“Go ahead and leave right now. I’ll contact the headmaster’s office for your mom.”
“Thanks, Jasmine,” she said, already making her way out of the restroom. Ellie couldn’t leave Georgetown Academy fast enough.
CHAPTER NINE
Thursday, 9:28am.
Taryn walked into her math class the next morning, wondering if Gabe would be there after his history class absence yesterday afternoon. She vowed that when she saw him, she would play it very cool. She didn’t want to be the girl awkwardly throwing herself at a guy who didn’t like her.
She didn’t have to wonder long if he’d show.
“The air hockey hustler. I can still taste that Ouzo in the back of my throat,” Gabe said, sliding into the seat next to hers. “I might need a rematch.”
His dark eyes flashed mischievously, and Taryn’s vow went straight out the window. Those were not the words of a guy who wasn’t at least a little interested.
“I don’t know. I might need a little more of a challenge,” Taryn answered.
“You free tomorrow night? I’m sure I can come up with something unexpected.”
Okay, more than a little interested.
“I just made plans to go to Cactus Cantina with Thatcher, Jenny and a couple other people.” Taryn was glad she didn’t seem too available. She wasn’t one to play games, but there was definitely something to the idea of the thrill of the chase.
“Okay, Saturday night then.”
“I’m game,” she said casually, as she opened her Algebra II book. She wanted to distract herself so she didn’t reveal just how excited she was.
Taryn rushed through dinner that night and now nestled herself among the plush purple throw pillows on her bed, her PowerBook on her lap. She desperately needed this Skype convo with her best friend, Lauren, and she wanted to make sure they squeezed it in before she went to bed.
“So we need to talk wardrobe for my date with Gabe,” Taryn told her, crossing one fuzzy pink slipper over the other. Lauren had aspirations of being a stylist one day and loved working her magic on Taryn.
Lauren swept the long blond hair off her face and leaned forward on her own bed, contemplating the subject as seriously as Taryn had been doing since math class that morning. Taryn could see the autographed True Blood poster hanging on the wall behind Lauren, courtesy of her studio-head father.
“I’m thinking effortlessly sexy,” Lauren finally answered.
“I was thinking that, too! But the weather here makes it really hard to pull off.”
“Does it, like, rain?” Lauren asked, the concept baffling to her since she had lived in L.A. all her life.
“Almost every single day,” Taryn responded. The rain had been depressing at first, but the thought of a date with Gabe in the rain somehow seemed romantic now.
“Then you need to make sure you have a really cute coat.”
Taryn looked toward her messy closet, her extensive wardrobe not even fully unpacked. “How about the belted red one I got last year at Planet Blue?”
“Yes! And wear that black shirt with all the buttons. Buttons immediately make a guy want to rip them off. It’s, like, primal or something. They can’t help themselves.”
“Good call,” Taryn replied, eyeing the shirt hung sloppily in her closet.
“I better get a bathroom text during the date. Gabe sounds like the perfect guy,” Lauren said, already having dissected Gabe’s Facebook photo earlier and concluding he was definitely as hot as Taryn had described. “Way better than Nick.”
Taryn agreed Gabe was a much better catch than her ex-boyfriend. She had thought it was love with Nick, who she had dated all last year and planned on losing her virginity to. But when she got cold feet at the last minute, he was such a jerk about it that she dumped him the next day. Thank god she hadn’t gone through with it.
“So have you told Ellie about the date?” Lauren asked, munching on the bar of dark chocolate she always let herself splurge on before bed.
“She wasn’t at school today.” Not that Taryn blamed her. Every news outlet was covering the campaign scandal Gabe’s dad had exposed about Ellie’s mom. It had already earned the annoying moniker of Strippergate and the school had practically been bursting out of its foundation with gossip about it. Taryn had been such an idiot for not realizing why Gabe and Ellie didn’t like each other, but she wasn’t used to thinking about people in terms of their parents. She could totally understand why Ellie had so much animosity toward Gabe, but it still felt really sad that all the students at G.A. had to fight their parents’ battles. There was already enough drama in high school to deal with. Taryn wanted to be honest with Ellie about her date with Gabe, but she wasn’t sure how she was going to bring it up now that the story between their parents was front and center.
