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“Anyway,” Daneca says, “there’s a rally next Thursday, and I want the whole HEX club to go. I got Ms. Ramirez, acting as our adviser, to apply for buses and everything. It’s going to be a school trip.”
“Really?” Sam says. “That’s great.”
“Well.” She sighs. “It’s not exactly a go. Ramirez said that Wharton or Northcutt would have to approve her request. And we’d have to get enough HEX members to sign up. So, can I count on you guys?”
“Of course we’ll go,” says Sam, and I level a glare in his direction.
“Whoa,” I say, holding up my hand. “I want more details. Like does this mean we have to make our own signs? How about ‘Worker Rights for Everyone Except People Who Don’t Need Them’ or ‘Legalize Death Work Today. Solve Overpopulation Tomorrow!’?”
The corner of Sam’s mouth lifts. I can’t seem to stop myself from being a jerk, but at least I’m amusing someone.
Daneca starts to say something else, when Kevin LaCroix comes up to the table. I look at him with undisguised relief. Kevin drops an envelope into my messenger bag.
“That stoner dude, Jace, says he hooked up with someone over the summer,” Kevin whispers. “But I hear all the pictures he’s showing around are really pictures of his half sister. Fifty bucks says there’s no girlfriend.”
“Find someone to bet that he did hook up or does have a girlfriend, and I’ll give you odds,” I say. “The house doesn’t bet.”
He nods and heads back to his table, looking disappointed.
I started being the school bookie back when Mom was in jail and there was no way I could afford all the little stuff that doesn’t come with the price of tuition. A second uniform so that the one you had could get washed more than once a week, pizza with your friends when they wanted to go out, plus sneakers and books and music that didn’t fall off a truck somewhere or get shoplifted out of a store. It isn’t cheap to live near the rich.
After Kevin LaCroix leaves, Emmanuel Domenech drops by. I get enough traffic to keep Sam and Daneca from being able to point out how obnoxious I’ve been. They spend their time writing notes back and forth in Daneca’s notebook as other students casually turn over envelope after envelope—each one, a brick rebuilding my tiny criminal empire.
“I bet Sharone Nagel will get stuck wearing the mascot fur suit to football games.”
“I bet the Latin club will sacrifice one of its members at the spring formal.”
“I bet Chaiyawat Terweil will be the first person to get called into Headmistress Northcutt’s office.”
“I bet the new girl just got out of a loony bin.”
“I bet the new girl just broke out of a prison in Moscow.”
“I bet Mr. Lewis will have a nervous breakdown before winter break.”
I note down each bet for and against these in a code I created, and tonight Sam and I will calculate the first master list of odds. They’ll change as we get more bets, of course, but it gives us something to tell people at breakfast if they want to know where to throw their cash. It’s amazing how rich kids get itchy when they can’t spend money fast enough.
Just like criminals get itchy when we’re not working all the angles.
* * *
As we get up to go back to our rooms, Daneca punches my arm. “So,” she says. “Are you going to tell us why you’re such a moody bastard tonight?”
I shrug. “I’m sorry. I guess I’m just tired. And an idiot.”
She reaches up to put her gloved hands around my neck and mock-chokes me. I play along, falling to the floor and pretending to die, until she finally laughs.
I’m forgiven.
“I knew I should have brought a blood packet,” Sam says, shaking his head like we’re humiliating him.
It is at that moment that Audrey walks by, hand in hand with Greg Harmsford. Audrey, who was once my girlfriend. Who dumped me. Who, when we were dating, made me feel like a normal person. Who I could have, maybe, once, convinced to take me back. Who now doesn’t even look at me as she passes.
Greg, however, narrows his eyes and smiles down at me like he’s daring me to start something.
I’d love to wipe that smug expression off his face. First, though, I’d have to get up off my knees.
* * *
