Mission (Un)Popular (22 page)

“The door was unlocked,” Matt answered.

“You have a thing for trespassing, don't you? You should leave.”

“Or else what? You're going to throw jelly beans at me?”

Matt smiled, taking a handful from one of the bowls we'd set out. The guys behind him laughed. The one with the shaved head flopped down on the sofa like he owned the place.

Em took a step forward. “Hey, hey,” Matt said. “Chill. We're not staying long. We just want to hear that SubSonic single you claim to have.” Matt walked over and joined his friend on the couch. “And also, I think you should tell me you're sorry about what you did to my girlfriend.”

“I didn't do anything to your girlfriend. But your girlfriend broke my best friend's leg…so if anybody should be apologizing…” As terrified as I was, I still couldn't help doing a small happy-dance on the inside.
Best friend?!
“And sorry,” Em went on, “but you already missed the premiere of the single.” As she said this, Em grabbed a CD off the shelf behind her and held it up. “If you'd had an invitation, which you don't, you would have known you were supposed to be here at seven.” She held the disk tightly against her stomach.

“Well, why don't you just play it again?” Matt suggested, putting his feet up on the coffee table to make it clear he wasn't going anywhere. The big East Asian guy stuck one hand out and leaned against the wall near the stairs, blocking the exit to make the same point. “Or better yet, give it to me. I'll listen to it at home,” Matt added. Em stepped forward again so that she was directly in front of me. At first I thought it was sweet—like she was protecting me, her broken-legged best friend—but then she extended her arm, straight back…so quickly that nobody saw. I felt something cold and sharp touch my hand—the edge of a CD,
the real
CD. I took it, slipping my hand awkwardly behind my crutch and quickly shoving the disk down the back of my super-tight elasticized black skirt.

“Not happening,” Em said, making a show of putting the fake CD behind her back.

Matt got up off the sofa and started walking toward her. “Listen, just give it to me, and then we'll leave. No problems.” Ken, who'd been standing on the sidelines, stepped forward now, putting himself between Em and Matt.

“Just take off, man. Nobody wants you here.”

“Like I said, I'll take off once she gives me the CD. What's the big deal anyway? She can burn herself another copy.”

“This is an unreleased single,” Em said, peering around Ken. “Nobody's going anywhere with it.”

“Come on. Let's just make this easy, okay? Give me the CD.” Matt lunged forward to get past Ken, but before he could reach Em, she'd darted around the other side and hurdled over the smaller sofa, knocking it down as she went. The big guy blocking the stairs made a grab for her, but she faked a left, then slipped around the right, dashing up the basement stairs. Matt chased after her, tripping on Ken's outstretched foot and crashing into the coffee table, spilling drinks everywhere. “Get her!” he shouted from the floor, and the two high school guys started after Em. Ken was right behind them…and Charlie Baker, Steve, Anderson, and most of the girls' volleyball team weren't far behind. I watched them go, knowing I couldn't follow on my crutches anyway.…Plus, I had bigger things to worry about. Em had trusted me with the most important job of all—keeping the SubSonic single safe. I couldn't let her down. And I could only think of one place where Matt and his goons wouldn't be able to get to it. I walked quickly down the hall—the CD pressing a cold circle against my back—and pushed open the door to the bathroom with my crutch. I flipped on the light.

“Hey!” I froze. There, washing his hands at the sink, was Gorgeous George.

“Sorry!” I squeaked, thankful at least that that was all I'd caught him doing. I came in and shut the door, locking it behind me. I didn't have time to explain. “You had the light off!”

He shrugged. “Couldn't find the switch.” Then he made a move to get around me to the door. “Do you mind?”

“Yes,” I said. “No. I mean, you can't go out there right now.” I teetered on my crutches and nearly fell into the wall. George caught my arm and steadied me. I winced as my cast touched the floor. My leg was still killing me. “Sarah's boyfriend Matt is here with two of his friends. They're trying to get the SubSonic CD from Em, but she slipped it to me. I have to hide it in here. It's the only way!” I finished breathlessly, reaching around and pulling the CD basically out of my underpants. He stared at it, then at me. “So you have to stay in here,” I explained. “To help me protect it. If this single falls into Matt's hands and gets leaked, do you know what it would do to K.wack'ed's career?” I didn't actually know if it would make any real difference, but it sounded urgent, and it worked.

