Secrets (4 page)

Elizabeth had never seen her sister in such a good mood. Jessica was making her positively dizzy, flying around the room like a hyperactive bumblebee as she got ready to spend Saturday night out with Cara.

"What do you think?" Jessica held up her ribbed burgundy sweater dress. "With that new belt I bought at the mall last month?"

"You're certainly going to a lot of trouble fixing yourself up just to go somewhere with Cara," Elizabeth observed. "What's up?"

"That's for me to know--and you, big sister, to find out," Jessica replied, smiling mysteriously.

She hummed as she launched into the task of untangling her hair from the jumble of electric curlers that sprouted from her head. Elizabeth

knew her game, though, and she wasn't going to play it.

She yawned. "Well, have fun--whatever it is."

Jessica stopped to glare at her sister's reflection in the mirror. "Aren't you even the tiniest bit curious about where we're going?"

"Not really." Elizabeth yawned again.

"You mean you're not even going to try to guess?" Jessica's lower lip edged out in a tiny pout.

"OK. Let me see ... you've been invited to a White House reception and your fairy godmother is getting ready to turn a zucchini from Mom's garden into a jet."

Jessica threw a hairbrush at her sister, missing her by several inches. "Very funny." She was trying very hard not to laugh.

"OK." Elizabeth giggled. "I give up. Where
are
you going?"

"To a party at Lila's. You could've been invited, too, if you tried a little harder to be friends with Lila."

Elizabeth shrugged. "Why should I? I think she's a phony."

"No phonier than some of
your
friends," Jessica shot back. "I won't mention any names, but I think you know who I mean. Her first initial is E--and I'm not talking about E.T., either."

"No comment," said Elizabeth. It bothered

her that Jessica was so determined to dislike Enid, but she knew if her sister guessed what she was feeling, she'd never let up. "Anyway, I wouldn't go to Lila's party even if I was invited. Face it, Jess, the Fowlers are snobs. I guess it comes from getting rich practically overnight."

"I don't care if their money grows on trees," Jessica said. "The point is, they know
all
the right people. Everybody who's anybody will be at that party."

"You mean like Bruce Patman, Bruce Patman, and Bruce Patman?" Elizabeth couldn't resist teasing her.

"You can joke about it all you like," Jessica said. "As a matter of fact, he
is
going to be there, and I'm making sure he notices me. So what do you think? Is the sweater dress OK? You don't think it makes me look fat, do you?"

"Yes and no."

"What?"
Jessica screeched as if she'd just been mortally wounded. She whirled to face her sister. "How dare you suggest I'm fat? We weigh exactly the same, for your information!"

"Cool it, Jess. I meant yes, the dress is fine, and no, it doesn't make you look fat."

"That's better." Jessica switched back to her usual ultra-charming self, flashing Elizabeth a brilliant smile.

She yanked the last curler from her hair, letting loose a mass of golden ringlets. Curly hair

was the one thing Jessica regretted not having been blessed with.

Elizabeth went back to her room and to the book she was reading, but she couldn't seem to concentrate. She was thinking about Enid, worrying over the fact that she hadn't called. It had been a whole twenty-four hours since their double-date--a record for silence where Enid was concerned. Especially since she had to know that Elizabeth was dying to find out how her confrontation with Ronnie had come out. She'd tried calling Enid herself, but both times her mother had said that she was too busy to come to the phone.

Something strange was going on.

Elizabeth decided she would try calling once more, and if Enid wouldn't come to the phone, then she was going over there herself to see what was the matter. Had Ronnie broken up with Enid? she wondered anxiously. Was Enid angry with her for advising her to be truthful with him?

This time Enid answered the phone herself-- though Elizabeth scarcely recognized her voice. She sounded so cold and distant.

"Are you OK, Enid?" Elizabeth asked. "You sound funny, like you have a cold or something."

"I'm all right."

"You don't
sound
all right. Aren't you going to tell me what happened last night?"

Enid laughed, but it was a dry, harsh sound. "I'm surprised you have to ask, Liz. I should think it would be pretty obvious to you."

"What are you talking about? Enid, hey, it's me, Liz. What's going on with you? Look, I'm sorry if I told you to level with Ronnie. Was he upset when you told him? Is that it?"

"Upset?"
Enid choked. "Yeah, I'd say he was upset, all right. Only I wasn't the one who told him."

"So he knows about the police record. Big deal. He'll get over it in a day or two. After all, it happened such a long time ago. It has nothing to do with you and Ronnie now."

"He knows about the letters."

Elizabeth gasped. "How could he have found out? You and I were the only ones who knew!"

"That's right," Enid replied icily.

"Oh, Enid, you couldn't possibly think--"

"What am I supposed to think?"
Enid was crying now.
"You
tell
me."

