Pretty Crooked (13 page)

This was no good at all. “But I already spent what I had and I need some for the next few days,” I blurted.

“You’ll just have to wait. For the time being we’re going back on an allowance system.” She placed both hands on my shoulders and stared me squarely in the eye. She looked as if she’d aged five years since we’d been here, but maybe I just hadn’t been examining her as closely before. “Willa, we’re not here to keep up with the Joneses. I told you, we’re here for you, for your future. And while I can afford private school, our lives are always going to be a little different than your friends’.”

“I knew
that
already,” I muttered.

“Look, we’re lucky to have this money—God knows where we’d be without it. But it’s a finite amount. We really do have to be careful.”

“But why?” I asked. And before I could stop myself, I blurted, “Why can’t you just get a real job like normal parents?”

I’d never asked her this before, though I’d always wondered it. There was so much about our lives that wasn’t normal—things I cherished and things that bugged me. The job thing was one of the latter. Lots of artists also worked regular jobs for money, and though I supported
my mom’s dreams I sometimes thought it was a little selfish of her to put them ahead of our needs.

“Painting
is
a real job.” My mom pulled away from me, looking hurt. “Besides, it’s not that simple.”

“Why not?”

“Because. I just can’t.”

“But you can. You could do lots of things. You’re young. You have skills besides painting.”

“Willa, we’re not going to talk about my situation, okay?” she said quietly. “There are certain things you wouldn’t understand. But you just have to trust me. I have your best interests at heart. And it’s more than a couple of sweaters that you’ll hate next year.”

“I trust you,” I said, though I wasn’t entirely sure I did. I wondered what things I wouldn’t understand. How was I supposed to understand them if she wouldn’t even tell me what they were? We’d always been in sync, but ever since we’d gotten here, it seemed like we were speaking two totally different languages, and hers was increasingly secretive.

“Well, that’s a relief.” She put her arm around me and squeezed me tight. “I was starting to think you were going to leave me for one of your new friends’ families. Wanna watch a movie tonight?”

“Maybe,” I said reluctantly. The whole conversation just wasn’t sitting right with me. I couldn’t just snap back to mom and daughter bonding. “I should try to do some of my English reading first.”

Once I was in my room, though, I realized I wasn’t really ready to face Thoreau and his lonely cabin in the woods—he would have to wait for Sunday. Instead, I sat down at the computer to check my email.

There was a new message from Nikki, sent to all of us, as she was wont to do. The girl lived for the mass email, whether it was a personal update or angels promising good luck for the next decade.

I’m sooo hungover, you guys. But look what I found this morning
.

XXX, N

It was a link to the Buzz. Out of boredom or some perverse curiosity, I clicked on it.

The top entry was a photo of Sierra. She was wearing jeans, high-heeled boots, and a tight V-neck T-shirt that revealed a faint blue tattoo on her arm. Someone had used a Photoshop program to draw nipples on her breasts and arrows pointing to where her flesh bulged.

Hey, fatty, is that a homemade tat?
the caption read.
Fashion Fail
.

I drew in a breath as utter disgust and anger surged through me.

Other people had logged on and made mean comments below, suggesting that she was a slut, that she’d hooked up with teachers at Valley Prep, that her mom was a prostitute. As I read I felt my whole body knotting
up—every last muscle constricted with fury.

I clicked the window closed, feeling as ashamed as I might have if I’d stumbled on a picture of her naked.

I didn’t need any more evidence that Kellie and Nikki were behind this—I could practically hear Kellie saying the words out loud. And I didn’t need any more signs that my anonymous makeover plan was the right way to go. Now I just needed to figure out how to get the money to pull it off.

CHAPTER TEN

BY MONDAY, I’D turned the dilemma over in my mind countless times and I’d finally come up with a workable solution. It was so obvious, I wondered why it had taken me so long. No access to the safe meant I had little choice: I would have to steal the money I needed and then I would deliver new goods anonymously to Mary, Sierra, and Alicia.

And who better to steal from than the people who had more than enough, the people responsible for all of the teasing? I’d be making things right while getting a little revenge. I’d be kickin’ it Robin Hood–style. The idea made me positively giddy.

