Crescendo

foyer merged into a large sitting room with a high ceiling and dark Victorian furniture. All of the furniture, including the coffee table, was being used for seating. Vee hesitated in the doorway.

“Just taking a moment to mentally prepare for this,” she called to me over the music. “I mean, the place is going to be infested with Marcie. Marcie portraits, Marcie furniture, Marcie odors. Speaking of portraits, we should try to find some old family pictures. I’d like to see what Marcie’s dad looked like ten years ago. When his dealership commercials come on TV, I can’t decide if it’s plastic surgery that makes him look so young, or just massive amounts of makeup.”

I gripped her elbow and yanked her flush against me. “You are not ditching me now.”

Vee peered inside, frowning. “All right, but I’m warning you, if I see a single pair of panties, I’m out of here. Same goes for used condoms.”

I opened my mouth, then snapped it shut. The chances of seeing both were fairly high, and it was in my best interest not to officially accept her terms.

I was saved from further discussion by Marcie, who sashayed out of the darkness holding a punch bowl. She divided a critical glance between us. “I invited you,” she told me, “but I didn’t invite her.”

“Good to see you, too,” Vee said.

Marcie scrutinized Vee slowly, head to toe. “Didn’t you used to be on some stupid color diet? Looks to me like you gave up before you even started.” She turned her attention to me. “And you. Nice black eye.”

“Did you hear something, Nora?” Vee asked. “I thought I heard something.”

“You definitely heard something,” I agreed.

“Could that be … a dog fart I heard?” Vee asked me.

I nodded. “I think so.”

Marcie’s eyes thinned to slits. “Ha, ha.”

“There it went again,” Vee said. “Apparently this dog has real bad gas. Maybe we should feed it Tums.”

Marcie thrust the punch bowl at us. “Donation. Nobody gets inside without one.”

“What?” Vee and I said at the same time.

“Do-nay-shun. You didn’t really think I invited you here without an agenda, did you? I need your cash. Pure and simple.”

Vee and I eyed the bowl, which was swimming with dollar bills.

“What’s the money for?” I asked.

“New cheerleading uniforms. The squad wants ones with bare midriffs, but the school’s too cheap to spring for new ones, so I’m fund-raising.”

“This should be interesting,” Vee said. “The term Slut Squad will take on a whole new meaning.”

“That does it!” said Marcie, her face darkening with blood. “You want in? You’d better have a twenty. If you make another comment, I’ll boost the cover charge to forty.”

Vee poked me in the arm. “I didn’t sign up for this. You pay.”

“Ten each?” I offered.

“No way. This was your idea. You pick up the tab.”

I faced Marcie and pulled on a smile. “Twenty dollars is a lot,” I reasoned.

“Yeah, but think how amazing I’ll look in that uniform,” she said. “I have to do five hundred crunches every night so I can trim my waist from twenty-five to twenty-four inches before school starts. I can’t have an inch of fat if I’m going to wear a bare midriff.”

I didn’t dare pollute my mind with a mental image of Marcie in a promiscuous cheerleading uniform, and instead said, “How about fifteen?”

Marcie cupped a hand on her hip and looked ready to slam the door.

“Okay, calm down, we’ll pay,” said Vee, reaching into her back pocket. She stuffed a wad of cash into the bowl, but it was dark and I couldn’t tell how much. “You owe me big-time,” she told me.

“You’re supposed to let me count the money first,” Marcie said, digging through the bowl, trying to recapture Vee’s donation.

“I just assumed twenty was too high for you to count,” Vee said. “My apologies.”

Marcie’s eyes went slitty again, then she turned on her heel and carted the bowl back into the house.

“How much did you give her?” I asked Vee.

“I didn’t. I tossed in a condom.”

I lifted my eyebrows. “Since when do you carry condoms?”

“I picked one up off the lawn on our way up the walk. Who knows, maybe Marcie’ll use it. Then I’ll have done my part to keep her genetic material out of the gene pool.”

Vee and I stepped all the way inside and put our backs to the wall. On a velvet chaise in the sitting room, several couples were tangled together like a pile of paper clips. The center of the room was filled with dancing bodies. Off the sitting room, an arched entryway led to the kitchen, where people were drinking and laughing. Nobody paid Vee or me any attention, and I tried to rally my spirits at the realization that getting inside Marcie’s bedroom unnoticed wasn’t going to be as hard as I’d thought. Trouble was, I was beginning to think I hadn’t come here tonight to snoop through Marcie’s bedroom and find evidence that she was with Patch. In fact, I was dangerously close to thinking I’d come because I knew Patch would be here. And I wanted to see him.

It looked like I was going to get my chance. Patch appeared in the entrance to Marcie’s kitchen, dressed in a black polo shirt and dark jeans. I wasn’t used to studying him from a distance. His eyes were the color of night and his hair curling under his ears looked like it was six weeks past needing a cut. He had a body that instantly attracted the opposite sex, but his stance said I’m not open to conversation. His hat was still missing, which meant it was probably in Marcie’s possession. No big deal, I reminded myself. It was no longer my business. Patch could give his ball cap to whoever he wanted. Just because he’d never loaned it to me didn’t hurt my feelings.

Jenn Martin, a girl I’d had math with freshman year, was talking to Patch, but he looked distracted. His eyes circled the sitting room, watchful, as if he wasn’t about to trust a single soul there. His posture was relaxed but attentive, almost like he expected something to happen at any moment.

Before his eyes made it around to me, I shifted my gaze. Best not to be caught staring with regret and longing.

Anthony Amowitz smiled and waved at me from across the room. I automatically smiled back. We’d had PE together this year, and while I’d hardly said more than ten words to him, it was nice to think somebody was excited to see me and Vee here.

“Why is Anthony Amowitz using his pimp smile on you?” Vee asked.

I rolled my eyes. “You’re only calling him a pimp because he’s here. At Marcie’s.”

“Yeah, so?”

“He’s being nice.” I elbowed her. “Smile back.”

“Being nice? He’s being horny.”

Anthony raised his red plastic cup to me and shouted something, but it was too hard to hear over the music.

“What?” I called back.

“You look great!” A goofy smile was plastered on his face.

“Oh boy,” Vee said. “Not just a pimp, but a smashed pimp.”

“So maybe he’s a little drunk.”

“Drunk and hoping to corner you alone in a bedroom upstairs.” Ugh.

Five minutes later, we were still holding our position just inside the front door. I’d had half a can of beer accidentally sloshed on my shoes, but luckily, there’d been no vomit. I was about to suggest to Vee that we move away from the open door—the direction everyone seemed to run moments before spilling the contents of their stomach—when Brenna Dubois came up and held a red plastic cup out to me.

“This is for you, compliments of the guy across the room.”

“Told you,” Vee whispered sideways.

I stole a quick glance at Anthony, who winked.

“Uh, thanks, but I’m not interested,” I told Brenna. I wasn’t very experienced when it came to parties, but I