“Oh! Did I tell you Carisse Kaplan started listening to Bob Marley and dreaded her hair?” Lauren asked, her sky blue eyes the size of saucers.
“No!” Taryn squealed. She settled herself even deeper into her pillows, knowing she would be on Skype for at least another two hours.
The next afternoon, Taryn was even more excited about her date as she skipped to the dining hall, an extra bounce in every step her wedge platform boots made on the concrete. As she pushed open the double doors, she threw an internal victory party for herself, for finally getting to lunch without getting lost. It was hard to believe the first day of school was just days ago. Everything had fallen into place so quickly, it seemed ridiculous now that she had let herself get so negative.
It was Friday, which apparently meant pizza day and the smell of melting cheese made Taryn’s stomach growl. Narc was already at their table, talking animatedly to the son of the Venezuelan ambassador (clearly the baseball coach had pulled some strings to conveniently get the rookie at the same table as Narc). Graham, with his newly single status, was sandwiched in between the two girls he was flirting with the other day, his arm casually draped around one of them. Taryn sat down on the opposite end, and just as she was wondering if Ellie was going to show up, she saw her walking over to the table, hand-in-hand with Hunter. The conversation she was going to have to have with her about Gabe was unavoidable now.
“I’ll see you after lunch,” Ellie said to him with a sweet smile. No wonder everyone at G.A. looked at them as the golden couple. They looked so perfect together, like they were totally in sync. Even their clothes seemed to coordinate with Ellie in an oversized winter-white sweater over black jeggings and Hunter in a black sweater with a white collar peeking out from the top of it.
He gave her a quick kiss, then whispered, “I love you” in her ear. It was like watching a Nicholas Sparks book come to life, but without all the sobbing and dying. Ellie watched him walk away almost wistfully.
“Hunter seems so great,” Taryn said as Ellie sat down beside her.
“He’s pretty amazing,” she responded thoughtfully. Taryn got the feeling she wasn’t used to bragging about him to other people, which was admirable considering everyone at this school seemed obsessed with Hunter. “I just feel really lucky to have him. He’s been so supportive with…you know…all this stuff coming out about my mom.”
“I’m so sorry about all that,” Taryn said.
Ellie gave her an appreciative smile. “Yeah. There’s nothing worse than reading a blog by a total stranger devoted to saying horrible things about your mother.”
“You can’t let yourself read that stuff. I’ve never even Googled my dad. It’s like all those writers forget they’re writing about actual human beings with families.” Taryn had been lucky that her father had been so well-received during his terms as governor. Sure, he got negative press from the other side, but there was no insane mud-slinging from his critics or crazy scandals surrounding their family. Hopefully, their luck would continue now that they were in D.C.
“I’m the opposite. I have a news alert on my phone so I get texts whenever there’s a story about my mom.”
“Ellie! Take that off
your phone! What’s the point? You know the stories are out there. You don’t need to put yourself through that.” When Taryn’s father was elected, they sat down as a family and hashed out how they would deal with toxic press. Her three siblings were all under the age of twelve, and it was important to Taryn’s dad that all his children were shielded from the twenty-four seven scrutiny. “My family tries to only stick to fact-based news organizations,” she told Ellie.
Ellie raised her eyebrow as if to suggest Taryn was being incredibly naïve. “Have you seen some of the headlines about my mom from the so-called fact-based news organizations?”
Ellie had a point. Unfortunately for her mom, the strip club her assistant campaign manager had taken the donors to was called The Booby Trap. It made for some interesting headlines.
“‘Marilyn Walker Didn’t Anticipate this Booby Trap.’ ‘Walker Stepped Right into Mills’ Booby Trap.’ It’s awful,” Ellie said with a sigh.
