Sorority Girls With Guns (26 page)

Richard keeps shaking his head.  “You both have your parents' influential name, if not their money. You have all those expensive clothes and gadgets I made you leave behind, which you could sell for a lot of cash.” He looks at me, then Tiffany, then Morgan. “I bet you all have a closet full of clothes similar to the ones you've been buying in the thrift store and selling right?”

Morgan shrugs. “Eventually they'll both run out of stuff to sell.”

“
And by then they'll be back in Mommy and Daddy's good graces.” Richard shrugs. “Still not the same thing. That's the purpose of this bet: To show you what it's
reall
y like to live on a limited income, when you don't have rich parents who will bail you out just as soon as you apologize.”

“
I'm so sick of listening to this!” Charlie snaps, leaning over the front seat to yell at Richard, who's riding shotgun. “We spend almost a month meeting all your challenges, and you're still making fun of us!”

“
Hey, I met all your challenges too!”

“
Oh, yeah, it must have been really hard partying at an awesome club, drinking expensive champagne and enjoying the hookers we ordered,” Matt says.

“
That last stunt almost got me arrested!” Richard yells. “I had to fund a charity party just to get out of that mess.”

“
You're the one who's always saying how the rich should use their money to help others, not themselves. You get the opportunity to do it, and here you are complaining,” Matt jumps in.

“
Well, we're here.” Morgan slams the car into the nearest empty parking place, hitting the brakes so hard we all get intimately acquainted with our seatbelts.

Tiffany is the first to throw open her door and jump out. Unfortunately, her first try is unsuccessful, since she's forgotten she still has her seatbelt on. For her sake, I make the effort to suppress my laughter as she finally frees herself and flees from the car. Then I follow her as Matt and Charlie get out on the other side.

“
What about me?” Richard yells from his seat. “Aren't you going to drop me at my hotel?”

“
Why don't you walk?” Morgan says, slamming her door shut and glaring through the window at him. “Or call a cab. Or a limo. Or whatever. Just get out so I can lock the car.”

Richard sighs and reluctantly leaves the car. Morgan locks it and follows Tiffany toward the door. Matt and Charlie head off in the direction of their shared room, and I'm going after Morgan when Richard taps me on the shoulder.

“
What do you want now?” I ask.

He flashes the dimples. “There's something I want you to know. Thought we should talk in private.”

“
About what?” I turn off my cameras by touching an icon on the app, and Richard does the same.

The smile keeps going on and off, making his dimples flash like a strobe light. “About how I know your secret, too. About how you'll be keeping your mouth shut even after the reveal on our channel because you want me to do the same.”

I am too experienced at both being lied to and lying to let this affect me. “I have no idea what you're talking about.”

  “
I watched some of your video from the day you and Tiffany and Morgan decided to go thrift shopping.” He leans against the Buick, oblivious to the fact that it's filthy after driving down a dirt road. So much for the expensive clothes Matt goaded him into buying at some swanky, overpriced place downtown.

“
And?” I keep my face and voice still and steady, in spite of the fact that my heart is hammering away at my ribcage.

“
You know, last semester I did an extra-credit report for history about Andrew Jackson,” he says, stuffing his hands in his pockets. “You know what it said?”

“
His brother Michael was the big star but he was the big, overlooked talent in the family?”

That actually catches Richard off-guard and the dimples disappear again while he contorts his brow into a Tiffany-like frown. “What are you...oh, you mean Michael Jackson?” He rolls his eyes. “You think they teach that in history class?”

I shrug. “He was big back in the eighties. That's history. I only know about him because they did a Michael Jackson song week on
Are You the Next Pop Tart
?”

Richard sighs. “You know, there are some people who actually read those overpriced books the school forces us to buy. And that's my point – after delivering a report on President Andrew Jackson, I can tell you a few highlights about his life and career, but there's no way I could tell you what he ate for breakfast every day.”

“
Who cares what he ate for breakfast every day?”

Richard shakes his head, the dimples starting to twitch again. “The point is, I noticed something when you were talking about Feebay: You were way more knowledgeable than the average person who does an extra-credit report for Econ class.” He holds up a hand as I open my mouth. “Yes, I know about your legendary great memory. But you don't read that much about Feebay for a two-minute report in the first place. You would have skimmed a few financial journal articles, mentioned their stock price and maybe a few tips about selling that anyone could get if they Googled 'How to Sell on Feebay'.”

I lift a shoulder. “So?”

“
So you gave Morgan and Tiffany some very detailed, specific examples. You knew way too much about it to have only sold a couple things for revenge.” He shoves off the Buick and walks toward me. “I read the new sellers' chat board. Everyone new knows
nothing
about selling, picking the right items, including measurements. You might have guessed right on one or two of those things, but you were explaining stuff like an expert.”

“
That doesn't prove anything,” I say, trying not to talk too fast or too slow or too differently from how I normally talk. “I'm studying marketing. I know a lot about selling. And I did a lot of research for this Green Day project.”

 
Richard is standing so close to me now that I can smell his $150 a bottle cologne. “You used your old ID so I was able to look at your selling history. Based on your feedback alone, I can tell you've been selling for years – and not just occasionally, but a lot of items.”

“
So what?” I refuse to confess to anything when he has no proof. “Lots of people sell on Feebay. Especially people who shop a lot. There's only so much room in my closet.”

