“Sympathy for the Devil.” It could’ve been Ridley’s theme song. She was introducing herself, in a big way.
The people on the dance floor just assumed it was another one of Dickey Wix’s screw-ups, on his way to becoming the most famous thirty-five-year-old DJ on the prom circuit. But the joke was on them.
Forget light strands shorting out; within seconds all the bulbs above the stage and the track lighting along the dance floor began to blow, one by one, like dominoes.
Ridley led Link onto the dance floor, and he twirled her around as Jackson students screamed, pushing their way off the floor, under the spray of sparks. I’m sure they all thought they were in the middle of some kind of electrical wiring disaster that Red Sweet, Gatlin’s only electrician, would get blamed for.
Ridley threw her head back, laughing and undulating around Link in that loincloth of a dress.
Ethan—we have to do something!
What?
It was too late to do anything. Lena turned and ran, and I was right behind her. Before either of us reached the doors to the gym, the sprinklers went off, all along the ceiling. Water poured into the gym.
The audio equipment started to short out, sparking like an electrocution just waiting to happen. Wet snowflakes dropped to the floor like soaked pancakes, and soap-flake snow turned into a bubbling mess.
Everyone started to scream, and girls dripping mascara and hair product ran toward the door in their soggy taffeta skirts. In the mess, you couldn’t tell a Little Miss from a Southern Belle. They all looked like pastel-colored drowned rats.
As I reached the door, I heard a loud crash. I turned to the stage just as the giant glitter snowflake backdrop toppled. Emily flopped out of position, off her step on the slippery stage. Still waving to the crowd, she tried to catch herself, but her feet slipped out from under her and she fell to the gym floor.
She collapsed into a pile of peach and silver taffeta. Coach Cross went running.
I didn’t feel sorry for her, even though I did feel sorry for the people who would be blamed for this nightmare: the Student Council for their dangerously unstable backdrop, Dickey Wix for capitalizing on the misfortune of a fat teenage cheerleader in her underwear, and Red Sweet for his unprofessional and potentially life-threatening wiring of the lighting in the Jackson High gym.
See you later, Cuz. This was even better than a prom.
I pushed Lena out the door in front of me. “Go!”
She was so cold I could barely stand to touch her. By the time we got to the car, Boo Radley was already catching up to us.
Macon shouldn’t have worried about her curfew.
It wasn’t even half past nine.
Macon was infuriated, or maybe he was just worried. I couldn’t tell which, because every time he looked at me, I looked away. Even Boo didn’t dare look at him, lying at Lena’s feet, thumping his tail on the floor.
The house no longer resembled the dance. I bet Macon would never allow a silver snowflake through the doors of Ravenwood again. Everything was black now. Everything: the floors, the furniture, the curtains, the ceiling. Only the fire in the study fireplace burned steadily, casting light out into the room from the hearth. Maybe the house reflected his changing moods, and this was a dark one.
“Kitchen!” A black mug of cocoa appeared in Macon’s hand. He handed it to Lena, who sat wrapped in a scratchy woolen blanket in front of the fire. She clutched the mug with both hands, her wet hair tucked behind her ears, clinging to the warmth. He paced in front of her. “You should have left the moment you saw her, Lena.”
“I was kind of busy getting doused with soap and laughed at by everyone in school.”
“Well, you won’t be busy anymore. You’re grounded until your birthday, for your own good.”
“My own good is so clearly not the point here.” She was still shaking, but I didn’t think it was from the cold, not anymore.
He stared at me, his eyes cold and dark. He was furious, I was sure now. “You should have made her leave.”
“I didn’t know what to do, sir. I didn’t know Ridley was going to destroy the gym. And Lena had never been to a dance.” It sounded stupid even as I was saying it.
Macon just stared back at me, swirling the scotch in his glass. “Interesting to note, you didn’t even dance. Not a single dance.”
“How do you know that?” Lena put down her mug.
Macon paced. “That’s not important.”
“Actually, it’s important to me.”
Macon shrugged. “It’s Boo. He is, for lack of a better word, my eyes.”
“What?”
“He sees what I see. I see what he sees. He’s a Caster dog, you know.”
“Uncle Macon! You’ve been spying on me!”