“Leave me alone, Amber!”
I leaned my head against the stall door and closed my eyes. “Did you really expect it’d be okay, Britt?” I asked her. “I mean, you came to prom with Jamie on your arm and acted like you didn’t even know us, and then you wanted us to care that he ignored you all night and left you at the punch bowl?”
“You should’ve let us come to dinner with you!” she screeched.
“Britt,” I said, trying to keep my voice level. “Come on, honey, you know Spence was never going to go to dinner with Jamie. I wanted nothing more than to have you at our table, but you made it impossible for us to include you when you said yes to him.”
The door suddenly opened and I had a good look at Britta’s tearstained face. “It wasn’t like anybody else was asking me, Amber,” she choked out.
And that’s when I knew what this was really about. “Oh, Britt,” I said, taking her in my arms. She sobbed on my shoulder and I winced at how skinny she was. “You’re a beautiful girl, and I know that you know that. You could’ve just come with us and had a good time.”
Britt whimpered and wiped her cheeks with hands. “It’s not the same as having a gorgeous guy as your date,” she said. “I just wanted someone to like me enough to ask me to the dance, Amber. I know Jamie and Spence aren’t friends anymore, but it was so nice to have someone like him ask me, you know?”
I bit my lip. “You never thought that Jamie had an ulterior motive, Britt?”
She backed away from me in an instant. “What’re you saying?” she demanded.
“Isn’t it obvious? If Jamie got you to come tonight, he knew it’d make Spence mad.”
Britt’s jaw dropped. “You take that back, Amber,” she said.
There was such hurt in her eyes. Dammit! I thought. I never should’ve told her.
“I take it back,” I said. “I’m sorry. I think it’s that I just don’t trust him. Not where my best friend is concerned.”
Britta eyed me suspiciously. “He asked me because he likes me,” she insisted.
“Of course he did,” I said. Then I offered: “Jamie has always said he thought you were pretty.”
Britta wiped her cheeks again, appearing at least a little mollified. “He has?”
“He has. And I’m so sorry that it worked out like this, Britt. I love you, and I don’t want us to be angry at each other.”
She looked at me then and wrapped her thin arms around my neck. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry, Amber. I should’ve turned him down, but I was so flattered, you know?”
“I do,” I said. “And it’s okay.” I patted her back until she calmed down, and when she let go of me I smiled to reassure her. “Why don’t you take a minute to fix your makeup, and I’ll meet you back out on the dance floor? You, me, and Sara can all dance together. Screw the boys and their stupid fight, right?”
She laughed wetly and nodded. “Okay. But give me a few minutes. I must look a mess!”
I gave her arm a gentle squeeze, then headed out of the ladies’ room to find Jamie and give him a piece of my mind. It was one thing to be mad at Spence. It was a completely different thing to use one of my best friends like a pawn in his game of war with my boyfriend. But first, I wanted to find Spence and make sure he was okay.
Despite our talk a week ago, he’d continued to be withdrawn and distant with me, but tonight he’d shown up with a radiant smile, and he looked so beautiful I could hardly take my eyes off of him. He’d treated me like a queen, and it was just like it was before all this UCLA and SAT business started.
And then, a half hour ago, we’d been dancing to a slow song and he’d said, “You know I’ll always love you, right, Ambi? Forever. And if forever ever ends, then I’ll love you all over again.”
It was such a funny thing to say—“if forever ever ends”—but it was so sweet, too. Approaching Bill, I said, “Have you seen Spence?”
Bill motioned to the exit. “He left about ten minutes ago. Said he was gonna go cool off.”
Spence and Jamie had gotten into it again right after our slow dance. No fists this time, but plenty of words. Britta had tried to defend Jamie, and he’d told her to shut up, which was why she’d run off to the ladies’ room.
“Where’s Jamie?” I asked Bill, thinking it would be the perfect time to yell at him myself.
“He walked out, too,” he said. “About five minutes before Spence.”
“Oh, boy,” I muttered, and hurried toward the exit.
Out in the hallway I tried to decide where either of them might be. I started with the parking lot—no sign of them—then I moved through the halls searching each section. When I got toward the back of the school I heard a car backfire, and wondered at it sounding loud enough from the road to echo into the school.
Then I finally found Jamie, wandering the halls of the science wing. He saw me and froze, and there was something in his expression—something so sad that my anger faded away. I walked quickly to him.