And wham—I was no longer mature, or nice, or anything good. I was the same critical, insulting, immature girl he’d known last year. It was practically a vindication of Logan’s words, and that one sentence hurt just as deeply.
I wanted to shrug the whole thing off and say, “You know how it is. All’s fair in love, war, and high school.” But I couldn’t. I couldn’t act like what I’d done didn’t matter when I knew, inside, that it did.
“I made a mistake. I thought Amy wrote something horrible about me, and I retaliated.”
“You weren’t sure it was Amy, but you retaliated anyway?
“I thought I was sure.”
“Did you talk to her?”
Of course I didn’t talk to her. She wouldn’t have told me the truth— Well, actually she would have told me the truth, but I wouldn’t have believed it was the truth. I couldn’t tell Josh this, though. I couldn’t admit to being blindly suspicious along with being vindictive. “I said it was a mistake.”
“A mistake because you retaliated or a mistake because you retaliated against the wrong person?”
Either. Both. I wasn’t sure, and I didn’t want to think about it anymore. How much guilt should a person have to endure while waiting to get prom pictures taken? I didn’t answer, but I couldn’t think about anything else.
Why hadn’t I just taken that flyer into the office and let them handle it?
Josh didn’t press the point. We stood together in line, silently apart, until the photographer called out it was our turn. Then we went and stood side by side, hands clasped, under the archway. I smiled, knowing the picture would turn out awful anyway. It was a fitting symbol of the evening.
After the pictures Josh and I went back to the dance floor and danced for a few more dances. The music blared out a quick tempo, and even though I tried to dance to the beat, my arms and legs felt stiff and clumsy.
Once, I noticed Logan dancing with Cassidy in a far corner. He looked perfectly happy. And why shouldn’t he? He knew he’d been right about everything all along.
For the second time that night I came close to beautifying myself with tears and runny mascara. I wanted to go home; instead, I kept dancing with Josh. Every step I took, every note I heard, all seemed to echo the words in my head, “It’s true . . . It’s true . . .”
Finally, mercifully, the prom ended. I decided not to suggest one of the after-prom parties. Instead, when they turned up the lights, I yawned and commented on how late it was.
Josh drove me home, and we didn’t talk much in the car. I knew he wanted the evening to be over as badly as I did, so it almost surprised me when he got out of the car at my house and walked me to my door—but that was the thing about Josh, he was a perfect gentleman.
He paused on the doorstep. “Thanks for asking me out, Samantha. I had a nice time.”
He wasn’t even a good liar; still I smiled at him anyway. “Thanks for coming. I’ll give you your copy of the pictures as soon as I get them.” If I didn’t burn them first.
I hadn’t expected him to, but he leaned forward and gave me a kiss on the cheek.
“That’s a friendship kiss. I want us to be friends.”
“Right. Exactly.” I felt like he was breaking up with me. “Well, I’ll see you later.”
I opened the door and went into the darkened house. Without turning on the lights, I put my purse on the hallway table and my corsage—which was now brown around the edges—into the fridge. I walked quietly up the stairs, checked in with my parents, then went to my room and kicked off my shoes. I slowly took off my earrings, necklace, and all the trappings of the evening.
The night was over, and yet in some ways it wasn’t. In some ways tonight was a beginning. The person I was going to become was just beginning to form, because I couldn’t stand to be the person I had been before. I could still see Josh’s face looking at me with disappointment—still hear Logan’s words as we danced. I went to the ball as Cinderella and then found out I was actually one of the wicked stepsisters.
I got in my pajamas and slipped into bed, trying to clear my mind of the images of the night: colorful dresses swishing around me, couples swirling by. Music blaring. I pressed my eyelids together tightly and imagined that instead of blankets, I was covered in a layer of thick green vines. Then in my mind, one by one, I turned over each leaf.
CHAPTER 14
The next day I got out my extra poster board, the markers, the scrapbook stuff, and then locked myself in my room. Very carefully, I made VOTE FOR AMY posters. I couldn’t undo that I’d helped tear her first ones down, but I could make her some new ones.
After dinner I went back to my room, and while I did my homework I resolved to be friendlier to everyone in school. I’d say hi to people in the hallway. I’d ask Cassidy what orphanage project she was working on next and volunteer to help. I’d even be nice to Elise.
See, I wanted to say to Logan. See, I’m not only thinking of myself.
On Monday I went to school early and put the Amy posters up before anyone was around. I didn’t worry too much about someone catching me; after all, there was no rule about putting posters up for an opponent.
I thought about resigning from the race. I really did. I wondered if that would be the only way to completely redeem myself for what I’d done. But then again, I hadn’t actually done anything to hurt Amy’s chances for winning. I hadn’t smeared her name the way Rick had smeared mine. I’d just made her redo all of her posters.
These thoughts still edged around my mind as I put up the last poster. I surveyed it for a minute, then went to put the tape away in my locker. I didn’t feel like standing and ogling with my friends on the front landing, so I took my biology book from my locker and sat down on the floor to read the next assignment.
I wasn’t sure what to say to Chelsea or how I should act when I saw her next. I wanted to be angry and blame everything on her, but in truth I knew she hadn’t set out to sabotage my campaign. Of course, she should have told me Cassidy hadn’t done the sabotaging, but I even found this hard to be angry about. I kept asking myself what I would have done in Chelsea’s place. If I’d made a horrible mistake and my friends had already blamed it on someone else, would I have straightened them out? Would I have done the right thing or the wrong thing?
I thought about all of the insults I’d wanted to utter over the last two weeks, Amy’s posters, and the way I’d treated Cassidy.
Not only did it deflate all of my anger but it made me feel really depressed too. It seemed like the last few weeks had been nothing but a revelation of all my faults.
I flipped open my biology book and tried to push these thoughts away. The chapter heading read, “Predators and prey, the life struggle of the ecosystems.” Hmm. I got to read about things killing other things. That might take my mind off my problems.
This is what I’d sunk to. I was now finding escapism in the food chain.
I hadn’t read for very long before I noticed someone standing beside me. I looked up and saw Logan.
“I’m ready,” he said.
“Ready for what?”
“Ready to pass out VOTE FOR SAMANTHA flyers on the front steps.”
I stared at him for a moment longer, and he said, “Remember our bet?”
“Oh, yeah.” I shrugged, and then returned to my book. “You don’t really have to do that.”
I expected him to go away. He didn’t. “Yes, I do. A bet’s a bet. I would have really made you go out with Doug if I’d won, so now I have to really pass out flyers for you.”
I looked back up. “You would have made me go out with Doug Campton? Doug, the Hot Babes calendar guy?”