Hallie Hath No Fury . . . (3 page)

I knew that I shouldn't be doing it, that I should be respecting Gemma's privacy, but I found myself flipping more pages, a warm feeling spreading through my chest as I read through our summer together, filtered through her eyes. She wrote about us making s'mores together (she burned hers and we shared mine) hanging out at the beach, eating saltwater taffy. It was a reminder of how great a friend she'd been all summer, and as I scanned through the pages, I felt that I should really call her. No matter what her dad did, we'd been friends, and I was feeling, as I read through these entries, just how much I was missing her.

I flipped another page and felt my breath catch in my throat. I frowned, then squinted down at the paper, sure that I'd read it wrong, sure that I was misunderstanding.

I was wrong this whole time about Dad and Karen. Everyone knows except me. They must think I'm so stupid. My parents are never going to get back together if she's around. Their trial separation will turn into a real one.

So I have to get Karen to leave.

I have to make Hallie miserable so she'll take her mom with her and go.

I don't want to but it's what I have to do. This is the whole future of my family. I have to see it through, no matter what happens.

I blinked down at the page, willing the letters to arrange themselves into some different kind of order, trying to get them to make some kind of sense. Because this … this meant … I flipped the pages and felt tears start to slide down my face.

Tried to sabotage Hallie's first kiss. Didn't work … will have to try something else.…

Thought the birthday party thing would work—she looked pathetic sitting all alone, her mom comforting her, not knowing it was me. I felt bad, but I thought it would work for sure. But it didn't.… I have to think bigger.…

Dad told me he's thinking about getting a place in Brooklyn when the summer's over. I know it's because he wants to keep dating Karen.… What happened to him and my mom thinking things over this summer? How's he supposed to do that from Brooklyn? I need to do something big.…

I have an idea. I'm hoping it'll work. It's going to happen tomorrow night, at the dinner party. And if things go according to plan, Karen will think my dad's behind it and break up with him.…

I had reached the end of the journal. There was nothing else after that—but of course, I knew what happened next. It was my mother's career wrecked, our exit from the Hamptons, my mother barely able to get out of bed for weeks.

I sank down to the ground, as though that would help me process what I'd just read. Because I couldn't get my head around it. It was like my brain wouldn't
let
me believe in this new reality. But there it was, in front of me, in ink and pencil, in Gemma's own handwriting, refusing to be ignored.

Gemma.

It had been Gemma.

All of it, this whole time, had been Gemma.

She'd been my friend to my face while secretly plotting the best ways to hurt me behind my back. She'd gone to her journal and made notes when things hadn't seemed successful enough, or when I hadn't seemed upset enough that she'd ruined my birthday and botched my first kiss. She'd been thrilled when I'd broke down and cried, because that meant her plan was on track. And sure, she expressed moments of doubt that she should be doing this, but those were quickly swept away, and she was on to the next thing.

My tears were falling faster now, and I stopped even trying to brush them away. I'd never felt a betrayal like this, ever. It felt like a rug had been pulled out from under me. More than a rug—it was like the ground underneath my feet was shaky and I didn't know how to balance.

I just couldn't get over the coldness of it, the planning that had gone into it. She was making notes about the best ways she could hurt me, devising strategy … and this whole time, I hadn't had a clue. I'd just thought she was one of my best friends, and so I was confiding in her and sharing my secrets.… I took a shaky breath and wiped underneath my eyes.

I was starting to feel nauseous as I stared down at the last entry, the one about the dinner party. She seemed to think it would just get my mom to break up with Paul. But I figured Gemma must have been thrilled things had gotten so bad. She was probably back in the Hamptons celebrating, and laughing at how easy I'd been to fool. Suddenly, her expression in the car made sense. Of course she hadn't wanted to look me in the eye—I would have seen how thrilled she was with her victory.

Something cold and hard started to take shape in my chest as I brushed the last of my tears away. I wasn't going to let her get away with this. I needed to tell my mom, at least, that Paul had nothing to do with it. And then Gemma would get in terrible trouble, and then … I wasn't sure what came next. I was hoping there was something I could go to the police with here, but I just figured I'd take it one step at a time.