“All right.” George nodded. He walked around me and hopped into the Jacuzzi, where he stretched out his legs and reached his hands up behind his head. “If we're staying a while, I might as well get comfortable,” he explained when I looked at him.

Suddenly, the hugeness of the situation hit me. I was alone, in a bathroom, with Gorgeous George. And not only that, he was in a Jacuzzi. With his clothes on, but still! For something to do, I opened the little purse Em had given me and took out my painkillers. I turned on the tap, cupped my hands underneath the water, and took two more. After all, my leg was really hurting, and I'd accidentally missed a dose earlier. I probably needed to catch up.

When I was done, I walked over, propped my crutches against the wall, and sat down on the edge of the Jacuzzi with my back to George. You could have cut the awkwardness with a knife. I was thankful that someone in the rec room had turned the music back up. The thumping beat gave me something to focus on.

“So. That song was awesome, eh?” I said finally.

“It rocked,” he answered. “I wish I could hear it again.”

“I know,” I said, letting my head fall to one side against the tile wall. The cool ceramic felt nice on my cheek. “Me too.”

We sat without talking for a minute—him, marveling at the incredibleness of the “Velocity” song; me, marveling at the incredibleness of sitting beside him. I closed my eyes. Overhead, we could hear crashing footsteps, then a thud, like more furniture tipping over.

“Did you see any of Shane Marlowe's tattoos when you met him?” George asked, out of nowhere. “Huh? Tattoos?” I opened my eyes and blinked a few times to focus them.

“Like, the rabbit or the cobra?” I had no idea what he was talking about. And for some reason, when he said cobra, I heard korma, which is this Indian curry dish my mom used to make sometimes (in our pre-VTV days) when she was trying to honor my heritage. I don't really like it, though. Too spicy.

“He has a tattoo of korma? Who?” I asked.

“A cobra,” George corrected. “Shane Marlowe…K.wack'ed.”

“Oh!” I said, much too suddenly, remembering that, apparently, I was supposed to have met him once at an amazingly cool party. I started laughing. “Right. Duh. No. He was wearing long sleeves that day.”

“The cobra tattoo is on his ankle.”

“And pants. Obviously. It wasn't a naked party.”

“Oh. Just, I thought you said he was wearing a bathing suit. So I thought maybe…”

“Right. Well. Yeah. But he was mostly in the water. And then he got dressed and came inside. It was raining. My hair looked
so
bad. But then it always looks bad.” As soon as I said it, I started kicking myself internally. I hadn't even
been
at Em's modeling pool party. And since it was a huge lie anyway, I might as well have said that my hair looked amazing.

“I like your hair,” he said. My heart almost stopped beating. I turned to look at him over my shoulder.

“Really?”

“Yeah. It's big.” He closed his eyes and lay back against the headrest of the Jacuzzi, then took a deep breath like he was trying to inhale the moment. I watched him with a whole new level of adoration. All of a sudden I could see it so clearly. He liked me. I knew he did. I mean, there was nobody else there—just the two of us. He didn't
need
to tell me that he liked my big hair. There was no reason to lie to each other.

He opened his eyes, then flipped his hair, dispersing the ocean air smell of his shampoo. It was like breathing in a waft of pure dreaminess. I couldn't help myself. Before I knew what I was doing, I'd turned all the way around and reached into the hot tub to brush one of the stray strands back from his face. My fingers slid through so easily, I'd swear his hair was made of pure, spring-fed water.

“I like your hair too,” I said. He turned to look at me. Our eyes locked, and suddenly we were connecting on a whole new level. I could just feel it. So I opened up my heart to him.

“Um—” he started to say, but I cut him off.

“I think you're gorgeous,” I said, before the moment could slip away. “I think you're so cool.”

“Umm. Okay.” He narrowed his eyes at me, like I was mysterious, like he couldn't quite figure me out. “You're…pretty cool too. I guess.”

“There was this time in third grade when we went on a field trip to the arena to skate. I kept falling down. And you came up to me and helped me up off the ice. You were wearing black mittens. Do you remember? With pictures of hockey sticks on them.”

“Um. Not exactly,” he said. “Third grade was a while ago.”

