Pushing Perfect(69)

“It was pretty hard to find that, though, wasn’t it?”

“Once I had her married name, it wasn’t,” she said. “But yeah, there’s nothing here that would link it to her now.”

“I wonder if people know,” I said. “I wonder if the lawsuit is something she’d want to keep quiet.”

“We’ve found our leverage,” Alex said.

“Exactly. We just need to figure out what we want and how to use the leverage to get it.”

“We should tell everyone,” I said. “Let’s meet tonight. I want to get it over with.”

“Okay. You want to text them?”

“I don’t have Justin’s number. I can take care of the other two.”

Alex rolled her eyes. “Great. Fine.”

“We’re all in this together,” I reminded her. As if she needed reminding.

I got out my phone to text them and realized I hadn’t looked at it since I’d shut the ringer the day before. The signal was blocked in school, so I wasn’t in the habit of checking my phone during the day. Because if I had, I’d have seen that in addition to the missed calls from my parents, I had new text messages.

A lot of them.

My head started pounding as I wondered how many of them were from Ms. Davenport, what she could possibly want now. But none of them were from her. They were all from Isabel. I’d forgotten to call her.

She was not happy.

I started reading through each text.

Where are you guys?

Did you find out anything?

I’m staying up until I hear from you.

WHAT IS HAPPENING?!?!

Okay, now I’m getting scared.

Seriously, you’re freaking me out.

Just write even one word so I know you’re okay.

I can’t do this anymore.

And then the last one:

If you haven’t texted me by the time I wake up, I’m coming up with my own plan.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Alex asked, reading over my shoulder.

“I don’t know, but that’s the last one I got. I’ll write her back and apologize and hopefully that will be the end of it.” I wrote and apologized and told her about our plan to meet up.

My phone buzzed with a text notification almost immediately.

Too late. Couldn’t stand it anymore. Had to talk to someone.

Tell me you didn’t, I wrote back.

No choice. Bringing her with me tonight.

I’d been hoping she didn’t mean who I thought she meant, but as soon as I read her final text, I knew.

“Was that her?” Alex asked. “Is she mad?”

“That’s not the problem anymore,” I said.

“Then what is?”

“She told someone.”

“She did what? Who did she tell?”

I tried to stay calm. Breathe, I told myself.

“Becca,” I said.





27.


The problem with Marbella was that there weren’t very many places for big groups of kids to go. Not if they wanted to have a private conversation, and particularly not if they wanted to talk about how they were going to take revenge on their blackmailer. Too many kids hung out at Philz; the coffee shop I’d gone to with Raj didn’t have big enough tables; and we’d all come to hate the Bayview Diner, which we now associated with all this craziness.

Thank goodness for Raj, who took it upon himself to figure out a solution. It turned out one of the big chain restaurants on El Camino Real had private rooms you could reserve, as long as you ordered something. We’d have to suffer through terrible inauthentic Mexican food, but at least we’d be alone.

We arranged to meet at six, driving over in two cars. I picked up Raj and Alex, who reverted to their usual seats; Justin was responsible for everyone else. We rode to the restaurant in silence; for once, Alex didn’t bug me about the radio.

Justin was pulling into the parking lot just as we were. We waited by my Prius as he got out of the car, followed by Isabel and Becca, just as I’d expected. I avoided looking directly at them, which conveniently allowed me to avoid seeing whatever expression Becca might have had on her face as she looked at me.

The restaurant was tacky inside and out. The front was painted in yellow and red and green, with giant ceramic cacti flanking the entrance. An overly chipper middle-aged man confirmed our reservation and led us to the back room, which was covered in murals in the same bright colors as the outside. We sat down at the table set for six: I took a chair at one end, Alex and Raj on either side of me, and Isabel sat at the other, surrounded by Becca and Justin. When there had been five of us, I’d felt like we were all in it together; now that we were six, it felt like we’d been divided into teams. I hoped I was wrong about that, but Alex and Raj pretty much wanted to kill Isabel for talking; they weren’t having the same eye-contact issue I was, and their glares were practically verbal, they were so hostile. I wasn’t too happy about it myself, but I understood, even if I didn’t like it.

Instead of Not-Pinky, our cranky waitress at the Bayview Diner, we had a perky girl with a shiny blond ponytail. She looked young enough to go to school with us, but no one seemed to recognize her, and most Marbella kids didn’t have jobs. At least not during the school year. She set down six enormous glasses of water and two big bowls of chips with sides of salsa and asked if we wanted anything to drink.