Made You Up(57)

“I’m not sociopathic; it just takes a while for me to process. I’m pretty good at turning off my guilt when I don’t want it. But I can’t stop. It’s an easy way to get money, it keeps anyone from getting too close to me, and I feel . . . safe.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that when I’m the one doing everyone else’s dirty work, and everyone is afraid of me, I feel safe. I control what happens and to who.”

“Whom,” I mumbled, and to my surprise, he smiled.

“Right. Whom.”

I got the feeling the smile wasn’t only because I had corrected his grammar. I wondered if he’d ever told anyone any of that before, and then wondered about his mother, in Goshen, and exactly how he planned to get her out while his dad was still around. I wondered what he would do if his little dictatorship over the school ever crumbled.

I peered back into the trophy case. Scarlet’s picture screamed at me.

“I might know something about what’s going on with Celia,” I finally said. I told him everything I knew about Celia, Celia’s mother, McCoy, Scarlet, and the scoreboard. How Tucker had been helping me look up information about it, but we’d reached a dead end.

“I know McCoy doesn’t like you, and Celia does,” I added. “And that . . . worries me. I think they’re both really unstable. McCoy needs some kind of psychiatric help, and I don’t think he’s going to get it. I don’t think he even knows, or cares. And I know—I know—it’s like, I’m the crazy girl, making up crazy stories, why would you listen to me, but if you could just do me a favor and . . . watch out.”

He stared at me. Blinked.

Then he nodded and said, “Okay. I’ll be careful.”





Chapter Twenty-eight




Celia’s second suspension wasn’t announced, exactly, but everyone in the school knew the details. Thanks to her lawyer of a father (and some unforeseen intervention from Satan himself, because who else would come to her rescue?), Celia wasn’t expelled. That was the bad news. The good news was that she’d be gone for the rest of the semester. The other bad news was that the semester was only ten more days. And the entire club saw the other other bad news coming from a mile away: when the semester was up, Celia would be back, and she’d be doing community service.

The only person who didn’t seem to like the good news or the bad news was Principal McCoy, who only became more short-tempered and irritable after Celia was gone. His morning announcements were short and curt, and he didn’t say anything about the scoreboard. In the afternoons, he could often be found outside the gym watching the club work. I knew Miles was a big boy who could take care of himself, but if there was ever a time to put my finely honed sense of paranoia to good use, it was now.

During those ten days, the school went back to relative normality. Maybe it was the Christmas spirit in the air, or the thought of a two-week vacation, but everyone seemed a lot more lighthearted, in spite of finals. Presents were exchanged. I saw small people dressed in red and green flitting between classrooms. I made everyone in the club Christmas cards and attached a Greek drachma from the 1800s to each one, unsure if they’d think it was stupid.

I gave Miles his first, to see how he’d react. I fixed my goggles on my face at the lab table as he weighed the card in his hand. Then he opened it up as if it had a bomb inside.

He pulled the coin out and studied it. “A drachma? Is . . . is it real? Where’d you get it?”

“My dad’s an archaeologist. He picks up stuff all over the place.” And the coins were one of the things he’d brought home that I knew were real.

“But this could be worth a lot of money,” said Miles. “Why are you giving it to me?”

“Don’t feel too special.” I pulled out the test tubes and test tube rack we’d need for our lab. “I put them in the cards for everyone in the club.”

“But still. How do you know this isn’t worth hundreds of dollars?”

“I don’t, but I assume my dad wouldn’t give it to me if it was worth a lot of money.” I shrugged. “I have a bunch of stuff like that.”

“Did you ever think that maybe he gives it to you in spite of the fact that it’s worth a lot?”

“Do you want it or not?” I snapped.

Miles dipped his chin and stared balefully at me over his glasses, shoving the coin deep into his pocket. He turned back to the card.