“I know,” I said. “But I've just always wanted you to know—that meant a lot to me.”

There was a knock on the door and we both looked up.

“Somebody has to pee,” I said seriously. “We should let them in. But I'm really glad we talked like this.” I handed him the CD. “Stash it between those towels, okay?” He reached up to the shelf behind him and slid the disk in. Meanwhile, I silently congratulated myself for playing it so cool. After all, I didn't want to freak him out. Now that we'd established that we liked each other, there'd be plenty of time to tell him exactly how I felt about him. Plus, the CD would be safe in there.

When I stood up on my crutches, the world went black for just a second, but I only swayed slightly, taking a deep breath to steady myself, then I unlocked the door. “Oh, hi, Brayden.” I smiled at the star setter of the girls' volleyball team. She looked over my shoulder at George, who was just climbing out of the Jacuzzi tub. “You can pee now if you want. We're done.” Then I walked out to the L-shaped couch and lay my head against a cushion.

Before long, Em, Ken, the eighth grade guys, and the volleyball girls came back downstairs, telling the story of what had happened.

“Matt was so pissed,” Em said, recounting how she'd eventually let him corner her in her mother's walk-in closet and wrestle a burned copy of a
Soothing Sounds of the Ocean
meditation CD from her hands.

“And we were all outside, just pounding on the closet door,” Ken said.

“Seriously, I thought he might hurt you or something,” Michelle added.

“But then, like a minute later he walks out and he's all like ‘Uh, you guys. Let's bounce.'”

“What did you say to him?” Kiki asked, incredulous.

“I just let him know he didn't want to mess with me,” Em answered, all mysterious, then she met my eyes from across the room and smiled, and I had a feeling I knew exactly what she'd said. I laughed and made a mental note to suggest we stop by the 7-Eleven soon and buy Jason-the-gerbil a swamp water Slurpee to thank him for the dirt on Matt's
other
girlfriend.

“Em Warner, you're the queen of cool,” I said, letting my head fall back against the pillow. A few people laughed, then someone turned the music up even louder, and the party got back to normal. I remember a chocolate-bar-eating contest between the eighth grade guys…then Charlie Baker and James Stilton crawling into the space under the overturned sofa and declaring it a party fort…and someone starting a game of spin the bottle. After that, I must have fallen asleep or something because…

“Margot.” The next thing I knew, I heard Em's voice.

“Yeah?” I answered, opening my eyes to see what she wanted. The music was still loud, but the room was emptier now. The entrance of the party fort had been covered with towels, and for some reason, a bunch of books had been pulled off the shelves and arranged like a cobblestone walkway leading up to it. Empty pop cans littered the carpet. George and Ken were on the L-shaped sofa with the bowl of jelly beans, tossing them up in the air and trying to catch them in their mouths.

“Your stepdad's here,” Em said.

I sat up, rubbing my eyes. “Are you sure it's not somebody else's stepdad?”

“He says his name's Bryan.”

I blinked a few times. It didn't make sense. As far as Bryan knew, I was in bed asleep.…But even if he
had
found out I'd gone to Em's house, he didn't know her address. I found my crutches on the floor beside the sofa and noticed the clock on the DVD player. It was 12:15. I'd meant to call a taxi at 11:00 at the latest.

By the time I managed to get to the bottom of the stairs, Bryan was already on his way down. I knew it was really him the second I saw his scuffed loafers. “What are you doing here?” I asked. He was wearing green plaid pajama bottoms underneath his yellow rain slicker. I could see him doing his best to take a yogic breath while he looked around the basement at the tipped furniture and general chaos.

“Margot, it's time to go home,” he said firmly.

“How did you know I was here?” My voice squeaked.

He took another deep breath, then repeated: “Margot, I said time to go.”

“I asked you a question,” I said.

Before I realized what was happening, Bryan had picked me up. “Oh, no way,” I shouted. “Don't touch me.” He didn't even listen. For such a wimpy person, it was amazing that he actually managed to lift all one hundred pounds of me, even while I kicked at him with my good leg. “You have no right!” I shouted. He swung me around and carried me up the stairs without answering, then set me down at the top. Em followed behind with my crutches. “Go outside and get in the van,” he said. Then he turned to Em. “Is there an adult in the house?”