“I told you, Kiki. We’re friends.”
I grin. We’re friends. I’m pretty sure I can count on one hand how many times someone’s used that word in reference to me and meant it wholeheartedly.
The two of us tiptoe to his door. Norman inhales and sticks his key in the lock. He jiggles it slightly for extra effect, warning Jack that we’re about to enter.
“Here we go,” says Norman.
My chest tightens, as I brace myself for what I’m about to see. Norman swings open the door and there’s Jac
k and his girlfriend on opposite sides of the room. He’s at his desk, working on his laptop, and she is on his bed. She’s blond and pretty in an obvious way—too basic for cable or movies, but she’d be cast on a CW drama for sure.
Though the scene couldn’t be more innocent on the surface, seeing the two of them in the same room hits me like a gut punch. Here’s Jack, this guy I thought I knew, a guy with whom I thought I had made a truly deep and meaningful connection, sitting with another girl, an important part of his life, someone I never knew existed until today. I told him about Davis and Beth. I risked my spot in the opera program to sing with him. I bared my soul to Jack. He fed me table scraps.
The girlfriend stands up and I freeze, not knowing what’s about to happen. But she’s smiling like this situation couldn’t be more normal. “Hey,” she says.
Jack glances up from his computer. His eyes meet mine for a second, and I feel our connection again in that brief moment before his gaze bounces back to the screen in front of him. His face is as red as Norman’s hair.
Norman points a thumb at the girl. “This is Izzy,” he says. “Jack’s girlfriend. Izzy, this is Kiki.”
Izzy looks as if she’s wracking her brain for any mention of a “Kiki.” I’d bet one of the voice scholarships she’s never heard my name before. “Nice to meet you. Hey”—she glances over at Jack—“we were just about to grab dinner. You guys want to come?”
“You were about to grab dinner?” I ask.
“Yeah.”
“You and Jack? Tonight? Now?”
“Yup. Wanna come?”
I ball my hands into fists and curl my toes. It’s all I can do to keep from lunging at him. He and this girl were going to “grab dinner” even though he had already made plans with me. Was his plan to stand me up? Oh my God. This day keeps getting better.
Norman saves me. “We have plans.”
Izzy grins, looking from me to Norman like she’s finally figured us out. “Oh. Are you two together?”
I giggle maniacally, like, if this girl only knew. I’m sure she thinks I’m legit insane. “Oh, no. Norman and I are just friends,” I say, the volume of my voice a tad high for this conversation.
“That’s nice,” she says, flinching. I mean, seriously. She has to think I’m nuts.
And I feel bad for her. I really do. I feel bad for me, obviously, but I’m not the only one Jack’s been messing with here. He’s the shithead. I want to hurt him. I don’t want him to get out of this situation scot-free.
I plaster on a big smile. “How long have you and Jack been together, Izzy?”
“A while,” she says.
“Are you one of his friends who makes fun of the music kids at school?”
She looks at Jack, whose eyes are glued to his computer screen right now. “What? We don’t—?”
“Jack said that he and his friends are really big jerks to the kids in band at school, which, considering how dedicated he is to his drumming, is really a dick move on his part. Super hypocritical.” I keep my eyes on her, willing myself not to glance at Jack to see his reaction. Because screw him and his stupid secrets.
“Drumming?” She grins, shaking her head, playing along.
“Yeah. He’s really, really good.”
“He’s never mentioned drumming.”
“That’s odd,” I say. “I don’t know why he feels like he needs to keep it a secret from you.”
Izzy frowns at Jack. “What’s she talking about?” Then she’s back on me. “You’re confusing him with somebody else.”
“Does he have an identical twin brother also named Jack who’s playing golf at Krause this summer? Because, if not, I’m pretty sure I’ve got the right guy.”
“Is she telling the truth?” Izzy asks Jack. “I don’t think I’ve ever even heard you say the word ‘drums.’”
His eyes are in his lap.
“This is real? She’s not kidding?” Izzy plasters on a nervous smile. “Why would you keep that a secret from me?”
I glance at Jack and touch the door handle, ready to flee. I’m about to lose it, and I can’t stay for any more of this conversation. “You might want to ask him what other secrets he’s been keeping.” I pull open the door and dart over to Seth and Andy’s room.
Everyone is already there: Kendra, Mary, Brie, Seth, and Andy, plus a few campers from the other voice classes, like Finley and Daffodil. They’re sprawled around the room, on beds or chairs, watching the next episode of Project Earth.
I can’t even look at the TV. I think Jack has ruined Project Earth for me. That bastard.
I look at Andy’s bed instead, where Kendra and Mary are sprawled out and Andy is tinkering on his phone.
“I need to go,” I say.
“Go where?” asks Kendra.
