And then she heard Caroline laugh — not a tight, nervous sound, but something genuine — and Aria looked up in time to see another tendril of blue smoke disappear.
When they’d first arrived, Caroline wouldn’t leave Aria’s side. But now she was doing flip turns in the pool with Ginny while Elle, Renée, and Amanda bounced a beach ball between them.
Something tugged in Aria’s chest — the feeling that she was in the right and wrong place at the same time — and she knew it was because of Lily. But at least Aria had a plan in motion now. She only hoped it would work.
“Truth or dare!” said Ginny later.
They were all sitting in a pillow fort (Aria and Elle had made it from scratch, not in a magical way, just a “let’s use everything we can find around the house” way).
Elle was playing with Aria’s hair, and Caroline was sitting cross-legged between Amanda and Renée, and Ginny was perched on a massive cushion.
“Dare,” challenged Amanda with a smirk.
“Hmmmm …” said Ginny.
“Oh, I know!” said Elle. She whispered in Ginny’s ear, and Amanda was instructed to put six marshmallows in her mouth and then call and order a pizza. She couldn’t get out the word cheese, so she had to hang up, which sent everyone into giggles.
Renée picked truth.
“Do you have a crush on anyone?” asked Elle.
Renée spent the next ten minutes talking about a boy named Jimmy, who was taking her to the dance, and who apparently had the bluest eyes in all of Eastgate. Everyone else seemed to know who he was. Aria simply nodded along.
Ginny boldly chose dare, and had to smear peanut butter on her face and go over to the neighbors’ asking for jelly. A boy who couldn’t have been more than five or six actually brought her a jar of strawberry jam.
Ginny beamed, victorious, and wiped her face on a towel while the other girls fell over laughing.
Before they were back to Ginny’s house, Ginny turned to Aria and said, “Okay, truth or dare?”
Aria came to a stop on the sidewalk and chewed her lip. “Dare.”
Ginny flashed a mischievous smile, and pointed to the nearest house.
“Go knock on the door,” she said, “and if someone answers, you have to kiss them on the cheek.”
The group let out a mixture of gasps and giggles. Aria’s eyes widened.
“That’s not nice,” said Caroline. “You should let her pick again.”
“She chose dare!” said Elle.
“Yeah, but —”
“I’ll do it,” said Aria decidedly.
“Really?” said the girls at once.
“Are you sure?” asked Caroline.
“You don’t have to,” said Ginny. “I can think up something else.”
But Aria shook her head. “No,” she said. “It’ll be fun.” Still, her heart fluttered as she made her way up the front steps. She glanced back and saw the girls looking on with awe. And then Aria turned, and knocked, and waited.
She wondered who would answer (if anyone did), whether it would be an old lady or a little kid or a mom or —
The door swung open. It was a boy. Not just a boy. But a boy with a summer tan and brown hair and green eyes. A boy Aria’s age. Aria had met boys her age at Gabby’s school, but she hadn’t planned on kissing any of them.
“Can I help you?” he said, flashing a smile that made a dimple appear in his cheek. Aria felt her face redden.
“Um,” she said.
“You okay?” asked the boy.
“Yeah, I …” Aria searched her brain for words. “Can I tell you a secret?” she blurted out.
“Uh, sure?” he said. He leaned in a little, and so did she. And then Aria kissed him on the cheek. The boy pulled back and looked at her with surprise, and Aria felt like her face was on fire. She started to back away. “Sorry,” she said. “It was just this silly game and I —”
“Wait,” said the boy. Aria stopped. “You forgot something.”
“I did?” asked Aria. He motioned her closer, and then he leaned forward and kissed her on the cheek. Then he pulled away, smiled, and went back inside.
The door shut, but Aria stood on the front steps, her heart racing, her face hot. For a second, she forgot who she was. What she was. Not in a bad way, or a scary way, but in a strange, wonderful, totally new way. And then she turned back toward the girls, and smiled so wide that the whole evening — street lights and setting sun and all — seemed to glow brighter.
The girls cheered, and Aria gave a sweeping bow.
