Alphas

23
JACKIE O
SHOWER
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH
3:07 P.M.

“RE-JEC-TED!”
“Darn it!” Charlie frustration-smacked the coin-tiled shower wall. “Owie, owie, owie!” She pressed her lips against her throbbing hand, urging both into silence.
Her aPod kept beeping, signaling that she was supposed to be in the DAM (Dominating Alpha Males) seminar, but instead she was hiding out in a stall decorated in international currency, cowering from seven showerheads spraying lavender-infused water.
Due to the expectation of privacy that comes with being in a bathroom, Shira couldn’t install cameras here without breaking the law. So in spite of the billowing steam and hair-curling humidity, it was the perfect location to crack the combination of the skeleton key.
Unfortunately, the only things opening so far were her pores.
“Okay, Shira. Let’s try your zip code.” Charlie punched in “6-6-6” with a sly giggle.
“RE-JEC-TED!” the robotic key-voice answered back.
A drop of water landed on her cheek like a hot tear. She brushed it away impatiently.
She tried the founding date of AlphaGirl International: 9-1-9-1-9-9-0.
“RE-JEC-TED!”
3-5. Shira’s press age.
4-3. Her real age.
“RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED!”
4-2. Darwin’s birthday.
5-2-4. Melbourne’s birthday.
9-1-9. Sydney’s birthday.
8-9. Taz and Dingo’s birthdays.
2-2-6-3-9. Bandy, Shira’s late husband’s name, spelled out on the keypad.
3-5-8-3-3-9. Fluffy, the name of her childhood chinchilla.
5-4-5-5-3-7. Killer, the name of her recently deceased cat.
7-2-8-2-6. Satan, Shira’s father. Kidding!
2-5-7-4-2. Alpha.
1-7-8-3. The number of offices Shira had worldwide.
6-7-9-1. The number of assistants Shira had hired.
6-7-9-0. The number of assistants Shira had fired. (Technically, Bee had quit.)
1. Shira’s favorite number.
9-5. The day Shira succeeded in breaking up Charlie and Darwin.
“RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED! RE-JEC-TED!”
“ARGGGG!” Charlie banged her head against some pesos. Even a key was rejecting her. Steam, frustration, and anxiety were making it hard to breathe.
Think, Charlie. THINK!
There was no way Shira had picked something random. A woman who controlled the weather would not leave anything to chance.
Charlie twirled her cameo bracelets around her wrist. She twisted so hard that one of the cameos flew open, and her mom’s picture smiled up at her.
Of course!
No wonder she couldn’t crack the Brazille Code—Shira hadn’t created it. Bee had. Bee planned everything for Shira—why not this?
And Charlie knew without hesitation what was important to her mother.
2-4-2-7-5-4-3. Charlie.
“AC-SESS GRANT-ED.”
“Ha!” Charlie laughed, kicking the spray of water with her feet. “I did it!”
In just a few short hours she’d introduce the Jackie O’s to the tunnels, where Dingo had disappeared to when he’d slipped behind Bandy’s portrait. It was the only place other than the bathrooms where Shira’s digital army couldn’t find them. But in addition to making friends, she’d be delivering Allie J to Darwin. Suddenly Charlie’s palms started sweating and she found it hard to breathe. It was kind of like setting up a playdate between a coyote and your new puppy. But she’d broken Darwin’s heart, and the least she could do was help mend it. And if all went according to plan, she’d have a house full of new BFFs mending hers.
Now all Charlie had to do was stay dry and wait.…
Finally the bathroom door opened. Bare feet slapped against the heated marble.
“Allie J? C’mere,” Charlie whispered from the shower. “Bring shaving cream.”
“Ew, no way!”
Charlie giggled to herself, thinking of how that must have sounded.
“Trust me, it’s not creepy, I swear.”
“Why should I believe you?” Allie J whisper-shouted.
Charlie pressed her mouth against the slight crack in the stall door. “Because I have something for you.”
“Double ew!” Allie J sounded repulsed. “I like boys, okay?”
Charlie rolled her eyes. “I know. That’s what I have for you.”
Allie J paused. “Huh?”
Charlie inhaled deeply, bracing herself, or rather forcing herself, to say the next word.
“What are you talking about?” Allie snapped.
“Darwin.” Charlie swallowed back the bitter taste of sacrifice. Her head took a dizzying dip. It was out there. There was no turning back.
Allie J opened the stall with trepidation, can of Pure Silk in hand. “If this is some ploy to get me to help you shave some hard-to-reach area, I’m so not—”
Charlie rolled her eyes and pulled Allie J into the shower.
“Ahhhhhh!” Water sprayed all over her. “My hair!”
She panic-stuffed her black hair into the back of her champagne-colored blouse in a very not-so-down-to-earth sort of way; odd behavior for someone who cruised communal bathrooms barefoot.
“Shhhhh!” Charlie grabbed the can of shaving cream and wrote I SPY on her right leg, in case Thalia’s superhuman ears were in range. The admission smelled like baby oil and relief.
“I knew it!” Allie J exclaimed, still panic-stuffing. “Wait. Why are you telling me?”
DBL AGENT Charlie spelled out on her left thigh, then put the can down.
“Why are you—”
Charlie covered Allie J’s mouth.
Allie J grabbed the can and wrote in the spaces between the straps on her gladiators.
Y R U TELLING ME?