I grabbed the notebook and ran out of my room, heading for my mother's room. She had to know the truth. She had to know that Paul hadn't done this to her.

I opened my mother's door without knocking, expecting to find her hunched over her laptop, but the room was empty and dark. I backtracked toward the kitchen, where Masha was sitting at the kitchen counter, slowly peeling potatoes in a methodical manner. “Where's my mom?” I asked, and even I could hear how frantic my voice sounded. “I need to talk to her.”

“Mama went to library,” Masha said, looking up from her potato and raising an eyebrow at me. “She said she needed to work. What is problem?”

“I need to tell her something,” I said, clutching the journal so tightly, I was in danger of ripping the pages. “I have to talk to her.”

Masha raised an eyebrow at me and then pushed out one of the kitchen chairs with her foot. “What is up, child?” she asked, and I could see a slight frown appearing between her eyes. “Tell Masha what's what.”

I looked at the door, considering just making a run for it and not stopping until I reached the carrel at the library that my mom liked to write in. But as I thought it through, I realized I didn't even know what I would say to her. I hadn't been able to get my thoughts together, and would probably just confuse her. And even though I wanted to get this taken care of
now
—and make sure Gemma was on her way to the grounding of her life by dinnertime—I realized that I probably should get my thoughts in some kind of order.

“Someone…” I started, hearing my voice shake, “did terrible things to me. And my mother. She…” I closed my eyes tightly, trying to block out the thoughts of the betrayal that still were hitting me with what felt like physical pain.

Masha shook her head. “And you want her to pay,” she said, and I could hear the slight amusement in her voice. She probably thought this was something small, some kids' problem. “I can tell you are mad, Hallie. But in my country, we have a saying—
Do not kill pig before blade is sharp
.”

“Ew,” I said, pretty sure that this was an expression I'd never heard before. I had a feeling I would have remembered it.

“Or,
Do not burn the field when it has not yet given corn
.”

“I really don't understand these,” I said, feeling more lost than ever, and also quite sure this had nothing to do with my situation.

Masha sighed and shook her head. “You know, is like…” Suddenly she smiled, like she'd hit upon what she'd been looking for. “I know how you say here.
Revenge is a dish best served cold.
”

Her words hung between us in the kitchen, and suddenly, it was like I could begin to understand what she'd been saying this whole time. “Oh,” I said softly, my mind starting to spin with new possibilities. Maybe I didn't need justice—not the kind that either of our parents would mete out, at any rate. Maybe I could get her
back.

“Not that I'm saying revenge is good,” Masha said hurriedly, maybe seeing where my head was going. “But that you shouldn't do anything when you're so mad. Think about it, yeah? Sleep on it. Things will seem better in the morning.”

“Right,” I said quickly, nodding, giving her a wide smile. “You're right. I'm going to think about it. Right now, in fact.” I headed out the door, still gripping the journal.

“Good girl,” Masha called after me. “You come and set the table in fifteen minutes.”

I hurried down the hallway to my room, then closed the door behind me and leaned back against it. My head was spinning, and my thoughts were going in a direction they'd never gone before.

Revenge.

Revenge.

What if I did this? What if I figured out a way to do to Gemma what she'd done to me? Getting Gemma in trouble for a few days or a week or even a month no longer seemed as appealing. I hadn't even known this was an option ten minutes ago, but now it was the only thing I could think about. I wanted to wreck her life the way she'd wrecked mine. I wanted her to feel that horrible sick sense of betrayal I'd felt when I'd read the journal. I wanted to do to her everything she'd done to me—but worse.

I could feel hot tears forming behind my eyes and closed them hard against it. Had Gemma even realized what she'd done to me? What she'd done to our family? She'd broken my mother's heart and wrecked her source of income. Since it was just the three of us, I'd felt protective of my mother, and the fact that Gemma was so willing to hurt her, to hurt all of us, so easily.…

I realized with a cold feeling stealing over me that she did probably realize. She just didn't care.

