The v Club

  "Well . . . like I told Eva," Mandy said, sitting up and looking past Kai at Eva, who lifted her hand in acknowledgment. "I just haven't been sleeping well lately, and it's got me all messed up."

  "It's okay," Kai said again. She was about to pump Mandy for more information--see if she could get to the root of things--when someone by the front door caught her eye. Kai's heart dropped. It couldn't be. But it was. As Eva launched into a rambling explanation of how they'd all

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  been really tense and stressed lately, Kai could only focus on one thing. One big toothy grinning thing. Andres.

  He was standing near the wall, sipping from a cup and laughing with Abby Alessi, doing that thing with his lips that he thought made him look like Antonio Banderas. Kai couldn't believe it.

  "That little bastard," she said under her breath.

  "Who?" Mandy and Eva said in unison.

  They followed her gaze and she didn't have to answer. Andres stuck out like a sore European thumb with his slick hair and his silky shirt tucked into his acid-washed jeans.

  "Omigod. Is that--?"

  "You bet your ass it is," Kai said.

  "Damn. He is beautiful," Mandy said, causing a little twist in Kai's stomach. "Did you bring him?"

  "No. I didn't even tell him I was coming here," Kai said.

  "Well, then how did he find you?" Eva asked, sounding disturbed.

  "I'm about to find out."

  Kai pushed herself up from the couch and stalked across the room, the crowd parting before her like the Red Sea.

  "Bonita!" Andres stretched out his free arm to hug her.

  "What're you, stalking me now?" Kai stopped and crossed her arms over her chest.

  "Oh, please. Get over yourself," Abby said, tossing her long blond hair. "He's here with me."

  Andres shrugged apologetically, and Kai gave Abby a

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  look that could have melted glass. She grabbed Andres's wrist and yanked him away from Abby and out the door. Beer sloshed over the rim of Andres's cup and he protested, but Kai ignored him. Wasn't there anyplace she could go to escape this guy?

  When Kai hadn't returned after five full minutes, Mandy started to wonder. Maybe it was just because she'd been so on edge in general lately, but something about this Andres thing didn't feel right. Kai had barely talked about the guy since he arrived, and whenever someone, usually Debbie, brought him up, she got all defensive and weird.

  Kai had always seemed so fearless. Since the first time Mandy had seen her practicing spikes against the wall in the gym at a summer volleyball practice, she had admired and envied that spark in Kai. But there was something about this Andres guy that spooked her friend, And the fact that someone was able to spook Kai, well, that spooked Mandy.

  "I'm gonna go check on them," Mandy said, pushing herself up.

  "I'll save the couch," Eva said.

  Mandy slid along the wall, hugging the furniture for the quickest route across Devon's increasingly crowded Jiving room. She opened the front door carefully and peeked out, but Kai and Andres were nowhere in sight. The street at the edge of Devon's lawn was dark, and Mandy could see the outline of badly parked cars and

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  SUVs. She listened hard and finally heard voices somewhere off to her left. They sounded angry.

  Pulse racing, Mandy hustled toward the nearest corner. Maybe she hadn't been able to bust in on her parents' arguments, but this situation was different. She had to find out if everything was okay. At least here she could try to help. Mandy approached the side of the house, and as she got closer, she could make out what the voices were saying.

  ". . . Am not just going to sit in your house with nothing to do just because you are afraid for me to meet your friends," said a voice with a thick Spanish accent.

  "Andres, just go home," Kai's voice said, sounding firm.

  "What are you afraid of? Are you afraid I will tell them what we do together?" Andres asked. "Are you so ashamed of being with me? Is that what this is about? It's just sex, bonita! What is the great deal?"

  Mandy felt like the grass had been whipped out from under her feet. She pressed a hand into the rough wooden shingles next to her, her skin tingling. Was it possible? Were Andres and Kai having sex? Was that why Kai had been so testy when Mandy had tried to talk to her about it?

