Court parks his Jeep in the row farthest from the school, where the alpha males park.
Females flock to this area of the parking lot to peruse the selection of mostly red, black or silver cars, some lowered, some raised, some with vestigial thingamabobs protruding off the sides with no real purpose, the way some cactus have leaves.
A waist-high brick wall separates the concrete path on which I’m walking from the lek, i.e., mating ground. I cautiously approach the area, head down, arms crossed tightly across my chest. Hopefully no one will notice me. I should have told Court I’d meet him outside the school. Someone’s bound to see me get into his car. Tongues will wag and Vicky will hear of it. She might even publish Kali’s journal to spite me.
Two teens with lettermen jackets challenge each other to a pushup contest on the other side of the wall. Court parked his Jeep in the opposite row.
I stop in my tracks when I pick up Vicky’s scent somewhere nearby, celery and black elder. She’s leaning her miniskirted bottom against the back of a Mustang just two cars down from Court’s. A half dozen of her admirers, both female and male, vie for her attention.
If I keep walking, Vicky will see me for sure. Time to backtrack. I’ll find Court—
Something bounces hard off my shoulder. “Oof!”
The object that hit me, a soccer ball, rebounds off the half wall, then rolls around by my feet. I pick it up.
“Hola,” Vicky calls.
Everyone’s looking at me. Instead of following my instincts to flee, I stand my ground, returning her saccharine grin with one of my own. Heart pounding, I square my shoulders and pass through the closest break in the wall, still clutching the ball. No one reaches for it.
Vicky’s gravel-colored eyes glitter as we give each other the once-over. Her eyes fall to a stain on my dress I thought no one would notice. If she likes that, she’ll love the hole I just cut in the back. I stick out like a hobo at a wine tasting.
“What are you doing here, Mimosa?” The way she says my name with the fake Spanish accent grates my nerves.
I shrug. “Just taking a walk.” This is a mistake, but my other option, pretending I’ve lost my hearing, isn’t much better. The strap of my messenger bag pulls my sundress in an indecent direction, and I shift and twist to get it back in alignment.
Vicky clicks her nails together. “Why would you be taking a walk in the smelly old parking lot? There aren’t any flowers here.” She doesn’t lose her smile, and neither do I. Maybe we can smile each other to death. She puts her finger on her chin. “Are you meeting someone?”
I squeeze the ball so hard it nearly pops.
“Wh-who would I be meeting?” I lift my nose and try to act superior.
“I don’t know. A boy?”
“I don’t have a boyfriend.”
“Of course you don’t. Love witches can’t have boyfriends. It wouldn’t exactly be fair, would it? I mean, you could use your potions. No one’s boyfriend would be safe.”
The girl with the purple-highlighted black hair from Whit’s table yesterday leans into the safety of her boyfriend’s shoulder and gives me the stink eye. Those candy grams. Even if I could fumigate the whole world, Vicky could still run me out of town with a single rumor.
Vicky tilts her blunt chin. “Or girlfriend.”
If I had any reservation over fixing Vicky with Drew’s elixir, it disappears like a snowflake on a radiator. I smile thinly. “Believe me, if I could use potions like that, I would get Tyson Badland to take me to the homecoming dance.”
A few people chuckle and Vicky’s smirk weakens. Her knees lock, and she twists a gold cuff around her wrist. She’s so focused on her prey, me, she doesn’t notice when Court and his best buddy, Whit Wu, appear from behind her. Whit grins when he sees me with the ball.
“So how can you be a love witch if you’ve never experienced el amor?” She purrs out the Spanish word so that it sounds dirty.
Everyone watches me squirm. The bummer about blackmail is that it always gets worse. The blackmailer keeps testing limits, never stopping until the thing valued no longer seems worth it. But she hasn’t cornered me yet.
Court and Whit close the distance, and Vicky’s spidery lashes flick toward them. Whit holds his hands up for the ball, but I don’t throw it to him.
Court frowns. “Vick, stop—”
I toss back my head, thankful my beret doesn’t go flying off. “The same way I don’t have to be a sanitation engineer to recognize garbage.” This time, a few people laugh. Time to go. I hurry by Vicky and deposit the ball into Court’s hands, at the same time slipping him his keys. “The sun did not shine, it was too wet to play,” I murmur.
He lowers his eyelids and cocks an ear toward me. But that’s the only line from The Cat in the Hat that I remember, and I hope it’s enough to lead him to Dr. Seuss’s hat, the windsock on the other side of the building. I beat a hasty retreat back toward the school. The scent of Vicky’s anger stays in my nose long after I’ve left the parking lot, foul as burning rubber.
THIRTEEN