Richard pulls out his smartphone and turns it around to face me. “Did you buy that 54DDD bra for yourself? I mean, I know silicone is a girl's best friend and all, but even
you
couldn't fit into that bra.” He scrolls down. “How about this size 3X sweater with glitter and rhinestones? Even if you could fit in it, you'd call something like this hideously tacky.”

I sigh as if bored. “Richard, why do you care what I've sold on Feebay before?”

“
You and I both know why.” He leans over and whispers in my ear, “You're not really rich any more than I'm really poor.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“
Selling on Feebay doesn't prove that,” I whisper back, my lips irritatingly close to those dimples.

“
You picked up on the idea of economizing faster than anyone else,” he continues.

“
I'm smarter than they are.”

“
You had that idea about digging under vending machines for money.”

“
I had a good idea. Did I mention I'm smarter than-”

“
You defend the rich more than any other rich person I know.” Richard's eyes glitter in the dim light of the motel's tacky neon Vacancy sign. “You know, you're right about me. I
do
have rich person guilt. But so do almost all rich people, to some degree. They may not all act on it as much as I do, but they're not vehemently defending themselves the way you do, either.”

“
It's not rich people I'm defending, Richard, it's money,” I hiss, in case he's still recording this conversation. “Don't confuse the two.”

He nods. “Only someone who's had to do without money would appreciate it as much as you do. The others take it for granted – even I do sometimes. But not you. You talk about money the way Tiffany used to talk about donuts when she was on that low-carb diet.”

“
Low carb diets are evil. They were invented by a man to make women crazy.”

“
I'm not recording this conversation.” Richard smiles. “Neither one of us wants it heard by anyone else. And you know we're both vulnerable here.”

He's right, and I know it. He could track down my family, find out where I went to school, look up old friends. “What do want, Richard?”

He shrugs. “You were right about something else: I'm not the best liar, and I'm definitely not as good as you.”

I smile, relief flooding my brain. “You want me to help you keep your secret, even if your parents show up or something unforeseen goes wrong.”

“
Or if this show really takes off, and someone who used to know me sees it...I know you could think of a way to fix it.” He's implying that I'm good at blackmailing people, which is true. I'm also good at alternative explanations for things that look bad. “And in exchange, I'll never cause problems for you.”

“
I still don't know what you're talking about,” I say, resolute to the end. The best liars are. Sometimes the worst are, as well, but that's not my concern right now. “But my skills are at your service, and you can trust me to act with discretion in this matter of
your
secret.”

He nods and walks away. I'm about to do the same when he stops and turns around. “Can I ask you one question?”

“
Sure.” I don't say I'll answer.

He strides back toward me, stopping where he was before. His sleeve brushes my bare shoulder, and I think that under different circumstances, I might have been very attracted to him right now.

“
Did you just make up that story about your cousin Cliff?”

I stare him down, my eyes burning into his. He doesn't blink. “That story was true, Richie Rich.”  I turn and walk away.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

When I get back to my room, Morgan is gone and a text message says she and Tiff went to the nearest bar and I'm welcome to join them. I text her back that I'm tired and want to wash the smell of that awful ranch off and go to bed, but the truth is that I want to be alone.

No, what I really want is to be in a real hotel with a fucking hot tub where I can relax and think about how to protect myself. Now that Richard has leverage on me, my leverage on him is worthless. Even assuming we win the bet, I'll always have to worry that he can extort me. Now, what could he get out of me?

Lacking access to a hot tub, I ponder this problem as I take a hot shower, which lasts as long as the hot water – about ten minutes. I get out of the shower, wrap myself in a threadbare, bleach-harshened cheap motel towel, and stare at myself in the mirror. I see a short blonde with boobs that everyone thinks are fake. The joke is that I could never have afforded fakes if I'd been naturally flat-chested. I take a cheap motel washcloth and wipe the steam off the mirror, and then I do something I never do in front of other people: No, not
that
sort of thing. This is something so shocking I could never let anyone see it: I smile, not a small, tight, fake smile like I occasionally flash at people whose asses I'm kissing as a last resort, but a big, open-mouthed, smile.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not the least bit happy right now. I'm just looking at my teeth. They're not the only reason I don't smile – being generally pissed off at the world is the main reason. But even when I fake happiness for personal gain, I can't let anyone see a big, wide smile on my face, because if they did they'd noticed that my top and bottom teeth have a gap the size of the Grand Canyon between them. I stick out my tongue at the mirror and it slides easily between the top and bottom rows of teeth. None of my friends from the sorority house or their usual party guests can do this. If my parents had had several thousand extra dollars when I was a teenager, I wouldn't be able to either.

I allow my mouth to relax into a nice, comfortable frown and the image in the mirror goes back to being unflawed.

My phone is playing my ringtone, Good Charlotte's “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous”. I walk into the shitty motel room that represents everything I've tried to distance myself from since the day I went to college and pretended my old, real life didn't exist. I pick up the cell phone that I bought on Feebay at a ridiculous discount, even though it's exactly like the ones Morgan and Tiffany paid $300 for at the local cell store. “Hello?”

“
Shade Stevenson?” The voice sounds vaguely familiar. “This is Harry Harmon from Channel Eight News.”

“
Oh...yeah, I saw your piece on the homeless problem,” I say. “But I thought you were going to actually interview the homeless?”

“
It's a three-part series, remember?” Harry clears his throat. “The interviews with the homeless aired on tonight's show.”