“I know. But your mom is awesome. She did the right thing and that will end up counting for something when all those reporters run out of their stupid puns. And as a long-standing member of Team Hillary, I can definitely say your mom has that same spark. All this outside stuff isn’t going to keep her from doing amazing things.”
Ellie nodded and her rigid posture relaxed a bit. Taryn had a feeling she and her mom were really close. Which made Taryn bringing up the Gabe sitch that much more difficult.
“Listen, I, um, wanted to talk to you about something. I just wanted you to hear it from me first,” Taryn started before she could change her mind about bringing it up.
Ellie leaned forward, her brow furrowed in worry. “What?”
“No, I mean, it’s not that big of a deal,” Taryn continued, starting to lose her nerve. “It’s just…Gabe and I are going on a date tomorrow night. And I know it must be weird for you to have to be at school with him while his dad is being so awful to your mom and I totally get it, but—”
“Taryn, don’t worry about it,” Ellie interrupted. “You should go out with him.”
Taryn wasn’t sure if she had heard her correctly. “Really? You’re cool with it? I want us to be friends without that getting in the way.”
Ellie nodded. “Me, too. I’m fine with it.” She sounded like she was fine with it, but her smile seemed a little tight. Taryn wasn’t going to dwell on that, though. If Ellie said it was cool with her, then Taryn was going to take her at her word.
Taryn exited her Biology class later that afternoon, happy to be headed to English. Not because she was excited to dissect the tangled romance of Catherine and Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights, but because it was her last class of the day. That meant she’d be one hour closer to her date with Gabe tomorrow.
She made her way toward her locker, passing by Thatcher. Taryn smiled and waved. Thatcher looked the other way.
“Hey, Thatcher,” Taryn said. He must not have seen her.
He entered a nearby classroom without turning around. That was weird. Taryn racked her brain to remember if anything strange happened earlier that would make him mad at her, but she couldn’t come up with anything. Maybe he really didn’t see her. Or hear her.
Her thoughts were interrupted when she saw Nora and Liesel walking toward her, their faces close together like they were sharing a secret. Taryn smiled at them. Even their invasive questions about her dad’s environmental policies couldn’t ruin a day like this.
“Hey, guys!” Taryn called out.
She knew they heard her because they looked directly at her, but neither of them said a word. Actually, they made a point to look away as they passed by her. Taryn’s stomach flipped over a few times. Something was wrong. She instinctively did an inventory of her face and body—nothing weird was in her hair, on her clothes or in her teeth. When she looked around at the other passing faces in the hallway, she realized this was not her imagination playing tricks on her. Students were pointing at her and whispering to each other as she made her way through the hall. Taryn’s stomach completely dropped.
She swallowed as she approached her locker. The guy who had his locker next to hers was putting his books away. He was in Taryn’s Biology class. Luke something. Luke Jensen.
“Hey, Luke,” Taryn started. She was waiting for him to completely ignore her, too, but thankfully, he didn’t.
“Hey,” he said slowly, almost apprehensively. He was having a hard time looking at her.
“Um, this might sound weird, but…is there something going on I’m missing? Like something that has to do with me?” she asked, her voice a little shaky.
Luke finally met her gaze. “All right, don’t kill the messenger, but word around school is you traded sexual favors with Nathan Wright for Percocet.”
The color drained from Taryn’s face. “What?! Who’s Nathan Wright?”
Luke gave her a funny look like he was contemplating whether or not Taryn was playing dumb. “Apparently he has an email chain between the two of you confirming the story.”
How was that possible? Taryn had never even met the guy!
She managed to mumble something to Luke, then made her way in a fog to her English classroom.
When she sat down in her seat, there were more stares and whispers. Everyone had heard about this. Taryn fought back the tears welling up in her eyes. They all believed this horrible rumor about her and no one had even asked for her side of the story. No one had given her the benefit of the doubt.
