Tease(32)

Suddenly Dylan jogs onto the field, up to where the plastic pitcher’s mound is set up. He does a bunch of professional-looking stretches, then looks over toward us and smiles, waving. The boys wave back like their lives depend on it. I smile, lifting my hand. But at the last moment I think, What if he’s actually waving at Emma?

It’s a crazy thought. Stupid. But it ruins the rest of the afternoon.



“Oh my God, I’m going to pee my pants!” Brielle squeals, doubling over.

“Shh, shh, shh . . . ,” I chant, but I’m giggling, too. And shivering, and tiptoeing, and hoping we don’t both face-plant on the icy street between Tyler’s and Emma’s houses. “Come on,” I say as softly as I can, “we have to do this fast!”

Brielle stops and takes a bunch of deep, fast breaths, biting her lip to stop herself from smiling. She holds up her end of the giant poster-board heart we just got out of her car and says, “Okay, okay. I got this. You got that?”

I shake my side of the heart—I’m holding the wooden post it’s been staple-gunned to—and a cloud of glitter floats through the night air, shimmering in the glow of the fancy lantern-shaped streetlights. With my other hand I salute Brielle, which is a mistake because then we both start giggling again.

We’re only one door down from Emma’s house, but we’re never going to make it at this rate. We were studying at Tyler’s, which was really just an excuse to hang out with him, Dylan, and Marcus, who it turns out is taking Brielle to the dance on Friday. The guys don’t know we’re doing this—they think we’re going home, but really we just stopped at the car to get this thing. It’s a secret mission. Secret and freezing. Which I guess is why this all seems so hilarious, when actually it might be incredibly stupid. Like, maybe stupider than the fake Facebook page.

But Brielle is determined. I think she spent like forty dollars at Michaels getting the supplies for the sign last weekend. And it looks pretty amazing, I have to say. I went over to her house yesterday and we worked on it for, like, two hours. If we were boys and this was really a sign asking someone to the Valentine’s dance, the girl would totally say yes, even though the dance is only three days away.

That girl would be impressed until she actually read the message, I mean. We made a giant, glittery heart that says “Roses are red, violets are blue, Emma’s a slut, and a skanky ho, too.”

So . . . not exactly romantic. But you have to be kinda close to the sign to read it, even with the puffy glitter paint we did the letters with. Brielle says that’s the best part, that Emma will think it’s a real sign right up until she’s standing right in front of it.

Now that I’m looking at it, though, the word slut is pretty gigantic. It’s bigger than Emma’s name, even. And to me, that’s the best part.

Finally we get our hysterics under control, enough to scurry across the dark, quiet street. We pause again in front of the wide lawn of the Putnam place. Emma’s parents—or her stepdad, anyway—are pretty loaded, though tonight their yard looks just as sad as everyone else’s, covered in patches of half-melted snow and dirty bits of ice from the last storm. Another fancy lamppost lights up the brick walkway leading to their pillared front door, and a big wreath made of roses hangs there. Totally Martha Stewart.

“I wonder why she never throws parties here,” I murmur.

Brielle yanks the heart poster forward and practically pulls me off my feet. “Because she’s a loser, dummy,” she snarls. “Who would come to her parties?”

Of course she’s right. And suddenly I get this flash of Dylan hanging out here, sitting close to Emma and smiling like he is in that photo online, and I yank my end of the poster right back.

“Here,” I say, “lemme stick it in.”

Brielle lets go of the heart completely and doubles over with giggles. “That’s what he said!” she cackles.

I’m pushing the pointed wooden stick into the almost-frozen yard and laughing, when suddenly a much brighter light pops on.

A spotlight, mounted over the Putnams’ garage, floods the yard, the sign, us.

“Run!” Brielle squeals, and we do, back across the street to her SUV. Of course it’s pointed the wrong way, so even when Brielle starts it up and steps on the gas, we have to drive past Emma’s house. Out of the corner of my eye I think I see someone standing on the big, ornate porch, the rose-wreathed door flung wide. But then we’re gone, down the block, and I don’t look back.

The sign wasn’t even really stuck in the ground when we ran away, but that’s fine, since Brielle and I have already done something epic that’s going to happen on Wednesday. But the best—or worst, I guess—thing on Wednesday turns out to be something we hadn’t even thought of.

Someone has written SLUT in huge red lipstick letters down the door of Emma’s locker.

“Amazing,” Brielle breathes when we spot it. “Maybe everyone at this school isn’t a total moron.”

My stomach does a little flip. It seems like kind of a scary coincidence, since this is the day that the student council is delivering everyone’s Valentine roses. You can pay a dollar to send a rose to anyone you want, and they attach a little note if you fill one out.

Brielle and I didn’t write on Emma’s locker, but we did send her some roses.