Since I’d never even shoplifted a lip balm, I knew I was going to need some assistance for the stealing part—preferably from a professional in the criminal arts. I didn’t know many people in Paradise Valley, but there was one person who could possibly help me.

I found Tre during a free period, practicing ollies on his skateboard behind the performing arts center. His baseball hat was cocked sideways on his head and he was wearing a red plaid shirt buttoned up over a hoodie. He did an ollie in front of me with ease, rolling by, and I could see that his body was meant for skating, a central core of balance smoothly guiding his long limbs. He waved, then circled back, darting in and out of the pots of blooming succulents someone had thoughtfully cemented here. Above us, a single row of clouds was drifting across the sky like curdled cream.

I wished suddenly that I was coming here under different circumstances, because it wasn’t going to be easy to ask what I had to ask him. It’s not like we were close, and I had no idea how he would respond.

It was too late now, though, because he’d seen me.
Gulp
.

“What’s up, Willa? Are you out here for a smoke or something?” This was where kids went to sneak cigarettes, and probably lots of other things that may or may not have made the pages of ValleyBuzz.

“No,” I said. “I’m actually looking for you.”

“Oh yeah?” He smiled, almost flirtatiously. “What for?”

I took a deep breath. There was no subtle or polite way to do this. I just had to come out with it. “I guess I’m wondering if you can help me. I need to steal something.”

He broke out into a laugh. “You’re kidding, right?” He skated past me, looping across the pavement on his board.

I jogged after him, my heart thumping in time with my feet.
Not kidding at all, Tre
. I had to get his attention before I lost my nerve.

“It’s kind of important,” I called out. “It’s for a good cause.”

He stopped again and stared at me, his smile collapsing into a deeply creased scowl. He looked offended. “Now why would I be able to help you with that?”

I shrugged, feeling sheepish. “I don’t know… I just… I just heard some things.”

“Don’t believe everything you hear.” He got back on his board, dismissing me.

Stupid
. What was I thinking, that I would insinuate he was a criminal and then expect him to want to help me, like he would just be all gung ho?

This whole thing was a bad idea.

Maybe I should just forget about it now
, I thought. Go back inside. Actually do something productive during my free period, like read or study. But I thought of the girls I could help, of all the stuff they’d dealt with, and something in me—the stubborn, angry part of me—pressed ahead. I needed to make him understand.

“Tre, seriously. I mean, I wouldn’t ask unless I really needed your help. Please. Just listen, at least.” I had to shout to be heard above his scraping wheels as he whooshed back and forth.

“I’m not into that,” he called back to me. “And even if I was, why would I teach some nosy girl my secrets?”

“Because I’m … nice?” I asked feebly.

He just stared at me under raised eyebrows.

His phone buzzed. He stopped to take it out of his pocket and look at the screen. Then he looked back at me as if surprised I was still there. “Sorry, Willa. I can’t help you,” he said with finality.

I wasn’t going to let him brush me off just yet. I saw an opportunity and I seized it quickly.

“That one of your—um—clients?” I asked, thinking of the other day in assembly. “I seem to remember you saying you owed me one.”

He sighed wearily and put his phone away. “This wasn’t what I meant.”

“I just need one little lesson,” I pleaded. “Maybe a half hour of your time, tops. Then we’d be even.”

“Look, Willa, you don’t know what you’re getting into.” He looked beyond me, as if remembering his past, then his eyes trailed back to where I was standing. “And I’m trying to do things differently here.”

“I understand,” I said. “But you can trust me. I won’t mess it up for you, I promise.”

“How do I know that? I barely know you. And no offense, but you don’t seem all that slick.”

I looked up at him, noticing for the first time that he had a tattoo peeking out of the collar of his shirt, one that he’d always kept hidden. It was a colorless face
made with scratchy lines. It looked like Sierra’s tattoo—the one the blog had made fun of. I wondered if it was a picture of his girl.

“You can trust me because we both have things to lose,” I said. “And because we’re both new here, and that makes us more alike than different.”

