Alphas (16 page)

“Alpha,” Allie J determined.

“Lauren Conrad?” Skye asked, twisting her blond waves into a high bun.

Allie J banged on her pillow like it was a buzzer. “Alpha!”

“You watch
The Hills
?” Triple lifted her arched brows in surprise.

“Um, only because they wanted to use one of my songs for the open. But I turned them down. Too superficial.”

“Know your history, Allie J!” Skye admonished. “Didn’t you watch
Laguna Beach
? Once a beta, always a beta. Vanessa Hudgens?”

“Not alpha,” Triple insisted.

“How can you say that?” Allie J asked vehemently. “Record deal. Huge box office. And Zac?”

“You can’t be alpha if your boyfriend is more famous than you,” Triple
duh
ed, slamming the cap on the moisturizer as if her word was final.

Allie J turned to Charlie and smirked. “So true.”

An invisible hand grabbed Charlie’s heart and squeezed.

“See anything you’d like to report?” Allie J snapped.

Charlie lay down on her bed and looked up at the dome skylight overhead. The moon was a smile-shaped sliver, and a single
star glowed beside it. She thought of Darwin’s mouth and the freckle she had kissed so many times.

Allie J pointed at her wrist, where a watch should be. “We should get going.”

“No way. Mission’s off.” Triple ran the leftover moisturizer through her nonexistent split ends.

“Why?” Allie J hissed through clenched teeth like a rookie ventriloquist. She was accessorizing her bedtime tank–boy shorts
combo with a thin cotton scarf. She looked half rollergirl, half hipster.

“Were you not there when Renee got chopped?” Skye eased herself back against her pillows and eyed Charlie with a mix of thanks
and respect. She patted the lavender shoe that hung from her lamp. For a moment she looked like she was homesick too.

Charlie smiled back shyly.

“Big picture, Allie J.” Skye extended her graceful arms, palms up. “Boy you met yesterday.” She raised her left hand to shoulder
level. “Or dream you’ve had since you were in vitro.”

Charlie snickered.
You mean in utero,
she wanted to say but didn’t dare. Besides, she had respect for Skye and her newfound priorities. Charlie had never imagined
the girl who used boys’ lips to blot her lip gloss would lead the charge away from them. But here she was, holding Allie J
back like a sports bra.

“Why can’t we have both?” Allie J countered.

A nauseating wave of déjà vu flooded Charlie and she fell back against her comforter. After all, she’d just been confronted
with the same choice yesterday and had regretted her decision ever since.

“Because
both
isn’t an option right now, okay?” Skye snapped. “We all have to make sacrifices for the things we want most. Believe me,
I don’t like it either.” She switched off her light and turned onto her side.

Something about what Skye said must have resonated with Allie J too, because she released a defeated sigh and climbed into
her bed. “I guess.”

“Smart choice,” Thalia called from downstairs. Charlie had forgotten about her exceptional hearing. “As the Dalai Lama says,
‘Sleep is the best meditation.’” And with that, the overhead lights flicked off.

Charlie sighed with relief and climbed under her covers. One by one, the girls’ breathing slowed and steadied. Skye released
a purr-snore, and Triple covered herself to the eyebrows with her comforter.

Charlie flipped onto her side and saw two green catlike eyes glaring at her in the darkness.

“I’m watching you,” Allie J whispered. And then she rolled over.

Charlie began to sweat, and her nightgown adjusted by auto-rolling up the sleeves and shortening the hem. The dwindling tank
made her think of how she acted around Shira, shrinking into herself so she wouldn’t get in the way.

Well, it was time for all that to change. Time to show Shira she was more than a spy for hire. Time to show her roommates
she could be trusted. And time to show Darwin that she was doing it all for him.

The vibe at breakfast was more grave than a cemetery until Allie’s aPod vibrated.

Darwin!

