Page 4 of Dirty Tricks

CHAPTERONE

Three monthslater

LEXA

“Don’t you dare,” Vonnie says as I drape my costume over the desk in my dorm room, still in its garment bag. “Get into the bathroom and try it on. What’s the point of having your gorgeous boyfriend buy you a special outfit if you’re not going to rub it in my face?”

“Here you go,” I say, pouncing on her and pushing the bag against her hip. “I’ll rub it all over you.”

She collapses into giggles, trying to fend me off with less and less effect the deeper into hysterics she treads. The girl is so ticklish she tickledherselfwhen getting changed into her PE kit this week. A feat that I thought should be submitted to the Guinness record book people for assessment, but which she charmingly declined.

I’m nervous to see what Finn deems an appropriate outfit. I told him I was going as Wednesday Addams, but he immediately interjected to say he’d sort it. Not to worry about a thing.

I hadn’tbeenworried, just excited.

We’ve been going out for just over two months now. Sometimes he doesn’t read me all that well, but it would be churlish to say anything. Better he tries and misses than going out with a boy who never tries to read me at all.

A knock at the door saves me from indulging her desire.

“About time,” Jenna announces, pushing me inside when I open the door and slamming it behind her. She leans against it for a moment, head tilted like she’s listening. “The boys have gone crazy in the common room. They’ve formed into teams and are vying to outperform each other at the party.”

“Outperform how?” Vonnie asks.

“Who cares how? I don’t understand why they turn everything into a sport.” She pushes away from the door and gives a squeal. “You got your costume? Try it on. Show us how it looks.”

And I’m back in the same position. “I’ll try it when I’m on my own,” I say, expressing my reluctance and seeing it not make a single jot of difference.

While I don’t want to take the costume out in front of them in case it’s embarrassingly raunchy, I can’t work out how to refuse them.

I’ve never been good at denying people what they want. After a few free sessions with a school counsellor—because my dad won’t pay for ‘that self-indulgent rubbish’—she identified I struggle to set boundaries and struggle harder to keep those I manage to set.

The advice on how to rectify those traits would have been more helpful, but she didn’t get to identifying that in the few hours I’d wrangled.

Unlike seemingly every other kid in this school, I don’t have oodles of money at my disposal. Everything has to go through my father first and he’d already told me no.

“What aboutyourcostumes?” I ask, perching on the edge of the bed and trying not to let my gaze wander back to the garment bag. To keep looking at it will just encourage them to keep pestering me. “What areyouboth wearing?”

“Sexy witch,” Vonnie declares. “With a broomstick to fend off attacking demons.”

“I’m an angel,” Jenna says, tossing her platinum blonde curls from side to side. “What else?”

“Come on.” Vonnie grabs my hand and drags me towards the bathroom while Jenna lunges for the garment bag. “At least unwrap it, even if you don’t want to wear it.”

“Okay.” I hold up my hands in surrender. “I’ll unwrap it, but that’s all. It’s unlucky to be seen in a Halloween outfit before the party.”

Jenna looks vaguely uneasy. “Is that true? It sounds familiar.”

“Because she’s stolen the idea from the bride not being seen before the wedding,” Vonnie says between bouts of laughter. “There’s no way that’s a real thing.”

“Oh,” I say, surprised by the bunny ears that fall out as soon as I undo the zipper. “Apparently someone confused Halloween and Easter.”

“Sounds about right,” Jenna sniggers. “All that testosterone’s got your boy’s head muddled.”

I drag the rest of the costume out, feeling better about the whole thing. “This is actually nice.”

A statement which makes Jenna howl even louder.

“See?” Vonnie says, pushing me towards my bathroom. “Go change in private, then give us a show.”

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