He seemed to think this over for a moment.

“So if we were gonna do this thing—and I’m not saying we will—I don’t want to know anything about what you’re planning, okay?
Nothing
.”

“Okay,” I said, my hopes rising bubbly in my chest. “I won’t tell you. Ever.”

“And you can’t ask me any questions, either. The past is the past. I wouldn’t expect anyone around here to understand, anyway.”

My eager smile retracted a bit—I felt like he wasn’t really giving me enough credit—but I nodded all the same. “Absolutely. I get it. No questions.”

“So when,
hypothetically
, did you want to start?”

“As soon as possible.”

“And where?”

“Wherever you want. You tell me.”

He kicked his board and grabbed the other end to pull it upright. “We couldn’t do it here. But there’s a park a few miles down the road. You free after school?”

“Today? Yep.” The girls were going shopping but I’d already made up an excuse to avoid it, telling Kellie I had a paper to work on.

“Okay, Willa. I’ll think about it. If you see me at that park at four, we’re good. If not, you’ll have your answer.” He tipped his board back down, jumped on it, and cruised past me again.

“Okay. See you,” I said. “I mean, hopefully.”

By then he’d sailed off across the asphalt, so I turned and walked back toward the main building, trying not to look behind me. The whole future of this plan was riding on Tre. And now I’d exposed it—not completely, but enough that it could be ruined if Tre decided to mention it to anyone.

And what if he did? In all my efforts to convince him I was trustworthy I’d forgotten the simple possibility that maybe I couldn’t trust him.

I had an urge to go back, make him promise he’d show, make him promise not to say anything to anyone, but I knew my desperation would get me nowhere. I had to play it cool. Wait and see.

Keep walking, nice and slow
.

There was a skate ramp at the park, which is where I would’ve expected to find Tre, but he wasn’t there. He wasn’t at the volleyball court or basketball court, either. I chained up my bike and looked at my phone. I was still fifteen minutes early. My breath was short and I felt light-headed, but it wasn’t from the bike ride, which was completely flat and only a couple miles from school.

Calm down
, I told myself. It was like I was already doing something illegal.

I sat down on a bench and waited, surveying the neatly clipped lawn that had to have been shipped in from somewhere else, then irrigated like nobody’s business to stay this green. A tiny sparrow hopped into the thick blades and disappeared, probably reveling in the suburban vegetation. I didn’t blame him. I was longing for a little lounge action myself.

I reached into my bag to get out
Walden
. The page hung in front of my eyes but its neat rows of text were just patterns to me. Then I pulled out my little cookie-shaped coin purse and walked toward the community center building, looking for a vending machine.

Would he show? I wondered. Or was he sitting on a couch at home, playing
NFL
on his Xbox and laughing at me? He’d made it clear that he wasn’t really planning to help me out, that he thought the whole thing was a bad idea.

I carried my soda back to the bench and watched some kids riding their bikes around. This was what parks were for. To help kids do wholesome activities and stay out of trouble.

For some reason I thought of Aidan, and his bike shop. I was sure he hadn’t really needed a job, if what everyone said about his family was true. He must have taken it because he loved bikes. Like I did. Which made him … kind of cool. My mind drifted back to the last day I’d
seen him, in the hallway, when he’d asked me out. Had he gone to Scottsdale by himself or with someone else? The thought of him asking someone else gnawed at me. He’d looked so cute that day, by my locker.... But he was a flirt. Everyone said so.
Forget him
, I thought. I had other things on my mind right now.

Like the sinking, uneasy feeling that Tre wasn’t coming. It was now five after. I would give him ten more minutes to show up, and then I would head home. The kids on their bikes swooped and swerved, laughing as they did another lap around the fields, tearing up the perfectly manicured turf.

I heard the board before I saw him. He coasted around the corner, his backpack slung over one shoulder, the red flannel shirt rippling against his muscled arms. He jumped the curb and stopped in front of me.

“Wow. You made it,” I said. Before I’d realized what I was doing, I’d flung a hug on him, throwing my arms around his back.