“Out. Somewhere. I need to leave the building.” I can’t breathe in here. Now it’s hitting me that I should’ve been on my date with Jack right now. But I’m not, because he has a girlfriend and he’s a lying, cheating asshole. He’s a lying, cheating asshole who almost got me into a shit ton of trouble with Mr. Bertrand. I risked everything for him, and for what?
“You want to go to a movie or something?” asks Kendra.
I shake my head like a dog trying to dry off. “Do you ever feel like it’s too much? I mean, we’re here at a college in Indianapolis, a place foreign to most of us, and what do we do all day? We go to class and we sing. And we eat and we sleep and we wake up and we do it again.”
“Yeah,” says Brie, “because we want to be the best.”
“Yeah.” I sigh. My release is gone. The one bright spot in the middle of all the tedious practicing, the thing that urged me to push through another hour of running through yet another stupid art song, the fact that maybe next year Jack and I could be a thing, musically and romantically, is done. That’s over. And what am I left with? Opera. “Jack has a secret girlfriend,” I blurt. Everyone stares at me.
“Kiki,” says Kendra. She moves to stand.
I hold up my hand. “I’m completely and totally fine about it, like, 100 percent. It’s a pothole on the road of life. A guy I liked for two seconds has a girlfriend. No big deal.”
I bite my upper lip because I can’t even look at Kendra right now with her big puppy dog eyes.
“The two of them are over there.” I point to Seth’s door, where Jack and Izzy are just across the hall. “So I need to get out of here.” I make a circle to indicate this room.
“There’s a party,” says Andy, waving his phone. “This guy I know who goes here. He and his roommates are having a thing.”
Brie folds her arms. “We’re not going to a party.”
“It’s Friday,” says Andy. “And it’s only, what, seven o’clock. We’d be back long before midnight.”
I think back to all the parties I went to with Beth. It was always me and her and her friends. I usually sat in the kitchen with the other losers who were dragged there solely to act as designated driver.
This time it wouldn’t be like that. I’d be going with my own group of friends, people who actually want to be around me—Norman and Kendra and Mary and everybody else. We could dance until we all turn to pumpkins.
“Let’s do it,” I say. “Let’s go.”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” says Brie.
“I’m with her,” says Mary.
Kendra says, “Kiki, you just got some pretty crappy news. Maybe don’t go nuclear right away. Give it a day, if you still feel like going out—”
“I’m not going nuclear. I didn’t say ‘let’s rob a bank’ or ‘opium sounds fun.’ I’m talking about going to a party. A real college party. We don’t have to drink or anything. Just go, get some fresh air.” The knowledge that Jack is across the hall with his girlfriend suffocates me. I need to feel something that’s not this.
Sighing, Brie stands up. “All right, Kiki. Let’s go.”
*
Kendra falls into step with me on the way to the party, which is a few
blocks away from campus at a house where a theatre major/stripper and her two gay best friends live. Andy knows them from some local theatre he’s done in Indianapolis. Also, I think he has a crush on one of the guys.
“How are you doing?” Kendra says. “Really.” The two of us drop back a few paces behind the others. The night, weather-wise at least, is a pleasant one.
Before we left, I ran upstairs to change into party clothes. I remembered a scene from Project Earth where Dana shows up for her first-ever real date with Ethan and he stands her up. When Ethan blows her off, Dana doesn’t sit on her hands, waiting for him to come around. She puts on her hottest dress and goes out dancing with her friends.
After the whole Beth/Davis debacle, I spent weeks alone in my room watching TV, chatting on Twitter, and performing soul-crushing concerts for myself. I wore a threadbare T-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts that had somehow wound up in my drawer at home, even though I have no idea how, and not in a sexy, “I’ve been with so many guys; these shorts could be anybody’s!” kind of way. No, this was a “one of my brother’s friends probably left his underwear here” situation.
So I decided to do what Dana would do. That would be my credo from now on: What Would Dana do?
I marched to the third floor and amped up whatever sex appeal I could squeeze out of my pores. I borrowed a hot, not twee, dress from Kendra. It’s tight and black and I’m wearing a pair of color-blocked wedges that will probably be the death of me. But I look good. I look hot. Take that, Jack No-Last-Name.
“Really, I’m fine. Thanks.”
“Jack’s a prick and you should forget all about him.”
“Done.” I feel a stupid lump forming in my throat, but I push it down. If I were at home with Beth, I’d probably hide in my room until I was over him, because I wouldn’t want to hear about why I blew it with him by being myself. But I’m not with Beth. I’m with Kendra. I try a different tactic. “I really liked him.”
“I know you did. It’s not your fault he’s a complete wang.”
I slow my pace a bit, keeping the two of us about a half-block behind the rest of our group. I don’t want them to hear this. This is for Kendra’s ears only. “No one’s ever liked me before.”
The Sound of Us Page 15