She pretended to be enthralled with her Wuthering Heights book when her half-senile English teacher, Mrs. Riggs, entered. As usual, she began immediately searching her desk for her bifocals. She miraculously found them underneath a messy stack of papers and then she looked directly at Taryn.
“Taryn, Headmaster Hopkins would like to see you in his office after school.”
A cacophony of “ooohs” followed a few mean-spirited smirks. This had just gotten much, much worse. Even the headmaster of the school wanted to discuss the rumor. Taryn was never one to buck authority, but there was no way she was going to that meeting without talking to her parents first. She would just bolt to her car the second class was over and pretend she never got the message.
The hungry, gossipy eyes of everyone in the room cloaked Taryn in a shroud of shame even though she was completely innocent. It was like they were ready to swallow her whole, then spit her back up in one swift motion. She tried not to look back at them, but her eyes inadvertently fell on Brinley Madison, sitting with her perfect posture in the row across from Taryn.
Brinley winked at her.
Taryn knew immediately she was the one who started this rumor. She was humiliated. Not just because the rumor about her was disgusting and untrue, but because she knew in that moment she had been a fool to think she could ever change the rules at Georgetown Academy.
***
Friday, 6:17pm.
Evan walked briskly through the halls of Today in Politics to the symphony of ringing phones, clicking keyboards and vibrant chatter. As she passed by the conference room, she looked at the muted flat screen on the wall and saw the news anchor was still reporting on Strippergate. She felt horrible for Marilyn Walker. Even though Evan had had a personal relationship with her, she didn’t feel biased in saying that Marilyn was one of the most ethical and moral politicians out there. It was unwarranted for Gabe’s dad to drag her through the mud like this. Again.
Evan turned the corner, nearly running into Paul Nelson’s assistant who was juggling six cups of Starbucks, and entered Maura’s cramped office. Maura was hunched over the computer, her eyes glued to the screen.
“Here are all the notes from the meeting,” Evan said as she tried to find a place for the thick folder among the ten thousand Post-its littering Maura’s desk. She was anxious to get out of there. She’d made plans to meet Gabe at the West End Cinema across town on M Street.
“Thanks,” Maura said, without looking up. “Oh, Samantha wants to see you in her office.”
Evan’s stomach er
upted in butterflies. “Do you know why?”
“She’s probably going to fire you.”
Evan’s jaw dropped.
“Evan, I’m kidding. Jesus, you need to lighten up,” Maura said without even smiling and still not looking up.
Evan frowned. The woman needed a little more finesse on the practical joke front.
“It’s something about someone at G.A.,” Maura added.
Evan made her way toward Samantha’s office, running through every possibility. Maybe she wanted to know if Evan was friends with Ellie, so Evan could give her some inside scoop on the Strippergate scandal.
Or even worse, Samantha could have heard the rumor about Taryn Reyes. It wouldn’t be that surprising. Whenever a scandal broke at school, it always seemed to make its way to the outside world somehow. Usually, if you had a parent who was powerful enough, the cover-up would begin mere seconds after the scandal occurred, but there was always the possibility someone leaked the story to the press before Taryn’s dad had a chance to intervene.
Evan would not substantiate the rumor. As much as she wanted to get on Samantha’s good side, she was not willing to throw Taryn under the bus when she didn’t even know what was true and what wasn’t. Someone could have easily made the whole thing up and faked those emails Nathan was apparently circulating. Evan would just tell Samantha that she didn’t feel comfortable commenting on it. Samantha would understand that. She was on her way to winning a Pulitzer.
Samantha was standing by the window, headset on, talking on the phone, a view of the Washington Monument directly behind her. Her pencil skirt and blouse made her thin frame look even more statuesque. She motioned for Evan to sit down as she clicked off her phone, removed her headset, and sat down at her desk. Her desk was much more organized than Maura’s. There was a place for everything and some of her files looked like they might even be color-coded.
“Thanks for stopping by, Evan,” she said, tapping a four-inch heel on the floor.
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