He sighed, a sound of pure frustration. “Lois, I am supportive . . . of you making a fresh start here. We talked about you staying out of trouble. It sounds like you’re using this job to do what you always do.”
Yeah, we had talked about it. But it wasn’t my fault that I wasn’t willing to stand by and let bad things happen unchecked. He should understand that as well as anyone.
Why couldn’t he seem to?
I ignored him, stopping in front of Perry. “Mr. White . . . Perry . . . sir, don’t worry. I take the Daily Planet’s reputation seriously and I know the Scoop reflects on it. It won’t be damaged, not by me. Even if he seals me up in a closet all weekend.”
So the last part was a little grumbly. Sue me.
Perry’s eyes widened with alarm. But when he spoke, the words were simple. And oh-so-important to me.
“I believe you,” he said.
This was more than progress, after how he’d flipped the day before. It was enough to carry me out of the office with my dad.
Dad could try to shackle me all he wanted. It wouldn’t work.
*
Or maybe it would.
As soon as we walked through the front door at home, he held out his hand and said, “Phone,” waiting until I placed mine in his palm. This was after a long, tense, silent car ride home.
Mom was coming off the bottom of the stairs into the living room. She carried my laptop with her.
I bit my lip against a protest that would give away how much I didn’t want them anywhere near my computer. The passwords should be uncrackable, even if they tried to get on it. But this would mean no chats with SmallvilleGuy all weekend long.
No intel. No nothing.
Good thing I had proposed lying low until Monday. “You’re seriously taking all my stuff? How am I supposed to get anything done?”
Dad said, “You can do your homework in longhand. You can’t have that much to do after just a week. Grounded means no contact with the outside world. It means thinking about what kind of life you should be making for yourself. Lois, I know at sixteen it seems like you have all the time in the world, but before you know it—before your mom and I do—you’ll be in college. You’ll be out on your own.”
“Right now I’m counting the seconds until that sweet, sweet freedom is mine.”
“We only want what’s best for you,” he said.
“No,” I said, “I think you just want me to be someone else. Someone I can’t be.”
I started for the stairs, slipping past my mom. I turned back to them. “If you really think what I’ve done is so bad . . . Dad, go read the comments. On the story at the Scoop page. Read the comments and see if you think that it didn’t need to be told, that there was no merit to it. I did not lie. Perry believes me. It’s too bad you can’t bring yourself to.”
I pounded the rest of the way up the steps, only slowing when Lucy peeked out of her bedroom door, making puppy-dog eyes. I paused to brush my hand across the top of her head. “I’m not going anywhere—really, I’m grounded, not being sent away,” I reassured her. “Don’t worry.”
And I finished the journey to my room across the hall, shut and locked my door.
My parents might be able to prevent me from reaching the outside world, but I would also keep them out of mine.
One way or another.
*
I had plenty to keep me busy. Plotting, worrying, planning, more worrying.
First, I plugged Maddy’s tiny MP3 player into my docking station, and I listened to the playlist she’d put together. She really did have excellent taste. It proved to be a nice mix of arty ballads that captured my frustration at being trapped in my room along with punk and hip-hop influenced anthems I jumped around to, raging against the injustice of same.
Then I spent more time plotting. I might have been forbidden access to my phone and outside assistance, but giving a girl time to think . . . that was turning out to be useful after all. As had the stationery set my parents gave me for my eleventh birthday, in case I wanted to write any of my old friends. Was it a coincidence that year had been my first foray into calls home from school because I was in trouble?
Not likely. Even back then, I’d been fighting for someone else. The first time the school had called home to complain about my behavior was when a teacher mispronounced the word “massacre” as if it ended “cree” and a straight-A student named Angie corrected her. The teacher had flipped out and sentenced Angie to lose her recess time for a week. I knew massacre was pronounced “mass-a-ker” from the military history shows Dad loved to watch, and so added my voice of support to Angie’s.
That had gone over well.
Anyway, now I used the pastel pink stationery that had been given to me soon after to write a heartwarming note of apology to deliver to Principal Butler on Monday—something I projected would come in handy at getting him off my back. If only temporarily.
Lucy had been bringing food and drink to my cell, and she even offered to lend me Unicorn University. Though she’d looked vaguely terrified that I might take her up on it and ruin her reputation.