WANT FRIENDS, Charlie sprayed onto her arm. She hated how pathetic that sounded but decided not to care. It was the truth.
“Why would I trust you?” Allie J asked aloud.
Charlie lifted the gold key, then wrote: STOLE FROM S. OPENS TUNNELS SO WE CAN MEET BOYS.
Allie J’s green eyes blinked in genuine surprise. Then they hardened into emerald stones. “Oh, I get it. You’re setting me up so I get sent home and you can have Darwin all to yourself.”
Charlie shook her head. For a moment she couldn’t believe that she was really trying to force the love of her life on a super-eligible bachelorette. “He doesn’t want me anymore,” she managed. “He likes you.”
Allie J squinted like she was trying to spot Charlie in the distance.
“‘Boys come and go, but in the end I see, it’s my friends who complete me…’” she said, quoting the chorus of “I Like My Boys Like Salad Dressing—On the Side.”
“Huh?” Allie J blinked in confusion.
“Do you even believe your own lyrics?” A spray of water found its way into Charlie’s mouth. She spit it out.
A look of panic crossed Allie J’s pretty face. “No I-I do,” she stammered. “Of course I do.”
“Then you understand what I’m talking about. Darwin was my whole life. And now that we’re done, I have nothing. I want to move on. I want friends.”
“Fine,” Allie J. said. “But we should include Skye, too. She’s been depressed about her ankle and…” Her voice trailed off for a second. “And the fact that we kinda accused her of being the spy.”
“That’s fine,” Charlie agreed.
“But no Triple,” Allie J added quickly. “She might tell.”
Charlie smiled. “Deal.”
Allie texted Skye, and just a few minutes later, Skye limped through the bathroom door, blond waves bouncing around her shoulders.
“Um, knock knock,” Skye rapped on the stall door. “What are you guys doing in the shower? Together.”
“Come in!” Allie J pulled Skye into the steamy fold, then broke the news that C IS SPY via shaving cream.
Skye stomped her foot in a lavender-scented puddle. “I told you it wasn’t me!” She looked more relieved than surprised. “So who are you going to turn in next? My ankle is getting much better, by the way. I can show you.”
“Don’t worry.” Allie J turned up the pressure on the shower so that it ran at a loud hiiisssssssssss and leaned in. “That’s the point. She’s on our side. She’s gonna to help us see the boys.”
“Why would she do that?” Skye asked Allie J, as if Charlie weren’t sitting right there.
“Because she’s not as bad as we thought,” Allie J explained.
Charlie’s insides warmed, and it wasn’t from the shower steam.
Skye sat down on the stall bench, downgrading her stare from murderous to curious. “Why are we talking about this in the shower?”
Allie J shot Charlie a nod-glance. Charlie lifted the gold skeleton key and winked.
“What’s that?” Skye asked.
“Shhhhhhh,” Allie J and Charlie hissed at the same time.
Charlie reached for the can. It was almost empty. She shook it twice and managed to eke out enough foam to write: TUNNEL BOYS.
Skye’s white-blond brows slammed together in bewilderment. “Ohmuhgud, what are you talking about?”
“Trust us, it’s good,” Allie J explained, and then mouthed, “Taz.” Skye’s brows drifted back into place.
“Why are you doing this?” Just as Allie J had, Skye asked the inevitable. Charlie couldn’t blame either of them.
“Because it’s like we’re living on some kind of reality show,” Charlie said quietly. “I’m tired of being watched and forced to compete against people who could be my friends. This ridiculous competition isn’t what anyone signed on for, and I want to do something about it. I want to go to a place where we can just hang out and be normal. Dial down the drama and—”
“Make out,” Allie J blurted, then dialed back her enthusiasm. “Sorry,” she said to Charlie.
“It’s okay, I told you. We’re done.” For now, anyway.
Skye smiled radiantly. “When you put it that way… I’m in.”
“You have to agree to some things first.” Charlie smoothed her hands over the frizz formerly known as her hair. “First, no more Charlie Brown-nose.”
The girls nodded in agreement.
“Second, we trust each other completely.”
Allie J tried to write a check mark on the wall, but a little slanted foam line was all the can had left to give.
“And third, full disclosure about everything,” Charlie added, knowing that she was still holding back one more secret: Why she’d really broken up with Darwin. Or rather, how she hoped that one day in the future, when he’d grown tired of Allie J, they would still end up together. But that was hers to keep.
“Deal?”
“Deal,” the girls responded.
“So when are we you-know-what-ing with you-know-who?” Skye might have been as beautiful as a Bond girl, but the girl did not speak spy.
“Tonight,” Charlie promised.
A smile started to stretch across Skye’s face, but it stopped at a grimace. “Uh-oh.”
“What?” Allie J asked. Her eyes were as round as the pesos in the wall, as if she were anticipating major disappointment.
“Toes before bros,” Skye pouted. “I’m supposed to coach some dancers.”
“So meet us after,” Charlie suggested.
“Thanks.” Skye smiled brightly.
“Sure.” Charlie could feel her feet expanding from the heat, and if she wasn’t mistaken, her heart had a little more volume too. So this was what having friends felt like? “Let’s make a pact. What we’re doing is dangerous, and we need to have each other’s backs. We have to protect each other and our secret. To the grave!”
“The grave!” Allie J and Skye agreed.
Charlie didn’t bother hiding her grin. On a campus where everything was an illusion, she had finally found something real.