"I--I don't know." Elizabeth was too stunned to think straight. "But, Enid, you've got to believe I never--"

"Why should I believe you? You're the only one who knew about those letters.
The only one.
I confided in you. It
had
to be you. Oh, Liz, how could you do this to me?"

"Enid, please--"

Before she could finish, Enid had slammed

the phone down. For a long time Elizabeth refused to believe what had just happened. She sat listening to the empty hum of the dial tone for several moments before slowly lowering the receiver.

"Who was that?" Jessica asked from behind her. "It sounded like you were having some kind of argument."

"Enid," Elizabeth replied, her eyes welling with tears. "It was Enid."

Jessica made a face. "What did
she
want? Wait a minute, don't tell me, let me guess--she couldn't walk from the living room into the kitchen without asking your opinion about it first, right?"

"Jessica, stop it!" Elizabeth snapped. "It's not funny. Enid was really upset. She and Ronnie have broken up--and she thinks it's all my fault."

In a burst, she confided in her sister about what had happened. Jessica rushed to her sister and threw her arms around her.

"It's so unfair! How could she accuse you of such a thing? There must have been some mistake. Enid probably let it slip out about the letters herself, and now she wants to blame someone else. I always knew she was just using you, Lizzie. I saw right through her from the very beginning. You're better off without her."

Elizabeth disentangled herself from her sister's

suffocating embrace. "I'm sure Enid didn't mean all those things she said. She was just upset about breaking up with Ronnie. It must have been pretty awful for her."

"What about you? Look what she's putting
you
through!"

"I'll survive. But I'm worried about Enid."

"For heaven's sake, Liz, are you trying to win the Nobel Peace Prize or something? Don't you ever fight back?"

"All I want to do is straighten out this whole mess. I just hope Enid will listen to me! I have a feeling if I called back right now, she'd only hang up on me again."

"So wait until you see her on Monday. Let her wait until then."

Elizabeth chewed her lip thoughtfully. "Maybe it would be better to wait. I don't think she's in the mood to listen to anybody right now. Poor Enid! I can't believe Ronnie would do this to her over a few crummy letters from a boy she's not even dating anymore."

"Don't you see? It's the principle of the thing. How could he ever trust her again, knowing how she'd covered up the truth? Honestly, Liz, I think it's better Ronnie
did
find out. Whoever told him about the letters was doing him a big favor."

"But
who?"
cried Elizabeth.
"Who
would have done such a hideous thing?"

She looked up to ask Jessica's opinion, but her twin was off again in a whirlwind of preparation for the party. Clearly, the subject was beginning to bore her.

Lila pressed a glass of red wine into Jessica's hand. "Try some," she said and giggled. "It's really good French stuff. I snitched a couple of bottles from my dad's wine cellar, but I'm sure he won't notice. He's got loads of it."

Jessica took a tentative sip. She felt very elegant, sitting there drinking wine at the Fowler mansion. Everything about Fowler Crest was elegant, from the magnificently landscaped grounds to the uniformed maid who had taken their coats when they had come in. It made Jessica's own comfortable split-level house seem like a shack in comparison.

"I
can't believe your father lets you have parties like this when he's not here," she said to Lila.

A tiny frown creased Lila's forehead. "Well--I didn't exactly tell him I was having a party. I just said I was having a few friends over. What he doesn't know won't hurt him, right? Besides, it's his own fault for not spending more time at home. If he wasn't so busy running around with Ms. Dalton ..." Her voice trailed off, and her frown darkened to a scowl.

"Speaking of Ms. D--" Cara began.

"Who
hasn't
been talking about her?" Jessica broke in impatiently. "Frankly, I'm sick of it. Can't anyone talk about anything else?" Jessica quickly grew bored with gossip that didn't directly concern her. It seemed that the girls of Pi Beta Alpha, the sorority that Jessica, Cara, and Lila belonged to, could talk of nothing else.

"Have you heard the news about Ronnie and Enid?" Cara whispered, catching sight of Ronnie standing over by the fireplace. Gossip was gossip, as far as she was concerned. It didn't much matter who the target was.

"Knowing you," Dana Larson put in as she glided up to the bar, "you probably found out about it before Enid did." She held out her empty glass to Lila. "Just Pepsi for me. Got to protect my pipes."

Dana was lead singer for The Droids, Sweet Valley High's answer to the Rolling Stones. They had a reputation for being pretty wild, but most of it was just conjecture. Not many outsiders knew what went on in the smoky confines of

Max Dellon's basement, where they held their practice sessions. As for Dana, she was fairly straight underneath the outrageous clothes she wore. Tonight she was decked out in tight black velvet jeans, a pair of sparkly pink leg warmers, and a purple satin blouse.

Cara nudged Jessica in the ribs. "Ronnie doesn't look too happy. Why don't you go over there and cheer him up?"