I could feel my heart pounding, and I wanted to begin immediately—the problem was, I had no idea how to start or what to do.

“Best served cold,” I muttered to myself. That meant being cool and calm and not acting in the moment. I needed to let go of the idea that I'd be getting Gemma back tomorrow or the next day. And in the meantime, I had to figure out how to go about this.

My hands clenched into fists at my sides as I thought about Gemma, lines from the journal playing over and over in my mind. There was no way I was going to walk away from this wrong. Gemma had hurt me and my family worse than anyone ever had. And I wanted to burn her life to the ground.

I suddenly had an idea, and I headed out of my room and down the hall to my mother's room. I scanned her bookshelves and the piles of books on either side of the bed, and finally found it—
The Count of Monte Cristo.

I took it back to my own room, locked the door behind me, and settled back against my pillows.

And then I started to read.

CHAPTER 4

Do your research.

Be patient.

Find out EVERYTHING you can.

Learn weak spots and exploit them.

Observe.

Be RUTHLESS.

 

I looked up from my notebook and stretched out my fingers, which had started to cramp. It had been a month since Masha had inadvertently steered me on the path to revenge, and I had been busy. I'd started using a new notebook, a plain composition book I'd gotten at the drugstore. And in the month I'd been working on this, it was more than half filled up. My mother was still absorbed in her mystery writing project—she left every day, early in the morning, went to the library, and didn't come back until they closed. Then she'd have dinner with us, trying her best to participate but, I could tell, only half-there. And then she'd shut herself in her room again and work until late at night, a strip of light and the faint sound of the keyboard clacking coming from behind her closed door. I was thrilled about this, not only because she was writing and not sleeping all day, but because it meant that she was paying absolutely no attention to me. Which, at the moment, was a very good thing.

I'd used my birthday money and bought my own copy of
The Count of Monte Cristo
. And after struggling to get through it the first time—in addition to dense language and endless paragraphs describing things, it was
long—
I'd read it again, this time taking notes, highlighting and scribbling in the margins. Then I'd transferred those lessons into my notebook. I'd been spending almost as much time at the library as my mother. I checked out any books I could about revenge, and spent hours in front of the computers, searching the Internet for famous revenge stories and studying them. What went right. What went wrong. Who succeeded—and if they didn't, why not. It seemed like most of the time, when a revenge plot went awry, it was because someone had gotten cold feet, lost their nerve at the last minute, let sentiment get in the way. But I knew that wasn't going to happen to me. Any time I felt myself wavering, I'd pull out Gemma's notebook and read it, and that was all the push I would need.

I'd gotten a list of famous revenge movies and started setting the DVR to tape what I could find on TV, checking the rest out from the library. Most of them were old and black-and-white, and in most cases, revenge was used as a cautionary tale. But sometimes, the heroes got away with it. And it was these I would rewind and watch over and over again, my heart pounding in my throat, studying the actors' faces at their moment of triumph, trying to imagine what mine would look like when I got my revenge on Gemma.

*   *   *

Don't ask for anything.

Let them think it's their idea.

Find out what someone loves most. Then take this from them. In front of them, if possible.

People will talk themselves out of things—give them another explanation.

Never start anything you can't walk away from.

I looked down at my notebook and ran my fingers over these last letters. This lesson had come from a Korean revenge film I'd watched with subtitles, squeezing my eyes shut during the violent parts. It was almost the end of the summer, and my notebook was getting close to full. But whenever I would feel the fury at Gemma start to overtake me—the anger so intense it scared me—I would read through the notebook again. These lessons and maxims, all so cool and composed, would help me calm down. My heart rate would slow, and the anger would fade. Just looking at everything I'd written helped me see that even though Gemma had gotten away with this for the moment, there was a change coming. Not now, not any time soon, but, like a wave that builds and builds before it crests on the shore, there would be a reckoning before too long.