Page 59 of Fraternizing with the Enemy
Was that just a really good guess or did she know? “It’s not lame.” A strange protectiveness washed over me. “I think it’s perfect.”
Jade put the goose down on her stomach and lounged deeper against my pillows. Her cheer uniform matched my blue bedspread perfectly. “Mads,” Jade said to my ceiling. “Do you think it was weird that Connor got Maisie a pair of sweatpants?”
It turned out that I hadn’t been the only one concerned about the drowned girl in glasses yesterday. Ithadbeen someone who was holding sweatpants yesterday outside the bathroom at Allen’s Alley—it’d been Connor. He’d gone out to his car and retrieved the pair for Maisie.
I continued powdering my face, glad Jade was suspicious of someone other than me. “Weird how?”
“Come on. It’s definitely notnormal. Why does he care if Maisie looks like she peed cola? Why would he go out of his way to grab her a pair of sweatpants from his car?”
Hey, Bobcats, he’d said to Maisie’s group yesterday.What a coincidence.
“Why is everyone acting soweird?” Jade let out aharsh sigh. “Landon dating that freakshow, Connor being nice to nerds, Reed quitting the football team—it’s like everyone’s mutinying. EveryoneexceptAshton, Kyle, and Riley, and I never sawthatcoming.”
I pivoted in my chair to look at her straight-on. “I’m not mutinying.”
You thought about it, my thoughts challenged.You’re still thinking about it. Abouthim.
“No,” Jade disagreed with the voice in my head. “You’re not. You almost did, with the whole Logan thing, but you didn’t even waver.”
I wavered, I wanted to cry.I so wavered.
“Youdidn’tvote for the MLTs, though,” Jade went on before my moral dilemma could sink too deep. “That was out of character for you.”
“Like I said before, if you’d reminded me, I would’ve given you a label. You didn’t need to put me on the list.”
“It wouldn’t have been fair otherwise.”
Fair.Fair? My jaw nearly dropped. “I never would’ve put you on it?—”
“Yes, you would’ve. You’d be going against Top Tier rules if you didn’t.”
The Top Tier rules. The open house felt like forever ago, when I sat on the window ledge happily kicking my feet while Jade rattled off the Top Tier guidelines. I’d been excited then. Eager. I’d finally been at the top of the pyramid, and the idea of walking through the halls with everyone’s attention on me had been beyond invigorating.
I hesitated, dragging my eyeshadow brush through the pan of blue pigment, looking at Jade once more in the small mirror on my desk. “Does it… feel how you expected? Being in the Top Tier?”
Jade didn’t hesitate. “Better.”
I looked at myself in the mirror—reallylookedat myself. Even with the foundation and concealer, there was no hiding the little puffy bags underneath my eyes. And my eyes, they seemed…quiet. That perfect little bubble I’d been floating in had popped somewhere along the way, leaving me with nothing but a dampened feeling of dread. Was it Logan who popped that bubble of happiness? Was that bubble of happiness even better? Or did it justfeelbetter?
“Is this how it is when you call Logan at night?” Jade asked suddenly, voice soft, curious. “Just staring up at your ceiling while his voice is in your ear?”
Something about the tone of her voice had me pausing before answering. The gentle quality seemed to come out of nowhere. “Called,” I said. “Past tense.”
“Right.Called.” She swung her legs over the side of my bed and sat up, running her hands over her curls. “Do you think we should kick Reed out? If he quit the football team, does he really belong in the Top Tier?”
I almost gasped, and not just because the topic change threw me for a loop. Kick outReed? “He voted in the Most Likely Tos,” I reminded her, fighting the urge to whirl around again. “If we kick him out, he could tell everyone who voted for who. Plus, I doubt Connor would let his dethronement slide.”
“Connor’s been—annoying. Sometimes I think I’d be better off dating Ashton or Kyle. Speaking of.” Jade got to her feet and came up behind me. She reached around me and plucked my eyeshadow brush from my grip. “You need to date Kyle.”
I jerked back from her. “Kyle?”
“We need somethingnew.” Her hand landed on myshoulder, forcing me still. She barely waited for me to shut my eyes before she began dragging the brush against my lid, smudging the eyeshadow I’d just finished. “Something to replace the excitement of Landon dating Lacey, because shesodoesn’t deserve the spotlight. And the fact that she’ssittingat ourtablenow? Ridiculous.”
“Almost as ridiculous as me dating Kyle.”
Jade’s fingers were almost painful against my collarbone. “You’re not still hung up on Logan, are you?”
“No! But we agreed—notKyle.” I huffed. “Logan would be better than Kyle.”