It had been well over ten hours since their last correspondence, and she’d been starting to wonder if getting her poetic license
publicly suspended by Keifer had turned him off. Angling away from Thalia and her superhuman senses, she clicked to read.
But it was simply another spy joke from “anonymous.” Just like the ones before it.

Q:
Why does Shira wear dark glasses?

A:
She has Charlie for eyes.

A chorus of suppressed snickers followed. But Allie was the only one who dared peek at Charlie’s reaction. Everyone else was
too afraid of being Reneed.

Allie waited to see if Charlie would shovel down her eggs Benedict, like one of those remorseless characters on
The Sopranos
whose appetites were unaffected by their crimes. Instead she drew a sad face in the low-fat, protein-enriched hollandaise
sauce pooling on her plate, then went Jackson Pollock on it with the prongs of her fork.

Allie sighed. Shira wasn’t in the cafeteria in person, but she was there in weather. Fat raindrops pelted the glass dome,
each loud splat sounding like the blade of a guillotine drop-slicing someone’s head off.

Prue, the redhead dancer from Chanel House, approached the table with a girl named Soofie, who was famous for inventing a
new, nondamaging hair-straightening process she’d trademarked as Soofer Smooth. “We’re so sorry about Renee,” Prue said in
a whisper, as if Renee had died. There had been a steady stream of girls stopping by to honor Renee’s memory and pay their
respects to the Jackie O’s.

Triple shrugged, then stirred her Dancer’s Detox tea. “She’ll be fine. I heard
Dancing with the D-List
is coming back for another season.”

Prue laughed with her shoulders.

“Either way.” Soofer leaned a little closer to Charlie. “I’m sure whoever told on her had a perfectly good reason for it.”

Allie’s stomach sank on behalf of the ousted actress. Sure she’d miss her partner in crush-crime, but truth be told, they’d
only known each other for a day. The bigger issue was what could have been. Or rather, what
should
have been. Wouldn’t any normal girl with the power to vote someone off the island choose her ex’s new picnic partner? Why
was Allie still here?

Their aPods vibrated again. This time Allie knew better than to get her hopes up. Still, she did. And once again, another
anonymous aJoke landed on her screen where Darwin’s latest text should have been.

Q:
Did you hear about Charlie’s new clothing line?

A:
It’s called Spyware.

“Totally immature.” Prue smiled at Charlie, clearly trying to get on her good side.

Charlie pushed her plate aside, obviously over more than breakfast, and Allie washed another bite of mushroom goo down with
a sip of lemon spritzer, musing over how quickly life here had changed. Just yesterday, everyone had been fighting for the
upper hand. Today it was for survival.

“Where are the boys?” Allie asked, after Prue finally left.

“Sydney said they’re stuck eating with Shira,” Skye reported.

“Since when is Sydney texting you?” Triple casually ripped off a piece of her croissant. “I thought he liked Renee.”

“It’s a text, not a marriage proposal,” Skye defended lightly.

Allie felt her fake eggs creep back up her throat. If Sydney had gotten over Renee in a matter of hours, what did that mean
for her and Darwin? She wasn’t sure she could handle another rejection—or another identity change. She knew her hair couldn’t.
Any more dye and it would break off at the roots.

Allie lifted her spoon, her reflection fun-housing in the convex silver base. She took comfort in seeing her beauty in the
same way she imagined a singer would be happy to hear her own voice after a bout of laryngitis—glad her gift was still there
even in times of crisis. But why wasn’t it enough to compel Darwin to call her?

“Good morning, Becca Nash here from the Serena/Venus House.” A girl with slicked-back hair shook everyone’s hand but Allie’s,
which managed to grab a fork just in time. Purell was scarce on Alpha Island. Better rude than ew-ed.

“I’m a journalism major, and let me just say, you haven’t felt wind until you’ve tried to hold onto a microphone in that tornado
simulator Shira built for us.” She held her smile, then turned to Charlie. “Not that I’m complaining. I mean, I loved it.
Blew the zits right off my face. And the experience was invaluable. I hope to get a lot of more it over the year.” She smiled
again. “A lot.”