"No, thanks, I'm saving myself." She perched on a stool and crossed her legs, making sure her hemline was just far enough above her knee to make it interesting.

"If you mean Bruce, you can forget it," said Lila. "He's not coming."

"What?" Jessica nearly fell off her stool.

"He called at the last minute to tell me he was going to some bash at the college. You know Bruce, always hanging around with older women."

Jessica's heart plummeted into her shoes--Elizabeth's shoes, actually, which she'd borrowed. After all the trouble she'd gone to, Bruce didn't even have the decency to show up! She knew that if he'd just give her half a chance, she could have him wrapped around her little finger. The tricky part was getting him there in the first place. She could see it wasn't going to be easy, but Jessica didn't discourage easily, either. She was already halfway there--thanks to Enid's letter.

Jessica squelched a tiny twinge of guilt as she remembered how upset Elizabeth had been. After all, how was
she
to know Enid would blame her sister? Really, the whole thing was Enid's fault from start to finish. People who left letters lying around for anyone in the world to see were just begging for trouble.

"The girl he's taking to the dance is
nineteen,
for heaven's sake," Lila went on. "I can't believe anyone that
ancient
would want to hang out at a high school dance."

Jessica scarcely heard the rest of what Lila was saying. Her mind was stuck like a broken record on those first words:
The girl he's taking to the dance ...

She gulped down half her glass of wine, gasping as it burned a fiery path down her throat. Nevertheless, she refused to surrender. The battle was not lost yet. It just called for a little new strategy and a fresh round of ammunition.

"This isn't going to be just
any
high school dance," Dana said. "After all, when you've got the greatest band around ..."

Jessica tuned out the conversation. With her eye on Ronnie, she slithered off her stool and made straight for her prey.

"Hey, heartbreaker," she drawled, linking her arm through Ronnie's. "Why don't you try cheering up? This is supposed to be a party. Aren't you having a good time?"

"Yeah," he snarled into his drink. "I'm having a ball."

"Well, you look like someone with a terminal case of the blahs. Come on, I know a terrific cure--let's dance."

"Thanks, Jessica, but I think I'll pass. I'm not really in the mood. Maybe later."

Jessica dropped her flirtatious pose and changed tactics. "Maybe you should have brought Enid," she suggested sweetly. "It's obvious you're miserable without her."

"Enid!" He looked as if she'd just injected him with poison. "No thanks, I'd be better off with Benedict Arnold."

Jessica cleverly jumped to Enid's defense.

"You shouldn't be so hard on her," she said. "After all, everyone makes mistakes. I suppose she's sorry, I'm sure there's no reason for you to hate her for life."

"Yeah, well, I happen to know Enid's not sorry at all. I even have written proof. Someone left a copy of a letter in my locker that some creep named George wrote to Enid."

Jessica pretended total innocence. "Liz did mention that George had been writing to Enid, but you know how those things are," she said. "When you're
involved
with someone the way Enid was with George, it's hard to break it off just like that."

"She's been writing to that jerk for two years!"

"Mmmm," Jessica conceded, taking a ladylike

sip of her wine. "That certainly does
seem
devoted. But just remember, appearances can be deceiving."

"Oh, I get the picture, all right," Ronnie said. "Look, Jessica, I appreciate what you're trying to do. It's nice of you to try to help Enid, but it's not going to work. It's over between us."

"What about the dance? Enid is up for queen."

"She should've thought of that before. It's her problem now, not mine. I'm sure she won't have any trouble conning some other poor jerk into taking her."

"What about you, though?" Jessica flashed him a smile oozing with sympathy.

He shrugged. "I'll probably just stay home. It's too late to get another date now."

"Well, what a coincidence!" she cried, clapping a hand over her mouth. "Would you believe I don't have a date, either?"

Several other boys had asked her, of course, but she'd turned them all down. She'd been saving herself for Bruce, and now it was too late--they all had other dates. And the dance was only a week away.

"Since
you
don't have a date and
I
don't have a date," she suggested, "why don't we go together?"

He looked at her as if she'd just suggested he carry her cross-country on his back. "I, uh, gosh, Jessica ..."

"Just as friends, of course."

"It does make sense," he agreed then.

"Well, there's certainly no point in sitting home and getting even more depressed, is there?" she asked.

"I guess not." He looked slightly bewildered, like someone who'd been picked up by a tornado and dropped in a foreign land.

Jessica turned her most radiant smile on him. Sliding her hand down his arm, she laced her fingers through his. She led him over to the dance area, where several couples had gone into body lock.

"Oh, by the way, Ronnie," she cooed, "I'm allergic to gardenias, but I absolutely
adore
orchids. Just don't get me a pink one--I'll be wearing a red dress."