  Omigod, she lied to us. She stood there the other day, looked at us, and said, "We're all virgins. Every last one of us!" Here Kai has been acting all concerned about Mandy, like all she wanted was to be a good friend, but meanwhile she has been lying to all of them. And even worse, she was

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  competing against them for a scholarship that she didn't remotely deserve.

  The very thought made Mandy sick with anger.

  Mandy heard footsteps, and all at once she realized Kai and Andres had stopped talking. She turned and rushed inside.

  Mandy had thought she and Kai were going to be close, were already close, but the more she learned about her newest friend, the more she realized how different they were. Mandy would never lie to her friends like that.

  Except that you have been, she thought shakily.

  But that was different, she told herself. Mandy was only lying to protect her family. Kai was lying to protect herself, and she was hurting others in the process-- competing for a scholarship she didn't deserve and a club presidency she wasn't even qualified for.

  "You wanna get out of here?" Mandy asked Eva, grabbing her jacket from a pile near the side door.

  Eva practically flew off the couch. "Yes, please."

  Mandy yanked open the door that led to Devon's garage.

  "Shouldn't we tell Kai we're going?" Eva asked.

  "Kai's a big girl," Mandy said stonily. "She can take care of herself."

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  Chapter 15

  The SILENCE WAS INTENSE. Debbie glared at the back of her father's head as he brought his car to a stop in front of their house. Before he'd even had time to cut the engine, she was out of the backseat, slamming the door as hard as she could.

  She hadn't said a word to either of her parents all morning. Not over breakfast, not during the ride to the soup kitchen. When they'd arrived at the temple, she'd volunteered to reorganize the pantry so that she could sequester herself in the large closet all morning, as far away from her father and any other human beings as possible. All morning she had been waiting for her father to come to her and apologize--for him to merely acknowledge the fact that he'd missed her game and that he felt bad about it, but he'd said nothing.

  Once inside, Debbie started to stalk upstairs, but she

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  hadn't gotten far when her father walked into the house behind her.

  "Deborah Patel, get down here this instant," he said in his scariest voice.

  "I want you to explain your attitude to me, young lady," her father said, fuming. Her mother bustled into the house and went straight to the kitchen. No help there. "You have been disrespectful to me and to your mother all morning."

  "So what? You're disrespectful to me!" Debbie shot back.

  Her father looked like he'd been slapped.

  "I am your father and you will not speak to me that way," he said, his eyes bulging.

  Debbie breathed in deeply. Breathed out. "Why didn't you come to my game?"

  Her father looked toward the ceiling like he was completely fed up by this question, even though she'd never asked it before. "I had work to do, Deborah. Work comes before games."

  Work comes before me, you mean, Debbie thought, tears stinging at her eyes. She hated herself for being so affected by this. She knew the refrain, had been hearing it all her life. Her father had to provide for the family. That is my role as the father, he'd said to her a million times. "Fine. Whatever," Debbie said finally.

  "Now I want you to go to your room and study," her father said. "You have a lot of work to do."

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  Studying. Apparently that was her role as the dau
ghter.

  "Fine," Debbie said again, this time through her teeth.

  By the time she got to her room, Debbie was about to explode with pent-up aggravation. She saw the hem of her father's sherwani suit sticking out of her bottom dresser drawer and snapped. She yanked out the silky costume she'd worked so hard on, balled it up, and shoved it in the bottom of her trash can. Then she grabbed her science books and threw them in too. She was just looking around her room to see if there was anything else she could destroy when she caught sight of her phone.

  Eva. She grabbed the receiver and dialed her number. Eva would always listen to her vent about her dad and knew exactly what to say to make her feel better.

  The phone rang four times before someone picked up. "Hello?"

  "Oh, hi, Mrs. Farrell," Debbie said, surprised to hear Eva's mom's voice. The woman was almost never home. "It's Debbie Patel."

  "Hi, Debbie," Mrs. Farrell said.

  "Is Eva there?"

  "No, she's not," Mrs. Farrell replied. "I think she went down to 4-H."

  Debbie's heart sank with disappointment. "Oh. Okay. Can you tell her I called?"

  "Sure. No problem."

