“For, like, the last thirty days?” Darcy said, poking her fork into something that vaguely resembled mashed potatoes.
“Leave her alone, Darce. So, who’s ready for homecoming shopping?”
That snapped Brynna to attention. “What? Homecoming shopping?”
Now it was Lauren staring at Brynna. “Don’t tell me you forgot. We talked about it yesterday. I left a message on your phone.”
Brynna’s mouth went dry. “On my phone?”
Lauren screwed up her face. “Uh, yeah. How else do you send a message? Carrier pigeon?”
Evan reached over the table and fished Brynna’s phone out of her purse. “Duh. See? Three missed messages.”
The hairs on Brynna’s neck pricked as blazing heat raced down her spine. She watched, every action in molasses-slow motion, as Evan hit the “call voice mail” button and pressed her phone to his ear. Before she could consider what she was doing, Brynna launched herself across the table, slamming her phone from Evan’s hand. It landed with a shattering thud on the ground, and Brynna, balancing on her belly on the tabletop, was half-covered in Evan’s mashed potatoes and the dregs of Lauren’s mocha.
“Holy overreaction, Batman!”
“Bryn, what the hell?” Evan kicked his chair back and stood, picking bits of mashed potato from his T-shirt.
Darcy and Lauren had hands pressed to their mouths, but Brynna could hear their stifled giggles, because the rest of the lunchroom had gone astoundingly quiet.
“I’m…sorry?” It was more question than apology, and Brynna wriggled herself off the table, ignoring the mashed potato scales that arced off her sweatshirt. She crumpled to her knees and started gathering the remains of her phone. Evan jumped down to join her, putting a hand on her forearm. His eyes were wide and smoldering brown when she looked up at him.
“What was that about? Did something else happen?”
Brynna eyed him for a short beat before shaking her head curtly. She knew he would tell her again to brush the call off. She wished she could.
The students in the lunchroom picked that perfect moment to get over Brynna’s James Bond maneuver and went back to talking, screaming, laughing—making enough merciful noise so Brynna couldn’t explain even if she wanted to.
Darcy laced her arm through Brynna’s the instant Brynna stood up. “I’m pretty sure wearing mashed potatoes is against the Hawthorne dress code. Come on, I’ll get you a pass and you can get into the locker room.”
Brynna let Darcy lead her from the lunchroom. She didn’t bother to look back.
“Um, so I guess you’re a pretty private person, then?” Darcy asked once they stepped into the deserted hall.
Brynna’s lips were still Sahara dry. Her throat felt constricted, but she forced herself to talk, offering a giggle that was supposed to sound carefree but came out tinny and staid.
“I think it was just some weird, Pavlovian reaction,” she lied. “My brother used to steal my cell phone and broadcast all my messages.”
Darcy was silent for a beat, her arm still wrapped around Brynna’s. She didn’t look at Brynna when she said, “You don’t need to lie to me.”
Brynna stopped, certain the thud-thud-thud of her heart would give her away. “I’m not lying. Why would you think that?”
Darcy dropped Brynna’s arm and kept walking, the hall long and empty in front of them. “Because you don’t have a brother.”
Brynna had to jog to catch up to her. “He’s my stepbrother.”
“Sure. Fine. Whatever.”
“Darcy!” Brynna put her hand on Darcy’s shoulder and forced the girl to face her.
Darcy blinked. “I work in the office, Bryn. I’ve seen your records. I know you’re an only child.”
Brynna’s thudding heart jumped into her throat, and her lungs felt like they were going to collapse. The lockers all around her seemed to close in, and the smell of industrial cleaner from the shiny hallway floor was sharp in her nose, almost suffocating. Darcy had seen all her records?
Thoughts spun in Brynna’s brain. Did Darcy know why Brynna came to Hawthorne? Did she know about Erica? Could she have been the one—?
Darcy’s eyes were a clear, pale blue. With her white-blond hair and little ski-jump nose, she looked like a pixie. With her wire-framed glasses and her cardigan sweater, she looked like a little, perfect-student pixie. Brynna swallowed. “What else do you know about me?”
“I know that you transferred from Lincoln High where you were on the swim team, that you’re horrible in math and earth science, and that you have to see a psychologist.”
“Do they always give that kind of information to student aides?”