Several minutes later, when they were all collapsed back in Ginny’s bedroom, Aria still hadn’t stopped smiling. And then Ginny pulled a pillow into her lap, turned to Caroline, and said, “All right, truth or dare.”
Caroline hesitated, smoke curling around her.
And then to Aria’s surprise, she took a deep breath and said, “Truth.”
Suddenly Ginny got very serious. “Okay,” she said. “What happened between you and Lily Pierce?”
Everyone went quiet.
Caroline felt like she’d been punched in the stomach. The light and happiness began to leak out of the room as Caroline looked from Ginny to Elle, Elle to Renée, Renée to Amanda, and then finally to Aria.
Caroline couldn’t read Aria’s mind, but her expression seemed to say one thing.
Tell the truth.
All Caroline wanted to do was forget. To put the past behind her and start fresh. But she couldn’t. Going forward sometimes meant looking back, and if she really wanted to make new friends, they deserved to know what had happened with her old ones.
So she told them.
About Lily and Erica. About standing up for Whitney, and being kicked out of the group for it.
When she was done, the room stayed quiet. Ginny frowned, and for a second Caroline thought she was mad at her. Then Caroline realized Ginny was mad for her. “I can’t believe they’d stoop that low,” she growled.
“Can’t you?” challenged Elle. “They’re the meanest girls in school.”
“I’m so sorry,” said Renée.
“We just figured you two got in a fight,” added Amanda.
“We didn’t know,” said Ginny, squeezing Caroline’s shoulder.
“Does Whitney know?” asked Elle.
Caroline started to shake her head, when Aria cut in. “Yeah, she knows.”
Caroline shot Aria a surprised look.
“And she still hangs out with them?” snapped Ginny. “Why would anyone put up with that?”
“Maybe she’s scared,” Caroline said quietly.
“Maybe she’s crazy,” countered Elle.
“Well,” said Ginny decidedly, “if she isn’t willing to stand up for herself, that’s her problem. Can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped. You did the right thing, Caroline.”
“Thanks,” said Caroline, hugging a pillow to her chest. She let out a deep breath, and for the first time in weeks, she felt like she could breathe.
Ginny cleared her throat. “Now back to business,” she said. “So, Elle, truth or dare?”
That night, when the girls were asleep, a tangle of pajama-ed limbs on the pillow fort floor, Caroline lay there, looking at the ceiling as if it were the night sky. And then, as she gazed up, tiny dots of light — like stars — began to pepper the darkened room.
“Hey, Aria,” she whispered in the dark. “Are you doing that?”
“Yeah,” Aria whispered back. There was a moment of silence, and then Aria said, “This was really fun.” It was strange, the way she said it. Happy and sad at the same time.
“Thank you,” said Caroline.
“For what?” asked Aria.
“For everything.”
“We’re not done yet,” said Aria, and Caroline could hear the smile in Aria’s voice as the stars began to soften and blink out. “But we’re on our way.”
Caroline’s mom picked them up early the next morning for Saturday school. Caroline was still rubbing
sleep from her eyes and pulling her hair back into a messy ponytail as she got in the car, Aria bobbing behind her. Aria didn’t look tired at all. If anything, she seemed peppy.
“What’s it like?” she asked as they rode to Westgate.
“What’s what like?” asked Caroline with a yawn.
“Saturday school,” said Aria.
Caroline shrugged. She had never gotten a Saturday school before, so she didn’t know what to expect. Would they be sweeping the floors? Picking up trash? Dying of boredom at a desk? The possibilities were endless.
When they got to school, Mr. Cahill was waiting for them in the office. He led them to the gym, where rolls of colored paper and buckets of paint were waiting for them.
Mr. Cahill swept his hand over the crafts and said, “Dance prep.”
“We’re going to dance?” asked Aria, her face lighting up. “That doesn’t seem like much of a punishment.”
“No, you’re going to prep for this week’s dance.”
Aria considered the gym. “But can we dance while we’re prepping?”