  Debbie's call waiting beeped. "Thanks," she said, then hit the flash button.

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  "Hello?" she said.

  "Hey, Deb, it's Riley."

  All the anger seemed to rush right out of her at the sound of his voice, even as her embarrassment from the night before came swirling back. "I was going to head over to the library to study," he said. "Wanna come?"

  Debbie smiled and glanced at the doodle-covered paper covers on the textbooks sticking out of the top of the trash can. "I'll be there in fifteen minutes."

  "Why am I lying to your best friend again?" Eva's mother asked. She hung up the phone and crossed her arms over her pink terry cloth robe. Whenever Eva's mother had a day off, she spent most of the morning lounging around in her pajamas and robe, happy to be away from hospital smells and out of her itchy white uniform.

  "I just... I don't feel like talking to her right now," Eva said, staring down at the open poetry book on her lap.

  And I definitely don't want to hear a play-by-play of whatever Riley and Debbie did at Devon's last night.

  Her imagination was already working overtime. She didn't need actual details. And she really didn't need to hear Debbie's excited voice as she related them.

  "Everything okay, hon?" her mother asked, sitting down next to Eva on the couch. "You want to talk about it?"

  "Not really," Eva said.

  "Okay, then do you want to go catch a movie?" she

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  asked. "I have no idea what's playing, but it's matinee prices until four."

  A lump of guilt welled up in Eva's throat. Her mother almost never voluntarily offered to spend money on entertainment, so she must be really concerned. But Eva knew there was no way she would enjoy a movie today. She was just too depressed to concentrate on anything.

  "Thanks, but I don't really feel like going out," Eva said. She gazed down at the words in front of her--words that meant nothing even though she'd read them twenty times.

  "Well, let me know if you change your mind," her mother said, reaching out and tucking a lock of hair behind Eva's ear. It was too short, and it fell right back out again, tickling her cheekbone. "I'm going to go take a shower."

  "Okay," Eva said.

  As her mother padded into the bathroom, Eva slapped her book closed, realizing she was never going to get anywhere until she got the image of Debbie and Riley walking upstairs together out of her mind.

  Unfortunately, short of a lobotomy, she had no idea how she was going to make that happen.

  For all the imagining Mandy had done, it was worse than she expected. She sat in the middle of her freshly made bed, her knees pulled up under her chin, listening to the sounds of the half dozen federal employees tromping around her house. An older man with a kind face had

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  told her to just go about her business but to keep her bedroom door open.

  Go about her business. Right. Like that was even possible.

  There was a sudden rap on her window and Mandy jumped. Eric. She jumped off her bed and ran to open the window. Eric tumbled into the room, his face red and sweaty from the exertion of climbing up her trellis. He'd only tried it once before, and that time he'd ended up with a sprained ankle.

  "Eric! What are you doing here?" Mandy asked, relieved and petrified at the same time.

  "I came over to talk to you, and this guy downstairs told me to vacate the premises," Eric told her, his eyes wide with worry. "What the hell is going on?"

  Mandy's eyes darted to the hallway. The voices that had stayed downstairs all morning seemed to be getting closer. She couldn't stand this. Her home had been taken over by strangers and her own boyfriend was climbing through the window to get to her. She felt like she was living a TV movie. None of this could actually be happening.

  "Mandy, please. I'm freaking out," Eric said. "You need to tell me what's going on."

  "Okay, come here," Mandy said, grabbing his arm. She pulled him over to her walk-in closet, yanked the cord that turned on the light, and dragged him inside, closing the door behind her.

  "Okay . . . okay . . . here's the thing . . . ," Mandy

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  began, keeping one ear trained on the door. Eric crossed his arms over his chest and waited, but Mandy just kept stalling. She shouldn't be doing this. She shouldn't be telling anyone what was actually going on. But what was she supposed to say? Eric had walked in on the search and seizure. There was no way to explain that away.

  Just tell him the truth. Tell him!

  "My father is being investigated for tax fraud," she blurted, squeezing her eyes shut.

