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A high peal of laughter from Laurel’s room broke through Emma’s reverie. It sounded like Madeline. She cocked her head and listened. Then she remembered—the Lying Game girls were there to work on the prank.
Emma rolled out of bed and pulled on a pair of yoga pants, then padded through the bathroom and opened Laurel’s door.
All the girls were scattered around Laurel’s room in T-shirts and jeans. Lili and Gabby lay sprawled across Laurel’s bed, both typing rapidly on their iPhones. Laurel sat at her desk, applying mascara in a magnifying mirror, while Madeline and Charlotte organized art supplies on the floor. Nisha was there, too, setting up a microphone and an old-fashioned audio recorder. Emma was glad to see that the other girls seemed to have accepted Nisha so easily.
“Good morning, Cinderella,” Charlotte said. “I brought you your glass slipper. And sustenance.” She pointed to the desk, where Emma’s gold heels—the ones she’d abandoned on Charlotte’s driveway in order to run barefoot after Ethan—sat next to a steaming coffee. Emma picked up the cup gratefully, blowing at the steam. She sat down on the floor and hugged Charlotte tight.
“Char, I’m so sorry about last night,” she said. “I hope the fight didn’t ruin your party.”
“Are you kidding? Everyone’s talking about it on Twitter,” Lili said without looking up from her phone. “Between that and my totally newsworthy conquest of Danny Catalano, this is the party of the year.”
Madeline snorted. “No one is talking about Danny Catalano but you. He’s been untouchable since that awful haircut.”
“It’s growing back,” Lili protested. “Plus, he’s an awesome kisser.”
Char turned to Emma. “It’s okay, Sutton. I know that craziness wasn’t your fault. But Twitter-Dumb is right—it did liven things up. Before Ethan went all Incredible Hulk on Thayer’s ass, the most exciting thing to happen was a spray-cheese fight some of the morons from the wrestling team got into on the back patio.”
Before Emma could say anything else, Madeline pointed at her accusingly. “So what’s going on with you and my brother, anyway? I thought you said you were through with him.”
“I am through with him, I promise.” Emma lifted her hands defensively. “We were talking, he kissed me, I didn’t pull away quickly enough, and Ethan saw. End of story. It was an accident.”
Madeline snorted. “You’re quite the safety hazard. Thayer sure seems to have a lot of accidents when you’re around.”
“Is he okay?” Emma asked. She felt a little guilty that she’d run after Ethan last night without checking on Thayer, but it had looked as if they hadn’t had enough time to do any serious damage. Plus, Ethan was her boyfriend, not Thayer.
“He’s fine,” Laurel said without looking up from her makeup. One eye was painted with bright teal glitter shadow, and the other was still natural, giving her a weird Clockwork Orange squint. “I drove him home right after the fight and helped him clean up. As usual,” she added pointedly.
Emma cringed. “I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt,” she said softly. She picked up a stuffed fox from Laurel’s bed and hugged it to her chest.
“You can’t help it. You’re basically catnip to boys,” Charlotte said dismissively. “Speaking of boys, did you make up with Ethan all right?”
“Um, yeah.” Emma hid her face behind her coffee cup, her cheeks burning. Charlotte’s eyes narrowed.
“Sutton, is there anything you’d like to tell us?” she asked, a wicked smile slowly stretching across her face. Madeline looked up curiously from the magazine she’d been leafing through. Even the Twitter Twins put down their phones.
“Is she, like, glowing?” Charlotte asked the others.
“I’d say she definitely made up with Ethan okay.” Madeline grinned.
Emma hugged her knees to her chest and beamed through her blushing cheeks. Laurel poked her in the side. “Talk, woman!”
“Okay, okay!” Emma said. “Ethan and I … last night, we … you know …”
The end of her sentence trailed off, but it didn’t matter. The room roiled with shrieks and giggles. Only Nisha was looking at Emma with concern. Emma cringed, remembering how she’d spilled the story of Ethan’s file to Nisha last night.
Emma ducked, trying to fend off the girls’ demands for details. “Use your imagination, ladies,” she said.
Madeline smirked. “You don’t want us to do that,” she deadpanned.
After that, all was forgiven, and the Twitter Twins started typing away on their phones, alerting their followers to “stay tuned” for a big event that night.
“Don’t give it all away,” grumbled Madeline. “If Celeste catches wind of anything, the whole thing is blown.”
“I don’t think she gets Twitter feeds on Mars,” said Gabby.
Laurel put on the new Rihanna album, and soon they were all sprawled across the floor, making various props and chatting about how the séance would turn out.
Emma went downstairs to grab a bag of pretzels and some Diet Cokes from the kitchen. She stopped in the living room, where Drake was curled up happily atop a sofa he definitely wasn’t allowed on. His tail flopped lazily against the cushions as she stroked his neck. For the first time in ages, she felt as if she was where she belonged.
“Hey.” Nisha’s voice interrupted her thoughts. She came over and rested a hand on Drake’s ear. “I love this dog,” she said, scratching him. “My dad’s allergic, so we’ve never been allowed to have one. I’d probably get something little that I could put clothes on, though.”