Charlie tried to return the smile. It looked more like she was holding in a burp.

“Mind if I ask you a few questions?”

The girls looked at each other in confusion.

“‘It’s better to know some of the questions than all of the answers,’” Thalia chimed in. “James Thurber.”

“Shoot,” Triple finally said, gathering her straight hair over one shoulder, then angling her body left.

“Great.” Becca lifted a mascara wand–size video camera; the red record light was already on. Suddenly the girls appeared live
on the Pavilion’s oversize plasma.

Becca licked her bleached teeth and began. “Skye Hamilton, as a roommate of both the recently expelled Renee Foraday and Charlotte
Deery—who has been indicted for espionage in the court of public opinion—what can you tell us?”

Everyone’s attention was fixed on the broadcast, the scraps of their English muffins and energy smoothies forgotten on their
tables. The Pavilion was utterly silent. Not a single utensil clinked.

Charlie lowered her head into her hands.

Skye smiled at the camera and cleared her throat. “No comment.”

“So, do you think Charlie should remain at Alpha Academy?” Becca pressed.

“I’m not a spy, okay!” Charlie practically shouted.

Everyone gasped. Becca turned her mascara-camera toward her.

“
I
believe you.” Skye gently touched her hand, then checked to make sure it was in the camera shot. “But can you prove it?”

Charlie balked. “What? How could I possibly—”

“I think it would really put people at ease and help clear your name if you could just—”

“Swear on Darwin’s life,” Allie interrupted. Charlie was neither gifted nor talented and had less drive than a Kia. The only
alpha thing about her was her access to Shira Brazille. And Skye was so obviously afraid of being next, she was concealing
Charlie’s true identity like Cover Girl.

“That’s stupid,” Charlie hissed.

“Do it! Swear on Darwin’s life that you’re not Shira’s spy and we’ll believe you.”

“I can’t, that’s crazy. We’re not three years old.” Charlie pushed back from the table with a screech and raced for the exit.

Skye arched one blond eyebrow directly at the camera lens.

“Well, I guess that answers that question,” Triple put in.

With an outstretched arm, the reporter turned the camera on herself. “This is Becca Nash with a self-produced update. Because
reporting is my passion and no news is no fun.”

Finally free to react, the Pavilion erupted in a swirl of commentary.

Over the din, Thalia called, “Charlie, leaving before dismissal is against the rules.” But Charlie kept running, forcing the
muse to chase after her.

“Maybe she’ll have to kick herself out,” Triple joked, stretching her funny bone.

Allie nodded grimly and picked up her phone. If Charlie was the spy, then her time here was limited. She couldn’t be sure
why she hadn’t been the first to go, but surely she would be the next. And she wasn’t going to spend another night missing
out on a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. She positioned her thumbs over the aPod.

Allie J:
I started a new song: No one kept Romeo and Juliet apart/Imagine if we changed the end and healed their heart? If you want
to hear the rest, meet me tonight.

She pressed
SEND
and imagined the message sailing toward Darwin on the wings of an air kiss. Almost immediately, her aPod buzzed in her hands.

Darwin:
Cant wait to hear it. C u l8r.

And then it happened, her first shock of inspiration. The title of her memoir would be
Carpe Darwin: The story of a girl who risked it all for love.

All she needed now was a happy ending.

Skye danced in the middle of the drum circle, her feet siphoning the beat from the all glass floor and distributing it to
the rest of her body. Life pumped through her in a primal sort of way, transforming her from a skilled dancer into a wild
creature of expression.

Triple, Prue, and the other tightly wound buns stretched on the sidelines.

“Skye, you can stop dancing,” Mimi announced. “Good work.”

Padding over to the barre, Skye squeezed in beside the other dancers and began loosening her joints.