  "What!?" Eric said.

  "Shhhhh!!!" Mandy told him, grabbing his wrists.

  "I'm sorry," he whispered, bending his knees slightly and bringing himself closer to her height. "But what}"

  Suddenly Mandy found herself spilling the whole story. Once she got started, she couldn't stop. She didn't even know what she was saying. Eric kissed the top of her head. "It's okay, I'm here," he said over and over again until her sobs quieted into tears of relief. "I'm here. . . ."

  They were the two most beautiful words in the world.

  Eric was here for her. Mandy felt like the poison that had been eating at her insides had been flushed right out of her.

  It's okay. I'm not alone anymore.

  "Why didn't you tell me all this before?" Eric asked.

  "I just couldn't," Mandy said pulling slightly away from him and backing into the hangers full of clothes behind her. "I was embarrassed," she added, ashamed

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  just to admit it. "I mean, how do you tell your boyfriend that your father is a felon?"

  "Mandy, you know you can tell me anything," Eric said, holding her arms and looking into her eyes. "I'm not gonna judge you because of something your father might have done. I'm not gonna judge you ever. I love you."

  "I love you too."

  "But you have to trust me."

  Mandy looked at him and it all seemed so simple. Of course she trusted Eric. She always had. She didn't have to be alone in this.

  "I know," she said. "I do."

  Feeling lighter than she had in days, Mandy opened the closet door and led Eric out into her room. They sat down together on the bed and clicked on the TV to some mind-numbing Saturday morning NBC show. Mandy cuddled up against Eric's side and he locked his arms around her. She didn't care if her parents walked in. She didn't care if the IRS agents walked in. For the first time in days, she felt safe. And she wasn't about to give that up for anything.

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  Chapter 16

  There was nothing on earth but the sound of her breath, the wind in her ears, the cool autumn breeze mixing with her sweat to cool her overheated skin. By the time Kai skidded to a stop in her driveway, her mind was made up. She knew what she had to do. I
t was time to lay down the law.

  She stretched on the front lawn for a few minutes, then headed for the kitchen, where she found Andres sitting at the table, shirtless, eating Cocoa Puffs and flipping through ESPN The Magazine. The sun poured in over him from the back window, highlighting his deep tan. Kai cursed the gods for the millionth time for making him so damn beautiful.

  Just looking at him reminded her of every huge mistake she'd ever made--trusting him, letting him get close enough to shatter her heart. Mistakes she would never make again.

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  "Hey," she said. She wanted to sound friendly and neutral. No reason to start out all belligerent.

  "Hey," Andres replied in the exact same tone.

  Kai opened the refrigerator and stared at the contents, pretending to mull over her choices. She didn't want to look at Andres, because if she did, there was a chance her eyes would wander to his bare chest and then all would be lost. He would undoubtedly notice and he would use it against her. This conversation was all about the upper hand.

  "We need to talk," Kai said, picking out a Snapple and popping the top. She took a long swallow, watching Andres out of the corner of her eye. He didn't even flinch.

  "About what?" he asked before shoving a huge spoonful of cereal into his mouth.

  "About last night," Kai said. She walked over to the counter that separated her from the table and leaned into it. "You can't do that again."

  "Do what?" Andres asked, eyes still on the soccer article in front of him.

  "You know what. Just. . . show up at a party like that," Kai said, waving her free hand.

  "How did you find out about it anyway?" she asked.

  "I was at Blockbuster. I heard a couple of people talking about a party and I talked to them. They invited me," Andres said nonchalantly.

  "Well, next time say no," Kai told him.

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  "Fine," Andres said. He turned a page and studied the headline and photo, his brow furrowing like he was concentrating on a math problem. "I didn't come here to hang out with immature little girls anyway."

  "I'm immature?" Kai demanded, her eyes flashing. "You're the one who dropped in here thinking I was just going to throw myself at you!"

  Andres looked up at her finally, and there was something hard in his eyes--something Kai had never seen before. Cocky, arrogant, playful, sexy she'd seen on Andres. Hard and cold, never.