Mr. Cahill sighed. “Sure,” he said. “But don’t have too much fun. This is Saturday school after all.” He almost smiled when he said it. “The theme is ‘In the Clouds,’ so I need you girls to start painting clouds on the blue paper roll. Think you can handle that?” Aria and Caroline nodded. “Great. I’m going to find coffee.”
Mr. Cahill left. Aria started to roll out some of the blue paper. “What a perfect theme,” she said. “It was made for you.”
“It’s weird, isn’t it?” said Caroline. The whole school had voted, and she’d been sure they were going to choose something flowery and pink. But Caroline had kept thinking how cool it would be to dance in the sky.
Aria shrugged. “Sometimes things just work out,” she said with a mischievous smile.
There was a radio in the corner, and Aria turned it on. Music echoed through the gym while they worked. Soon they were singing along — Aria cheerfully off-key — and laughing, and Caroline was just starting to think Saturday school wasn’t so bad at all.
Then the gym doors banged open, and in walked Lily Pierce.
Caroline froze. “What is she doing here?” she hissed.
Aria shrugged. “Not sure,” she said, even though she knew exactly what Lily was doing there.
She hadn’t turned Lily in for the swimming pool incident (in part because she didn’t have proof, and in part because she wasn’t sure Ms. Pierce would make Lily come today). But Aria had read the entire pamphlet on Westgate’s rules. So, all day on Friday, Aria had made sure that Lily broke just enough of the rules to land in Saturday school.
“My phone was turned off!” Lily had told the teacher after history class.
“Then how did it ring during my lecture?” he demanded.
“Mr. Cahill,” Lily had said at lunch, aghast, “I swear my shoelaces were black this morning.”
“Mhmmm,” said Mr. Cahill, “so they just magically turned green.”
“I don’t know how the popcorn got in my locker,” Lily had said later that day, exasperated.
“I could smell it all the way down the hall,” said the eighth-grade monitor. “And where did you even find a microwave?”
(That one had kind of been Lily’s own fault. She’d brought the bag of popcorn to school herself. Aria had simply made it pop.)
“Three strikes,” her mother, the headmistress, had snapped. “What’s gotten into you?”
Aria had almost felt guilty for setting Lily up (especially when she saw her face after leaving her mother’s office), but Aria had to do something to get Caroline and Lily together alone, and in neutral territory.
Now Lily marched over, and, without saying a word or looking at either one of them, she picked up a paintbrush and started making clouds.
“I’m going to go wash my hands,” said Aria, holding them up to show they were covered in white paint.
Caroline gave her a look that very clearly said, Don’t leave me here.
And Aria gave her one back that said You said this was what you wanted. A chance to talk? So go ahead. Talk. (Though Aria wasn’t very good at giving people looks, so she wasn’t sure that all came across.)
Caroline shook her head. I changed my mind.
Aria frowned. Change it back.
By this point, Caroline and Aria had been staring at each other for several long moments.
“So go already,” said Lily, annoyed.
Aria slipped out into the hall and wiped her hands together, the white paint vanishing. Then she willed herself to disappear. Invisible, she stood on her tiptoes and looked back through the glass insert of the door.
Caroline and Lily were not talking.
They were not talking in that way that said they clearly wanted to — the whole room, not just the smoke, was filled with things they weren’t saying. But neither one of them would go first.
A minute later Mr. Cahill came back with a mug of coffee and a newspaper under his arm. When he pushed the gym door open, Invisible Aria followed him inside.
“Miss Pierce,” said Mr. Cahill, turning down the music. “I never thought I’d see you here.”
“Yeah,” grumbled Lily. “Me neither.”
Caroline opened her mouth as if to speak, but didn’t. She and Lily went back to silently painting puffy white clouds on the blue paper. Aria, still invisible, came up beside Caroline and wrote a word in the wet paint of the nearest cloud.
TALK.
Caroline’s eyes widened a little. She glanced over at Lily, but Lily hadn’t seen the trick.
“What are you staring at?” asked Lily without looking up.
Caroline blinked. “Can you pass the paint?”
