The Takedown(20)

I’ll let you in on a little secret.

The in kids know you’re watching.

And just the way you could search Brittany Mulligan’s Woofer all day and not find a single double-chinned pic of her, even though she swore she didn’t pay to have her face Pulled—what you see is a crafted image.

Around you, the in kids smile brighter. Laugh louder. And it’s no accident that their every conversation sounds like an inside joke.

It’s not that it’s fake. They are enjoying themselves, only more so when you’re around.

This could work for you, too, you know. Nothing annoyed Audra more than Jacqueline Menendez and the uppity chem geeks. Liked. Hated. Popular. Unpopular. It’s all how you spin it.

And it’s definitely all a ruse.

So the next morning as I walked through Park Prep’s double doors and the first-floor hallway grew deadly quiet, I met that silence with a tiny smile. I knew it would be awful. Everyone else didn’t have to know that too.

The video was at 250,000 views. I tossed my hair. I hadn’t heard from any of the girls since I left Sharma’s yesterday. Even our group thread had taken on a morose hush. I smirked and waved at Charity Knowles. What would I do when I got to Coffee Check and it was obvious I had no other Docs to clink against mine? No clue. I put extra sway in my walk.

I was used to the head-angled-down, eyes-angled-up way that my age group viewed the world, but I’d never had an entire silent hallway give it to me. AnyLies could be any of them. I mean, when Oscar Hawley had asked me out last year, I’d laughed.

Him?

Or what about Mr. Huge Ego Ulee Ostrander, who I’d crushed in debate practice for two years running?

Him?

It was like a hallway of Justice League villains. Just beyond Ulee, Jessie Rosenthal and Ellie Cyr were again wedged together like two badly mismatched shirts on the same sales rack. As I passed, the girls stopped chatting and watched me with the grim silence of seeing a funeral pass.

Them?

I swiped at my Doc, pretended to laugh at something I saw there.

And then a mountain of curls was beside me and a hand slapped my butt, giving it a reassuring squeeze. Fawn. My Fawn had come through, adorable in a black pantsuit. Then Sharma, in a long black sheath dress and arm bangles, was on my other side. And seconds after, Audra completed our line.

“I didn’t know if you guys would be here.”

I tried to sound casual, but my voice shook.

“It’s the Walk,” Audra said under her breath. “We didn’t even miss the Walk when Fawnie took us to that seafood buffet in K-Town and we all got food poisoning.”

“In my defense,” Fawn said, “it had good reviews.”

Audra looked like a British dominatrix in her fitted black blazer, teeny skirt, and knee-high boots. Black. That was Sharma’s theme of the day for her color-themed week. It felt appropriate.

“For the record,” Audra continued, “I apologize if I didn’t seem supportive yesterday. After you left, Fawnie and Sharm explained why this is such a big deal to someone like you. So I guess I can see why you kept it a secret and why you still don’t want to admit to it. Only I don’t want to be fed any more lies. So maybe until you’re comfortable talking about it, let’s just pretend it didn’t happen and move past it.” Her lips puckered to the side. “I know that didn’t seem like an apology. But, well, I love you, Kylie-cat. I really am sorry for not being there for you. I know there’s no worse feeling.”

Actually, there was. The feeling when your bestie essentially calls you a liar to your face. My breakfast cereal curdled in my stomach. Wow. Thanks, friend. I could have continued to deny that it was me in the video or told them about AnyLies, but it’d sound like I was grasping at excuses. Besides, if I didn’t accept this lackluster support, I wouldn’t have any at all.

“Thanks, Auds. I know that wasn’t easy for you to say.”

She beamed at me. “Super-mature for me, right? I panic-attacked about it all morning.”

“This is actually kinda neat,” Fawn breathed.

The Walk normally garnered looks, but today all eyes were on us. So Audra chatted away brightly about nonsense. An always-unflappable Sharma swiped at her Doc. Fawn wore her sexy daydreamy look, which meant she was probably thinking about biscuit sammies. Unsmiling, I went for BTCH confidence. And we rocked the Walk that morning. To this day, it still stands as one of the most horrifying experiences of my life.

See? It’s all how you spin it.

In front of Coffee Check, I fumbled out my Doc. “That’s it?”

“That was nothing,” Fawn giggled, pulling out her own Doc.

Cue the moaning.

It was quiet at first, but it quickly filled the foyer like a choir crescendo. It was like everyone had tapped play on the Mr. E. sex video at the same time with their volume on high. I mean, it wasn’t like that. It was that.

Everyone in the vestibule had their tech out. It was impossible to know who was participating and who was innocently txting or doing last-minute homework. The sound came from at least fifty Docs. There was no way this many people had this big a grudge against me.

Channing Gregory grabbed Bryan Alders and started imitating the video. Stupid Channing thought he could get away with anything because his father was VP of the most popular online network. Yvonne Rose Harper paraded past, her Doc in the air, Mr. E. going at it on-screen. At least four people were filming us, laughing. Fawn still had her Doc raised half in the air, waiting for a kiss that wasn’t coming. There wasn’t anything to be done. Reacting would only make for a popular related link.