Lily lifted the bucket and dropped it between them. It splashed, dotting both their clothes with white. Lily groaned. Caroline laughed.
“It’s not funny,” snapped Lily.
Caroline’s giggles trailed off. “Do you remember that time,” she said, “when your dad was painting the window, and left the bucket on the ladder, and Erica knocked into it?”
Lily rolled her eyes. “Oh god, she was covered in red paint.”
“She was so worried about her hair. Not her clothes or her shoes or her skin. She was just terrified it would dye her hair.”
Lily cracked a smile. “She didn’t want to be a redhead.”
Caroline started to laugh. This time, Lily did, too. The blue smoke that circled both of them thinned a fraction.
When their laughter trailed away, Lily said, “Hey, do you remember that one time when —”
But she was cut off by the sound of the gym doors banging open, Aria turned to see Erica and Whitney barging inside. Aria groaned inwardly. Caroline grimaced, and to Aria’s surprise, Lily’s smoke began to darken at the sight of the two girls.
“What up, losers?” said Erica loudly, her voice echoing through the gym.
“Language, Miss Kline,” warned Mr. Cahill.
“What are you doing here?” asked Lily.
“We came to save you,” said Whitney, “from being stuck with trash.” The second part she said too low for Mr. Cahill to hear, but Caroline clearly heard.
Aria could see Lily’s expression falter. Just for a second. Her mouth opened as if she was going to defend Caroline, but then she put on a stiff smile and said, “Ugh, thanks. Let’s get some fresh air.” She dropped her paintbrush back in the bucket, splashing flecks of white on Caroline. This time, neither one of them laughed. Anger rolled through Aria, and she had to resist the urge to stick out her foot and trip Lily.
“Can I take a break, Mr. Cahill?” Lily called out. “The smell of paint is making me sick.”
Mr. Cahill sighed, and nodded. “Fine,” he said. “Ten minutes.”
He turned to Caroline. “You can take one, too, if you want.”
Caroline’s knuckles were white around her paintbrush. “That’s okay,” she said as Lily and Erica and Whitney vanished through the doors. “I’ll s
tay here.”
Mr. Cahill looked around. “Where’s Aria?” he asked.
When his back was turned, she flickered into sight.
“I’ve been here the whole time,” she said, cross-legged on the floor.
“Oh,” said Mr. Cahill, blinking. “Well, carry on.”
Caroline kept painting, even though tears were rolling silently down her cheeks. “I thought …” she whispered. “I thought … just for a moment … we could …”
“So did I,” said Aria. She really thought, if she could get the two of them alone … and for a second, it had worked. Lily’s smoke had thinned, and Aria had been able to see a side of Lily she hadn’t before. But it wasn’t enough.
And when Lily finally came back from her break, she didn’t say another word to Caroline.
All day a cloud hung over Caroline. Somehow getting a flash of old Lily made the new Lily even worse. And the worst part was that Caroline could see the old Lily in there somewhere, under all that mean, but she couldn’t get her out.
Just when she felt like she’d never shake the dark cloud — did her smoke look the way this felt? — she and Aria got back to her house, paint-streaked and tired, and saw Ginny and Elle waiting for them on the steps.
“There they are, our little rule-breakers,” said Ginny.
“Tell us, what’s it like to be juvenile delinquents?” teased Elle.
“Messy,” said Aria, holding up her paint-covered hands. “We painted clouds for the dance.”
“What’s the theme again?” asked Ginny.
“The sky,” said Aria, and Elle tilted her head to one side.
“Hmm,” she said. “That might be tricky to shop for. Ginny and I were going to the mall to look at dresses for the dance. Can you come?”
Standing there with Ginny and Elle, Caroline felt her spirits begin to lift. They didn’t care who was most popular. They weren’t bullies or nobodies. They were just themselves. Caroline nodded enthusiastically.
“You coming like that?” asked Ginny. “I mean, paint-splattered is a good look.”
Caroline laughed. “No,” she said. “Let me go inside and change. And actually I need to ask my mom if I can go.”